Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Russia, China have their sights set on undercutting dollar’s dominance as reserve currency,

but economists are sceptical says Michael Pizzi in Aljazeera America. Patrick Young earlier:
"The singular superpower era has been fuelled by an American economy benefitting from “dollarization”. Global reserve currency status has hugely fuelled America’s ongoing experiment in "government by irrational exuberance." Washington has grown addicted to borrowing cheaply, exploiting its reserve currency to spend liberally on all vestiges of government. Thus the powerhouse private economy of the United States runs parallel to a massively inefficient government spending machine. Being a reserve currency has multiple benefits - other nations habitually trade in dollars thanks to global benchmarks. Hence, oil, gas and indeed illicit narcotics are all traditionally priced in the dear old greenback. Surplus dollars often find their way back to the USA and end up holding US Treasury Bonds - the debt which feeds big government.
......
While the US dollar epitaph has been written many times, it still isn’t imminent. However, a dollar centric era is clearly coming to an end. Despite the ongoing failure of the political euro to be recognised as a valid reserve currency, US dollar threats are emerging rapidly - free floating bitcoin, rubles and yuan can all become significant competitors to the greenback.
.... 
QE is akin to another reserve currency trait, known in the economics fraternity as “exorbitant privilege.”For the US to pay bills, it can just print more cash and satisfy any debt denominated in dollars. The increasingly integrated global economy has enabled Washington to abuse exorbitant privilege at a scale unknown to previous reserve currency nations such as Imperial Britain."
P.S. C.K.Liu in 2008 "Workers all over the world are oppressed victims of dollar hegemony, which turns the labor theory of value up-side-down. " http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China_Business/JG30Cb01.html

No comments: