	taiwan to study suspending forex controls premier yu kuo hua ordered financial officials to quicken the pace of relaxing foreign exchange controls and study the possibility of suspending the controls a cabinet statement said the statement quoted yu as telling finance ministy and central bank officials the relaxation was needed to help reduce taiwan s surging foreign exchange reserves which reached a record billion u s dollars this month finance minister robert chien told reporters his ministry and the central bank would work jointly on new measures to ease the controls but he did not give details yu said the government could maintain the framework of the foreign exchange controls while finding ways to ease them the controls would be used during emergency taiwan s reserves have resulted largely from its trade surplus which hit billion dlrs in and billion in about pct of the surplus was from taiwan s trade with the united states according to official figures but he said that while easing the controls would help reduce the reserves it would not do so substantially in a short time economists and bankers said the new decision resulted from growing pressure from the united states taiwan s largest trading partner which buys almost half the island s exports lu ming jen economic professor at soochow university told reuters the decision came a little bit late but it was better than never ko fei lo vice president at first commercial bank said the government should rapidly relax its foreign exchange controls and open its market wider to help balance trade with its trading partners especially the united states the liberalisation in both imports and foreign exchange controls will not only help our trading partners but also help our own economic problems he said he said the mounting foreign exchange reserveshelped boost taiwan s money supply by pct in the year to end february reuter 
