Russia Is Actually Abandoning The Dollar

no smoking

Senior Member
Joined
Aug 14, 2009
Messages
5,000
Likes
2,302
Country flag
Now explain me how is this Asian bank while asian have same ownership percentage as European/rest of the world. Both Asian and rest has 25 % ownership so how this is going to benefit asian as so far i see this is china hegemony bank while it control 50% ownership :|
Because this bank will be focusing on providing financial support to infrastructure development within ASIA.

Even USA has 16.75 % in IMF so far seems like this bank is nothing but china try to put hegemony over whole asia?
Well, any proposal in IMF requires a majority approval of 85% which means USA can veto any bill by herself alone. This situation can't be change even if countries like China and India are willing to increase their contribution (actually the bills of changing share structure have been blocked by US for years).
In the case of AIIB, Chinese already made it clear: firstly, the proposal only require simple majority; secondly, their share should be lowered to 20% eventually.

So, no, this bank could be anything but an hegemony over whole Asia.

When this was announced last october this was the prefix
Has those changed?
No.
No.
 

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Dollar Hegemony and the Iran Nuclear Issue: The Story behind the Story



"International treaties are being held hostage by the west. There has been a lot of interference inside Iran by Washington. The nuclear issue is just an excuse to undermine the Islamic Republic and has very little to do with anything else." - Interview with RT by Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich, 6 April 2015.


This statement is right on the dot. The artificially created nuclear issue – is just an excuse for regime change"¦ perhaps yes. But there is more to it. While the expressed views on what the recent "Lausanne deal" really brought for Iran and the 5+1 participants may differ widely, one must sense that there is another story behind the story.

A little detail, nobody talks about, and maybe most pundits – eAven honest ones – are not aware of. In 2007 Iran was about to launch the Iranian Oil Bourse (IOB) – an international hydrocarbon exchange, akin to a stock exchange, where all countries, hydrocarbon producers or not, could trade this (still) chief energy source in euros, as an alternative to the US dollar.

This, of course would have meant the demise of dollar hegemony – the liberation of the world from the dollar stranglehold. This was inadmissible for Washington. It would have meant the end of the dollar as the world's chief reserve currency, and giving up the instrument of coercing the world into accepting Washington's dictate, the tool that serves to dish out sanctions left and right – no way!

Hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of hydrocarbons are traded on a daily basis; huge amounts of dollars that find no justification in the US economy, but – they allow the FED to print money at will – and every new dollar is a dollar of international debt, filling the reserve coffers of nations around the world, thereby also gradually devaluing the US currency, but barely affecting the US economy.

As long as petrol and gas are traded in dollars – a 'negotiated' imposition on Saudi Arabia by Father Bush, friend of the House of Saud, in the early 70s under the Carter Administration, in return for military protection – and as long as the world needs hydrocarbons to fuel its industries, so long the world will need dollars, insane amounts of dollars. The so-called Quantitative Easing (QE) allowed the US to print hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars to finance wars and conflicts around the globe, and to fund the relentless Zionist-Anglo-Saxon lie and propaganda machine. No problem
. It's just debt. Debt – paradoxically carried by the very countries that the empire eventually fights and lies to; countries which hold dollars in their reserves.


Hardly anybody knows that the real US debt, consisting of 'unmet obligations' has risen in the last 7 years from about 48 trillion to close to 130 trillion dollars in 2014 (GAO – General Accounting Office), about seven and a half times the US GDP.
Comparatively speaking, a debt by a multiple higher than that of 'troika' (EU-IMF-ECB) badgered and shattered Greece.

Allowing a country like Iran destroying the US hegemon's power base by taking a sovereign decision to abandon the dollar for oil and gas trading – no way. A pretext had to be invented to surmise the country which according to George W. Bush became a link of the axis of evil. What better than the nuclear threat – with the full support of Israel, of course. Bolstered by worldwide media manipulation, Iran became a nuclear menace not only for Israel and the entire region, but also for the US of A. A threat for the empire, some 15,000 km away, when at that time the most powerful Iranian long-range missile had a range capacity of about 2,000 km.:rofl:

This sounds almost like the latest (bad) Obama joke, accusing Venezuela to be an imminent threat to the United States. It would be laughable, if it wouldn't be so sad, so criminal actually. Because this lie is followed by economic warfare, akin to the one led against Russia – which – eventually backfired punishing the 'sanctioneers' themselves, especially the Europeans.:taunt1: When the real impact of the 'sanctions' became evident, the MSM were simply silent. People easily forget. Without opening their eyes, they remain gullible for the next lie.

The dollar is the ultimate pillar of the empire's world hegemony. Without it, it is doomed. Washington knows it. You don't have to look far to find similar examples to that of Iran. When Saddam Hussein announced in the late 1990's that he would sell Iraq's petrol in euros, as soon as the embargo would end in 2000, a reason had to be found to invade his country. The WMD menace that never existed was sold around the world, including at the UN Security Council, and – bingo – the western media killing machine had created a motive for invading Iraq and to murder Saddam. As if this wasn't enough, he was suddenly linked to 9/11 – and big miracle, Americans bought even this lie.

Muammar Gadhafi was another victim for asserting his country's sovereignty. He announced a new hard currency for Africa, the Gold Dinar, backed by Libyan gold. Libyan and African hydrocarbons could henceforth be traded in an alternative currency to the dollar, the Gold Dinar. Gadhafi also intended to free Africans from the western predatory telephone giants, by introducing a Libya sponsored low-price mobile network throughout Africa. Gadhafi was atrociously murdered by CIA handlers on 20 October 2011. Libya today is a hotbed of civil unrest and murder.

Iran's case is a bit more complicated. Iran has Russia and China backing. Nevertheless, with the propaganda machine painting a nuclear danger to the world, Iran could be brought to her knees, no problem. No matter what logic said and still says, no matter that the 15 US key intelligence agencies assured the then Bush Administration that Iran has no plans of manufacturing a nuclear bomb, that Iran was genuine in using its enriched uranium for power generation and for medical purposes.

No matter that Iran's enrichment process reached a mere 20% purity, enough for medical purposes, but far from the 97% required for a nuclear bomb, Iran had to be oppressed and under a web of lies made a pariah state, a risk for the world. That's what the average American and European today believes. It's a shame. Nobody openly dares talking about the only nuclear threat in the Middle East, Israel. That is another shame.

No matter what the Lausanne deal is today, or next June, after three more months of intense, but useless negotiations, no matter what a UN resolution would say about the deal, about the lifting of sanctions – Washington will always find a pretext to keep the stranglehold on Iran. As Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich said, "International treaties are being held hostage by the west"- there is no international compact or law that prevents the only rogue state in the world, the atrociously criminal US empire from crushing its way to satisfy its abject greed.

Always – that is, as long as empire survives. And yes, the economic survival is only a question of time. Fifteen years ago some 90% of worldwide reserve holdings were kept in US dollars, or dollar denominated securities. In 2010 the ratio shrunk to about 60%; today it is approaching 50%. When it sinks below 50%, governments around the globe may gradually lose confidence in the greenback, seeing it as what it is and has been for the last 100 years, nothing else but a fraudulent Mickey-Mouse currency at the service of a Zionist dominated western financial system, not worth the paper it's printed on; a currency that has been abusing and impoverishing the 'non-aligned' world at will.


Iran knows it, Russia knows it – without direct confrontation, the empire's grip may not hold as long as the Iran deal is planned to last, some 20 to 30 years. Therefore, the large concessions that Iran had to make for 'peace' – to reduce its enrichment process to 3.37% just enough to fuel power plants, and to sell or transfer its stock of 20% enriched medical-grade uranium abroad – these concessions to reach this 'glorious' interim agreement, are unimportant. It is a winner for Iran, as announced by Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, as well as Russia's Sergei Lavrov. Even if Washington derails the agreement within the next three months, or at any time at will, as is likely, Iran has won a battle of credibility worldwide, as she is ready to adhere to a signed agreement, no matter how far its sets her back.

In fact, the rotten palaces of empire are crumbling as these lines are going to print. Two new international Asian based development and investment banks have been created within the last two years. The BRICS Development Bank was signed into existence in Brazil in July 2014 by the leaders of the 5 BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Earlier this year sponsored by China and 20 other countries, the Asian Investment and Infrastructure Bank – AIIB, located in Shanghai, was created. Iran is a founding member of the AIIB.

Ecuador's Foreign Minister has also just announced that the Venezuela sponsored Banco del Sur – development bank for the Latin American hemisphere – will become operational in the course of 2015. These three banks are direct challenges to the Washington dominated IMF, World Bank and IDB (Inter-American Development Bank). Guess which ones are the most notorious 'allies' of Washington and which against the will of the White House, are joining AIIB's forty-some membership? – They include the epitome of neoliberal Europeans – UK, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

Washington's seemingly blind and preposterous arrogance drives the closest allies into the 'adversary's camp. The FED (Federal Reserve Bank) announced on 2 April 2015 that it fined the German Commerzbank with 1.7 billion US dollars for dealing with Cuba, Sudan and Iran :rofl: – Washington sanctioned countries.

