The Russian and Chinese central banks have agreed a draft currency swap agreement, which will allow them to increase trade in domestic currencies and cut the dependence on the US dollar in bilateral payments.
“The draft document between the Central Bank of Russia and the People’s Bank of China on national currency swaps has been agreed by the parties,” and is at the stage of formal approval procedures, ITAR-TASS quotes the Russian regulator’s office on Thursday.
The Russian Central Bank is not giving precise details on the size of the currency swaps, nor when it will be launched. It says this will depend on demand.
According to the bank, the agreement will serve as an additional instrument for ensuring international financial stability. Also, it will offer the possibility to obtain liquidity in critical situations.
“The agreement will stimulate further development of direct trade in yuan and rubles on the domestic foreign exchange markets of Russia and China,” the Russian regulator said.
Currently, over 75 percent of payments in Russia-China trade settlements are made in US dollars, according to Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper.
In early July, the Central Bank’s chairwoman Elvira Nabiullina said Moscow and Beijing were close to reaching an agreement on conducting swap operations in national currencies to boost trade. The deal was later discussed during her trip to China.
Shigeki Nozawa Bloomberg The dollar may fall below 75 yen next year as it becomes the world’s “weakest currency” due to the Federal Reserve’s monetary-easing program, according to JPMorgan & Chase Co. The U.S. central bank, along with those in Japan and Europe, will keep interest rates at record lows in 2011 as they seek to boost economic growth, said Tohru Sasaki, head of Japanese rates and foreign-exchange research at the second-largest U.S. bank by assets. U.S. policy makers may take additional easing steps following the $600 billion bond-purchase program announced this month depending on inflation and the labor market, he said. “The U.S. has the world’s largest current-account deficit but keeps interest rates at virtually zero,” Sasaki said at a forum in Tokyo yesterday. “The dollar can’t avoid the status as the weakest currency.” Read Full Article RELATED ARTICLE: Eurozone Debt Crisis 2.0: Dollar Sucks Less than Euro, Again
Eric Blair Activist Post The grand symphony of currency manipulation seems more finely orchestrated than ever before. However, it's not necessarily the fundamentals that are moving currencies so much as global perception. In the battle between the Fed's quantitative weakening of the dollar versus the eurozone debt crisis, the dollar is winning this round of who sucks less. On October 1st, I posed the question, will the dollar rebound before being dissolved into a global currency? At that time, no one was predicting the dollar to gain strength with the Federal Reserve planning more quantitative easing. The windbag media promoted QE2 as a stock market stabilizer and a boost to U.S. exports, yet mostexpertsopenly called it a backdoor bailout, or monetizing debt, or plain old money printing. Nearly everyone agreed it would ultimately erode the value of the dollar even further and cause measurable inflation.
Indeed, it was a well-justified gloom-and-doom 6 months for the dollar by Fed critics. After all the media build-up, the Fed's announcement of the $600B easing plancame strategically on the day after mid-term elections, when most of the media was focused on feeding the false left-right frenzy by digesting the election results. In other words, QE2 got some mention, but the timing was clearly a tactic to keep a lid on the talking-head backlash. Then, Obama rushed out of the country for the G20 economic summit taking the remaining media distraction with him. Between stories of Michelle's shopping trips, it was revealed that China and other foreign economic players were not very happy about the Fed's move. Yet, the dollar started to rally.
Recent commentary by Chuck Butler in the Daily Reckoning questions the commodity sell-off and dollar rally:
But does it all make sense, given what I mentioned above that the FOMC is looking for inflation to inject into our economy? No… But since when, going back to the financial meltdown, does anything the markets do make sense?
Nothing makes sense if we still believe fundamentals actually matter. Sure the dollar is nearly dead, fundamentally, but it seems that perception now trumps concrete analysis. As I reported in October:
The fundamentals suggest that it (the dollar) should be finished, but just as the world is about to declare it dead, miraculously a global storyline seems to emerge just when needed and foreign investors rush back in for "safety." A clear example was the steady drumbeat of a sovereign-foreign-debt war that resulted in reports of whether the Euro would even survive, while the dollar enjoyed a triumphant ride up victory mountain.
