Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Reserve Currencies. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Reserve Currencies. Sort by date Show all posts

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Reserve Currencies

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Reserve Currencies: Why are they important for an economy? - EcAlt > .
23-1-16 Bretton Woods - Why it's Important - EEE > .
15-1-23 A Japanese Lesson in Deflation for Europe - WSJ > .

Reserve currencies are crucial to the stability of any currency. Central banks and institutions use currency reserves to achieve their economic aims. As such, foreign exchange reserves have only grown in importance over time.

A reserve currency (or anchor currency) is a foreign currency that is held in significant quantities by central banks or other monetary authorities as part of their foreign exchange reserves (as cash, sovereign debt, treasury bonds, financial securities, and loans). As of 2020, China holds $1.1Tn of US debt. The reserve currency can be used in international transactions, international investments and all aspects of the global economy. It is often considered a hard currency or safe-haven currency.

Reserve currency status has both benefits (such as lower exchange rate risk and greater buying power) and drawbacks (such as artificially low interest rates that can spur asset bubbles). How? Higher demand for a reserve currency creates lower borrowing costs through depressed bond yields (most reserves are of government bonds). Issuing countries are also able to borrow in their home currencies and are less worried about propping up their currencies to avoid default. Low borrowing costs stemming from issuing a reserve currency may prompt loose spending by both the public and private sectors, which may result in asset bubbles and ballooning government debt

The U.S. was able to spend freely on stimuli partly because excess Chinese savings were parked in the dollar. This occurrence is not novel; Robert Triffin (of Triffin Dilemma fame) identified this shortcoming while the gold standard was still in place. Failure to control the outflow of currency places weak financial institutions at risk, and criminals love dollars.

The United Kingdom's pound sterling was the primary reserve currency of much of the world in the 19th century and first half of the 20th century. However, by the end of the 20th century, the United States dollar had become the world's dominant reserve currency. The world's need for dollars has allowed the United States government to borrow at lower costs, giving the United States an advantage in excess of $100 billion per year.

Reserve currencies are typically issued by developed, stable countries. The currency most commonly held as a foreign exchange reserve is the U.S. dollar, which, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), comprised nearly 62% of allocated reserves as of late 2012. Other currencies held in reserve include the euro, Japanese yen, Swiss franc and pound sterling. The dollar, while still the most widely held reserve currency, has seen increased competition from the euro. The euro has grown from slightly less than an 18% share of allocated reserves, when it was introduced into the financial markets in 1999, to 24% at the end of 2011.

The IMF reports both allocated reserves, meaning that a country has identified the currencies held in reserve, and total foreign exchange holdings. The overall percentage of total holdings that are allocated reserves has fallen steadily over the years, from 74% in 1995 to 55% in 2011. Much of this shift can be explained by changing foreign exchange holdings in emerging and developing countries. In 1995, advanced economies held around 67% of total foreign exchange reserves, with 82% of these being allocated reserves. By 2011, the picture had been flipped on its head: emerging and developing countries held 67% of total reserves, with less than 39% allocated. Emerging countries now hold roughly $6.8 trillion in reserve currency.  Between 1995 and 2011, the amount of currency held in reserve increased by over 730%, from around $1.4 trillion to $10.2 trillion.

The currencies of China (the world's 2nd largest economy), Brazil (6th), Russia (9th) and India (10th) - the BRIC countries - are not considered reserve, which is why these countries have been more vocal proponents of the creation of a reserve currency unattached to any one country.

Historically, reserve currencies have come and gone. International currencies in the past have (excluding those discussed below) included the Greek drachma, coined in the fifth century B.C., the Roman denari, the Byzantine solidus and Arab dinar of the middle-ages and the French franc.

The Venetian ducat and the Florentine florin became the gold-based currency of choice between Europe and the Arab world from the 13th to 16th centuries, since gold was easier than silver to mint in standard sizes and transport over long distances. It was the Spanish-American silver dollar, however, which created the first true global reserve currency recognized in Europe, Asia and the Americas from the 16th to 19th centuries due to abundant silver supplies from Spanish America.

