Most proposals for East-Asian monetary cooperation assign a special role to the Japanese yen as anchor currency. We focus on the potential role of the Chinese renminbi. Since China will assume the role of the dominant economy in the region and become a more important destination for Asian products than Japan eventually, this development assigns a special role to the Chinese currency. It is rather unlikely that the renminbi will assume a dominant role immediately, but a comparison with the European monetary integration process suggests designing a system where the relative weight of the renminbi increases gradually. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in ABSTRACTMost proposals for Asian monetary cooperation assign a special role to the Japanese yen as an anchor currency. We focus instead on the potential role of the Chinese renminbi. It becomes increasingly clear that China will assume the role of the dominant economy in the region, and that it will become a more important destination for Asian products than Japan in as little as five years. This development should assign a special role to the Chinese currency and its exchange rate to the other Asian currencies. It is rather unlikely that the renminbi will assume a dominant role immediately but by drawing comparisons with the European monetary integration process, it seems possible to design a system in which most of the present currencies have a role, but where the relative weights shift over time. The evolution of the ERM is a model for the process of Asian monetary integration.JEL Classification: F 3, F 4.