http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-21/petroyuan-cometh-china-docks-navy-destroyer-irans-strait-hormuz-port
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 09/21/2014 16:35 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-20/why-china-russia-china-are-now-enemy
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 09/21/2014 13:15 -0400
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-20/russia-finmin-calls-shift-away-us-treasurys-bric-bonds-settlement-non-dollar-currenc
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 09/20/2014 21:43 -0400
The PetroYuan Cometh: China Docks Navy Destroyer In Iran's Strait Of Hormuz Port
Since China fired its first 'official' shot across the Petrodollar bow a year ago, there has been an increasing groundswell of de-dollarization across the world's energy trade (despite Washington's exclamations of 'isolated' non-dollar transactors). The rise of the PetroYuan has not been far from our headlines in the last year, with China increasingly leveraging its rise as an economic power and as the most important incremental market for hydrocarbon exporters, in the Persian Gulf and the former Soviet Union, to circumscribe dollar dominance in global energy - with potentially profound ramifications for America’s strategic position. And now, as AP reports, for the first time in history, China has docked a Navy Destroyer in the Southern Iranian port of Bandar-Abbas - right across the Straits of Hormuz from 'US stronghold-for-now' Bahrain and UAE.
The rise of the PetroYuan has not been far from our headlines in the last year:
China Fires Shot Across Petrodollar Bow: Shanghai Futures Exchange May Price Crude Oil Futures In Yuan
Guest Post: From PetroDollar To PetroYuan – The Coming Proxy Wars
The Rise Of The Petroyuan And The Slow Erosion Of Dollar Hegemony
And now, as AP reports, for the first time in history, China has docked a Navy Destroyer in a Southern Iranian port of Bandar-Abbas - right across the Straits of Hormuz from 'US stronghold-for-now' Bahrain and UAE.
Adm. Hossein Azad, naval base chief in the southern port of Bandar Abbas, said the four-day visit that began Saturday saw the two navies sharing expertise in the field of marine rescue."On the last day of their visit while leaving Iran, the Chinese warships will stage a joint drill in line with mutual collaboration, and exchange of marine and technical information particularly in the field of aid and rescue," said Azad.The report said the destroyer was accompanied by a logistics ship, and that both were on their way to the Gulf of Aden as a part of an international mission to combat piracy....Last year a Russian naval group docked in the same port on its way back from a Pacific Ocean mission.The move is also seen part of off efforts by Iran to strike a balance among foreign navies present in the area near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, the passageway at the mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of the world's oil is shipped.U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet is based in nearby Bahrain, on the southern coast of the Gulf.
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Here's why it matters...
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History and logic caution that current practices are not set in stone. With the rise of the “petroyuan,” movement towards a less dollar-centric currency regime in international energy markets—with potentially serious implications for the dollar’s broader standing—is already underway.As China has emerged as a major player on the global energy scene, it has also embarked on an extended campaign to internationalise its currency. A rising share of China’s external trade is being denominated and settled in renminbi; issuance of renminbi-denominated financial instruments is growing. China is pursuing a protracted process of capital account liberalisation essential to full renminbi internationalisation, and is allowing more exchange rate flexibility for the yuan. The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) now has swap arrangements with over thirty other central banks—meaning that renminbi already effectively functions as a reserve currency.Chinese policymakers appreciate the “advantages of incumbency” the dollar enjoys; their aim is not forrenminbi to replace dollars, but to position the yuanalongside the greenback as a transactional and reserve currency. Besides economic benefits (e.g., lowering Chinese businesses’ foreign exchange costs), Beijing wants—for strategic reasons—to slow further growth of its enormous dollar reserves. China has watched America’s increasing propensity to cut off countries from the U.S. financial system as a foreign policy tool, and worries about Washington trying to leverage it this way; renminbi internationalisation can mitigate such vulnerability. More broadly, Beijing understands the importance of dollar dominance to American power; by chipping away at it, China can contain excessive U.S. unilateralism.China has long incorporated financial instruments into its efforts to access foreign hydrocarbons. Now Beijing wants major energy producers to accept renminbi as a transactional currency—including to settle Chinese hydrocarbon purchases—and incorporate renminbi in their central bank reserves. Producers have reason to be receptive. China is, for the vastly foreseeable future, the main incremental market for hydrocarbon producers in the Persian Gulf and former Soviet Union. Widespread expectations of long-term yuan appreciation make accumulating renminbi reserves a “no brainer” in terms of portfolio diversification. And, as America is increasingly viewed as a hegemon in relative decline, China is seen as the preeminent rising power. Even for Gulf Arab states long reliant on Washington as their ultimate security guarantor, this makes closer ties to Beijing an imperative strategic hedge. For Russia,deteriorating relations with the United States impel deeper cooperation with China, against what both Moscow and Beijing consider a declining, yet still dangerously flailing and over-reactive, America.For several years, China has paid for some of its oil imports from Iran with renminbi; in 2012, the PBOC and the UAE Central Bank set up a $5.5 billion currency swap, setting the stage for settling Chinese oil imports from Abu Dhabi in renminbi—an important expansion of petroyuan use in the Persian Gulf. The $400 billion Sino-Russian gas deal that was concluded this year apparently provides for settling Chinese purchases of Russian gas in renminbi; if fully realised, this would mean an appreciable role for renminbi in transnational gas transactions.
