Still there are those economists who argue that the ability of each country to choose an inflation rate is an undesirable aspect of floating exchange rates. These proponents of fixed rates indicate that fixed rates are useful in providing an international discipline on the inflationary policies of countries. Fixed rates provide an anchor for countries with inflationary tendencies. By maintaining a fixed rate of exchange to the dollar (or some other currency), each country’s inflation rate is “anchored” to the dollar, and thus will follow the policy established for the dollar
Critics of flexible exchange rates have also argued that flexible exchange rates would be subject to destabilizing speculation. By destabilizing speculation we mean that speculators in the foreign exchange market will cause exchange rate fluctuations to be wider than they would be in the absence of such speculation. The logic suggests that, if speculators International Monetary Arrangements 45 expect a currency to depreciate, they will take positions in the foreign exchange market that will cause the depreciation as a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. But speculators should lose money when they guess wrong, so that only successful speculators will remain in the market, and the successful players serve a useful role by “evening out” swings in the exchange rate. For instance, if we expect a currency to depreciate or decrease in value next month, we could sell the currency now, which would result in a current depreciation. This will lead to a smaller future depreciation than would occur otherwise. The speculator then spreads the exchange rate change more evenly through time and tends to even out big jumps in the exchange rate. If the speculator had bet on the future depreciation by selling the currency now and the currency appreciates instead of depreciates, then the speculator loses and will eventually be eliminated from the market if such mistakes are repeated.