Within hours of being sworn in, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's counterparts from Tokyo to Berlin started telegraphing warnings to him: Please don't call the yen weak. Be careful how you talk about cutting financial regulations — Europe is listening.
As President Donald Trump waited a few weeks for the U.S. Senate to confirm his Treasury secretary pick, the world watched as he and his advisers talked down the dollar and called out China and Japan for gaming foreign-exchange markets.
With Mnuchin finally installed, the Group of 20 finance chiefs will be looking for clues on whether he will clarify U.S. currency policy, a job that traditionally belongs to the Treasury secretary, or if he no longer believes in promises made during the Obama administration to refrain from competitive devaluations.