Real vs Dollar and other currency issues

[Clandestine782]

The Euro has been rapidly replacing the US dollar as a popular reserve currency choice. Already the big OPEC nations are untying their currencies from the dollar and moving to a basket of currencies. The IMF recently audited the US Federal Reserve. The Dollar continues its swan dive, Ben Bernanke will never lift interest rates, he rather have hyperinflation than US economic slowdown.

The writing is on the wall for the Greenback, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Bush or Obama. The US has consumed more than it has produced for nearly four decades and now the chickens have come home to roost.

I could not give a flip what some moron canuck thinks of California and of Obama. Canadians like Bill hate Obama because he is going to throw NAFTA in the trash. Australia is lucky that it has China to fall back on than the US.

Your comments about the Euro replacing the dollar as reserve currency are WRONG. (Do you look up *anything* before you post?)

Here are two links. One the IMF and the other (you guessed it)....Wikipedia.

http://www.imf.org/external/np/sta/cofer/eng/cofer.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reserve_currency

1. Even if the US dollar lost its status as reserve currency, it is not like US dollars would never be accepted anywhere for Americans to buy the things that they want. Swiss francs are accepted everywhere in the world-- even though ChFr make up less than 1/2 of 1% of the listed reserve currencies- and the Swiss Franc is the last currency on the face of the earth that is priced in terms of gold. (Swiss Constitution.) What happens if the US dollar is no longer reserve currency? The pound sterling was once a reserve currency and it isn't anymore. Has Britain fallen into the sea?

2. Have you noticed that it is not normal for countries to be able to make such money off of seignorage? If the US lost this ability, then it would be LIKE EVERYONE ELSE.

3. It is far from clear that the Eurozone will take over. (I think we already went down the road of the existence of the CFA Franc not being enough to make a single African currency.)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servl...tory/WBmarkets

[Clandestine782]

Like I said the Dollar's fate has nothing to do with politics. Greenspan helped to turn America into a debtor nation. We have no manufacturing, many of our jobs constantly go overseas, even the service ones that were meant to replace the factory work. Our middle class is in serious jeopardy of winding up in poverty. I would not be surprised if favelas show up in the good old United States, some areas of major US cities are already looking squalid. Recall that Schwarzenegger movie the Running Man?? The scenario was about the USA in 2017 where oil winds up in short supply leading to an economic collapse of the US, in that movie the US turns into a third world style police state with heavily guarded modern areas and shanty towns, only the superwealthy have rights, a dictatorship of the affluent, kind of resembles what Brazil looks like today, and handful of rich people and most in dire poverty. Real scary stuff.

Obama is certainly not going to be a savior of American democracy. People are going to be disappointed in his quest for Change.

A few points:

1. The world's largest creditor nation is........Japan. And it has been in recession for the last 20 years, and that status has increased. Being a debtor nation in the sense of having large amounts of Foreign Direct Investment is not the same thing as being a debtor nation because of having a huge budget deficit (Japan has a bigger budget deficit, but is still a creditor nation). There are other countries that have much higher debt/ GDP ratios. (Belgium. Italy. Japan. Singapore....etc).

2. Being a debtor nation as a result of FDI is similar to a bank being in debt because someone has put their savings there. Every time someone makes a deposit, the bank goes that much deeper in debt. And so it is with the United States (and even China, if their FDI figures are to be believed).

3. Manufacturing is not everything. If you did some looking of the figures of manufacturing volume, I wouldn't be surprised if it had actually increased in the United States. It's just that it takes fewer people to make the same amount of stuff. It's called............productivity. As a subset to this, I should say that the US is a service based economy anyway. Something like 85% of our economy is in goods and services. (And it's always been that way.) People can make money in logistics (which is the distribution of things that they may or may not have made) or financial services or any thing *other* that manufacturing.

4. There is oil in the United States. It's just that environutbags are afraid that we might disturb some birds or something and so the vast majority of it is off limits to oil developers. So now what?