Looking ahead, use of renminbi to settle international hydrocarbon sales will surely increase, accelerating the decline of American influence in key energy-producing regions. It will also make it marginally harder for Washington to finance what China and other rising powers consider overly interventionist foreign policies—a prospect America’s political class has hardly begun to ponder.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-20/why-china-russia-china-are-now-enemy
This Is Why China Russia & China Are Now "The Enemy"
Submitted by Jim Quinn via The Burning Platform blog,
The suppression of gold prices is essential at all costs to the Anglo-American banking interests. The saber rattling and attempts to lure Russia and China into military conflict are about who controls the financial world.
Russia and China keep accumulating the eternal currency – gold.
The American Empire and their EU disciples continue to accumulate debt and print fiat currencies. Has fiat paper ever won out over gold in the long-run? Change is coming. Revolution is in the air.
You can sense the desperation of the ruling oligarchs. Their fiat world is beginning to crumble. But they will not go without a bloody fight.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-20/russia-finmin-calls-shift-away-us-treasurys-bric-bonds-settlement-non-dollar-currenc
Russia FinMin Calls For Shift Away From US Treasurys Into BRIC Bonds, Settlement In Non-Dollar Currencies
It is no secret that Russia has had enough of the Petrodollar, and in light of ongoing western sanctions - which many view not so much as a reaction to events in Ukraine bur merely as an attempt to halt the Russian revolution against the Petrodollar status quo, crushing its economy before the momentum grows and more countries join Moscow - is constantly thinking of ways it can ditch the dollar as a medium of exchange as fast as possible. The problem is that when it comes to retaliating against the West, Russia - short of declaring an embargo on USD payments for its commodities - has little control over what currency its western trading partners will pay in. So instead it is focusing on its net exporting peers, aka the BRICS, with whom as previously reported, Russia had launched a "bank" alternative to the IMF when it comes to backstop and bailout funding, one that avoids reliance on the SDR, the USD, and on Western empathy.
It is the same BRICs that, Russia's Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, told Rossiya TV in an interview earlier today, should conduct transactions in national currencies, bypassing cross-rates with the US Dollar, adding that "we can easily make mutual settlements directly," and the mechanism should be beneficial to both sides of transactions.
And if it wasn't clear by now, Russia pivot away from the west and toward China is pretty much complete. Medvedev also said that "our collaboration with China is of strategic importance. We have great, brilliant political contacts, we have excellent economic relations. [China] is our strategic partner, and we are interested in expanding the volume of cooperation. We are not afraid of collaborating because we are confident that this is equal, friendly and mutually beneficial collaboration in all areas."
Meanwhile, regarding escalating Western tensions, the PM said that sanctions have created a bad situation for Russian banks on financial markets, all sources of liquidity are frozen. "We regard this as a senseless and ugly decision toward Russia, but we’ll manage without it." So does that mean that China will step in to provide the required FX reserves as Russia minimizes its USD exposure? Perhaps, but not entirely: Medvedev did add that "Asia, other markets “unlikely fully” to compensate for frozen European financing."
The PM also said that Russia passed through similar squeeze in 2008-2009 and can manage with central bank resources, adding that Europe is still important market for Russia, if EU members "make no absurd decisions to squeeze us out of this market, we’ll stay there, it’s interesting for us."
But while Medvedev was the good cop today, it was Russia's finance minister Anton Siluanov who was the designated "bad guy", and as theWSJ reported, Russia is considering diversifying its debt portfolio away from countries that have imposed sanctions on Moscow and into the papers of its BRICS partners.
Speaking on the sidelines of an annual investment forum in the Black Sea town of Sochi, Mr. Siluanov said the Finance Ministry wants to diversify its investment basket, and is looking for higher yields without too much risks. He said the ministry will consider buying papers issued by Brazil, India, China and South Africa, which along with Russia are known collectively as the Brics countries."[We would like to] walk away from investing in papers of the countries that impose sanctions against us," Mr. Siluanov said, adding that the reshuffle would be carried out gradually. He didn't elaborate on when the first purchases of Brics debt may take place.
The good news for the US, now that Russia appears set on either rapidly or slowly selling off its US Treasury exposure, is that Kremlin has possession of only $115 billion in US paper, which happens to be more than the $100 billion it reported in May when the first shock of aRussian bond sell off hit the market, and both of which happen to be amounts the Fed can easily monetize into its record big balance sheet (which, taper or no taper, just grew by $28 billion in the past week alone) in just over a month.
But at the end of the day it is not what Russia does, but what its other BRIC peers and US Treasury holders do. Because while Moscow may be in possession of just over $114.5 billion in US paper, China, Brazil and India share among them some $1.6 trillion in US Treasurys, better known as "leverage" in every sense of the word, or an amount that not even the Fed could monetize on short notice without sending a massive shockwave through the global capital markets.
In other words, while the US pushes Russia hard, it may be careful not to push it too hard, and in the process start an avalanche that leads to a BRIC bond avalanche, which may well be one possible endgame as the world is forced to transition from the US Dollar as a reserve currency in the coming years.
Never gonna happen?
Considering that none other than Obama's own former chief economic advisor, Jared Bernstein, is advocating dropping the USD as the global reserve currency, we would be careful with using the word "never" in this specific case...
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