This can only happen as long as all international banking transactions have to be channeled through US banks and controlled by the Rothschild dominated BIS – Bank for International Settlement. Russia, China and other SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) aligned countries have already broken away from the dollar system for international contracts and money transfers, including hydrocarbon trading. They are about to launch an alternative to the western ruled privately owned SWIFT transfer systems. The new system could be joined by any country wanting to break loose from the predatory dollar claws.

When even the staunchest stooges of empire seek alliances in the East, the writing is on the wall, that the economic winds are shifting, that a tectonic sea-change is in the offing and that the Iran nuclear deal, one way or another, doesn't really matter in the foreseeable future.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a former World Bank staff and worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources. He writes regularly for Global Research, ICH, RT, Sputnik News, the Voice of Russia / Ria Novosti, TeleSur, The Vineyard of The Saker Blog, and other internet sites. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe.

Dollar Hegemony and the Iran Nuclear Issue: The Story behind the Story | Global Research - Centre for Research on Globalization

@pmaitra, @sgarg, @jouni, etc etc
 
Last edited by a moderator:

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
'The dollar will fall substantially' - James Turk, precious metals expert
James Turk, a well-known precious metals expert believes that the US dollar is going to face trouble this autumn. According to Turk, "there are a couple of reasons for this."

The International Monetary Fund recalculates the Special Drawing Rights (SDR) every fight years.

The Chinese have taken every effort over the last five years to be included in the SDR when the next rewriting comes in September and October. China may move further away from western institutions and create other Asian institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.

The autumn of 2015 will be a critically important time of the year. The dollar may fall substantially, if the US government makes wrong moves, James Turk believes. "I think we are going to step on a mine before the end of this year," he said.

"Remember that the dollar has only risen because people around the world perceive it as the best option of a lot of poor choices. In other words, people are moving out of the euro, and moving out of other weak currencies, in an emotional kneejerk reaction into the dollar. They are not moving into the dollar because of any fundamental strengths. The problems of the U.S. are still quite severe, particularly the debt problem and government spending out of control. Things tend to rise and things tend to fall, and I wouldn't be surprised to get a big drop in the dollar before the end of the year," James Turk said.

'The dollar will fall substantially' - James Turk, precious metals expert - English pravda.ru
 

anoop_mig25

Senior Member
Joined
Aug 17, 2009
Messages
5,804
Likes
3,151
Country flag
Dollar Hegemony and the Iran Nuclear Issue: The Story behind the Story



"International treaties are being held hostage by the west. There has been a lot of interference inside Iran by Washington. The nuclear issue is just an excuse to undermine the Islamic Republic and has very little to do with anything else." - Interview with RT by Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich, 6 April 2015.


This statement is right on the dot. The artificially created nuclear issue – is just an excuse for regime change"¦ perhaps yes. But there is more to it. While the expressed views on what the recent "Lausanne deal" really brought for Iran and the 5+1 participants may differ widely, one must sense that there is another story behind the story.

A little detail, nobody talks about, and maybe most pundits – eAven honest ones – are not aware of. In 2007 Iran was about to launch the Iranian Oil Bourse (IOB) – an international hydrocarbon exchange, akin to a stock exchange, where all countries, hydrocarbon producers or not, could trade this (still) chief energy source in euros, as an alternative to the US dollar.

This, of course would have meant the demise of dollar hegemony – the liberation of the world from the dollar stranglehold. This was inadmissible for Washington. It would have meant the end of the dollar as the world's chief reserve currency, and giving up the instrument of coercing the world into accepting Washington's dictate, the tool that serves to dish out sanctions left and right – no way!

Hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of hydrocarbons are traded on a daily basis; huge amounts of dollars that find no justification in the US economy, but – they allow the FED to print money at will – and every new dollar is a dollar of international debt, filling the reserve coffers of nations around the world, thereby also gradually devaluing the US currency, but barely affecting the US economy.

As long as petrol and gas are traded in dollars – a 'negotiated' imposition on Saudi Arabia by Father Bush, friend of the House of Saud, in the early 70s under the Carter Administration, in return for military protection – and as long as the world needs hydrocarbons to fuel its industries, so long the world will need dollars, insane amounts of dollars. The so-called Quantitative Easing (QE) allowed the US to print hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars to finance wars and conflicts around the globe, and to fund the relentless Zionist-Anglo-Saxon lie and propaganda machine. No problem
. It's just debt. Debt – paradoxically carried by the very countries that the empire eventually fights and lies to; countries which hold dollars in their reserves.


Hardly anybody knows that the real US debt, consisting of 'unmet obligations' has risen in the last 7 years from about 48 trillion to close to 130 trillion dollars in 2014 (GAO – General Accounting Office), about seven and a half times the US GDP.
Comparatively speaking, a debt by a multiple higher than that of 'troika' (EU-IMF-ECB) badgered and shattered Greece.

Allowing a country like Iran destroying the US hegemon's power base by taking a sovereign decision to abandon the dollar for oil and gas trading – no way. A pretext had to be invented to surmise the country which according to George W. Bush became a link of the axis of evil. What better than the nuclear threat – with the full support of Israel, of course. Bolstered by worldwide media manipulation, Iran became a nuclear menace not only for Israel and the entire region, but also for the US of A. A threat for the empire, some 15,000 km away, when at that time the most powerful Iranian long-range missile had a range capacity of about 2,000 km.:rofl:

This sounds almost like the latest (bad) Obama joke, accusing Venezuela to be an imminent threat to the United States. It would be laughable, if it wouldn't be so sad, so criminal actually. Because this lie is followed by economic warfare, akin to the one led against Russia – which – eventually backfired punishing the 'sanctioneers' themselves, especially the Europeans.:taunt1: When the real impact of the 'sanctions' became evident, the MSM were simply silent. People easily forget. Without opening their eyes, they remain gullible for the next lie.

The dollar is the ultimate pillar of the empire's world hegemony. Without it, it is doomed. Washington knows it. You don't have to look far to find similar examples to that of Iran. When Saddam Hussein announced in the late 1990's that he would sell Iraq's petrol in euros, as soon as the embargo would end in 2000, a reason had to be found to invade his country. The WMD menace that never existed was sold around the world, including at the UN Security Council, and – bingo – the western media killing machine had created a motive for invading Iraq and to murder Saddam. As if this wasn't enough, he was suddenly linked to 9/11 – and big miracle, Americans bought even this lie.

Muammar Gadhafi was another victim for asserting his country's sovereignty. He announced a new hard currency for Africa, the Gold Dinar, backed by Libyan gold. Libyan and African hydrocarbons could henceforth be traded in an alternative currency to the dollar, the Gold Dinar. Gadhafi also intended to free Africans from the western predatory telephone giants, by introducing a Libya sponsored low-price mobile network throughout Africa. Gadhafi was atrociously murdered by CIA handlers on 20 October 2011. Libya today is a hotbed of civil unrest and murder.

Iran's case is a bit more complicated. Iran has Russia and China backing. Nevertheless, with the propaganda machine painting a nuclear danger to the world, Iran could be brought to her knees, no problem. No matter what logic said and still says, no matter that the 15 US key intelligence agencies assured the then Bush Administration that Iran has no plans of manufacturing a nuclear bomb, that Iran was genuine in using its enriched uranium for power generation and for medical purposes.

No matter that Iran's enrichment process reached a mere 20% purity, enough for medical purposes, but far from the 97% required for a nuclear bomb, Iran had to be oppressed and under a web of lies made a pariah state, a risk for the world. That's what the average American and European today believes. It's a shame. Nobody openly dares talking about the only nuclear threat in the Middle East, Israel. That is another shame.

No matter what the Lausanne deal is today, or next June, after three more months of intense, but useless negotiations, no matter what a UN resolution would say about the deal, about the lifting of sanctions – Washington will always find a pretext to keep the stranglehold on Iran. As Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich said, "International treaties are being held hostage by the west"- there is no international compact or law that prevents the only rogue state in the world, the atrociously criminal US empire from crushing its way to satisfy its abject greed.

Always – that is, as long as empire survives. And yes, the economic survival is only a question of time. Fifteen years ago some 90% of worldwide reserve holdings were kept in US dollars, or dollar denominated securities. In 2010 the ratio shrunk to about 60%; today it is approaching 50%. When it sinks below 50%, governments around the globe may gradually lose confidence in the greenback, seeing it as what it is and has been for the last 100 years, nothing else but a fraudulent Mickey-Mouse currency at the service of a Zionist dominated western financial system, not worth the paper it's printed on; a currency that has been abusing and impoverishing the 'non-aligned' world at will.