While the Dutch guilder was a reserve currency of somewhat lesser scope, used between Europe and the territories of the Dutch colonial empire from the 17th to 18th centuries, it was also a silver standard currency fed with the output of Spanish-American mines flowing through the Spanish Netherlands. The Dutch, through the Amsterdam Wisselbank (the Bank of Amsterdam), were also the first to establish a reserve currency whose monetary unit was stabilized using practices familiar to modern central banking (as opposed to the Spanish dollar stabilized through American mine output and Spanish fiat) and which can be considered as the precursor to modern-day monetary policy

It was therefore the Dutch which served as the model for bank money and reserve currencies stabilized by central banks, with the establishment of Bank of England in 1694 and the Bank of France in the 19th century. The British pound sterling, in particular, was poised to dislodge the Spanish-American dollar's hegemony as the rest of the world transitioned to the gold standard in the last quarter of the 19th century. At that point, the UK was the primary exporter of manufactured goods and services, and over 60% of world trade was invoiced in pounds sterling. British banks were also expanding overseas; London was the world centre for insurance and commodity markets and British capital was the leading source of foreign investment around the world; sterling soon became the standard currency used for international commercial transactions.

Attempts were made in the interwar period to restore the gold standard. The British Gold Standard Act reintroduced the gold bullion standard in 1925, followed by many other countries. This led to relative stability, followed by deflation, but because the onset of the Great Depression and other factors, global trade greatly declined and the gold standard fell. Speculative attacks on the pound forced Britain entirely off the gold standard in 1931. The United Kingdom's pound sterling was the primary reserve currency until the UK almost bankrupted itself fighting WW1 and WW2 resulting in the Pound losing its status as the world's most important reserve currency. In the 1950s 55% of global reserves were still held in sterling; but the share was 10% lower within 20 years. As of 30 September 2019, the pound sterling represented the fourth largest proportion (by USD equivalent value) of foreign currency reserves.

The establishment of the U.S. Federal Reserve System in 1913 and the economic vacuum following the World Wars facilitated the emergence of the United States as an economic superpower. 

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the system suffered setbacks ostensibly due to problems pointed out by the Triffin dilemma—the conflict of economic interests that arises between short-term domestic objectives and long-term international objectives when a national currency also serves as a world reserve currency. The Triffin dilemma or Triffin paradox was identified in the 1960s by Belgian-American economist Robert Triffin, who pointed out that the country whose currency, being the global reserve currency, foreign nations wish to hold, must be willing to supply the world with an extra supply of its currency to fulfill world demand for these foreign exchange reserves, thus leading to a trade deficit.

The use of a national currency, such as the U.S. dollar, as global reserve currency leads to tension between its national and global monetary policy. This is reflected in fundamental imbalances in the balance of payments, specifically the current account, as some goals require an outflow of dollars from the United States, while others require an overall inflow.

After WW2, the international financial system was governed by a formal agreement, the Bretton Woods System. Under this system, the United States dollar (USD) was placed deliberately as the anchor of the system, with the US government guaranteeing other central banks that they could sell their US dollar reserves at a fixed rate for gold.

Specifically, the Triffin dilemma is usually cited to articulate the problems with the role of the U.S. dollar as the reserve currency under the Bretton Woods system. John Maynard Keynes had anticipated this difficulty and had advocated the use of a global reserve currency called 'Bancor'. The bancor was a supranational currency that John Maynard Keynes and E. F. Schumacher conceptualised in the years 1940–1942 and which the United Kingdom proposed to introduce after WW2. The name was inspired by the French banque or ('bank gold'). This newly created supranational currency would then be used in international trade as a unit of account within a proposed multilateral clearing system—the International Clearing Union (which would also need to be founded).

Currently, the IMF's SDRs are the closest thing to the proposed Bancor but they have not been adopted widely enough to replace the dollar as the global reserve currency.

Additionally, in 1971 Nixon suspended the convertibility of the USD to gold, thus creating a fully fiat global reserve currency system.

In the wake of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, the governor of the People's Bank of China explicitly named the reserve currency status of the US dollar as a contributing factor to global savings and investment imbalances that led to the crisis. As such, the Triffin Dilemma is related to the Global Savings Glut hypothesis because the dollar's reserve currency role exacerbates the U.S. current account deficit due to heightened demand for dollars.

Following the 2020 economic recession, the IMF opined about the emergence of "A New Bretton Woods Moment" which could imply the need for a new global reserve currency system. (see: § Calls for an alternative reserve currency)

Economists debate whether a single reserve currency will always dominate the global economy. Many have recently argued that one currency will almost always dominate due to network externalities (sometimes called "the network effect"), especially in the field of invoicing trade and denominating foreign debt securities, meaning that there are strong incentives to conform to the choice that dominates the marketplace. The argument is that, in the absence of sufficiently large shocks, a currency that dominates the marketplace will not lose much ground to challengers.

