Singapore central bank says does not manipulate currency for export advantage

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The Monetary Authority of Singapore said on Wednesday it does not manipulate its currency for export advantage, after the U.S. Treasury flagged the city-state as one of the countries whose currency practices deserve scrutiny.

The Trump administration said on Tuesday no major trading partner met its currency manipulation criteria but nine countries, including China, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and Singapore required close attention.

"MAS does not and cannot use the exchange rate to gain an export advantage or achieve a current account surplus," the Singapore central bank said in a statement. A deliberate weakening of the Singapore dollar would cause inflation to spike and compromise MAS' price stability objective, it said.

The MAS manages policy through exchange rate settings rather than interest rates, letting the Singapore dollar rise or fall against the currencies of its main trading partners within an undisclosed policy band.

(Reporting by Aradhana Aravindan; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)