Iran knows it, Russia knows it – without direct confrontation, the empire's grip may not hold as long as the Iran deal is planned to last, some 20 to 30 years. Therefore, the large concessions that Iran had to make for 'peace' – to reduce its enrichment process to 3.37% just enough to fuel power plants, and to sell or transfer its stock of 20% enriched medical-grade uranium abroad – these concessions to reach this 'glorious' interim agreement, are unimportant. It is a winner for Iran, as announced by Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, as well as Russia's Sergei Lavrov. Even if Washington derails the agreement within the next three months, or at any time at will, as is likely, Iran has won a battle of credibility worldwide, as she is ready to adhere to a signed agreement, no matter how far its sets her back.

In fact, the rotten palaces of empire are crumbling as these lines are going to print. Two new international Asian based development and investment banks have been created within the last two years. The BRICS Development Bank was signed into existence in Brazil in July 2014 by the leaders of the 5 BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Earlier this year sponsored by China and 20 other countries, the Asian Investment and Infrastructure Bank – AIIB, located in Shanghai, was created. Iran is a founding member of the AIIB.

Ecuador's Foreign Minister has also just announced that the Venezuela sponsored Banco del Sur – development bank for the Latin American hemisphere – will become operational in the course of 2015. These three banks are direct challenges to the Washington dominated IMF, World Bank and IDB (Inter-American Development Bank). Guess which ones are the most notorious 'allies' of Washington and which against the will of the White House, are joining AIIB's forty-some membership? – They include the epitome of neoliberal Europeans – UK, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

Washington's seemingly blind and preposterous arrogance drives the closest allies into the 'adversary's camp. The FED (Federal Reserve Bank) announced on 2 April 2015 that it fined the German Commerzbank with 1.7 billion US dollars for dealing with Cuba, Sudan and Iran :rofl: – Washington sanctioned countries.

This can only happen as long as all international banking transactions have to be channeled through US banks and controlled by the Rothschild dominated BIS – Bank for International Settlement. Russia, China and other SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) aligned countries have already broken away from the dollar system for international contracts and money transfers, including hydrocarbon trading. They are about to launch an alternative to the western ruled privately owned SWIFT transfer systems. The new system could be joined by any country wanting to break loose from the predatory dollar claws.

When even the staunchest stooges of empire seek alliances in the East, the writing is on the wall, that the economic winds are shifting, that a tectonic sea-change is in the offing and that the Iran nuclear deal, one way or another, doesn't really matter in the foreseeable future.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a former World Bank staff and worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources. He writes regularly for Global Research, ICH, RT, Sputnik News, the Voice of Russia / Ria Novosti, TeleSur, The Vineyard of The Saker Blog, and other internet sites. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe.

Dollar Hegemony and the Iran Nuclear Issue: The Story behind the Story | Global Research - Centre for Research on Globalization

@pmaitra, @sgarg, @jouni, etc etc
IRAN can still launch Iranian Oil Bourse now that they have signed interim nuclear deal with P5+1
 
Last edited by a moderator:

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Collapse: a Foregone Conclusion
by BEN DENBY

Since 1971, the value of the US dollar, and with it the corporeal integrity of the US economy, has been tied to what we know today as the petrodollar system. This arrangement is the result of Nixon's abolition of the gold standard in 1971, the basis of valuing the US dollar since the end of WW2, coupled with a deal struck with Saudi Arabia and other OPEC nations for US military hardware and protection in return for oil sales exclusively in US dollars. Despite rendering the US dollar a fiat currency, in the short term at least this arrangement bolstered the dollar's flagging value by creating demand for it outside the country — thereby rendering what would have otherwise become inflation into a useful export. The concept of a 'petrodollar' arose as the volume of these fiat greenbacks outside US borders rose proportionally to those within, as a way of distinguishing between the two.

At the time the 'Nixon Shock' as it came to be known may well have seemed like a useful workaround for various problems associated with the disintegration of the postwar Bretton Woods system, which had set monetary policy on exchange rates and the like amongst industrialized states during the intervening period, not least of which being high rates of unemployment and inflation internal to the United States itself.
At the same time as saving the dollar from what might be regarded as the inherent shortcomings of market ideology in the short term, however, it also appears to have been a fatal error to the extent that it tied the value of the dollar to what was and remains a finite resource — a fact that would ultimately lead to the collapse of the petrodollar, and with it the US economy.

While none of Nixon's courtiers may have been willing to acknowledge that the king has no clothes, in retrospect it seems clear that Nixon was beset by myopia; in lieu of alternative means to maintain the value of the currency, then, the collapse of the dollar, with it the US economy, and with it the empire, was and remain a foregone conclusion. Even if though various wars of aggression the US military could establish control all the remaining oil reserves on the planet, under the pretext of protecting democracy from terrorist attacks etc., the finite nature of the oil supply meant were only so much to be controlled; that being the case, all that remained was to determine when collapse would in fact occur. It was only a matter of time. This was to become all the more pressing as other factors such as the peak oil phenomenon signaled the onset of the permanent decline in supply.

One might very well marvel at the hubris and hypocrisy informing this process. On the one hand, we can see the calculated and very conscious use of state power to prop up what was otherwise a purportedly free market not only capable of being supported through its own mechanisms, but whose acolytes scream bloody murder whenever anyone proposes regulation or taxation for the purposes of compensating for its antisocial and monopolistic tendencies. On the other, we have the pretense that one can depart even from ideological tenets that have little foundation in objective fact and are embraced because they function to rationalize institutional privilege and power, and still achieve successful or even simply functional outcomes in the long term.

By the same token, and in fact in this latter sense in particular, the real significance of these facts arguably derives from two points: (1) the fact that, barring the successful implementation of strategies to separate the maintenance of the value of the US dollar from the petrodollar system, they appear to define the parameters for the endgame of US military power; and (2) the broader lesson that may be drawn about the nature of power. We can best understand the first point by examining it in the context of the second.

If one of the reasons to marvel at the conditions surrounding the Nixon Shock and the creation of the petrodollar on their own terms was the pretense of being able to depart from professed ideological principles, even where these lacked basis in fact, and still achieve ultimately successful outcomes, this was also indicative of a failure to maintain a basic harmony between means and outcomes of a type that has a far broader and more notorious history in numerous contexts far removed from the United States of the early 1970s. One might even go so far as to describe it as one of the quintessential follies of state power — especially when governments begin to dismantle freedoms in the name of defending them in the name of protecting democracy from terrorism, as per some of the more draconian and infamous legislative products of the current and ongoing Terror Scare, or as they have done in the past, perhaps by conducting wars of aggression to conquer and kill in the name of 'love thy enemy' as in the Crusades, or using the Dictatorship of the Proletariat to exercise a dictatorship over the proletariat as in the ultimately catastrophic experiment with state communism in the USSR.

Where the health of any society at least claiming to be free is concerned, the destructive effects of 'ends justify the means' type morality is hardly news. It remains a truism of freedom and of free societies that means determine outcomes, and that just as libertarian means will beget libertarian outcomes, so too will authoritarian means beget correspondingly authoritarian outcomes (libertarian in the technical sense of an advocate of individual freedoms). In this respect, the essential failing of the Nixon Shock — besides the lack of evidence to support the foundational myths of laissez faire ideology and the mountain of evidence against it notwithstanding — was that it would function ultimately to preserve economic and social order, root out crisis and chaos, and in so doing uphold the values of freedom and justice upon which the United States was purportedly founded. In other words, Nixon's pretense that he could fix what was in actual fact a systemic problem and preserve order and freedom through means apparently justified by the goal of defending the economy from disruption contained the seeds of its own demise.

It is this fact in particular that gives us a reasonable basis to expect that this endgame or slow-motion downfall of US economic and military power will unfold in ways manifesting this exact same lack of respect for the imperative to maintain a basic harmony between means and outcomes — to the extent that freedom and justice even remain values for those in high places at a rhetorical level. It gives us a reasonable basis to likewise expect that the 'ends justifies the means' morality characteristic of the exercise of US military and economic power will not only continue, but become more acute, especially where the refusal of those in power to reflect on the events that have created it in the first place is concerned.

We find all the more reason to believe this to be so in considering that a manifest lack of interest in the democratic imperative to maintain a basic harmony between means and outcomes appears to go much further back than 1971. While trying to predict the course the process of the degeneration of the petrodollar into collapse will take with any measure of accuracy would be a generally pointless exercise, we might anticipate the logic the response to it from the US government it will follow thanks to the following offering from George Kennan, Director of Policy Planning in the US State Department, in 1948:

We have about 50% of the world's wealth, but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We should cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."

Nothing in the period since then has done anything to suggest that anyone in the State Department or anywhere else in the US establishment has changed their mind on this count, the Nixon Shock not least of all. The evidence tends strongly in fact towards the opposite conclusion, namely that 'concentrating everywhere on our immediate national objectives' and 'ceasing to talk about human rights, democratization and the raising of living standards, objectives' that are in any event 'vague and unreal' has become the sole determiner of foreign policy — or better yet, that any desire to maintain any pretense to the contrary has all but disappeared.