However, some economists, such as Barry Eichengreen, argue that this is not as true when it comes to the denomination of official reserves because the network externalities are not strong. As long as the currency's market is sufficiently liquid, the benefits of reserve diversification are strong, as it insures against large capital losses. The implication is that the world may well soon begin to move away from a financial system dominated uniquely by the US dollar. In the first half of the 20th century, multiple currencies did share the status as primary reserve currencies. Although the British Sterling was the largest currency, both the French franc and the German mark shared large portions of the market until WW1, after which the mark was replaced by the dollar. Since WW2, the dollar has dominated official reserves, but this is likely a reflection of the unusual domination of the American economy during this period, as well as official discouragement of reserve status from the potential rivals, Germany and Japan.

The top reserve currency is generally selected by the banking community for the strength and stability of the economy in which it is used. Thus, as a currency becomes less stable, or its economy becomes less dominant, bankers may over time abandon it for a currency issued by a larger or more stable economy. This can take a relatively long time, as recognition is important in determining a reserve currency. For example, it took many years after the United States overtook the United Kingdom as the world's largest economy before the dollar overtook the pound sterling as the dominant global reserve currency. In 1944, when the US dollar was chosen as the world reference currency at Bretton Woods, it was only the second currency in global reserves.

The G7 (G8) also frequently issues public statements as to exchange rates. In the past due to the Plaza Accord, its predecessor bodies could directly manipulate rates to reverse large trade deficits.

A report released by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in 2010, called for abandoning the U.S. dollar as the single major reserve currency. The report states that the new reserve system should not be based on a single currency or even multiple national currencies but instead permit the emission of international liquidity to create a more stable global financial system.

Countries such as Russia and the People's Republic of China, central banks, and economic analysts and groups, such as the Gulf Cooperation Council, have expressed a desire to see an independent new currency replace the dollar as the reserve currency. However, it is recognized that the US dollar remains the strongest reserve currency.

On 10 July 2009, Russian President Medvedev proposed a new 'World currency' at the G8 meeting in London as an alternative reserve currency to replace the dollar.

At the beginning of the 21st century, gold and crude oil were still priced in dollars, which helps export inflation and has brought complaints about OPEC's policies of managing oil quotas to maintain dollar price stability.

Some have proposed the use of the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) special drawing rights (SDRs) as a reserve. China has proposed using SDRs, calculated daily from a basket of U.S. dollar, euro, Japanese yen and British pounds, for international payments.

On 3 September 2009, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) issued a report calling for a new reserve currency based on the SDR, managed by a new global reserve bank. The IMF released a report in February 2011, stating that using SDRs "could help stabilize the global financial system."

Commodity currency .
Exorbitant privilege .
Floating currency .
Foreign exchange reserves .
Cryptocurrency .
Fiat currency .
Hard currency .
Krugerrand .
Seigniorage .
Special drawing rights .
Triffin dilemma .
World currency .


21-11-24 Indian government set to ban cryptocurrencies:

A non-fungible token (NFT) is a unique and non-interchangeable unit of data stored on a digital ledger (blockchain). NFTs can be associated with easily-reproducible items such as photos, videos, 3D models, audio, and other types of digital files as unique items (analogous to a certificate of authenticity). NFTs use blockchain technology to provide a public proof of ownership. Copies of the original file are not restricted to the owner of the NFT, and can be copied and shared like any file. The lack of interchangeability (fungibility) distinguishes NFTs from blockchain cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin.

NFTs have drawn criticism with respect to the energy cost and carbon footprint associated with validating blockchain transactions as well as its frequent use in art scams. Further criticisms challenge the usefulness of establishing proof of ownership in an unregulated market based on digital files that are easy to copy.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

SDRs - Special Drawing Rights

2021 What is the SDR? - IMF > .The IMF's Special Drawing Rights (SDR or XDR) - 1 Minute > .

The SDR  Special Drawing Right  is an international reserve asset, created by the IMF in 1969 to supplement its member countries’ official reserves. Read more: https://bit.ly/3iin1gU .

The SDR (IMF) is an international reserve asset, created by the IMF in 1969 to supplement its member countries’ official reserves. So far SDR 204.2 billion (equivalent to about US$293 billion) have been allocated to members, including SDR 182.6 billion allocated in 2009 in the wake of the global financial crisis. The value of the SDR is based on a basket of five currencies—the U.S. dollar, the euro, the Chinese renminbi, the Japanese yen, and the British pound sterling.

Special drawing rights (SDRs) are supplementary foreign exchange reserve assets defined and maintained by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). SDRs are units of account for the IMF, and not a currency per se. They represent a claim to currency held by IMF member countries for which they may be exchanged. SDRs were created in 1969 to supplement a shortfall of preferred foreign exchange reserve assets, namely gold and U.S. dollars. The ISO 4217 currency code for special drawing rights is XDR and the numeric code is 960.

