The Glade 4.0

Full article (not long):

http://www.businessinsider.com/nigeria-introduces-yuan-into-into-forex-reserves-2011-9

They plan to move 5-10% of their reserve currency into Yuan in Q4. Notably, this will be done in part through making oil trades with China denominated in Yuan rather than dollars. Nigeria is a significant player in the oil market. Not the largest, certainly, but I would imagine in or around the top 10. For them to start trading oil in anything other than dollars (even if it's only in part) could signal the start of something very ugly for the dollar.

Another aspect of the deal is, as you might imagine, Nigeria buying Chinese treasury bonds. To quote the article:

Right or wrong, this is an attitude that a lot of people have held about the dollar in the past. It has a lot to do with why the dollar became not just "an" but "the" international exchange currency in the first place, and has allowed the U.S. to frankly get away with a lot of things that other countries couldn't, monetarily and economically speaking. One country isn't a trend, but then you should also take a look at the last link the article. There's also been a certain amount of talk about adding the Yuan to the IMF reserves. In any case, we're not talking about the Yuan totally eclipsing the dollar as a reserve currency over night, but to any extent that it crowds out the dollar, it's going to make matters worse for the U.S. on several fronts.

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

Did China just have to supply their bank routing and account numbers?

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I don't know. I keep hearing about how undervalued Chinese currency is. If there's pressure for them to let it increase in value, it may not be a bad investment. Buy low, let it rise, sell high.

The Yuan's value as a reserve currency is entirely dependent on China continuing to fix its value in international trading; it's an attractive alternative to the dollar precisely because China takes great effort to insulate their currency from real market pressures.

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