It seems reasonable to assume then that the US establishment will continue to do all in its power to protect the petrodollar, and with it the corporeal integrity of its own economy, and that it will continue to do so even where this comes into conflict with human rights, democratization and the raising of living standards — much less to say international law, or anything approaching a coherent moral principle like the idea that everyone has the right and duty to control the conditions of their own lives as long as they respect the equal rights of others. The euphemistic language Kennan employs to sneer with such haughty distain at cornerstones of civilization such as respect and regard for human rights and the freedoms of the individual are a clear marker in this respect; his moral disengagement from the rights and freedoms of his victims in the process of 'maintaining the position of disparity' upon which his economic and social privileges, and those of his establishment counterparts, depend, certainly sets the tenor for the rest of the century, if not for the next one as well.

One can anticipate then a general refusal to engage in any of kind of policy or institutional change that might potentially avert the social and human catastrophes that are a sure consequence of economic collapse, or at least offer some hope to those who would be obliged to bear the brunt of them (no prizes for guessing who that might be). This appears to be all the more true to the extent that the arrogant refusal to acknowledge the means by which this state of affairs has come to pass has established a pattern of blame-shifting and scapegoating that, rather than slowing down as the end of the petrodollar beckons, can only increase with the desperation of those responsible for maintaining it.

One need only look at the reaction of the US establishment to the 9/11 attacks and all that has transpired since to appreciate the extent to which this is true. The willingness to engage in the politics of scapegoating and blame-shifting in order to maintain positions of economic privilege within an increasingly overt imperial global order has become completely ingrained and normalized in political discourse to the point where the norms of free societies are not only history but so completely neglected in popular discourse as to be almost beyond recollection. In their place is not only a series of propaganda norms that set the meaning of freedom on its head, but also function to facilitate the kind dynamics necessary to maintain the ideological pretexts that what is now really an imperial establishment needs to operate without being revealed as such.

Therefore, as far as propaganda directed against the mass of humanity for the purposes of deception, we have seen, do see and will continue to see in the first instance a fundamental confusion — apparently a willing one — about the meaning of what freedom entails. Every tyrant and oppressor throughout history has believed in their own freedom and their own right to do as they pleased, the difference between themselves and those they oppressed being any limits to that freedom. This essentially defines the difference between the idea of freedom as a meaningful concept and the use of freedom as a propaganda tool with which to beat one's enemies and smear or demonise those considered to be a threat to one's social or economic privileges. Freedom defined as a meaningful concept that one actually cares about and wants to implement in practice entails rights that are limited, rather than absolute, on the grounds that rights for each are possible only to the extent that rights for one end where those for another begin, and vice versa, to infinity.

On the other hand, freedom as a propaganda tool is defined as an absolute, in absolutist terms of black and white, such that any attempt to articulate the notion of rights of freedom in a multilateral or multifaceted sense is treated as a hostile manoeuver. This nowhere more the case than when attempting to hold those who admit no limits on their own freedom, as in the manner typical of tyrants and sociopaths, to their contempt for the rights and freedoms of others. In this instance, rather than being something to stand in front of and defend for others, it becomes something to hide behind, and in the course of doing so those who claim absolute rights typically accuse those trying to reign in their abuses or hold them accountable for their actions in perpetrating abuses of trying to deprive them of their freedom — of themselves being oppressors who have no respect or regard for individual rights and no concept of the meaning of freedom.

In this manner of projecting one's own unconscious shame onto a scapegoat we see the most important mechanisms of moral disengagement: playing the victim, blaming the victim, abjuring oneself of responsibility for the consequences of one's actions, ignoring the consequences of one's actions, and articulating a defense on the ground of the 'those who aren't for us are against us' fallacy — one that traces back at least as far back as the Bible (eg. Matthew 12:30; Mark 9:40).

Therefore to doubt, question, challenge, not venerate the ideological orthodoxies to which the nation demands obedience with the requisite level of awe, which seems increasingly the case where the basic operating assumptions of neoliberal ideology is concerned, or even simply think for oneself is to give oneself over to the antagonists who threaten the mythical social consensus on which rests the order, freedom, security and sense of identity of the nation (as if any nation was ever best served by everyone bending over backwards to imitate hand puppets for the 1%ers who constitute the imperial establishment), or of western civilization writ large. In essence, if you think for yourself and question authority, the terrorists win. Or the communists, or whichever bogeyman happens to be handy at that moment in time.

In the second place, we can continue to expect to see the habit on the part of this neo-feudal global corporate aristocracy of constructing a series of self-justifications based on the self-serving assumption that the interests of the imperial establishment are the same as those as the interests of the nation as a whole, more or less irrespective of which one you happen to be a member of, or even more broadly of civilization writ large. On the basis of this assumption, the imperial establishment and those who serve them have create a self-serving interpretation of the causes of and remedies needed to fix political, social and economic trouble internationally in a way that has shifted, does shift and will continue to shifts blame away from themselves as controllers of the levers of power onto scapegoats. This they again have done, do do and will continue to do according to the process sociologists refer to as the production of deviance, as well as the subjective emotional mechanisms social psychologists refer to as moral disengagement.

The production of deviance is based on the fact that deviance itself is a completely subjective concept, and as such is a matter entirely of how those with the power to enforce their own interpretation of the word on common usage choose to define it. It typically has very little or nothing whatsoever to do with the appearance, thinking or behavior of those so labeled. The process of producing deviance is notable for the fact that the interpretations of deviance that are chosen and imposed on common usage are generally self-serving for those creating them; in effect, they create a problem or threat for which the creator becomes both cause and cure. For this reason, the production of deviance is as much a matter of reasserting the authority of the definer of the term in the face of crisis and shifting the blame for the crisis away from them onto a physically or numerically weaker scapegoat who can then be silenced through whatever means are considered appropriate. The value of this process to a power structure facing ever more acute threats to its own existence by virtue of the finite nature of the substance upon which its existence depends is obvious.

Similarly too then we can see the importance for a power structure in crisis of the aforementioned mechanisms of moral disengagement that make the blame-shifting process possible — playing the victim, blaming the victims, a militant ignorance in the face of the moral imperative to acknowledge the consequences of one's actions for others and an ideological self-justification that purposefully confuses being criticized, contradicted, questioned or not worshipped with sufficient reverence and awe with being attacked via the 'with us or against us' fallacy.

All of the above were a necessary devices to justify either draconian state policy or military adventurism and aggression or both following or during such events as the blowing up of the USS Maine in 1898, the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915, the Red Scare of 1919-1920, the War Scare of 1948, the Red Scare of 1947-54, the Cold War of 1947-1991, the CIA-sponsored coup d'etat that installed the Shah as leader of Iran in 1953, the CIA-sponsored overthrow of the Arbenz government of Guatemala in 1954, sponsorship of numerous proto-fascist client states throughout the world during the Cold War, the planned campaign of disruption and terror against Cuba contained in the Operation Northwoods document of 1962, the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964, the CIA-sponsored overthrow of the Allende government in Chile on September 11, 1973 and the continuing Terror Scare that constitutes the reaction of the imperial establishment to the September 11 terrorist attacks.

To illustrate several of these examples, the sinking of the Lusitania by Germany was used by the United States to justify entry into WW1 on the grounds of the necessity of stopping the barbarous Hun who had no respect for human life, though the German embassy in London put out an advertisement warning that the Lusitania was a potential target for u-boats and the ship itself later turned out to be carrying military supplies, and was therefore a legitimate target under international conventions on war crimes. The first US propaganda from the war invoked parallels with the Crusaders of the Middle Ages; we are somewhat unsurprised to find none other than Adolf Hitler praising the propaganda effort of the Committee for Public Information during WW1 and citing it as one of the primary reasons for the German defeat. None of this would have been possible either without the ability of the US war-mongers to maintain the pretense of being victims or to engage in the production of deviance via the motto of 'He who is not for America is against America' emblazoned on tens of thousands of 'America First Society' membership cards during the same period.

The mythology of the 'domino theory' as expressed in documents such as NSC-68 similarly utilized the same kind of dynamics and mechanisms we can expect to continue to see as the petrodollar becomes under great and more dire threat of extinction. As George Kennan noted above, the actual reasons for the Cold War were the maintenance of the 'position of disparity' upon which the economic wellbeing and growth of the US economy depended in the postwar period; as Frank Kofsky in particular demonstrated, the mythology of communist expansion which served as pretext for the military aggression upon which this policy depended was forestalled on the one hand by the doctrine of 'Socialism in One Country' Joseph Stalin had long adopted as a contentious response to the failure of communist revolutions in Germany and Western Europe. On the other, Russia was in the postwar years far too weak as a result of the hammering it had taken during the Second World War to even contemplate military expansion.

