I’m the Under Secretary at the Treasury, responsible for the side of the dollar that rarely gets mentioned. This week, I did something the United States has claimed for 28 years it would never do: I bought a foreign currency. The last time we did this was back in 1998. A reporter described it as a new era of currency activism, and I let that stand, since activism is the word you use when you plan to keep intervening. Before this week, here’s what we always said—and I helped write some of these statements. The United States supports exchange rates set by the market. We do not buy foreign currency. We said the market should set the price, and we would accept whatever it decided. We stuck to this for 40 years, through every Secretary, and we meant it as firmly as you mean a rule you’ve never had reason to break. But then the yen dropped to its lowest point in 40 years, and I finally lost patience with the market’s choices. So we stepped in. 'Intervened' is the straightforward word, and I’ll explain the softer term soon. To boost the yen, you have to buy it, and that means spending something else. Here’s the part I’m proudest of, and I want you to pay attention to the money, because that’s what matters most. I didn’t spend dollars. Using dollars to buy yen would have weakened the dollar, and protecting the dollar is my main job. Instead, I used euros. To help Japan’s currency without hurting America’s, I used Europe’s. The euros were already available, and using them didn’t affect the dollar at all. Europe wasn’t asked. It just happened to be the source we turned to when we needed funds. The trade followed the usual path, moving through the bank at 33 Liberty Street and then through Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. The yen rose from its 40-year low to the 155 range. Tokyo said it would do this again if needed, and so would we. We called our reason 'disorderly movements.' I like that term. A disorderly movement means a price goes somewhere we didn’t approve. Order is when the price matches what we want. The market became disorderly simply because it stopped matching my view. Now, the word. Now, about the word. For 28 years, we used the honest term 'intervention,' but it’s an awkward word. It means the market was right and we stepped in anyway. It’s a word you use once, apologize for, and say you won’t do again. 'Activism' sounds better. Activism is when someone cares enough about a result to stop waiting and take action. Activism is seen as a good thing. No one apologizes for activism or promises to do it just once. Newspaper handed me activism; I took it. I crossed intervention out of the talking points and wrote activism over it, in the same pen we use for everything, because the pen is the only tool in this building that has ever changed a price. This new era is really the same actions with a better name. We will support market-determined exchange rates, but also decide which ones the market can support. We don’t buy foreign currency—unless we use other foreign currency—on the days when the market forgets who maintains order. The yen is now at 155. The dollar hasn’t been affected. Since Friday, the market has agreed with me on every price, and that’s the only order I’ve ever needed. And Europe still hasn’t asked where its money went.

My cat Nugget has been secretly feeding a stray through the gap under our fence for what my roommate estimates is at least four months, and we only found out because our food bill for cat treats had nearly tripled. "He's not eating more," my roommate said, staring at the receipt. "We'd notice if he ate more. Look at him, he's the same size." I caught them in the act on a Tuesday, home early, watching through the kitchen window as Nugget carried a single treat in his mouth to the exact same spot in the fence, dropped it through the gap, and sat there like a tiny concierge waiting for a tip. A scruffy grey cat appeared on the other side within seconds, ate it in one bite, and left without acknowledging Nugget at all. "That's so rude," I said, genuinely offended on my cat's behalf. "He's running a whole delivery service and that cat doesn't even say thanks." I mentioned it to my neighbor, who lit up immediately. "Oh, that's Church," she said. "He showed up after my divorce, my ex used to feed him, guess he never really left the block. I've been wondering why he stopped begging at my door as much." Turns out Nugget had unionized the neighborhood cat welfare system without consulting a single human involved. We started leaving extra treats out on purpose after that, cutting out the middleman, though Nugget still insists on doing the delivery run himself every evening, treat in mouth, entirely unnecessary, deeply committed to the bit.