SDRs are allocated by the IMF to countries, and cannot be held or used by private parties. The number of SDRs in existence was around XDR 21.4 billion in August 2009. During the global financial crisis of 2009, an additional XDR 182.6 billion was allocated to "provide liquidity to the global economic system and supplement member countries’ official reserves". By October 2014, the number of SDRs in existence was XDR 204 billion. Due to economic stress caused by the global pandemic (2020-2021) some economists and several finance ministers of poorer countries have called for a new allocation of $4T to support member economies as they seek ways to recover. In March 2021 the G24 and others proposed an allocation of $500B for this purpose.

The value of a SDR is based on a basket of key international currencies reviewed by IMF every five years. The weights assigned to each currency in the XDR basket are adjusted to take into account their current prominence in terms of international trade and national foreign exchange reserves. In the review conducted in November 2015, the IMF decided to add the Renminbi (Chinese yuan) to the basket, effective 1 October 2016. Since that date, the XDR basket has consisted of the following five currencies: U.S. dollar 41.73%, euro 30.93%, renminbi (Chinese yuan) 10.92%, Japanese yen 8.33%, British pound 8.09%

The SDR was created as a supplementary international reserve asset in the context of the Bretton Woods fixed exchange rate system. The collapse of Bretton Woods system in 1973 and the shift of major currencies to floating exchange rate regimes lessened the reliance on the SDR as a global reserve asset. Nonetheless, SDR allocations can play a role in providing liquidity and supplementing member countries’ official reserves, as was the case amid the global financial crisis.

The SDR serves as the unit of account of the IMF and some other international organizations.

The SDR is neither a currency nor a claim on the IMF. Rather, it is a potential claim on the freely usable currencies of IMF members. SDRs can be exchanged for these currencies.

Friday, August 22, 2014

Gold Standard

2022 Was Dropping The Gold Standard A Mistake? - EcEx > .

gold standard is a monetary system in which the standard economic unit of account is based on a fixed quantity of gold. The gold standard was widely used in the 19th and early part of the 20th century. Most nations abandoned the gold standard as the basis of their monetary systems at some point in the 20th century, although many still hold substantial gold reserves.

In the 1790s, the United Kingdom suffered a silver shortage. It ceased to mint larger silver coins and instead issued "token" silver coins and overstruck foreign coins. With the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the Bank of England began the massive recoinage programme that created standard gold sovereigns, circulating crowns, half-crowns and eventually copper farthings in 1821. The recoinage of silver after a long drought produced a burst of coins. The United Kingdom struck nearly 40 million shillings between 1816 and 1820, 17 million half crowns and 1.3 million silver crowns.

The 1819 Act for the Resumption of Cash Payments set 1823 as the date for resumption of convertibility, which was reached by 1821. Throughout the 1820s, small notes were issued by regional banks. This was restricted in 1826, while the Bank of England was allowed to set up regional branches. In 1833 however, Bank of England notes were made legal tender and redemption by other banks was discouraged. In 1844, the Bank Charter Act established that Bank of England notes were fully backed by gold and they became the legal standard. According to the strict interpretation of the gold standard, this 1844 act marked the establishment of a full gold standard for British money.

On the 21st of September 1931 Britain abandoned the gold standard. The gold standard was a system where the value of a country’s currency was directly linked to a specific quantity of gold. Britain had used the system for centuries, but the impact of First World War and the later Great Depression placed immense pressure on the country’s financial stability.

By September 1931, Britain’s economic situation had deteriorated to a critical point. Foreign investors had been converting pounds into gold, depleting the country’s reserves. The Labour government, led by Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, responded by taking unprecedented action. After consultations with the Bank of England, the Treasury issued a statement announcing its intention to suspend the gold standard on Sunday 20 September, and parliament approved the Bill the next day.

Britain’s departure from the gold standard had immediate and lasting consequences. Almost immediately, the pound sterling experienced devaluation. This made British goods more competitively priced on international markets and provided a boost to the country’s export industries that had been suffering as a result of the Great Depression, but meant that foreign investments in Britain lost value.

The government’s decision to abandon the gold standard was soon adopted by other countries. This signalled a major shift in the nature of global economics and gave more opportunities for flexible exchange rates and increased government intervention in monetary policy. These in turn became crucial tools for managing economic crises in subsequent decades, and since 2013 there hasn’t been a single country that continues to use the gold standard.

The pound left the gold standard in 1931 and a number of currencies of countries that historically had performed a large amount of their trade in sterling were pegged to sterling instead of to gold. The Bank of England took the decision to leave the gold standard abruptly and unilaterally.