Now, here we go again. As soon as the Fed announcement was made, the media shifted its focus once again to the eurozone debt "crisis." Story after story, day after day, about the developing crisis in Ireland -- and now Portugal. News agencies often salivate to repost these headlines, because crisis sells. And it sells because doom and gloomers, otherwise known as fundamental analysts, are waiting for reality to catch up to the numbers -- not just in the eurozone, but globally. The debt-infected PIIGS is a legitimate story, but it is clearly being heavily pushed to make the dollar look less pitiful.
Today's major headlines from leading UK papers show how "critical" the eurozone debt crisis has become. The first story appeared in the London Guardian titled Ireland crisis could cause EU collapse, warns president, where EU President Van Rompuy warned in a speech in Brussels, that "We're in a survival crisis . . . we all have to work together in order to survive with the eurozone, because if we don't survive with the eurozone we will not survive with the European Union." The article went on to define the pressure cooker facing the PIIGS:
Van Rompuy's speech added to the pressure on the Irish government, which was continuing to resist international pressure to accept a bailout this morning.
Shares fell across Europe as pressure mounted on Ireland to accept an EU or International Monetary Fund bailout to stem contagion to other high-deficit eurozone countries. Portugal, which has seen its borrowing costs rocket along with Ireland's, warned last night that it too might need a rescue package.
But despite fears that the crisis could bring down the euro, Ireland's minister for European Affairs Dick Roche denied this morning that Ireland needed emergency financing.
The next article that encapsulates the heightened fear surrounding the debt crisis was written by the brilliant financial reporter Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of the Telegraph titled The horrible truth starts to dawn on Europe's leaders where he states: "The entire European Project is now at risk of disintegration, with strategic and economic consequences that are very hard to predict." Granted, he was basing his analysis on the same Van Rompuy speech, which seems eerily reminiscent ofHank Paulson's dire warning of complete collapse and martial law in the U.S. if the Congress did not pass the TARP bailout.
The situation for the PIIGS hasn't changed in the last six months. It isn't incredibly more severe than it was then. And despite mildly encouraging retail numbers this quarter, the U.S. is not much better off than it was when the dollar was sinking like a stone. So, it is vividly transparent that the global banksters use the media to move the FOREX at times of their choosing and in contrast to fundamentals. In turn, we all buy in and post and repost the crisis headlines feeding the manipulation machine.
The video below shows the absurd shell game that is the eurozone debt mess. It's comically and obviously robbing Peter to pay Paul to prop up the Ponzi scheme: The media machine seems unbeatable, but luckily it's somewhat predictable. I reiterate what I said when I predicted the dollar to rebound in October:
The severely debased dollar is unlikely to rebound to previous highs given the international awareness of America's financial problems. Understanding that the goal of the global elite is to move toward a global currency, ultimately they must kill the dollar and other major currencies.
Although the end may be very near for the dollar we will likely see the establishment play them off each other for as long as possible. These cycles have seemed to run for about six months, but I don't think we'll see the dollar rise again for that amount of time. Nor do I think it will reach its twelve-month highs against the euro again, but I would wager that we'll see very strong gains to the dollar by year end. The European Union heads are to meet again in December to determine amendments to the Lisbon Treaty, which some leading diplomats are calling "mission impossible." The lead-up to this meeting, coupled with the eurozone debt issues, will drive this quarter's news cycle and the FOREX.
Another development to watch in regards to the strength of the dollar is food, oil, and gold commodities. Since they trade in dollars, it would make sense that they would sink if the dollar starts beating up on the euro. And we already have witnessed some slight movements downward. However, I predict that they will remain relatively stable and fall far less than the euro will against the dollar. And by the first quarter of next year, commodities will be off to the races again where we will likely see $100 oil and $2000 gold by mid-year. That may be the real start of the end of the dollar, and the euro.
