Another meeting, another weekend of frustration for supporters of international economic co-ordination.
This weekend’s annual International Monetary Fund meetings will be followed over the next month by finance ministers and heads of government from the G20 group of leading economies meeting in Korea. But expectations for co-operation to secure the global economic recovery are diminishing.
The hostility between Washington and Beijing has escalated into something resembling trench warfare. The US stepped up its warnings that manipulated exchange rates were standing in the way of global recovery, while Beijing said super-loose monetary policy in the advanced world was creating destabilising capital flows.