The gold specie standard ended in the United Kingdom and the rest of the British Empire at the outbreak of WW1, when Treasury notes replaced the circulation of gold sovereigns and gold half sovereigns. Legally, the gold specie standard was not repealed. The end of the gold standard was successfully effected by the Bank of England through appeals to patriotism urging citizens not to redeem paper money for gold specie. It was only in 1925, when Britain returned to the gold standard in conjunction with Australia and South Africa, that the gold specie standard was officially ended.

The British Gold Standard Act 1925 both introduced the gold bullion standard and simultaneously repealed the gold specie standard. The new standard ended the circulation of gold specie coins. Instead, the law compelled the authorities to sell gold bullion on demand at a fixed price, but "only in the form of bars containing approximately four hundred ounces troy [12 kg] of fine gold". John Maynard Keynes, citing deflationary dangers, argued against resumption of the gold standard. By fixing the price at a level which restored the pre-war exchange rate of US$4.86 per pound sterling, Churchill is argued to have made an error that led to depression, unemployment and the 1926 general strike. The decision was described by Andrew Turnbull as a "historic mistake".

Many other countries followed Britain in returning to the gold standard, leading to a period of relative stability but also deflation. This state of affairs lasted until the Great Depression (1929–1939) forced countries off the gold standard. On September 19, 1931, speculative attacks on the pound led the Bank of England to abandon the gold standard, ostensibly "temporarily". However, the ostensibly temporary departure from the gold standard had unexpectedly positive effects on the economy, leading to greater acceptance of departing from the gold standard. Loans from American and French Central Banks of £50,000,000 were insufficient and exhausted in a matter of weeks, due to large gold outflows across the Atlantic. The British benefited from this departure. They could now use monetary policy to stimulate the economy. Australia and New Zealand had already left the standard and Canada quickly followed suit.

The interwar partially-backed gold standard was inherently unstable because of the conflict between the expansion of liabilities to foreign central banks and the resulting deterioration in the Bank of England's reserve ratio. France was then attempting to make Paris a world class financial center, and it received large gold flows as well.

In May 1931 a run on Austria's largest commercial bank caused it to fail. The run spread to Germany, where the central bank also collapsed. International financial assistance was too late and in July 1931 Germany adopted exchange controls, followed by Austria in October. The Austrian and German experiences, as well as British budgetary and political difficulties, were among the factors that destroyed confidence in sterling, which occurred in mid-July 1931. Runs ensued and the Bank of England lost much of its reserves.

Economists, such as Barry Eichengreen, Peter Temin and Ben Bernanke, blame the gold standard of the 1920s for prolonging the economic depression which started in 1929 and lasted for about a decade. It has been described as the consensus view among economists. In the United States, adherence to the gold standard prevented the Federal Reserve from expanding the money supply to stimulate the economy, fund insolvent banks and fund government deficits that could "prime the pump" for an expansion. Once off the gold standard, it became free to engage in such money creation. The gold standard limited the flexibility of the central banks' monetary policy by limiting their ability to expand the money supply. In the US, the central bank was required by the Federal Reserve Act (1913) to have gold backing 40% of its demand notes.

Higher interest rates intensified the deflationary pressure on the dollar and reduced investment in U.S. banks. Commercial banks converted Federal Reserve Notes to gold in 1931, reducing its gold reserves and forcing a corresponding reduction in the amount of currency in circulation. This speculative attack created a panic in the U.S. banking system. Fearing imminent devaluation many depositors withdrew funds from U.S. banks. As bank runs grew, a reverse multiplier effect caused a contraction in the money supply (?). Additionally the New York Fed had loaned over $150 million in gold (over 240 tons) to European Central Banks. This transfer contracted the U.S. money supply. The foreign loans became questionable once Britain, Germany, Austria and other European countries went off the gold standard in 1931 and weakened confidence in the dollar (?).

The forced contraction of the money supply resulted in deflation. Even as nominal interest rates dropped, deflation-adjusted real interest rates remained high, rewarding those who held onto money instead of spending it, further slowing the economy. Recovery in the United States was slower than in Britain, in part due to Congressional reluctance to abandon the gold standard and float the U.S. currency as Britain had done.

In the early 1930s, the Federal Reserve defended the dollar by raising interest rates, trying to increase the demand for dollars. This helped attract international investors who bought foreign assets with gold.

Congress passed the Gold Reserve Act on 30 January 1934; the measure nationalized all gold by ordering Federal Reserve banks to turn over their supply to the U.S. Treasury. In return, the banks received gold certificates to be used as reserves against deposits and Federal Reserve notes. The act also authorized the president to devalue the gold dollar. Under this authority, the president, on 31 January 1934, changed the value of the dollar from $20.67 to the troy ounce to $35 to the troy ounce, a devaluation of over 40%.

