Senator Sam Brownback, Senior Republican Senator on the Joint Economic Committee, has released the two attached reports. One, titled “A Primer on Exchange Rates,” explains some of the language that surrounds exchange rates and identifies forces that are thought to help determine exchange rate movements. The other, titled "Trade Deficits, Current Account Deficits, and the Dollar,” provides basic definitions of the trade and current account balances and discusses recent movements in those balances as well as in the U.S. dollar in historical perspective.