[Hitmanm3]

Like I said the Dollar's fate has nothing to do with politics. Greenspan helped to turn America into a debtor nation. We have no manufacturing, many of our jobs constantly go overseas, even the service ones that were meant to replace the factory work. Our middle class is in serious jeopardy of winding up in poverty. I would not be surprised if favelas show up in the good old United States, some areas of major US cities are already looking squalid. Recall that Schwarzenegger movie the Running Man?? The scenario was about the USA in 2017 where oil winds up in short supply leading to an economic collapse of the US, in that movie the US turns into a third world style police state with heavily guarded modern areas and shanty towns, only the superwealthy have rights, a dictatorship of the affluent, kind of resembles what Brazil looks like today, and handful of rich people and most in dire poverty. Real scary stuff.

Obama is certainly not going to be a savior of American democracy. People are going to be disappointed in his quest for Change.

Favelas have been in the USA since the 6o's it was called the projects and they are still around visit places like south central LA and go to New York and see Brownsville and so on. You really need to to open your eyes.

[Clandestine782]

Ben Bernanke is the steward of the Dollar's value, he has kept interest rates low and has no plans to raise them. The US has a mountain of debt, he would rather risk inflation than see the economy go into stand still. The US is not in a true recession but its growing at a snail's pace. The ECB recently raised interest rates, the Fed was hoping the ECB would cut interest rates to narrow the spread between US and European rates, which would put less pressure on the Dollar. The spread in interest rates between the US Federal Reserve and other major banks is one of the reasons why the Dollar continues to lose value.

I have a lot of friends who work in real estate in the US and most of them still have jobs... because of foreign real estate buyers, many from Europe and the Mideast, the US is going through a fire sale right now.

Ben Bernanke is NOT the steward of the dollar's value. The policy of the government is (as it has been since Nixon ended the gold standard) is BENIGN NEGLECT. Currency pegs/ fixed exchange rates all fail in the long run, and so the US did the right thing by not trying to maintain any fixed value of the US currency against *anything*. For a longer discussion of why the gold standard was not a good idea, read Paul Krugman's "Goldbug variations."

[CBGBConnisur]

Like I said the Dollar's fate has nothing to do with politics. Greenspan helped to turn America into a debtor nation. We have no manufacturing, many of our jobs constantly go overseas, even the service ones that were meant to replace the factory work. Our middle class is in serious jeopardy of winding up in poverty. I would not be surprised if favelas show up in the good old United States, some areas of major US cities are already looking squalid. Recall that Schwarzenegger movie the Running Man?? The scenario was about the USA in 2017 where oil winds up in short supply leading to an economic collapse of the US, in that movie the US turns into a third world style police state with heavily guarded modern areas and shanty towns, only the superwealthy have rights, a dictatorship of the affluent, kind of resembles what Brazil looks like today, and handful of rich people and most in dire poverty. Real scary stuff.

Obama is certainly not going to be a savior of American democracy. People are going to be disappointed in his quest for Change.

[Bubba Boy]

Alan Greenspan ran really loose monetary policy for years, this essentially expanded the level of debt in the banking system and combined with Bush's policies (ie higher budget deficits and the war spending) and has got us to where we are now. Bernanke inherited the subprime mess which has dominated monetary policy since. He is basically just trying to keep the banking system from imploding.

[CBGBConnisur]

Ben Bernanke is the steward of the Dollar's value, he has kept interest rates low and has no plans to raise them. The US has a mountain of debt, he would rather risk inflation than see the economy go into stand still. The US is not in a true recession but its growing at a snail's pace. The ECB recently raised interest rates, the Fed was hoping the ECB would cut interest rates to narrow the spread between US and European rates, which would put less pressure on the Dollar. The spread in interest rates between the US Federal Reserve and other major banks is one of the reasons why the Dollar continues to lose value.

I have a lot of friends who work in real estate in the US and most of them still have jobs... because of foreign real estate buyers, many from Europe and the Mideast, the US is going through a fire sale right now.

[Gfechaser]

I have noticed that there seems to be some antagonizing going on concerning the political candidates and as a result some race baiting. I understand that everyone has an opinion but can we try to focus on monetary policy instead of quips about race and politics? When it is all said and done the information and tips on this site are designed to help all of us. Who cares about race really when we all utilize the information provided on this site to enjoy the p4p scene.