Other factors in the prolongation of the Great Depression include trade wars and the reduction in international trade caused by barriers such as Smoot–Hawley Tariff in the U.S. and the Imperial Preference policies of Great Britain, the failure of central banks to act responsibly, government policies designed to prevent wages from falling, such as the Davis–Bacon Act of 1931, during the deflationary period resulting in production costs dropping slower than sales prices, thereby injuring business profits (?) and increases in taxes to reduce budget deficits and to support new programs such as Social Security. The U.S. top marginal income tax rate went from 25% to 63% in 1932 and to 79% in 1936, while the bottom rate increased over tenfold, from .375% in 1929 to 4% in 1932. The concurrent massive drought resulted in the U.S. Dust Bowl.

The Austrian School asserted that the Great Depression was the result of a credit bust. Alan Greenspan wrote that the bank failures of the 1930s were sparked by Great Britain dropping the gold standard in 1931. This act "tore asunder" any remaining confidence in the banking system. Financial historian Niall Ferguson wrote that what made the Great Depression truly 'great' was the European banking crisis of 1931. According to Fed Chairman Marriner Eccles, the root cause was the concentration of wealth resulting in a stagnating or decreasing standard of living for the poor and middle class. These classes went into debt, producing the credit explosion of the 1920s. Eventually, the debt load grew too heavy, resulting in the massive defaults and financial panics of the 1930s.

Thursday, March 16, 2017

44-7-1 Bretton Woods Conference 44-7-21

2019 (Bretton Woods, Gold Standard) New World Order - Caspian > .1931-9-21 Britain abandoned gold standard; Parliament's Amendment Act - HiPo > .
Currencies - Way of the Triffin - Weighs 'n Means >> .


Early in the Second World War, John Maynard Keynes of the British Treasury and Harry Dexter White of the United States Treasury Department independently began to develop ideas about the financial order of the postwar world. After negotiation between officials of the United States and United Kingdom, and consultation with some other Allies, a "Joint Statement by Experts on the Establishment of an International Monetary Fund," was published simultaneously in a number of Allied countries on April 21, 1944. On May 25, 1944, the U.S. government invited the Allied countries to send representatives to an international monetary conference, "for the purpose of formulating definite proposals for an International Monetary Fund and possibly a Bank for Reconstruction and Development." (The word "International" was only added to the Bank's title late in the Bretton Woods Conference.) The United States also invited a smaller group of countries to send experts to a preliminary conference in Atlantic City, New Jersey, to develop draft proposals for the Bretton Woods conference. The Atlantic City conference was held from June 15–30, 1944.

Preparing to rebuild the international economic system while World War II was still raging, 730 delegates from all 44 Allied nations gathered at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, for the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, also known as the Bretton Woods Conference. The delegates deliberated during 1–22 July 1944, and signed the Bretton Woods agreement on its final day. Setting up a system of rules, institutions, and procedures to regulate the international monetary system, these accords established the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), which today is part of the World Bank Group. The United States, which controlled two thirds of the world's gold, insisted that the Bretton Woods system rest on both gold and the US dollar. Soviet representatives attended the conference but later declined to ratify the final agreements, charging that the institutions they had created were "branches of Wall Street". These organizations became operational in 1945 after a sufficient number of countries had ratified the agreement.

The Bretton Woods Conference had three main results: (1) Articles of Agreement to create the IMF, whose purpose was to promote stability of exchange rates and financial flows. (2) Articles of Agreement to create the IBRD, whose purpose was to speed reconstruction after the Second World War and to foster economic development, especially through lending to build infrastructure. (3) Other recommendations for international economic cooperation. The Final Act of the conference incorporated these agreements and recommendations.

Within the Final Act, the most important part in the eyes of the conference participants and for the later operation of the world economy was the IMF agreement. Its major features were:
  • An adjustably pegged foreign exchange market rate system: Exchange rates were pegged to gold. Governments were only supposed to alter exchange rates to correct a "fundamental disequilibrium."
  • Member countries pledged to make their currencies convertible for trade-related and other current account transactions. There were, however, transitional provisions that allowed for indefinite delay in accepting that obligation, and the IMF agreement explicitly allowed member countries to regulate capital flows. The goal of widespread current account convertibility did not become operative until December 1958, when the currencies of the IMF's Western European members and their colonies became convertible.
  • As it was possible that exchange rates thus established might not be favourable to a country's balance of payments position, governments had the power to revise them by up to 10% from the initially agreed level ("par value") without objection by the IMF. The IMF could concur in or object to changes beyond that level. The IMF could not force a member to undo a change, but could deny the member access to the resources of the IMF.
  • All member countries were required to subscribe to the IMF's capital. Membership in the IBRD was conditioned on being a member of the IMF. Voting in both institutions was apportioned according to formulas giving greater weight to countries contributing more capital ("quotas").
The Bretton Woods system of monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the United States, Canada, Western European countries, Australia, and Japan after the 1944 Bretton Woods Agreement. The Bretton Woods system was the first example of a fully negotiated monetary order intended to govern monetary relations among independent states. The chief features of the Bretton Woods system were an obligation for each country to adopt a monetary policy that maintained its external exchange rates within 1 percent by tying its currency to gold and the ability of the IMF to bridge temporary imbalances of payments. Also, there was a need to address the lack of cooperation among other countries and to prevent competitive devaluation of the currencies as well.

