U.S. Treasury appoints Judy Shelton as advisor to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent

The U.S. Treasury Department announced on Friday the appointment of Judy Shelton as an advisor to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, after the Senate did not confirm her nomination to the Federal Reserve Board because of her controversial economic views.

The department said Shelton will advise Bessent on currency policy, with particular focus on assessing financial conditions in China.

The Treasury added that Shelton "has specialized throughout her career in analyzing countries' domestic monetary and financial conditions and their impact on exchange rates."

Shelton is not known as an expert on Chinese affairs. In 1988 she published a book titled "The Collapse of Money," followed in 1989 by "The Coming Soviet Collapse."

Before joining the Treasury, Shelton worked as a senior researcher at the Independent Institute, and previously held a similar position at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

She holds a Ph.D. in business administration from the University of Utah.

Senators from both parties — including all Democrats and a number of Republicans — rejected President Donald Trump's 2019 nomination of Shelton to the Federal Reserve Board because of her positions on central bank independence, her support for the gold standard, and her questioning of the need for a central bank in the United States.

Bessent recently appointed David Zervos, the former chief market strategist at Jefferies, as an advisor in the same role Shelton will occupy. Neither Shelton's nor Zervos's appointments require Senate confirmation.