[Alex Deuce]

When the majority of people are saying this, that just backs up that the market will do the exact opposite. We are very close to the bottom of the dollar cycle. The more people that say what is below, the better it is.

Bubba I have used your Rio guides with the great success and look at you as being very knowledgeable of Rio. However, i am going to have to respectfully disagree on your assumption of the resiliency of the American Dollar. The American Consumer has been floating this economy for decades. We have a trade imbalance excluding oil that is sending trillions of money out of the US economy on a yearly basis. Our mid level management and skilled and semi skilled workers are loosing income and jobs by the millions every year. Therefore, when the consumer/worker has no more credit nor access to a decent wage the economy will slow and start to retreat. You think the dollar is weak now? Wait until the first quarterly negative GDP report. A negative GDP report is coming before the election. The administration is running out gimmicks to publish it as positive. I look at the markets as predictors of GDP, especially in the manufacturing and retail sectors. Anybody looked at Bloomburge or the Wall street lately?


PS. I hate McCain Als0! Not because of his age, race or constituency. I hate McShame because he is not the person he was in 2000. He is not the straight shooter with common sense solutions to problems. He is what he is trying to paint Obamma as; "A political Hack that will Say or change any position to win. And that shit with Bud Day was the most absolutely Hypocritical, Low Class ,immoral (and yes immoral) thing i have ever seen! McCain might just actually be the Manchurian candidate for real!

Vote "None of the Above in 08"

[Bubba Boy]

You racially slur Asians and Whites. You also use discrimatory comments about McCains age?

You are a rascist and a biggot. You are exactly the type of person he has had to distance himself from to keep his chances alive.

[Bubba Boy]

When the majority of people are saying this, that just backs up that the market will do the exact opposite. We are very close to the bottom of the dollar cycle. The more people that say what is below, the better it is.

[Alex Deuce]

The Euro has been rapidly replacing the US dollar as a popular reserve currency choice. Already the big OPEC nations are untying their currencies from the dollar and moving to a basket of currencies. The IMF recently audited the US Federal Reserve. The Dollar continues its swan dive, Ben Bernanke will never lift interest rates, he rather have hyperinflation than US economic slowdown.

The writing is on the wall for the Greenback, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Bush or Obama. The US has consumed more than it has produced for nearly four decades and now the chickens have come home to roost.

I could not give a flip what some moron canuck thinks of California and of Obama. Canadians like Bill hate Obama because he is going to throw NAFTA in the trash. Australia is lucky that it has China to fall back on than the US.

Ditto and my final thought was suppose to read as ;

COMPETENCE OVER IDEOLOGY IN 08" AND "GET TO BRAZIL BEFORE THE DOLLAR TANKS TO 1-1

[CBGBConnisur]

The Euro has been rapidly replacing the US dollar as a popular reserve currency choice. Already the big OPEC nations are untying their currencies from the dollar and moving to a basket of currencies. The IMF recently audited the US Federal Reserve. The Dollar continues its swan dive, Ben Bernanke will never lift interest rates, he rather have hyperinflation than US economic slowdown.

The writing is on the wall for the Greenback, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Bush or Obama. The US has consumed more than it has produced for nearly four decades and now the chickens have come home to roost.

I could not give a flip what some moron canuck thinks of California and of Obama. Canadians like Bill hate Obama because he is going to throw NAFTA in the trash. Australia is lucky that it has China to fall back on than the US.

[Wanderer1000]

Edward M -

I asked the exchange rate at Luomo on my second visit about 2+ weeks ago. It was the older lady behind the desk, the one who never wants to give you the receipt, and always rounds the bill up four or five reals. She told me 1.60R was the exchange - 2 below the official exchange at the time. I don´t like this lady - still pulls this crap on me after I´ve been going there many times over several weeks.

Of course, I should have asked again with the other ladies on another day, since I know you´ve said they´ve given a great exchange in the past. I just haven´t exchanged too many bills on this trip, so I didn´t bother.