On 15 August 1971, the United States unilaterally terminated convertibility of the US dollar to gold, effectively bringing the Bretton Woods system to an end and rendering the dollar a fiat currency. This action, referred to as the Nixon shock, created the situation in which the U.S. dollar became a reserve currency used by many states. At the same time, many fixed currencies(such as the pound sterling) also became free-floating.

The Nixon shock was a series of economic measures undertaken by United States President Richard Nixon in 1971, in response to increasing inflation, the most significant of which were wage and price freezes, surcharges on imports, and the unilateral cancellation of the direct international convertibility of the United States dollar to gold.

While Nixon's actions did not formally abolish the existing Bretton Woods system of international financial exchange, the suspension of one of its key components effectively rendered the Bretton Woods system inoperative. While Nixon publicly stated his intention to resume direct convertibility of the dollar after reforms to the Bretton Woods system had been implemented, all attempts at reform proved unsuccessful. By 1973, the Bretton Woods system was replaced de facto by the current regime based on freely floating fiat currencies.

Monday, April 30, 2012

● Economics Course



Balancing Economies ..
Bank Failures ⇔ Economic Recession ..
Bond Yields - Interest Rate vs Inflation ..
Brain Drain ..
Currency Manipulation ..
Currency Swap & IRD ..
Current Account ..
Debt ..Devaluation Risks - X ..
Wariness in Economics ..

» Economics Playlists » >>

Crash Course Economics - CrCo >> .
4 - Supply and Demand ..6 - Productivity and Growth ..8 - Fiscal Policy and Stimulus ..13 - Recession, Hyperinflation, and Stagflation ..17 - Income and Wealth Inequality ..29 - Economics of Healthcare ..35 - Economics of Happiness ..

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

⧫ Domestic Economics

Domestic Economics
1929 Stock Markets Slump & Crash ..
Agricultural Futures - 21st C ..
Black Market, WW2 ..
Blockchains, Cryptocurrencies, NFTs
Debt - Productive, Counterproductive ..
Demographic Engineering Fail ..
"Dutch Disease" ..Economic Recessions and Recoveries ..

Monday, May 24, 2010

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Wednesday, August 20, 2014

IMF - International Monetary Fund

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How the IMF Works - IMF > .
23-1-16 Bretton Woods - Why it's Important - EEE > .
22-5-25 Was Dropping The Gold Standard A Mistake? - EcEx > .

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an international financial institution, headquartered in Washington, D.C., consisting of 190 countries working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world while periodically depending on the World Bank for its resources. 

The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. It comprises two institutions: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), and the International Development Association (IDA). The World Bank is a component of the World Bank Group

The World Bank was created at the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, along with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The president of the World Bank is traditionally an American. The World Bank and the IMF are both based in Washington, D.C., and work closely with each other. Although many countries were represented at the Bretton Woods Conference, the United States and United Kingdom were the most powerful in attendance and dominated the negotiations. The intention behind the founding of the World Bank was to provide temporary loans to low-income countries that could not obtain loans commercially. The Bank may also make loans and demand policy reforms from recipients. The World Bank's most recently stated goal is the reduction of poverty.

The IMF was formed in 1944, started in 27 November 1945, at the Bretton Woods Conference primarily by the ideas of Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes, it came into formal existence in 1945 with 29 member countries and the goal of reconstructing the international monetary system. It now plays a central role in the management of balance of payments difficulties and international financial crises. Countries contribute funds to a pool through a quota system from which countries experiencing balance of payments problems can borrow money. As of 2016, the fund had XDR 477 billion (about US$667 billion).

