Am I getting it wrong? Or you didn't concentrate much on the question? If I'm not mistaken, he mean as a newbie can you give out merit to another user? I think one must have sMerit in order to send merit.
So I'm little bit confused seeing you saying yes and getting more lost when the above me justify the answer you gave to OP. I need more enlightenment please.
I think he already assume that a newbie can send out a merit if he already got some merits. Then only he was able to have smerits to send out some merits. Its not that he didnt answer it correctly but only a few tweaks like reasoning like what I was said.
A plain newbie account cant send any merits if he dont have any smerits. To be clear.