The Federal Reserve has taken a new step to meet the global demand for dollars, setting up a facility that would allow central banks and international monetary authorities to enter into repurchase agreements with the US central bank and trade US Treasuries for dollars.
The Fed said the new facility would work in tandem with the dollar swap lines already established by the central bank with its peers across 14 different countries as the coronavirus pandemic has spread across the world.
In recent weeks the greenback’s value has risen sharply as investors have flocked to safe assets, and companies have scrambled to offset the blow to revenues from economic shutdowns.