Through the fund and other activities such as the gathering of statistics and analysis, surveillance of its members' economies, and the demand for particular policies, the IMF works to improve the economies of its member countries. The organization's objectives stated in the Articles of Agreement are: to promote international monetary co-operation, international trade, high employment, exchange-rate stability, sustainable economic growth, and making resources available to member countries in financial difficulty. IMF funds come from two major sources: quotas and loans. Quotas, which are pooled funds of member nations, generate most IMF funds. The size of a member's quota depends on its economic and financial importance in the world. Nations with greater economic significance have larger quotas. The quotas are increased periodically as a means of boosting the IMF's resources in the form of special drawing rights.

As an alternative to the current reserve currency system, some have proposed the use of the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) special drawing rights (SDRs) as a reserve. China has proposed using SDRs, calculated daily from a basket of U.S. dollar, euro, Japanese yen and British pounds, for international payments.

On 3 September 2009, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) issued a report calling for a new reserve currency based on the SDR, managed by a new global reserve bank. The IMF released a report in February 2011, stating that using SDRs "could help stabilize the global financial system."

The IMF is mandated to oversee the international monetary and financial system and monitor the economic and financial policies of its member countries. This activity is known as surveillance and facilitates international co-operation. 

The IMF was originally laid out as a part of the Bretton Woods system exchange agreement in 1944. During the Great Depression, countries sharply raised barriers to trade in an attempt to improve their failing economies. This led to the devaluation of national currencies and a decline in world trade.

This breakdown in international monetary co-operation created a need for oversight. The representatives of 45 governments met at the Bretton Woods Conference in the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, in the United States, to discuss a framework for postwar international economic co-operation and how to rebuild Europe.

There were two views on the role the IMF should assume as a global economic institution. American delegate Harry Dexter White foresaw an IMF that functioned more like a bank, making sure that borrowing states could repay their debts on time. Most of White's plan was incorporated into the final acts adopted at Bretton Woods. British economist John Maynard Keynes, on the other hand, imagined that the IMF would be a cooperative fund upon which member states could draw to maintain economic activity and employment through periodic crises. This view suggested an IMF that helped governments and to act as the United States government had during the New Deal to the great recession of the 1930s.

The IMF formally came into existence on 27 December 1945, when the first 29 countries ratified its Articles of Agreement. By the end of 1946 the IMF had grown to 39 members. On 1 March 1947, the IMF began its financial operations, and on 8 May France became the first country to borrow from it.

The IMF was one of the key organizations of the international economic system; its design allowed the system to balance the rebuilding of international capitalism with the maximisation of national economic sovereignty and human welfare, also known as embedded liberalism. The IMF's influence in the global economy steadily increased as it accumulated more members. The increase reflected in particular the attainment of political independence by many African countries and more recently the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union because most countries in the Soviet sphere of influence did not join the IMF.

The Bretton Woods exchange rate system prevailed until 1971, when the United States government suspended the convertibility of the US$ (and dollar reserves held by other governments) into gold. This is known as the Nixon Shock. The changes to the IMF articles of agreement reflecting these changes were ratified by the 1976 Jamaica Accords

Since the demise of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates in the early 1970s, surveillance has evolved largely by way of changes in procedures rather than through the adoption of new obligations. The responsibilities changed from those of guardian to those of overseer of members' policies.

Later in the 1970s, large commercial banks began lending to states because they were awash in cash deposited by oil exporters. The lending of the so-called money center banks led to the IMF's changing its role in the 1980s after a world recession provoked a crisis that brought the IMF back into global financial governance.

In late 2019, the IMF estimated global growth in 2020 to reach 3.4%, but due to the coronavirus, in November 2020, it expected the global economy to shrink by 4.4%.

In March 2020, Kristalina Georgieva announced that the IMF stood ready to mobilize $1 trillion as its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This was in addition to the $50 billion fund it had announced two weeks earlier, of which $5 billion had already been requested by Iran. One day earlier on 11 March, the UK called to pledge £150 billion to the IMF catastrophe relief fund. It came to light on 27 March that "more than 80 poor and middle-income countries" had sought a bailout due to the coronavirus.

On 13 April 2020, the IMF said that it "would provide immediate debt relief to 25 member countries under its Catastrophe Containment and Relief Trust (CCRT)" programme.

In November 2020, the Fund warned the economic recovery may be losing momentum as COVID-19 infections rise again and that more economic help would be needed.

The current Managing Director (MD) and Chairwoman of the IMF is Bulgarian economist Kristalina Georgieva, who has held the post since October 1, 2019Gita Gopinath was appointed as Chief Economist of IMF from 1 October 2018. Prior to her appointment at the IMF, Gopinath served as the economic adviser to the Chief Minister of Kerala, India.

sī vīs pācem, parā bellum

igitur quī dēsīderat pācem praeparet bellum    therefore, he who desires peace, let him prepare for war sī vīs pācem, parā bellum if you wan...