As a final note: They can't allow the euro to fail before the dollar because the European Union is the banking model they desire for the world currency; separate nation states with local currency but where consolidated economic governance is dictated by a grand central bank. Incidentally, theeurozone debt crisis 2.0 is a dog and pony show.
Jean H. Lee Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea — A strong sense of pessimism shrouded the start of an economic summit of rich and emerging economies Thursday, with President Barack Obama and fellow world leaders arriving in Seoul sharply divided over currency and trade policies. The Group of 20 summit, held for the first time in Asia, has become the centerpiece of international efforts to revive the global economy and prevent future financial meltdowns. Hopes had been high that the Group of 20 – encompassing rich nations such as Germany and the U.S. as well as growing giants such as China and Brazil – could be the world forum for hashing out an economic way forward from financial crisis.
But agreement appeared elusive as the summit began, divided between those such as United States that want to get China to allow its currency rise and those irate over U.S. Federal Reserve plans to pump $600 billion of new money into the sluggish American economy, effectively devaluing the dollar.
Obama told fellow leaders that the U.S. cannot remain a profligate consumer using borrowed money and needs other countries to pull their weight to fix the world economy.
"The most important thing that the United States can do for the world economy is to grow, because we continue to be the world's largest market and a huge engine for all other countries to grow," Obama said at a news conference.
Brazil's president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, warned that such policies would "bankrupt" the world.
"If the rich countries are not consuming and want to grow its economy on exports, the world goes bankrupt because there would be no one to buy," he told reporters. "Everybody would like to sell."
Concerns about trade gaps, protectionism and a currency war threatened to overtake momentum for forming global solutions to the financial crisis created at last year's London summit.
So far, officials can't even agree on the agenda, much less a draft statement. Government ministers and senior G-20 officials have labored for days without success to come up with a substantive joint statement to be issued Friday, G-20 summit spokesman Kim Yoon-kyung said.
Patricia Zengerle and Krittivas Mukherjee Reuters President Barack Obama defended the Federal Reserve's policy of printing dollars on Monday after China and Russia stepped up criticism ahead of this week's Group of 20 meeting. The G20 summit has been pitched as a chance for leaders of the countries that account for 85 percent of world output to prevent a currency row escalating into a rush to protectionism that could imperil the global recovery. But there is little sign of consensus. The summit has been overshadowed by disagreements over the U.S. Federal Reserve's quantitative easing (QE) policy under which it will print money to buy $600 billion of government bonds. The move could depress the dollar and cause a destabilizing flow of money into emerging economies. "I will say that the Fed's mandate, my mandate, is to grow our economy. And that's not just good for the United States, that's good for the world as a whole," Obama said during a trip to India. "The worst thing that could happen to the world economy, not just ours, is if we end up being stuck with no growth or very limited growth." European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet said all participants at a meeting of the world's central bankers in Basel, Switzerland had insisted they were not pursuing weak currency policies. Read Full Article
The Fed ponders its biggest decision yet. Will it sacrifice the dollar?
Image: Mark Wilson/Getty
Joel Hilliker The Trumpet The Federal Reserve is expected to announce today whether or not to unleash a second round of quantitative easing. It may be one of the most important decisions in its history. Will the Fed sacrifice the dollar, and risk losing reserve currency status in an attempt to stimulate the economy and “painlessly” pay its debts? The Telegraph’s Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is warning that the Fed’s quantitative easing plan“risks” a “currency war”that may accelerate “the demise of the dollar-based currency system, perhaps leading to an unstable tripod with the euro and yuan, or a hybrid gold standard.” The problem facing the world is that the global economy is trapped in stalling speed. Most of the regular tools used by central banks have been exhausted. Interest rates are already near zero, and many governments have mostly spent what they can—and yet the global economy is sputtering.