In this example in particular, the two Red Scares, domestic panics over the perceived menace of communist expansion within the United States itself, had served to thwart rather acutely the capacity of dissidents, critical thinkers and doubters of the magnificence of states as a general concept to get a fair hearing — the latter in particular. The stated policy of George Kennan did not apparently represent a dire threat to democracy around the globe, particularly in Asia where attempts to seek redress of the great (and expanding) gap between the global north and south in the name of promoting 'human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization' were dismissed with sneering contempt as 'vague and unreal objectives.'

Rather, according to the theory of the domino effect, it was attempts to see 'human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization' through movements for independent nationalism that made a victim out of what after 1989 would be the sole remaining superpower. In addition to the 'if you think for yourself the communists' win logic of McCarthyism, brilliantly parodied by Arthur Miller during the period in his stage play The Crucible, one might also point to the blaming of the million of victims around the world for rejecting the logic of Kennan's 1948 callous prescription for the maintenance of US power as well as the mythology of the domino effect as further evidence of moral disengagement, this time in the form of victim blaming. Is there any reason to imagine that the imperial establishment should be willing to reflect on this history or that any prospect exists of history not repeating itself further in this manner? Hardly.

Further doubt again is cast over the likelihood that the imperial establishment is likely to change mentality or policy in the face of the decline of the petrodollar when we consider that their response to the 9/11 attacks was to usher in a Terror Scare, or a moral panic over terrorism. History tends to forget these day that they did this by rehashing the 'War on Terrorism' rhetoric of George Shultz and other Reaganites during the 1980s, who apparently attempted to link movements for independent nationalism on the one hand, and the blowback from sending hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to often fanatical Muslim proxy combatants fighting the Soviet Union during the Afghanistan War on the other, to an overarching Communist conspiracy to bring down western civilization on the grounds of a logic so comprehensively and exhaustively binary in scope it could have hardly landed elsewhere than the 'for or against' fallacy.

This seems all the more significant when we remember that the 'War on Terrorism' mythology of today, the mythology that underwrites the Terror Scare just as the 'Domino Theory' mythology underwrote the Cold War, is based on half truths. In the former case, the fact that movements for independent nationalism have often been based on aspirations articulated in terms of 'human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization' commonly associated with left wing politics has been used to associate them with the USSR, in the manner typical of one playing the victim treating the opposition or perceived enemy as a big, demonic, terrifying monolith. The same is true of the ragged renegades that Chalmers Johnson and many others have identified as blowback from the aforementioned CIA backing of the Mujahedeen during the 1980s, non-state actors who according to the mythology of the 'War on Terror' constitute the sum total of the phenomenon of terrorism writ large, when we know in fact — and as many of the examples above well illustrate — the main drivers of terrorism historically and in the present are states.

Naturally the imperial establishment is as silent on the subject of its own historical role in supporting and encouraging radical Islamic fundamentalists in the grounds that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, as it is on that of its continuing alliances with states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, many of whom continue to provide substantial aid to ISIS, and as it is for that matter on the policy articulated by George Kennan in 1948 that appears to have informed its attitude to the rest of the world ever since. Chomsky and others have well documented its militant ignorance in this respect, as well as its singular contempt for the aspirations of billions around the world for 'human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization,' much less to say the autonomy of sovereign governments particularly throughout the course of the second half of the 20th century — all carried out in the name of preserving precisely the things they set out to destroy while engaging in the production of deviance and invoking various mechanisms of moral disengagement in order to avoid ever having to engage in concerted, comprehensive, principled, and above all critical refection on self.

The authoritarian and even totalitarian strains of this line of thinking are not hard to decipher; they indicate the extent to which the democratic norms many still take for granted have been colonized by an imperialism that dare not speak its own name, but that defines the parameters of the conditions that beget the foregone conclusion that a empire built on a finite resource will eventually fall. Where one might argue that to bring about a free society you must use freedom as a means, on account of the fact that outcomes are generally determined by means, rather than the other way around, variations on the theme of moral panicking and scapegoating using the various mechanisms demonstrated above will continue to be rolled out to try to mask the actual assumptions about the world that inform the operations of power, such as those informing Kennan's appraisal of international affairs in 1948.

Just as they represent a dominant theme in history and inform current practice, so too will these themes of scare mongering, othering and scapegoating define the parameters of the endgame of US power. As the crisis of the petrodollar becomes more acute, as it only must as the remaining supplies are slowly used up in the process of expediting military adventures and extravagant consumer lifestyles, the hunt for the ways and means of the production of deviance and thus pretexts to invoke the mechanisms of moral disengagement will only become more acute, the shrieking about perceived threats from Russia or Iran or China only ever more shrill. As Ronald Wright once observed, "Each time history repeats itself, the price goes up." This time around, with history repeating itself every which way, and apparently via the logic of 'with or against' as an excuse for a policy of 'the ends justify the means,' the ability to maintain a basic harmony between means and ends in contradistinction to this tendency may well prove to be the wellspring of the political ascendency for anyone still able. Those who are not, on the other hand, may well choke on it.

Ben Debney is a PhD candidate in the School of Politics and International Relations at Deakin University, Melbourne. He is researching moral panics and the political economy of scapegoating.


http://conspiracyanalyst.org/2015/03/30/collapse-a-foregone-conclusion/
 
Last edited:

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Russia Hopes to See Multicurrency World Despite US Opposition - Deputy Prime Minister

Russia hopes to see a multicurrency world despite the United States' perceived stance against International Monetary Fund (IMF) reform, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich said Monday.


Dvorkovich heads the Russian delegation at the World Economic Forum on East Asia held from April 19 to 21 in the Indonesian capital.

"We still hope we will have a multicurrency world with more stable conditions," the official said, citing the US Congress as the "only obstacle to reform" of the IMF.

In 2010, a group of 20 economies, known as G20, agreed on reforms to Washington-based IMF envisioning the spread of quotas and governance to developing markets. An impasse in Congress last March has forced the legislative branch to jettison the IMF reform text from a Ukrainian aid package bill, stalling the process.

Dvorkovich said the global shift to a multipolar economy is not reflected in the international organization whose functions include providing loans to developing nations to ensure economic stability.

"It's a strange world where the powers have changed, but the institutions are not changing because of the unwillingness of one really important and big countries," the official told reporters.

The United States currently holds a plurality of IMF's foreign exchange reserves, giving it over 16.5 percent of total votes. In contrast, Japan is the IMF member with the second largest percentage of votes, with 6.23 percent.


"The sooner you have other currencies on the table to be competitive against the dollar, the less we will be worried about the Fed rate fluctuations," Dvorkovich added.

The Russian lawmaker stressed the uneasy task of seeing through governance and quota reform in the IMF is to have "long-term goals" and "fulfilling political responsibilities."

"It took China at least 20 years, probably more, to get to where it is right now"¦ Russia is the biggest country in the world with more than 100 nationalities. It takes time and nobody should oversimplify the ways to deal with the situation," he said.

Earlier in February, the G20 finance ministers and central bank governors said they were disappointed with delays in the quota reforms of the financial institution.




Read more: Russia Hopes to See Multicurrency World Despite US Opposition - Deputy Prime Minister / Sputnik India English - News, Opinion, Radio
 

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
US Economic Decline Overshadows IMF-World Bank Meeting

The annual spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank held in Washington over the weekend comprised the treasurers and central bankers, together with financial experts and analysts, from all the major capitalist economies. However not a single proposal was advanced from this high-level meeting to alleviate, let alone resolve, the mounting problems besetting global capitalism.

The reason is not hard to find. The meetings were dominated by the ongoing disintegration of the very structures of the post-war economic order of which the IMF and the World Bank have constituted two major pillars.

While it was not officially on the agenda, the announcement by China that it had secured the agreement of 57 countries to become founding members of its proposed Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) was a hot topic of discussion in the backrooms and corridors, especially at the World Bank.

The IMF and World Bank have been the two most prominent institutions reflecting the economic primacy of the US in the post-war world. But the establishment of the AIIB, and the decision of major economic powers, including Britain, France and Germany, to sign up is an expression of major shifts in the world economy and the position of the US within it.


A New York Times article headlined "At Global Economic Gathering, US Primacy is Seen as Ebbing," published on the eve of the meetings, captured some of the mood. In an interview with the NYT, Arvind Subramanian, the chief economic advisor to the Indian government, said the US was almost handing over legitimacy to the rising powers. "People can't be too public about these things, but I would argue this is the single most important issue of these spring meetings."

The article went on to cite comments made by former treasury secretary and a top adviser in both the Clinton and Obama administrations, Lawrence Summers, that the inability of Washington to prevent key allies from joining the AIIB signalled "the moment the United States lost its role as the underwriter of the global economic system."

US treasury secretary Jack Lew disputed the notion that there was any decline in the American position, saying there was a lot of "noise in Washington" and this occasion was no exception "but the United States' voice is heard quite clearly in gatherings like this."

