White House Takes Steps to Re-Energize Ex-Im Bank

The Trump administration is moving to bring back to life an agency that smooths export deals between U.S. manufacturers and overseas buyers, potentially ending a three-year freeze that has held up more than $40 billion of export deals.

The White House is expected to soon nominate Kimberly Reed to fill the top position at the U.S. Export-Import Bank. Reed would follow the administration’s prior nominee, former congressman Scott Garrett, who was rejected by a Senate committee in December. Reed’s nomination would be a victory for the business-friendly faction of the GOP and for large U.S. manufacturers that rely on the agency to complete export deals.

Unlike Garrett, Reed thinks the Ex-Im Bank’s role is essential for the U.S. to counter foreign governments that operate their own export-finance agencies. At her nomination hearing late last year for a less-senior post at the bank, she said not having a functional export-finance agency amounted to “unilateral disarmament.”

The Ex-Im Bank helps support U.S. exports through a range of programs, including guaranteeing loans to foreign buyers, credit insurance and some direct lending to foreign companies.

Some Republicans think what it does amounts to corporate welfare, saying the bank puts taxpayers at risk of losing money to finance sales that should be left to the private sector.

Almost half of the U.S. Export-Import Bank’s $72.5 billion of business on its books in 2017 went to the aircraft industry, according to the bank’s annual report.

In late 2015, AGCO Chairman and CEO Martin Richenhagen lobbied for the Ex-Im Bank’s reauthorization.

Source: Wall Street Journal