All that is left for national economies is to try to gain export market share at the expense of their neighbors. To do this, nations are attempting to devalue their currencies to make their exports less expensive and imports more expensive. The risk, as Evans-Pritchard points out, is trade war.
Relations between China and America are especially strained. America wants to devalue the dollar and thus reverse its trade imbalance with China. China is resisting and is maintaining its dollar peg, which ensures that the yuan’s exchange rate remains fixed to the dollar. And the war is spreading. The Telegraph reports (emphasis ours throughout):
China’s Commerce Ministry fired an irate broadside against Washington on Monday. “The continued and drastic U.S. dollar depreciation recently has led countries including Japan, South Korea and Thailand to intervene in the currency market, intensifying a ‘currency war.’ In the mid-term, the U.S. dollar will continue to weaken and gaming between major currencies will escalate,” it said. …
Taiwan intervened on Monday to cap the rise of its currency, while Korea’s central bank chief said his country is eyeing capital controls as part of its “toolkit” to stem the flood of Fed-created money leaking out of the U.S. and sloshing into Asia. …
“It is becoming harder to mop up the liquidity flowing into these countries,” said Neil Mellor of the Bank of New York Mellon. “We fully expect more central banks to impose capital controls over the next couple of months. That is the world we live in,” he said. Globalisation is unravelling before our eyes.
Simon Black Sovereign Man In ancient Sanskrit, the name means “venerable island,” and the Arabs used to refer to it as “Serendib” for serendipity. Sri Lankans tend to agree– they find their small island of 20 million to be littered with good fortune, and many foreigners will concur. Sri Lanka is perhaps most famous for its multi-decade civil war between government forces and the separatist Tamil group, which comprises about 10% of the island’s population. The war was long and bloody with both sides carrying on vicious extermination campaigns involving large groups of civilians. In 2009, the government of Sri Lanka finally declared an end to the war against the Tamils after successfully neutralizing the opposition’s leadership. Left without a cogent head, the Tamils capitulated and the entire country endeavored to rebuild its war-torn economy. (enthused by the news, international investors bid Sri Lanka’s stock market up by over 100% in 2009; P/E valuations are now in the mid-20s and dividend yields around 1%… not exactly a screaming buy…)
For years, textiles and agriculture dominated the economy, particularly the production of rubber, cinnamon, tea, coffee, grains, and ganja– hey, it’s for medicinal purposes…
The country is now feeling the effects of significant inflation, however, no doubt the result of its policy to keep its currency cheap against the US dollar. Its exports may be strong, but Sri Lanka is importing inflation from the US courtesy of quantitative easing, and locals on the ground are feeling the pinch.
The Sri Lankan rupee has remained artificially suppressed against the dollar while agricultural commodity prices have been steadily rising in dollar terms. This makes food more expensive to locals in Sri Lanka.
Bob Chapman International Forecaster The recognition of currency war, which has been going on for years, reflects the failure of international cooperation and the failure the G-20 to find a solution of the beggar-thy-neighbor policies of almost every nation. The result has been growing geopolitical dislocation, which G-20 has yet to find a solution for. These efforts, until recently, were turned upside down by the failure of the Copenhagen Summit in the summer of 2009, when it was discovered that global warming was a giant scam. This was proof positive that global leadership was nothing less than a group of common criminals. Economic and financial failure has brought about global austerity measures, and bickering over trade and currencies as well. As this transpired the economies of the US, UK and Europe slid downward in socio-economic, crisis, which in some cases has degenerated into violent demonstrations. The US and UK are in economic paralysis due to the major changes anticipated in next week’s elections of House and Senate delegates. The President isn’t even going to be in Washington to witness the massacre of the Democrats. He just refuses to deal with it, as a long line of bureaucratic appointees head back to Harvard, foundations, think tanks, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. This as the Chairman of the Fed unveils plan two of quantitative easing, the creation of money and credit out of thin air, which in reality has been going on in the bond market since early June. Another bit of subterfuge dreamed up on Wall Street.
