Judy Shelton is taking on a counselor role at the Treasury, advising Secretary Scott Bessent on currency matters. The department said her work will center "with a particular focus on evaluating financial conditions in China." Treasury added that "throughout her career, she has specialized in analyzing the internal monetary and financial conditions of nations and their impact on exchange rates." The announcement is slated for release later Friday.
Her title matches David Zervos, the former chief market strategist at Jefferies, whom Bessent also recently appointed as counselor. Neither Shelton's nor Zervos's appointments require Senate confirmation.
Shelton's previous nomination to the Federal Reserve in 2019 did not clear the Senate. A bipartisan group, including all Democrats and a number of Republicans, rejected President Donald Trump's pick due to her positions on the Fed's independence, her backing of a gold standard, and her questioning of whether the U.S. needs a central bank.
She is not recognized as a China specialist. Her books include The Coming Soviet Crash (1989) and Money Meltdown (1994), the latter arguing for a unified international monetary regime. Before stepping into this post, she held a senior fellowship at the Independent Institute - an organization known for its free-market orientation - and earlier was a fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. She earned a Ph.D. in business administration at the University of Utah.
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Shelton's arrival comes amid churn in Treasury's upper ranks. A recent Wall Street Journal rundown counted seven Senate-confirmed officials who had departed by the end of August, and noted that only one of those roles has been filled so far.
Two new counselors are now in the mix, and Treasury has flagged that Shelton's work will zero in on evaluating China's financial conditions as part of currency policy. For everyday investors, the practical takeaway is simple: pay attention to how Treasury frames currency issues and any updates tied to China's financial backdrop, since those signals can shape the broader policy conversation.
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