[taurath]

I believe the dollars strength is built on its unassailability as the petrodollar and foreign reserve currency, which lets the fed set interest rates and print money while creating less inflation than any other currency. The world looks very very different when energy markets aren’t fulfilled in dollars in ways that most citizens won’t understand.

[kortilla]

That’s false. The petrodollar is irrelevant because two non-US companies trading using an intermediate currency like the USD create a balanced buy and sell of the intermediary.

[philistine]

If the petrodollar is irrelevant, why is Iran insisting that anything transiting the straight of Hormuz be bought using the Chinese Yen?

[kortilla]

Because China has a controlled currency and can lock flows back out.

Please do enough research to at least get the right currency before engaging in these discussions.

The forex markets are so extremely liquid and deep that trading in USD is no different than trading in any other free floating high volume currency.

Petrodollar might have mattered in 1975 when you couldn’t swap 100 million USD for 100 million euros in 2 seconds without even moving the market.

[linhns]

Yuan. Not Yen. Iran shouldn’t be insisting anything.

[philistine]

But why is Iran insisting the Chinese Yuan be used? Because they're idiots?

Because Petrodollars make our global economy work, and Iran wants their partner China to be in control! If Americans lose sight of their need to maintain their role as *THE* lingua franca of international trade, then all hell is lost. The US cannot afford its military without massive consequences if it can't raise extraordinarily cheap debt through purchases of oil in US dollars immediately turned around to buy US debt to maintain that money's value.