President Bush was getting ready to head off to his first economic summit with the Group of Eight in Genoa when he accidentally triggered a tempest in the currency market. In an interview with foreign reporters on July 18, Bush said the strong dollar has "pluses and minuses" for the U. S. and that it was up to the markets to decide its fate. Whoops. That less-than-ringing endorsement helped trigger a sharp 3% slide against the euro, as speculators bet that the Administration was shifting gears and wanted the dollar to fall. Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill, who made a similar gaffe earlier in the year, scrambled to the rescue, spending, the next week talking up the dollar. Make no mistake, he asserted: The Administration still believes in a strong dollar. By July 25, the greenback had recouped much of its losses.
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机译：布什总统准备无意中引发货币市场的暴风雨，准备与八国集团在热那亚举行的第一次经济峰会。布什在7月18日接受外国记者采访时说，美元坚挺对美国来说是“利弊”，由市场来决定其命运。哎呀投机者押注，政府正在调整齿轮，并希望美元下跌，但这种不那么令人鼓舞的认可使欧元兑美元汇率急剧下跌了3％。财政部长保罗·奥尼尔（Paul H. O'Neill）在今年早些时候做出了类似的失误，于是在下周争先恐后地进行了救助，支出，谈论美元。他断言没有错：政府仍然相信美元坚挺。到7月25日，美元已弥补了大部分损失。
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