It may well be, but talk is cheap. The fact remains that the US is unable to offer any economic measures to boost the global economy in the way that it once could. This is under conditions where, as the main document prepared for the meeting, the IMF's World Economic Outlook (WEO) drew out, lower growth, and even stagnation, is becoming the "new normal." The WEO was accompanied by the IMF's Global Financial Stability report, which showed that far from lessening, financial risks are on the increase.

Those risks are certain to be increased by another major issue that dominated unofficial discussion—the looming prospect that Greece may default on its loans, possibly as early as the middle of next month.

The official mantra within the euro zone is that the financial risks posed by a Greek exit are not as severe as they were in 2012. This is largely because the outcome of the austerity measures imposed under the so-called troika has been to take Greek debt off the hands of the private banks and transfer it to the European Central Bank and the IMF.

In the lead up to the meeting and during its sessions, the IMF and European financial authorities made clear there would be no accession to calls by the Greek government for some relief. In fact, the Financial Times has reported that in private and off-the-record discussions some European government representatives were in favour of pushing Greece out of the euro zone.

The hard line against Greece was laid down by IMF managing director Christine Lagarde. Adopting the tone of a school ma'am lecturing an errant student, she said: "We have been able to express and explain the policy of the IMF in terms of payments delays and give the precedents and history of that to Mr Vourafakis [the Greek finance minister]."

Speaking at a press conference during the Washington talks, ECB president Marion Draghi said the euro zone was much better equipped than it had been in the past to deal with a Greek crisis and sought to downplay the risks of financial contagion.

However, he added: "We are certainly entering into uncharted waters if the crisis were to precipitate, and it is very premature to make any speculation about it."

Summing up the American position, Lew warned that a crisis in Greece would place a cloud of uncertainty over the European and global economies. "I do not think anyone can predict how markets will respond to dramatic changes in circumstances," he said. "We have been clear in our conversation with all parties there is an urgent need to come together around a comprehensive approach."

While the US views the prospect of a European crisis with alarm because of its impact on the American economy it is not able to significantly intervene. That is a measure of its economic decline. Gone are the days when a crisis would see the US convening an international economic summit to hammer out measures to overcome it.

In fact there was considerable discussion over whether US financial policy may contribute to financial instability, when the Federal Reserve begins to increase official interest rates. In 2013, indications that the Fed was moving to wind back its program of asset purchases—quantitative easing—brought a sharp movement of funds out of emerging markets in what was dubbed a "taper tantrum."

In the lead up to last weekend's meeting, the director of the IMF's monetary and capital markets department, José Viñals, warned that there could be a "super taper tantrum" as the Fed moved closer to lifting official rates from their present near-zero level.

"This is going to take place in uncharted territory," he said. "Markets could be increasingly susceptible to episodes in which liquidity suddenly vanishes and volatility spikes."

However, despite the warnings of these dangers, nothing emerged from the IMF-World Bank meeting to suggest that financial authorities have any measures to meet them.


US Economic Decline Overshadows IMF-World Bank Meeting | Global Research - Centre for Research on Globalization
 

Sakal Gharelu Ustad

Detests Jholawalas
Ambassador
Joined
Apr 28, 2012
Messages
7,114
Likes
7,761
@pmaitra

I tried to dig in a little big into ADB to get the picture: http://www.adbi.org/files/2012.10.02.wp385.world.bank.adb.should.asia.have.both.pdf

Firstly AIIB vs WB
Table 1: ADB and the World Bank: Selected Financial Indicators
($ billion)
...................................................................................... ADB ........................................... World Bank
Lending in 2010 ........................................... 8.2........................................... 44.2
Disbursements in 2010 ........................................... 5.3 ........................................... 28.9
Outstanding loans ........................................... 43.6 ........................................... 129.5
Authorized capital ........................................... 163.8 ........................................... 278.3
Outstanding debt ........................................... 51.8 ........................................... 135.2
Total assets ........................................... 100.2 ........................................... 312.8
Net income ........................................... 0.6 ........................................... 0.9

As you can see ADB is much small compared to WB. But ADB works specifically in Asia so it can compete with the WB lending at least in Asia. AIIB on the other hand has a seed capital of $100 billion from China. So, it would depend on how other members contribute to pitch it as a rival against World Bank. A lot will depend on how Chinese economy grow in the next decade or so. If the news for heating up of Chinese economy are true then it would take longer. In the short run, it is difficult to challenge the hegemony of World Bank. But ofcourse, China can fund projects now which otherwise would have been knocked down in WB. In the sort run I think it would only help normal countries because they get more aid!! But it would take some time for China to take over world.

Investing In The Potential Of New Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank

Now IMF vs BRICS bank:

Look IMF balance sheet here: https://www.imf.org/External/Pubs/FT/quart/2011fy/073110.pdf

The balance sheet has total assets around SDR 240 billion, where 1SDR=$1.51. This means IMF is sitting on around $360 billion compared to BRICS which is $40 billion. So, again it would take a lot of time for BRICS to catch up. But BRICS can obviously help distressed economy, which is given a raw deal by IMF. So, right now BRICS cannot be seen as a global competitor either. To match fund for fund BRICS would need another $300 billion infusion which is 3% of Chinese economy right now and so leaves $60 billion for each member country to shell out. This is roughly 3% of India's GDP. Given that the voting rights in BRICS are going to be the same, each country needs to contribute same and China cannot take over BRICS. When and how members would contribute will come out only in the future. So, till then BRICS is a small competitor in short run, but might have implications in the long run. Again, except India other BRICS nations do not have good growth right now. So, the BRICS bank challenge would also take some time to materialize. Not to forget that IMF's prescriptions have changed over the last few decades due to research and they have a lot of trained officials. So again, building intellectual capital will take some time before any of these banks can start lending.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Goodbye Dollar, Hello Altyn? In Ex-Soviet Union, Possible Future Currency Has Rich Past

When Russian President Vladimir Putin submitted a bill aimed to help de-dollarize the post-Soviet space, it came as no surprise for many in the former U.S.S.R.

On August 28, Putin asked parliament to ratify a treaty among members of the Commonwealth of Independent States that would expand the use of their national currencies -- instead of the dollar or euro -- in foreign trade payments and financial services.

The move came as the ruble and other currencies across the region continue to suffer. It followed months of calls in Russia for the creation of a single currency for the Eurasian Economic Union, which comprises Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan.

The proposed name: the "altyn."

For many, altyn sounds less Russian than Turkic -- an impression that is completely accurate and raises many questions.

The word, although not Slavic, is inseparable from the history of Russian statehood, as are many other Turkic-origin words related to the Russian government and financial system.

So, why altyn?

Starting in the 15th century, the altyn was a major currency in what we today call Russia.

Many relate its name to the Turkic word "altyn" -- gold.

But there is another explanation. If we look at the exchange rate of the altyn against another former Russian monetary unit, the denga (also Turkic: tanga or tenge), we will see that one altyn was equal to six half-dengas. Six in Turkic is "alty" -- and here lies the root of the currency's name.

The Golden Horde, of which many Russian principalities and territories were part -- and of which Muscovite Russia was certainly a successor -- had half-denga coins.

Denga, like altyn, is of Turkic origin. The Russian word "dengi" -- money -- is derived from denga.

The altyn and the denga circulated in Russia for centuries, until the end of the 18th century. Later, the name altyn went completely out of usage after the image of St. George on a horse with a spear started being engraved on the back of the coin. Spear is "kop'ye" in Russian, and the word "altyn" was gradually replaced by a derivative of kop'ye -- "kopeyka" or kopeck.

The half-kopeck coin survived the Russian Revolution and was in use in the Soviet Union until 1928.

Another trace of the altyn, the three-kopeck coin, continued to circulate until the Soviet breakup of 1991.

Echoes of the altyn also rang out in the Russian word "pyatialtynnik" or "pyatialtynny" -- meaning "five altyns" and used as a synonym for a 15-kopeck coin.

As for denga, it is the root not only of the Russian "dengi" but also the national currency in Turkic-speaking Kazakhstan -- the tenge. Over in Turkmenistan, another Turkic-speaking Central Asian nation, the tenge is the smallest monetary unit, with 100 tenges making one manat.

The smallest monetary unit in Kazakhstan is called the "tyin" -- a Turkic world that was used by tens of millions of Soviet citizens for the Russian kopeck.

In the Russian language, it was preserved in "poltinnik" (half-a-tyin), which was used originally for 50 kopecks (half a ruble), but in the modern Russian language is used to replace the word "fifty" -- as in 50 rubles, or even $50.

And someone who turns 50 in Russia might say, "Mne poltinnik stuknul" -- I hit 50 (or, more literally, 50 hit me).

While history is often rewritten to serve political aims or conform to current societal preferences, languages still carry historic "proofs."

The Russian history strongly connected with the history of the Turkic-speaking Volga area, and many regions of the North Caucasus and Central Asia, is a part of the common history of the former subjects of the Golden Horde.

