The article “save soldier dollar” published by the “ИТОГИ” on 5 August 2013 is devoted to the problem of US currency role in the world economy.
According to the author, there is no reason to suggest, that in the nearest future dollar will lose its ground and allow regional leaders such as Russia or China to replace it with their own currencies.
Yet the author claims that some countries which play major roles in their regions attempt to free their economies from dollar dependence and want their currency to be held in significant quantities by governments and institutions of other countries from their region.
As for Russia, he declares, that FSU countries such as Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, whose economies are quite dependent on oil and gas export, whose reserves for the purpose of stable financial stance should be kept in dollars, are unlikely to change their reserve currency.
China, thanks to its specific political regime, is still quite instable for countries to keep their reserves in yuan. However, if yuan keeps its’ appreciation in a long-term period and future leaders avoid their communistic rhetoric, it will be possible.
In conclusion the author notes that as US banks on the export growth, the only thing which will be able to make up dollar deficit in the world trade system is its role of the world creditor. Therefore, the only threat to the status of its currency is its government.
Given that Russian Bank since last week gave up making dollar interventions, ruble is no longer under any control. I am totally agree, that ruble is strictly dependent on oil price, but the thing I want to point out is that such drastic changes in oil price quite often reflect the global tension periods instead of market trends. So, Ukraine might be a key factor.
As for China, I m quite sure that they threat us as a part of their plan. Keeping pressure on central Asia and boosting SCO's influence, China step by step redirects economies and markets of those regions, that historically are supposed to lean to Russia, to its side.
The Chinese have much greater control over the yuan than Russia over the ruble. The USD price of oil has slumped over a massive 20% in the months since July, as has the energy export dependent Russian ruble in the same period (more correlation with oil than all the events in Ukraine). The Chinese have also let the CNY slip, but only by much less than 2% during this period.
China has a grand plan for the yuan (CNY). What do you think is Russia's approach to China's plan for the yuan?
This is a presentation which has no solution, but which does have a history. There are too many variables to consider and no one country can control all of them.
