John B. Taylor - The Empty Chair at the Iraq Hearings - washingtonpost.com

John B. Taylor - The Empty Chair at the Iraq Hearings - washingtonpost.com: "We have been working with Iraqi economic officials, including the governor of the Central Bank of Iraq. He has a very tough job conducting monetary policy, perhaps tougher than the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board has here in the United States, even with our current market turmoil. I am happy to report that the central bank has implemented the recommendations of the Baker-Hamilton commission in this area. It has raised the interest rate all the way to 20 percent to control inflation, and through such actions the inflation rate has come down sharply. The new Iraqi dinar, which was introduced in 2003, has proved popular and has appreciated nicely in the past year. The Central Bank of Iraq now has $21 billion in reserves, many times more than it had just after Saddam Hussein stole a billion dollars from its vaults in March 2003. This summer the Baghdad Stock Exchange opened to foreign investors, rose 85 percent in July and held its own in August. As the closely watched Grant's Interest Rate Observer noted Sept. 7, 'Iraq has turned into a capital magnet. . . . Money is sometimes misinformed, but it is never insincere. Something is afoot in Iraq.' So there are measurable signs of economic and financial progress. "