After all, such important Russian words related to statehood as "kazna" (state treasury), "kaznachei" (accountant), "tamozhnya" (customs) -- from "tamga" (mark or stamp) -- are remnants of the state system of the empire called the Golden Horde.

Others include "yarlyk" (label), "tyurma" (prison), "karaul" (guard), "yamshchik" (postman), and many more.

We shall see whether the altyn will return to the former Soviet space. Or should we say the post-Golden Horde space?

http://www.rferl.org/content/goodbye-dollar-hello-altyn-future-eurasian-currency/27228511.html
 

pmaitra

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 10, 2009
Messages
33,262
Likes
19,593
Russia Launches Own Crude Oil Benchmark

(Sputnik - Russian news agency) | Russia Insider



Originally appeared at Sputnik

In November, Russia is set to launch test trading of its new domestic-produced benchmark oil. It is expected to drive up the price for Russian oil and end its dependence on Brent pricing. That may result in trading Russian oil in rubles.

The plan to create a Russian oil benchmark has been in the making for several years. Currently, Russian-produced Urals and ESPO (crude transported through the ESPO pipeline) is traded cheaper against Brent due to the lack of a transparent pricing mechanism and guarantees of delivery.

According to Russian officials, Russian benchmark crude would make domestic-produced oil grades more liquid and expensive.

To be recognized as benchmark in the international market, Russian crude has to meet the following three requirements. It has to be traded at clear and transparent prices; its deliveries have to be guaranteed; the trading volume has to reach not less than 10-15 million tons per year, or three million barrels a day.

The Russian Energy Minister expects that the first trading would take place before the end of 2015 or in the first half of 2016. Russian Urals or ESPO – the Ministry has not decided yet.

As for now, general rules have been elaborated to trade Russian oil on the St. Petersburg International Mercantile Exchange (SPIMEX), RBK reported.

The project presumed trading futures contracts on Russian crude with delivery guarantees. As a result, a market mechanism of pricing for Russian oil would form, with no dependence on foreign-produced crude benchmarks.

First off, the new mechanism will be good for Russian-based oil companies which could trade oil at higher prices, Vyacheslav Mischenko, Senior Deputy Director of Argus Media, told Sputnik.

What is for buyers, it will be in demand by small trading companies which have no contracts with major Russian oil producers.

Mischenko underscored that in order to guarantee the oil deliver the facilities of state-owned Transneft could be used.

“The point is that a new mechanism will be created. Not all Russian oil, but some amounts of it will be traded on the stock exchange,” he said.

“The main goal is to make the Russia Urals oil a reference brand. Currently, the price for Urals depends on Brent quotes. Russian-produced oil, including Urals, is key in supplies to the European market and to Mediterranean region, so it could be a reference one,” Mischenko explained.

He also expressed confidence that over time ruble contracts for Russian oil would challenge contracts in dollars.

“Now, Brent trading volumes has declined. It is not good that pricing in the oil market depends on Brent that is not much physically represented in the market,” Vladimir Feigin, head of the Institute for Energy and Finance, told Sputnik.

“The new mechanism is aimed at trading oil futures, with guarantees of delivery. If it is comfortable for market players, the mechanism would play a significant role in the market,” he added.
_____________________________________
Commentary: Currently, the US Dollar is not backed by oil, but the US Dollar is necessary to buy oil. Once that necessity is gone, the demand for US Dollar will gradually go down. An alternative mechanism, such as, but not limited to, an oil bourse, might assist in this regard. With Saudi Arabia planning to issue bonds, it appears that the US-Saudi oil games are nearing an end. Interesting times ahead.
 

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Grandmaster Putin’s Trap – 2
Fri, Nov 13, 2015

'The Others' Alliances, China, Russia, United States

By ORIENTAL REVIEW


In December of last year we published an intriguing article by Dmitry Kalinichenko, “Grandmaster Putin’s Trap,” which has drawn far more attention from readers than we ever expected. It continues to be cited by many international political and economic experts. That article addressed Russia’s latent strategy to get rid of US bonds and use its petrodollars to buy monetary gold. It seemed for a while that the ruble’s nosedive late last year, coupled with the Kremlin’s reduced fiscal space, has left Moscow unable to pursue its plan to permanently diversify the international financial system. Nevertheless, taking a look at 2015, it turned out that Putin’s strategy is working quite well.

Due to invisible market’s hand the gold-to-oil price ratio has more than doubled in the past two years. While in May 2014 it costed 12 barrels of oil to buy one ounce of gold, this ratio rose to 26 barrels/ounce in January 2015 (where it currently remains). By lowering the price of oil relative to gold, it looks like Wall Street & London’s City are trying to hamper Russian tactic of buying gold in exchange for oil and natural gas (gas prices are linked to oil via BTU). However, these actions fell short of their goals. Declining oil prices and a depreciating national currency have not led to a slowdown in the Bank of Russia’s gold purchases on the domestic market for rubles. Despite threats and sanctions, Russia has continued to add to its gold reserves. Bank of Russia bought a record 171 tons of gold in 2014 and another 120 tons in the first ten months of 2015. Consequently, by Nov. 1, 2015 the Bank of Russia had accumulated a total of 1,200 tons of gold in its reserves, which are officially the fifth largest in the world, although in reality Russia is actually in 4th place, as Germany is allowed to store only one-third of its reserves at home. In fairness it should be noted that China has not provided updated data on its gold reserves since 2009, when it officially possessed 1,054 tons. According to some estimates, Chinese reserves may have tripled since than.


Monetary gold in Bank of Russia reserves since 1995, in millions US$. Source: CBR.RU



The year 2014 brought Wall Street yet another unpleasant surprise. Russia emerged as the world’s second biggest gold producer, surpassed only by China. China and Russia’s global leadership in gold mining enables them to create their own currency and trading systems, built on a solid foundation of gold, which will be used by the BRICS countries as a universal unit of account and as a fixed measure of cost.

Faced with the prospect of having to grapple with a powerful Russian-Chinese gold alliance soon that will call into question the dollar’s future as global reserve currency, the United States has begun to employ all its traditional punitive measures against a country that has dared to challenge America’s financial clout in the world. Ignore all the blather about “democratic values” – these measures are nothing but a way to force Russia to sell gold.

The Russian people have heard Washington’s ultimatum and understand it perfectly: the US has imposed sanctions in order to oust the legitimate and democratically elected government in Moscow. But not surprisingly, the sanctions levied by the US against the Russian public – at great cost to the EU – have had the opposite effect. Russians have rallied around their nation’s leader, and China and Russia are now closer than ever before. The foreign policy of dictatorship of unmitigated arrogance, so fecklessly conducted by Washington, has had the expected consequences. By habitually and universally replacing the force of law with the right of force, the US has bungled away all of the political capital and credibility it had previously earned among the Russian and Chinese public.

It is China’s support of Russia’s position that is neutralizing all of Washington’s attempts to lean on Moscow. Even if Russia is forced to sell gold, it will sell it … to China, meaning that it will remain within the “gold alliance.” It is noteworthy that President Xi Jinping’s September visit to the US has not led to any substantial agreements. China is well aware that if Washington is able to sever the alliance between Russia and China, the first action of a Russia’s hypothetic pro-US government would be putting an energy garrote on China’s neck. Wall Street needs to colonize Russia first in order to subsequently colonize China. China’s leaders understand this very well. Incidentally, the same fate awaits Europe, which is yet another geopolitical competitor of the US. However, unlike Beijing, Europe’s leaders have not yet figured this out.

It is important to keep in mind that the dollar’s attacks on gold end always end the same way – in a painful knockout for the dollar. There have been no exceptions to this rule throughout monetary history. Nor will there be this time. Hence the well-known market rule: “Any maximum of the gold price is not the last one.” It would be naive to believe that this golden rule is unknown to that grandmaster of patience, Vladimir Putin, and to Xi Jinping. By systematically increasing their gold reserves, Russia and China are relentlessly moving forward to strip the US dollar of its status as a global reserve currency.

America’s standard military solution won’t work in this situation. Russia is not Iraq, Libya, or Yugoslavia. Were the US to launch direct aggression against a country like Russia, that would be their last move ever. Therefore, the White House is trying to use radical militants from Muslim and European countries as cannon fodder. There was a time when that approach was more effective. In the mid-twentieth century, Wall Street & London’s City managed to drag Europe into a war against the Soviet Union using their protégé Hitler, whom they had literally brought to power in Germany. Today Ukraine and Syria are the theaters for America’s hot war against Russia, and the European Union is the theater for America’s economic war against Russia (it is noteworthy that while European entrepreneurs are suffering under the sanctions imposed on Russia, their American competitors are busy signing lucrative new deals with Moscow).

