bernanke
Federal Reserve Board chairman Ben Bernanke declined to answer a question from a Michigan member of Congress that's perplexing many homeowners: Should they refinance?

Last week, the average U.S. rate on a 30-year-mortgage climbed to 4.5 percent - a two-year-high.

Rep. Bill Huizenga, R-Zeeland, who is vice chair of the Monetary Policy and Trade Subcommittee, said at a congressional hearing on Wednesday that he had recently refinanced his mortgage and wanted to pass along a question one of his friend's had: "Should he refinance right now?"

Bernanke said he couldn't answer. "I'm not a qualified financial adviser," Bernanke said. "I wouldn't want to."

Separately, Rep. Gary Peters, D-Bloomfield Township, asked whether Japan was manipulating its currency to aid big companies. The Japanese yen has fallen by about 30 percent this year. Bernanke said Japan is not manipulating its currency, but using monetary policy trying to "break the deflation they've had for about 15 years and a side effect of that is the yen has weakened. ... The international consensus is as long as a country is using domestic policy tools for domestic purposes that that would be an acceptable approach."

He contrasted Japan with China, which he said is keeping its currency artificially low to boost exports.

Late last month, Ford Motor Co. president and chief executive Alan Mulally met with Bernanke and raised the Japanese currency issue. "I've actually talked to a couple of people at the auto industry - at some of the companies - to try to get their sense," Bernanke said.

U.S. automakers and the United Auto Workers union have strongly lobbied to keep the world's third-largest economy out of the free trade talks known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership. They fear that dropping U.S. tariffs on Japanese imports would give Japanese rivals a significant leg up and could lead to the loss of thousands of U.S. auto jobs. Japan is set to join the 11-nation talks officially next week aimed at creating one of the world's largest free trade zones.