It´s too bad that L let´s a lady like this play nickel and dime games with gringos (I assume she doesn´t pull this on brasileros, but who knows) - it´s not a big deal money wise, but it makes the customer feel disrespected.

[Alex Deuce]

I normally do not lend much credence to wiki. I only use it for my friends that don't like to read multiple books. This article has some absolutely glaring observations on both sides about the Great Depression and our current state.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression

O! and Bill1963 a couple of things;

1. Yes, we are in danger of having the dollar being removed as the reserve currency. The stability and value of the US dollar is being undermined by our deficit spending and low rate of return for foreign investors. Russia and even our lil friends the Saudis have been pointing this out. Our currency is one of the major factors in the rise in the cost of Fuel along with speculation. And don't give me that shit about more drilling. Its pure BS! There a over 100 million acres not 70 that have not been touched. Will we eventually have to drill more? Yes, no doubt. But our drilling should be based upon finding additional supplies not whether a company can make 6% or 10% ROI. Its called GREED. You noticed that no oil company has been clamoring to give back their offshore oil lease. Hell the only state that has bought them back has been Florida. The only reason that happened was that the oil companies were friends of the Bush's and the Presidents Brother was placating the tourist industry for re-election.

2. I am an independent and I will say this, for a nation with over a 302 million people to have these two candidates is a fucking shame. I hate both parties. Both are full of shit and allow special interest to rob America blind.

3. McCaine is about as competent as George Bush. You see it in his slow comprehension of the major issues and his dogged clinging to ideals that got us in to this mess. If you want to talk about good Republicans with Ideas and the mental capacity to move this nation forward, lets talk about Trent Lott and Newt Gengrich. The problem is that both men fell into the same moral virtue and rigid idioms of the rove machine that they set up for Democrats.

Lets get back to McCaine; He was a spoiled Military brat. He did not Excel at anything prior to being shot down over Hanoi. Im a military brat. You want to talk about a sticky issue? Ask a navy man about the career chances of a cadets that finishes 5th from bottom, crashed 4 planes, two of his own negligence, got caught twice for Adultry and insubordination. They would tell you that there is no chance in green hell he makes it past 4 years. But, we got ole Johnny daddy pulling the strings. There is a reason there are over 500 pages missing from his record. His time as a POW were the SINGULAR most heroic act of his life PERIOD. Everything else has been a smoke screen to cover up that he is borderline morally corrupt and does not have the mental capacity to effectively evaluate complex issues! His personality and history of a POW lead to his high praise as commander of the southeast training wing located at Cecil field in Jacksonville florida. Most of the administrative and planning work was done by his XO. Most military give him the benefit of the doubt cause of his POW status. But they all know how he got to where he is. And don’t get me start on the Keyton 5 incident. He was guilty as hell. He triangulated a position as a corruption fighter to cover up his own shit.

4. Obama, may be inexperienced but I believe he has the mental capacity to see beyond the trees in the forest. The major issue i have with him is that he refuses to grab his nuts and make a stand! It’s always the perceived weakness of practical people to waffle in the face of decisions. If he cannot convince me by the time of the election, I will be writing in "None of the Above."

5. A working person would be a damn fool to vote republican. They are continually voting against their own economic needs. John McCain says lets let the free market take care of the situation and give tax incentives. Well, you have to have a job to get the tax incentive. The free market regardless of regulation, says it’s cheaper due to wages and lack of competition for employees to move our shops to china and India. Therefore, how can an working American get a job and realize that tax break if he is unemployed? His would be boss is getting not only greater tax break than he but millions in stock options from moving that guys job. OO!! But they are bitter over democrat’s stances on Religion and Guns. Fucking ignorant Asses! So much so, that when their disposable income rose over 9% under Clinton/Newt they were still bitter and more concerned that the guy got a blow job than the fact that they had more money in the bank.


Last statement: "COMPETENCE OF IDEOLOGY IN 08" AND "GET TO BRAZIL BEFORE THE DOLLAR TANKS TO 1-1"