Here are the hard facts about de-dollarization

Hey everybody, Peter Zion here coming to you from Colorado where the weather can’t decide what it wants to do today, it’s sunny. So we’re just gonna work with it. A lot of you have written in asking me about all this hullabaloo about D dollarization. Like, this comes up every year, too. And so I have to explain it again. Fundamentally, nothing has really changed this time. But let me give you the three things to look for. If you do want to take D dollarization. Seriously, in the future, this is not the time number one size, for a currency to be a currency of exchange, a currency of trade, and especially a currency of reserve. It has to exist in huge volume, because that’s a lubricate trillions of dollars of financial transactions and physical transactions every single day. And something in excess of 25 $30 trillion of annual merchandise trade, that’s a lot. And there are really only four countries in the world for currencies in the world, we could even theoretically do that the US dollar, the European euro, the Japanese yen, and the Chinese you want number one, number two, access, you have to be able to get a hold of nearly unlimited volumes of that currency, whenever you want to, obviously, the dollar crashes that itch the Japanese yen, not so much. The Japanese tried to go global back in the 1980s. Turns out their financial system couldn’t handle it. And it contributed was one of the many factors as to why they have had on average 0% growth since 1993 94, something like that. And so they have kind of closed up shop, the currency is available, you can add it to the side, but it’s never going to be a mainline exchange currency. Let’s see, China is eliminated from that category as well. The number one concern that the Chinese have is for control, absolute total domineering dictatorial control over their own internal financial sector. That means they don’t want to see large cross border flows, especially from China to the rest of the world. So every once in a while, the Chinese will do what they’re doing now and talk up the yuan and talk about internationalization, then as soon as it starts to happen. A current flood of currency from the Chinese goes elsewhere, because the Chinese are the people who are the least confident in their own economic system. And then the Chinese government slams it shut, and we don’t hear about it for a couple years, again, like we are now. Okay, what’s the other the big one a trust, you have to trust that the currency is gonna be worth something, you have to trust that the government’s not going to intervene. And that means this is kind of a subset of trade. Now, with trade, if you are a major trading country, and a large percentage of your GDP is gotten from exports and imports, then you have a vested interest in what the value of your currency is, every single day, the US is perfect for that, because the US trade to GDP ratio, so only about 15%. And about half of that is either energy or NAFTA and everything else falls into other like six 7%. So the United States really doesn’t care what happens to the value of the currency every day, the Chinese don’t have a freely traded system, so they can micromanage what the value is every single day. There’s also the issue of whether your money is going to be there, the next day now, the United States maybe has taken a hit on this with the Russia sanctions, and that it’s weaponized the US dollar in a few ways. But compare that to say what goes on with monetization. Now, I know I know a lot of you folks out there who are like gold bugs like us monetizes like mad. And you know, there’s something to be said for that. We do have a large money supply, it’s probably bigger than it needs to be. But a couple things to keep in mind. It’s been shrinking for the last year, as all the stimulus efforts from the last 15 years because of COVID, and financial crisis and everything else, and finally wound down, it’s going in the right direction. And second, I compare it to everyone else. The Japanese, the Europeans, and especially the Chinese print currency in far greater volumes in the US dose. So the US currency is the primary finance currency, it’s the primary currency and everyone’s foreign reserves, the primary trade currency is the primary store of value. The Chinese you want is none of those things. In fact, 99% of the issued currency of the Chinese yuan is held within the Chinese system. But their money supply is bigger than the United States because they print currency so ridiculously. So if you want to use that as a reason to talk down the dollar, that’s fine. Just make sure you apply the same criteria to everyone else, because the yen in the US even though the Japanese economy is less than a third of the size of the US, it’s about the same currency exchange, and the euro is bigger, too. So the US runs the least bad ship if that’s the right way to look at it. And then finally, of course, there’s the euro. The Europeans for a long time have been moving the US Dollar as a co equal currency, if you will, the European Euro should be right there with them. But they confiscated insured bank deposits basket when they had the financial crisis in the late 2000s, early 2000 10s. And as a result, anyone who could move their money out of Europe did so it’s a regional currency. And that’s not nothing. But it’s no longer a serious contender for any sort of broad dominant international role. There are a couple of other countries that have started to kind of join in shouting on this topic, but I don’t take those seriously either. One of them is Bangladesh. Bangladesh has recently publicly pret pledge that the nuclear power plant that they’re planning on buying from the Russians will be paid for with rubles. That means nothing because the Bangladeshis don’t have the money to buy a nuclear power plant. So to pledge for something that’s never going to happen in a currency that they don’t have yet, whatever. And then there’s Argentina who says it’s gung ho to join any sort of not dollar system. The Argentine’s are trailblazers in many financial matters. But currency adoption is not one of them. They’re basically looking for currency that can be printed without causing inflation for them and without them having to pay back in foreign currency later. So you know, I wouldn’t take that too seriously either. Now, all that said, there is one country out there that is seriously considering maybe even implementing a degree of D dollarization. Because it doesn’t care about these factors. It has something else that is driving its decision making, and we’ll talk about that tomorrow.