Tag Archives: Petrodollar recycling

The World Is Creeping Toward De-Dollarization, by Ronald-Peter Stöferle

Posted on September 20, 2017 | Leave a comment

The US is slowly losing a huge economic advantage: having the world’s reserve currency. From Ronald-Peter Stöferle at mises.org:

The issue of when a global reserve currency begins or ends is not an exact science. There are no press releases announcing it, and neither are there big international conferences that end with the signing of treaties and a photo shoot. Nevertheless we can say with confidence that the reign of every world reserve currency has to come to and end at some point in time. During a changeover from one global currency to another, gold (and to a lesser extent silver) has always played a decisive role. Central banks and governments have long been aware that the dollar has a sell-by date as a reserve currency. But it has taken until now for the subject to be discussed openly. The fact that the issue has been on the radar of a powerful bank like JP Morgan for at least five years, should give one pause. Questions regarding the global reserve currency are not exactly discussed on CNBC every day. Most mainstream economists avoid the topic like the plague. The issue is too politically charged. However, that doesn’t make it any less important for investors to look for answers. On the contrary. The following questions need to be asked: What indications are there that the world is turning its back on the US dollar? And what are the clues that gold’s role could be strengthened in a new system?

The mechanism underlying today’s “dollar standard” is widely known and the term “petrodollar” describes it well. This system is based on an informal agreement the US and Saudi Arabia arrived at in the mid-1970s. The result of this deal: Oil, and consequently all other important commodities, is traded in US dollars — and only in US dollars. Oil producers then “recycle” these “petrodollars” into US treasuries. This circular flow of dollars has enabled the US to pile up a towering mountain of debt of nearly $20 trillion — without having to worry about its own financial stability. At least, until now.

For a long time the basis on which this global currency system rests was poorly documented. Finally, Bloombergpublished a comprehensive article in May 2016, which provided detailed confirmation of the agreement that was hitherto only known as a rumor. The fact that this article is published now also represents a subtle clue that there are simmering shifts in the global currency system.

To continue reading: The World Is Creeping Toward De-Dollarization

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Why It Really All Comes Down To The Death Of The Petrodollar, by Tyler Durden

Posted on August 23, 2015 | 3 comments

Good article about the death of the petrodollar and petrodollar recycling. The links in the article are also recommended. From Tyler Durden at zerohedge.com:

Last week, in the global currency war’s latest escalation, Kazakhstan instituted a free float for the tenge. The currency immediately plunged by some 25%.

The rationale behind the move was clear enough. The plunge in crude prices along with the relative weakness of the Russian ruble had severely strained Kazakhstan, which is central Asia’s largest crude exporter. As a quick look at a chart of the tenge’s effective exchange rate makes clear, the pressure had been mounting for quite a while and when China devalued the yuan earlier this month, the outlook for trade competitiveness worsened.

What might not be as clear (on the surface anyway) is how recent events in developing economy FX markets following the devaluation of the yuan stem from a seismic shift we began discussing late last year – namely, the death of the petrodollar system which has served to underwrite decades of dollar dominance and was, until recently, a fixture of the post-war global economic order.

In short, the world seems to have underestimated how structurally important collapsing crude prices are to global finance. For years, producers funnelled their dollar proceeds into USD assets providing a perpetual source of liquidity, boosting the financial strength of the reserve currency, leading to even higher asset prices and even more USD-denominated purchases, and so forth, in a virtuous (especially if one held US-denominated assets and printed US currency) loop. That all came to an abrupt, if quiet end last year when a confluence of economic (e.g. shale production) and geopolitical (e.g. squeeze the Russians) factors led the Saudis to, as we put it, Plaxico’d themselves and the US.

The ensuing plunge in crude meant that suddenly, the flow of petrodollars was set to dry up and FX reserves across commodity producing countries were poised to come under increased pressure. For the first time in decades, exported petrodollar capital turned negative.

Thus when Beijing moved to devalue the yuan, it drove a stake through the heart of the EM world by simultaneously i) validating concerns about weak Chinese growth, thus guaranteeing further pressure on commodities, ii) delivering a staggering blow to the export competitiveness of multiple emerging economies, iii) depressing demand from the mainland by making imports more expensive. Thanks to the conditions that resulted from the death of the petrodollar (e.g. falling FX reserves and growing fiscal headwinds), the world’s emerging markets were in no position to defend themselves against the fallout from the yuan devaluation. Complicating matters is a looming Fed hike. Included below is a look at flows into (or, more appropriately, “out of”) EM bonds. As Barclays notes, the $2.5 billion outflow in the week to August 21 is the highest level since February of last year

To continue reading: Why It Really All Comes Down To The Death Of The Petrodollar

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