The Fed is monetizing a stimulus plan that the administration is no longer capable of assisting, due to an enraged public. On the other hand, large dollar holders are loudly complaining that the Fed’s policies will cause major inflation and a falling US dollar. Of course, the flip side is if the Fed doesn’t act in this manner the US economy will collapse and with it the world economy. The dumb Chinese, Japanese and oil producers should have long ago accumulated gold and gotten rid of dollars. That was not to be as they in fact enslaved to US leadership by yields and exports. The expenditure of $5 trillion over the next two years by the Fed will only take the US economy sideways at best, and in turn take the dollar to new lower levels. All the insiders know the plan won’t work, but it will buy time, perhaps so they can have another war as a distraction, as they have done many times before in history. Even the public knows it won’t work having been alerted by information pouring out of talk radio and the Internet. The US is already in austerity. Just look at real unemployment of 22-3/4%. This is getting worse not better and that means a change in control in the House and Senate could well bring about a constraining of fiscal and monetary policy.
The US is on a path to socio-political chaos as the dollar falls and the world monetary system comes unglued. Those countries in decent monetary and fiscal condition will pull away from dealing with the US and that has already occurred with Brazil that doesn’t want inflationary dollar investments entering their country, thus, they have implemented a dollar investment tax. The US cannot return to the past. Its leadership lost that opportunity in June of 2003 when they decided to go ahead and take down the economies of the US, UK and Europe in order to force the inhabitants of these countries to accept world government. A main cog in this plan was the implementation of free trade, globalization, offshoring and outsourcing, which has cost the US in just ten years 8.5 million jobs.
There is no chance now of return as countries pull away from US and UK financial markets. These moves will protect these countries for a time, but eventually they will feel the sting of economic failure and instability as trade wars and tariffs become the norm. Washington will cease to be the world leader. The currency and trade wars have only just begun. They could not be avoided by either side. There is about to be a convergence of problems. Things that previously were not connected that will burst forth without warning. That will eventually lead to the implosion of the system.
These factors will be accompanied by social unrest, which we have just seen the beginnings of in Europe. This time of social, monetary and fiscal turmoil will last at least into 2014 before any solutions are put on the table. An easy solution is multilateral revaluation, devaluation and default. This would be very painful, but would stop the power by today’s elites in the US, UK and Europe and the unmasking of their treachery.
Throughout Europe and the US there has and will continue to be a rise in patriotic movements, which those who control governments already have labeled terrorists. These are people like us who bring truth and exposure of facts to the attention of the public.
We are currently facing a new crisis in the US in the mortgage markets and in their securities, which has been aided and abetted by a disintegrating legal system. This comes to real estate at a time when it is on life support. The states cannot be of much assistance because most of them are broke, which is another distinct problem.
The US has already abdicated its role of world leader. Even leadership from Wall Street and banking is dreadful. Worse yet there is no one to take its place, as the world lies adrift in a sea of trouble. The atmosphere is explosive because no one wants to give up anything. The financial markets will all eventually fall and the flight to gold and silver as the only real money will gain acceptance, as we predicted long ago. Americans and others have failed to see the future and they’ll pay dearly for not paying attention.
One of the interesting developments of the new currency wars is a concept that, the nations that will be the most successful, are the nations that devalue the fastest. One of the things nations miss is that the cheap currency that propels exports; also raises the costs of imports. Another fallout is others won’t want to own your currency and if you devalue a currency enough it becomes worthless, or nearly so. A good example of that was in the 1930s where only tariffs were successful. As a rule those tariffs were not steep. The threat, of course, is that nations get mad at one another and war follows.
What these nations have been doing is similar to quantitative easing, or simple fiat creation of money and credit. These actions are the antithesis of sound money.
