YEREVAN, MAY 30, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister of Malaysia Mahathir Mohamad proposed the idea of creating a common trading currency for East Asia that would be pegged to gold, reports Reuters.

The PM said the proposed common currency could be used to settle imports and exports, but would not be used for domestic transactions.

“In the Far East, if you want to come together, we should start with a common trading currency, not to be used locally but for the purpose of settling of trade,” he said at the Nikkei Future of Asia conference in Tokyo.

Mahathir Mohamad said under the current foreign exchange system, local currencies were affected by external factors and were manipulated. 

Earlier this week, the Trump administration said no major trading partner met the criteria required to be placed on the U.S. Treasury Department’s list of its currency manipulators but named Malaysia among nine countries that required close scrutiny.