April 24 (King World News)
“The real concern about US bank deposits is that they are denominated in US dollars, and the supply of new dollars has been increasing by about $1,000 billion per year for the last several years. The demand for dollars has not been increasing by the same amount. Indeed, as more and more countries implement measures to settle their trade balances in their own currencies, the demand for dollars is falling.
When the supply increases and the demand falls, the price falls. The exchange value of the dollar in terms of other currencies has escaped sharp declines because of the dollar’s traditional role as world reserve currency and safe haven and because the sovereign debt crisis in Europe has caused flight from the euro to the dollar. The Japanese, the Saudis and the oil emirates have large dollar holdings and no interest in destabilizing the dollar.
The Chinese (who also have large holdings) attitude toward the dollar could be adversely affected by Washington’s aggressive “Pivot Asia” policy of surrounding China with military bases.
Nevertheless, the world is watching, and the world sees only feeble efforts by Congress and the White House to balance the $1,000 billion annual operating deficit, a deficit that will rise if the economy turns down. The world sees the monetization of $1,000 billion in Treasury debt and the banks’ mortgage-backed derivatives per year. The question is unavoidable: Who wants to hold dollars and dollar-denominated financial assets when the dollar faces such obvious exchange-rate risk?