The Forex, foreign exchange market, trades $4 trillion a day and its projected to trade $10 trillion daily in the next couple of years. Money flows are already wild to say the least. Many foreign currencies have been rising versus the dollar. Some nations such as Brazil have already instituted capital controls by putting taxes on foreign purchases of local sovereign debt. Those not into the foreign game are buying US Treasuries, gold, silver and commodities.
The FOMC and the Fed, even though they know it won’t work, are becoming more and more accommodative. You will get some idea of their plan next week. The result will be a falling dollar, which is not really monetary policy, but grasping at straws in the wind. You will find nothing of sound money here and as a result markets will ultimately not survive. Remember, we could return to the circulation of gold and silver. 76 years ago gold coins were widely circulated and silver was in everyone’s pocket just 47 years ago. It is not impossible. It could happen again over the next few years.
It was just two weeks ago that the dollar revisited 76.54 on the USDX. It had rallied over the past four months from 76.88. It is currently about 77.28. Every time it tries to rally it gets knocked down again. That is a long way from 89 where it was seven months ago. One thing is for sure, as long as we have ill-fated policies such as QE2 the dollar will continue to fall.
We also found it of interest that Bill Gross of PIMCO found the Fed has taken Charles Ponzi one-step further. He says, “Has there ever been a Ponzi scheme so brazen?” No, there has not, said Bill. When the Fed meets next Wednesday it could signify the end of a great 30-year bull market in bonds.
What should be noted is that the Fed is intent on generating another asset bubble to accommodate the sale of Treasury and Agency bonds and to give Wall Street and banking more funds to speculate with. This will renew the elitist wealth effect and in the process send the dollar lower, which in turn will increase inflation, which is already sapping consumer buying. The Wall Street gang plan to use Fed funds to jack up the market, which is already overpriced by 20%, is an act of pyromania. In addition, the average increase in 15 commodities yoy to October is 35%. Food costs are up 48% and energy 23%. Real inflation is up 7%, not the 1.6% the Fed lies about.
Carlo Piavano Associated Press LONDON — World stocks rose and the dollar slumped Monday after global finance chiefs vowed to avoid a currency war that could derail the global recovery. With no concrete guidelines to go by, however, investors are wary that this may only prove a temporary truce. Finance ministers from the Group of 20 developed and emerging countries promised to avoid competitive devaluations – weakening a national currency to help exports and sustain economic recovery – but offered no binding targets for evening out trade imbalances. Analysts said firmer guidelines may yet be delivered at next month's meeting of world leaders in South Korea, though sharp differences in views remain. For the time being, the weekend's promises were enough to calm investors' fears of a currency war and focus attention on the main economic event on the horizon – the Federal Reserve's expected expansion of the U.S. money supply, an attempt to boost growth that markets fear could also weaken the dollar. Read Full Article RELATED ARTICLE: Will The Dollar Rebound Before Being Dissolved into Global Currency?
Lesley Wroughton Reuters A G20 agreement to give emerging market countries more power in the International Monetary Fund opens the door for breakthroughs on easing global tensions over trade imbalances. The surprise deal reached at weekend meetings of finance ministers from the Group of 20 in South Korea shifts IMF voting power to under-represented emerging countries like China, India, Brazil and Turkey.
Countries like the United States are betting that with greater representation emerging economies such as China will be more willing to address the trade distortions causing currency volatility and threatening increased protectionism.
The deal avoided a widening of the gulf between emerging and developed nations and a chaotic ending to a G20 meeting in which the United States failed to convince China and others to agree to targets to limit current account imbalances.
The IMF agreement also spares the G20 from losing credibility, opening the way for G20 heads of state, meeting in Seoul on November 11 and 12, to handle more politically difficult decisions on fixing the trade imbalance problem.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner flew to China on Sunday for further talks with Chinese authorities in the hopes of finalizing a currency deal before the Seoul summit.
Youssef Boutros-Ghali, Egypt's finance minister who heads the IMF's steering policy panel, the International Monetary and Financial Committee, said problems in the world economy could not be addressed without acknowledging the rising clout of emerging economies.
