The End of the American Empire can now be seen
Historians will one day note that September 24, 2018, was the Beginning of the End of the U.S. Dollar Hegemony.
I've been writing for years about how America's wars and sanctions have been driven Russia and China together, both politically and economically, and how they've been working to create a non-dollar financial system.
Earlier this year, most of the rest of Asia slipped out of the sphere of influence of the American Empire.
Just last month, Europe warned that it was losing patience with U.S. Dollar Hegemony.
Washington either didn't listen or didn't care.
Then this happened.
The European Union said Monday (Sep 24) its members would set up a payment system to allow oil companies and businesses to continue trading with Iran in a bid to evade sanctions after the US withdrew from a nuclear agreement.Iran and the European Union announced their defiance towards US President Donald Trump's administration after high-level talks at the United Nations among the remaining members of the accord.
The WSJ says this "is a direct rebuke of President Trump’s policy on Iran and his decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal in May."
The details are still being worked out, and it's too late to save Iran from the full weight of our sanctions, but this is no short-term measure. It won't take long before Europe discovers that they can save a lot of money by using their own non-dollar SWIFT system. And they can save a bunch more money by trading in Euros instead of dollars.
Such transactions, presumably in euros and pounds sterling, would not be transparent to American authorities. European companies dealing with the state-owned intermediary technically might not even be in violation of the U.S. sanctions as currently written. The system would be likely be open to Russia and China as well.
Europe would thus provide an infrastructure for legal, secure sanctions-busting — and a guarantee that the transactions would not be reported to American regulators.
It would be pointless to sanction the special purpose vehicle because the U.S. would have no way of knowing who deals with it, and why.
...
No currency’s international dominance has lasted forever, and there’s no reason for the U.S. dollar to be the exception to this rule. Trump’s confidence in his ability to weaponize the dollar against adversaries and stubborn allies alike could eventually backfire for the U.S. as efforts to push the dollar off its pedestal grow ever more serious.
Comments
well
at least it happened on my birthday.
"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott
Wow Happy Birthday!
Well done is better than well said-Ben Franklin
Happy birthday to you! I hope you have a very good year.
Happy Birthday longtalldrink!
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
awwww. I hope you had a good day and will be the
beneficiary of good things during this year.
Happy Birthday Steven D!
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
I should think historians might pick s different date
Like September 24, 2008 for the Beginning of the End of the U.S. Dollar Hegemony.
But god knows, it depends on the historian and how they want to fame the story. I've seen a short US history that reads in total:
September 17, 1787 — September 11, 2001
September seems like a troublesome month for the US.
Personally, I marked Operation Enduring Freedom, October 7, 2001, as the point-of-no-return — when the US attacked Afghanistan, the very place where Empires traditionally go to die.
I suppose it could be considered the ultimate October surprise.
There will always be debate when it comes
to the end of an empire.
Did the British Empire end in 1918, 1931, or 1956? It depends on how you look at it.
I certainly would entertain that the American Dollar Hegemony began ending on September 12, 2001. Or September 15, 2008.
But yesterday was at the very least an important landmark.
Do the dates in your post apply to the US dollar, or to the
end of the US empire?
I don't decouple the degrading of the US Dollar
...from the forced end to the American Empire. I honestly never have, and I've been writing about how it was going to happen since 2003, when I began trading the Forex. Those dates refer to significant milestones along the way.
You can add Trump's 'speech' to the UN
Caesar gets laughed at.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Daang! You beat me to it!
Well, this would certainly give an additional reason why the UN laughed at T's "I am sooo great" speech. (Additional because there were so many other reasons to laugh at it/him.)
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass
It's gonna be ugly
but I for one welcome it.
Time for the nitty gritty.
Baby are you ready?
[video:https://youtu.be/5xZMQPFN0LY]
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
They can see what's happening
so why don't they change it and make the country become sane?
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
Snort!
Damned good I wasn't taking a drink when I read what you just posted.
You're an ass snoop. Where the hell is the s/.
Thanks.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
Related news re: China
China stops talking
More China
Syria
Interesting times.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
And not a moment too soon.
Couldn't have happened to a nicer empire.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
China can have the headaches
"I made one hundred fifty-six decisions today. All of them wrong."
The dollar was severely defective as an exchange currency
If a nation has a major trade deficit the natural course of action is that the currency of that nation should be devalued. That makes exports cheaper and imports more expensive, restoring trade balance. That creates inflation and a reduction of the standard of living of that nation and exports more of its output. This is what happens if international trade system works properly. It doesn't happen because the US dollar is the universal trade currency, and that is a massive subsidy for the US. Furthermore, this trade imbalance forces other countries to hold US dollars, buy US debt and invest in US assets, because the US cannot ship overpriced US goods to the rest of the world. Trump and his wacko economic advisers are exactly wrong. The world is not being unfair to the poor USA, it's exactly the opposite. There is no resolution to the US trade problem, because the Dollar is the standard. Perversely, if the world economy gets into trouble, investors turn to the Dollar, driving up the value of the Dollar and compounding the trade imbalance.
Here's an interesting observation that completely debunks Trump's logic- The US consumer buys imported goods when having a choice at the shopping center, the car dealer or the appliance shop. And even when he buys American, the parts and assemblies come from abroad. If the US consumer will not buy US goods then how can we expect consumers from other countries to buy US goods?
I completely agree with gjohnsit, The world has had it with subsidizing "the greatest nation on Earth". I expect that the world will take a few years to sort this out, but in the end the US Dollar will not be the standard for trade and the US economy will take a significant hit. China is the country to watch as it has had the greatest volume of world wide trade for many years, I think since around 2010. China's reaction to Trump will be full-on outrage, unlike Russia's Putin who is far more moderate and still fantasizes that he can be a good partner with the US.
Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.
EU Announces Entity to Keep Business With Tehran
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0UJe9zUO5o]
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
Another way in which we get
less and less "Exceptional."
BTW, hearing Obama claim this country is Exceptional told me more about Obama than I cared to know. Same when he claimed that soldiers returning from Vietnam had been spat upon.
They all claim it
Obama was the first Democratic politician whom I heard
claim it (and the only politician whose claiming it told me more about Obama than I wanted to know). You see, I was a huge Obama supporter in 2008, in both effort and $$, yet he was the also the one who caused me to stop voting Democratic, starting with the 2010 midterms. So, as disappointing politicians go, his disappointing comments struck me harder than others.