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Derivative Meltdown and Dollar Collapse
The frightening prospects from a derivative meltdown, well known for years, seem to deepen with every measure to
prop up a failing international financial system. The essay Greed is Good, but Derivatives
are Better, characterizes the gamble game in this fashion: "The elegance of derivatives
is that the rules that defy nature are not involved in intangible swaps. The basic value in the payment from the risk is always
dumped on the back of the taxpayer. Ponzi schemes are legal when government croupiers spin loaded balls on their fudged roulette
tables."
Under conventional international trading
settlement, the world reserve currency is the Dollar. The loss of confidence in the Federal Reserve System causes a corresponding
decline in value in U. S Treasury obligations. Add into this risk equation, derivative instruments that are deadly threats
that can well destroy national currencies. One such response to this unchecked danger can be found in a Bloomberg Businessweek
perceptive article, A Shortage of Bonds to
Back Derivatives Bets, makes a stark forecast.
"Starting next year, new rules will force banks, hedge
funds, and other traders to back up more of their bets in the $648 trillion derivatives market by posting collateral. While
the rules are designed to prevent another financial meltdown, a shortage of Treasury bonds and other top-rated debt to use
as collateral may undermine the effort to make the system safer."
However,
what happens when buyers of Treasury notes abandon the reoccurring cycle of rollover debt and stop buying new T-Bonds? Take
the Chinese example as a template for things to come. China's yuan hits record
high amid US pressure, "The Yuan touched an intraday high of nearly 6.2640 to $1.0, according
to the China Foreign Exchange Trade System, marking the highest level since 1994 when the country launched its modern foreign
exchange market." While
it is old news that the Dollar consistently drops in purchasing power, the circumvention of typical trade agreements, that
by-pass transitions using the Dollar as the currency of exchange, is relatively recent. The next report forewarns of a major
departure from the post Bretton Woods global trade environment. China And Japan Move Away
From Dollar, Will Conduct Bilateral Trade Using Own Currencies, is one method to avoid the direct consequences of a derivative meltdown. "The
China Foreign Exchange Trade System, the division of the People's Bank of China which manages currency trading, said that
the country will set a daily trading rate based on a weighted average of prices given by market makers. The People's Bank
said on Tuesday that an initial trading rate would be set at 7.9480 Yuan for every 100 Yen at market in Shanghai. Unlike yuan-dollar
trading, which only allows for a daily fluctuation of 1 percent in Yuan trading value, Yuan trading with the Yen will be able
to move within a 3 percent range."
Timing of a Dollar
reputation is almost impossible to pinpoint with precise market foreknowledge. Yet the inevitability that The Dollar is Doomed, refers to the insight of "Hans F. Sennholz in his essay - Saving the Dollar from
Destruction - we are presented with a bleak financial future. Even under optimum conditions,
the alternatives are not pleasant. Now let’s ask the 64,000 dollar question. What will happen when interest rates start
to rise?"
The economic havoc, with
the rise in interest rates, will greatly disrupt existing worldwide trade agreements and practices. In the article How The U.S. Dollar Will
Be Replaced, Brandon Smith addresses the pragmatic measures undertaken by major trade
partners to protect their domestic economies from a Dollar freefall. "To
those people who consistently claim that the dollar will never be dropped, my response is, it already has been dropped! China,
in tandem with other BRIC nations, has been covertly removing the greenback as the primary trade unit through bilateral deals
since 2010. First with Russia, and now with the whole of the ASEAN trading bloc and numerous other markets, including Japan.
China in particular has been preparing for this eventuality since 2005, when they introduced the first Yuan denominated bonds.
The bonds were considered a strange novelty back then, especially because China had so much surplus savings that it seemed
outlandish for them to take on treasury debt. Today, the move makes a whole lot more sense. China and the BRIC nations today
openly call for a worldwide shift away from the dollar:"
After historic downgrade,
U.S. must address its chronic debt problems. "Dagong Global, a fledgling Chinese rating agency, degraded the U.S. treasury bonds
late last year, yet its move was met then with a sense of arrogance and cynicism from some Western commentators. Now S&P
has proved what its Chinese counterpart has done is nothing but telling the global investors the ugly truth."
The derivatives time bomb lingers over every financial market on the planet. Reforms cannot
remove excess and greed, from risk management fiscal contracts. When the largest foreign trading partners look to insulate
their transactions from an unstable Dollar currency, the panic has already begun. It
should be self-evident that additional U.S. Treasury bailouts with unlimited Federal Reserve claims against every asset of
collateral that can be attached, is obscene in its nature. Hedging is equivalent to reassigning betting risk to unfunded insurance
underwriters that would never be able to pay off the claim. Governments are broke by almost any financial standard. Central
banksters accumulate titles to real property and assets by hook or crook. Nation
states held hostage to financial manipulation are slaves to the central banks. With the demise of the Dollar, the fake debt
obligations of the United States must be repudiated. Foreign states are prepared to sever their links to the Dollar reserve
currency, by trading directly in the domestic currencies of other countries. Interacting commerce in Dollars with American
companies will continue, but the yoke of Federal Reserve Notes legal tender will be rejected when the derivative meltdown
explodes. James Hall – October 17, 2012
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