So, let’s take a deep breath and engage open, informed and critical minds when it comes to debating many of the still open, un-known and critical issues surrounding the so-called “game changer” event when the BRICS+ nations convene this August in S. Africa.

Good Wednesday caucus folks. This is a bit disjointed, but an attempt to look into the consequences of US dollar weaponization, sanctions on steroids and the rest of the
world's response. I should mention the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)..

and other regional financial alliances that have found work-arounds to the IMF, World Bank
and WEF money changers. Latin America and the Caribbean countries are striving in this direction.
Wall Street / Londan are relentless in their pursuit of global hegemony,
but there is considerable push-back.

It is not a free trade bloc, but members do coordinate on trade matters and have established a policy bank, the New Development Bank, (NDB) to coordinate infrastructure loans. That was set up in 2014 in order to provide alternative loan mechanisms from the IMF and World Bank structures, which the members had felt had become too US-centric. The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) was set up by China at about the same time for largely the same reasons and to offer alternative financing than that provided by the IMF and World Banks, which were felt to impose political reform policies designed to assist the United States in return for providing loans.

What is in progress, as confirmed by BRICS sherpas, is the R5: a new common payment system. The sherpas are only in the preliminary stages of discussing a new reserve currency which could be gold or commodities-based. The discussions within the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU), led by Sergey Glazyev, by comparison, are way more advanced.

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The Arctic Silk Road, from now on, will be increasingly strategic. The Chinese can keep it open at least from July to October every year. And as a bonus, a warming Arctic allows better access to oil/gas resources. A trademark “win-win” - no wonder since 2017 the development of the Arctic Silk Road is part of BRI.

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On the Russian front, all eyes are on the 7,200 km-long, multimodal International North-South Transportation Corridor (INSTC) – which alarms the collective west as a de facto replacement of the Suez Canal. The INSTC cuts shipping costs by about 50 percent and saves up to 20 days of travel compared to the Suez route.

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The order of priorities is to get R5 rolling. All current BRICS currencies start with an “R”: renminbi (yuan), ruble, real, rupee, and rand. R5 will allow current members to increase mutual trade by bypassing the US dollar and reducing their US dollar reserves. This is only the first of many practical steps in the long and winding road of de-dollarization.

Discussing the expansion of BRICS to BRICS+ is currently underway and could be decided
in the next summit on August 2023.
The countries that have shown interest in joining BRICS are:

Algeria
Argentina
Bahrain
Egypt
Indonesia
Iran
Saudi Arabia
United Arab Emirates
Afghanistan,
Bangladesh
Belarus
Kazakhstan
Mexico
Nicaragua
Nigeria
Pakistan
Senegal
Sudan
Syria
Thailand
Tunisia
Turkey
Uruguay
Venezuela, and
Zimbabwe.

However, the Federal Reserve plans to challenge BRICS by launching a new
FedNow payment service. (If you can't beat the enemy, then copy them.)

Sources--
https://www.silkroadbriefing.com/news/2022/11/09/the-new-candidate-count...
https://watcher.guru/news/brics-full-list-of-countries-that-want-to-join...
https://new.thecradle.co/articles/brics-problems-bri-solutions
https://goldswitzerland.com/the-brics-wont-kill-the-dollar-us-policy-will/
http://eng.sectsco.org
https://www.minhacienda.gov.co/webcenter/portal/TributacionIncluyente/pa...

As always, this being an open thread, chime in with whatever topics you have.