Recently, European countries have begun to realize that Washington is simply conning them. After all, any product is, first and foremost, nothing but energy manifested in the form of a commodity. Taking its cue from America’s geopolitical ambitions, Europe is single-handedly reducing its own level of competitiveness. If we peel away the lofty slogans and declarations about “values” and just consider the dry economics of the matter, everything becomes clear: if the EU is cut off from its supply of cheap Russian energy, in addition to being cut off from the massive Russian market for its goods, Europe will not be able to survive in its present form.

Wall Street & London’s City, as before, do not know what Putin has in mind. But everyone is quite certain that Putin is up to something, and whatever that is will surprise everyone and advance the interests of Russia and its allies.

Trying to make sense of Putin’s and his counterpart Xi Jinping’s actions, Bloomberg published an interesting article six months ago about the future of the gold market:

“It would probably have to be very different than an old gold standard,” Kenneth Hoffman, the Princeton-based head of global metals and mining research at Bloomberg Intelligence… “It wouldn’t be a traditional system where you walk into a bank and you walk out with an ounce of gold. It would have to be something new and different.”

Predictions by leading Western media outlets about the imminent emergence of a Russian-Chinese alliance to revive the gold standard are heard often enough that they now seem like signals or even calls for such a step, addressed to Moscow and Beijing.

Back in the 18th century, the philosopher and writer Voltaire stated: “Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value – zero,” and he was absolutely right. There have been many different paper currencies throughout the history of mankind. But all of them, in one way or another, eventually reverted to zero and vanished. Those who lived during the reigns of such historical figures as Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Hitler, and Stalin honestly believed that the currency existing at that time would remain in circulation forever. But not one of those currencies still exists. And all that today’s dollar and ruble have in common with their previous incarnations from 100 years ago is the fact that their names are unchanged.



The modern dollar and ruble are entirely different currencies, with different purchasing power, and a different appearance. Some currencies die off suddenly, some revert to zero through gradual depreciation, but somehow or other they are all worth nothing in the end. Obviously, the enfeebled US dollar that has lost 98% of its purchasing power in the last 40 years (as just another unsecured pseudo-currency) is already on the brink of its natural devolution to zero.

This argument is increasingly used by advocates of a return to the gold standard. However, they forget that all gold currencies previously in circulation eventually died just as surely as the paper currencies. Why did this happen, since the gold currencies were secured by the gold they physically contained? Because any gold currency is, first and foremost, a currency with a designated value, not money based on the weight of the gold contained in those coins!

Gold currencies had a fiat value represented by the denomination embossed on them, which imposed a legal duty on all market players. This duty required that they use all gold coins exclusively as currency, with a face value specified and assigned by law. But eventually an inevitable inconsistency emerged between the market value of the gold contained in the coin in accordance with its weight vs. the fiat value of the denomination that was embossed on the gold coin itself. This inconsistency has spelled the end for every single form of gold currency throughout humanity’s monetary history. There are no exceptions to this rule, which is well known on Wall Street. It is critically important for that crowd that Russia and China be goaded into minting yet another doomed gold currency. As soon as Russia and (or) China issues such a gold currency, it will be immediately attacked by Soros and other speculators in Wall Street’s pocket like him. Whatever the face value, in rubles or yuan, that is embossed on the gold currency of Russia or China, after a while that value will begin to diverge from the value of the gold within the coin. It will become profitable for speculators to cyclically exchange paper currency for gold currency, which will deplete the country’s gold reserves and consequently lead to default.

As the situation currently stands, there is no one in the world who can answer this ostensibly simple question: why, knowing that it is not feasible to mint a gold national currency, are Russia and China continuing the rush to build up their gold reserves? Right now no one in the world knows that…. except Putin himself and his colleague Xi Jinping…

http://orientalreview.org/2015/11/13/grandmaster-putins-trap-2/
 

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Just the Beginning: Iran, India Dump Petrodollar, Settle Oil Payments in Rupees




Iran is interested in closer cooperation with BRICS, the Eurasian Economic Union, and the SCO

Iran and India have announced that they intend to settle all outstanding crude oil payments in rupees, as part of a joint strategy to dump the dollar and trade instead in national currencies.

Ditching the dollar, Iran and India have agreed to settle all outstanding crude oil dues in rupees in preparation to future trade in their national currencies.

The dollar dues — $6.5 billion equaling 55 per cent of oil payment — would be deposited in National Iranian Oil Co account with Indian banks. Sources said work was underway to amend the agreement with Iran to allow entire crude oil payment to be made in rupees. “Finance Ministry is moving a Cabinet note on withholding tax exemption on oil payments,” they said.

Since 2013, Indian refiners have been depositing 45 per cent of their oil payments to Iran in rupees with UCO Bank and withholding the remainder after a payment route through Turkey’s Halkbank was stopped under US and European sanctions.

http://russia-insider.com/en/its-ha...etrodollar-settle-oil-payments-rupees/ri12083
 

sorcerer

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 13, 2013
Messages
26,920
Likes
98,472
Country flag
Eurasia Abandoning US Dollar Hegemony One Kick at a Time
Economic integration between nations not in the direct sphere of Western influence is making significant progress, gradually abandoning the US dollar as their primary trading currency.


The historic energy agreement between China and Russia exemplifies how to De-dollarize as both countries strengthen their ties with payments settled in Yuan and Ruble. It’s still premature to expect some dramatic shift away from the Dollar in oil trade worldwide. Nevertheless, the advent of a petro yuan on the hydrocarbon market, is one of the pillars of the future multipolar world.

Russia’s proposal to set up their own oil-price market is another important step in that direction. There are even rumors of backing the Ruble with gold. This would actually be a sensational move, explaining the reasons why Moscow and Beijing have been buying so much gold in the last year, breaking several records.

Meanwhile, other parts of Eurasia are also integrating: Iran and India have taken the plunge and are now trading in rupees instead of dollars. Considering the importance of Tehran on the oil market and the importance of New Delhi as a consumer, it comes as no surprise that every effort was made to reach such an agreement and to start de-dollarizing their economies immediately. The geopolitical role of the petrodollar continues to be the most important existential factor for Gulf countries, and for Washington as it’s poised to surmount an astonishing 20 trillion-dollar debt in 2017.

The petrodollar-system is also deeply tied to the dollar and its hegemony as the world reserve currency. Eurasian integration depends on a gradual decline in the penetration that the dollar has in their economies. Giving up the US Dollar as the world's reserve currency means sinking the US’ ability to finance wars and allies without restraint. A clear benefit to much of the planet suffering the consequences of American foreign policy.

The US has failed in it’s attempt to divide and hinder the Eurasian integration with the MENA (Middle East and North Africa). The multipolar world is advancing and Beijing, Moscow and Tehran widely understand that their dependence on the dollar is simultaneously Washington’s major lifeline.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Virendra

Ambassador
Joined
Oct 16, 2010
Messages
4,697
Likes
3,041
Country flag
How does that relate to US relenting about sanctions imposed on Iran?
What forced the Americans to do so?
 

Params7

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 26, 2009
Messages
52
Likes
17
If Putin is trying to take down the petro dollar, he definitely needs to be careful. Gaddafi was trying that with his gold dinar, then was butchered in the streets after NATO bombed his country for 7 months.
 

amoy

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 17, 2010
Messages
5,982
Likes
1,849
Iran wants oil payments in euros only
Fri Feb 5, 2016 4:12PM

Iran says it wants to settle payments for its new and outstanding oil sales only in euros.

Iran indicated on Friday that it wants to settle payments for its new and outstanding oil sales in euros and not in dollars or any other currencies.

Reuters has quoted an official from the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) as saying that the rule applies to newly signed deals with France’s energy giant Total, Spain’s refiner Cepsa and Russia’s Lukoil.

"In our invoices we mention a clause that buyers of our oil will have to pay in euros, considering the exchange rate versus the dollar around the time of delivery," the NIOC source, who has not been named, has told Reuters.

Iran has also told its trading partners including India that owe it billions of dollars that it wants to be paid in euros rather than US dollars, added the person.

The NIOC source further emphasized that the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) had instituted a policy while the country was still under sanctions to carry out foreign trade in euros.

"Iran shifted to the euro and cancelled trade in dollars because of political reasons," the source said.

Hossein Yaqoubi-Miab, the director for international affairs department of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI), said in December that Iran says it wants India to pay outstanding oil dues in euros, stressing that it needs the euros to pay the installments for the loans it has received for its infrastructure projects.

Yaqoubi-Miab added that preparations have already been made by Tehran to receive euro payments from India.

Indian refineries should pay equal to some $6.5 billion in outstanding oil dues.

Reuters has further added in its report that Indian officials are working on a mechanism that could involve local banks United Commercial Bank (UCO) and IDBI Bank for handling payments to Iran.

UCO CEO R.K. Takkar said the bank is involved in payments to Iran, but did not say if there were any plans to change the payment mechanism.

http://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2016/02/05/448836/Iran-wants-oil-payments-in-euros-only-


~~Still waters run deep. ~~from my MiPad using tapatalk
 

Latest Replies

Global Defence

New threads

Articles

Top