President Donald Trump has repeatedly bashed China, accusing the world’s second-largest economy of cheating the U.S. by maintaining an artificially weak currency.

But now the Trump administration might be on the verge of transforming its rhetoric into action, speculates a team of economists led by Deutsche Bank’s Michael Spencer. Deutsche Bank expects the Trump administration to officially label China a currency manipulator and recommend penalties like higher tariffs on Chinese imports unless the country enters into negotiations to help lower its trade surplus with the U.S.

The team says the move could happen in the coming weeks. Typically, these types of decisions are reserved for the Treasury’s biannual report on foreign exchange practices of major trading partners. The next report isn’t due until April, however.

Trump, the team argued, has shown a determination to swiftly deliver on his campaign promises, and aggressively combating China’s allegedly unfair trade policies was one of his more prominent promises.

“Some time in the next few weeks, President Trump or his Treasury Secretary may declare China a currency manipulator and propose penalties including tariffs on some or all imports from China unless it ceases this and other alleged unfair trade policies,” Spencer and his team wrote in its Tuesday note.

Should the U.S. levy a formal accusation, Spencer and his team don’t expect the Chinese authorities to devalue or float the renminbi. However, interest-rate hikes, which would be seen as a more traditional defense of the country’s currency, could provide a more effective defense of the currency.

Chinese authorities have hinted that they’d respond with tariffs in proportion to the U.S. move, the economists said. That would translate to a trade war between the No. 1 and 2 largest economies on the planet, which could have sweeping implications.

China has been trying to control the pace at which the yuan, also known as the renminbi, is depreciating since mid-2014, when the dollar began rapidly appreciating against most of its rivals. Since mid-2016, the country’s central bank has been struggling just to keep the currency’s value stable against a trade-weighted basket.

To accomplish this, authorities have been forced to reverse efforts to liberalize the country’s capital account and make the renminbi more widely available. The country has liquidated roughly a quarter of its foreign currency reserves, which fell below $3 trillion for the first time in almost six years in January.

Deutsche Bank

China managed to avoid being labeled a currency manipulator for the entirety of former President Barack Obama’s presidency. The last time the country was cited by the U.S. as a currency manipulator was in 1994. However, China is one of six countries on the Treasury’s “monitoring list.”

To be labeled a currency manipulator, a country must meet three criteria: It must have a significant bilatera- trade surplus with the U.S., it must have a material current-account surplus, and it must engage in persistent one-sided intervention in the currency market, according to the Treasury Department.

China’s currency has gained about 26% against the dollar since July 2005, when authorities first abandoned a strict peg to the dollar in favor of a so-called managed float. Today, the currency is allowed to move within 2% above or below a midpoint that is set by the People’s Bank of China’s currency authority.