[peteretep]

> People do not trust "Federal Reserve notes"

Really? There I was thinking foreign governments liked holding their reserves in US dollars...

> that at least some people realize that there is no such a thing like US dollar, only those "notes" printed by Ben Bernanke and his pals

Wake up, SHEEPLE!

[piokoch]

"foreign governments liked holding their reserves in US dollars"

Yes every government has to keep dolar reserve because this is the only currency you can buy oil with. USA managed to force oil suppliers to accept only US dollars.

This is the source of the dollar power and enable FED to print as much dollars as they want. People all over the World must purchase dollars.

[rjknight]

Minor snark, but 'the Fed', as in 'The Federal Reserve Bank of the United States of America' is an abbreviation, not an acronym. If you really want to use a TLA, 'FRB' (Federal Reserve Bank) might work, but 'FED' is meaningless. This undermines the credibility of your pronouncements on monetary economics.

[indiecore]

Ok why do foreign governments also hold Euros, British Pounds, Chinese Yuan, Japanese Yen and Canadian Dollars as reserve currency? You're tinfoil hatting bit too hard here man.

[cynoclast]

You really do not have a clue how our monetary system works, do you?

[peteretep]

So enlighten us all, rather than posting snarky comments.

[saraid216]

The last time on HN that I responded to blatant ignorance with a three-paragraph summarization of a complex system, I was called rude because I said, "You don't seem to know how X works."

[Androsynth]

Obligatory link to Irwin Schiff's 'How an Economy Grows and Why it Doesnt' http://freedom-school.com/money/how-an-economy-grows.pdf

But regarding your original point, foreign govts and banks hold the US dollar because historically it has been strong, stable and accepted everywhere. It has no intrinsic value and recently governments are moving away from solely pegging their currencies to the US dollar as it has weakened relative to other currencies in the past few decades (eg Euro).

Another reason they take the US dollar is that they have no other choice. If China or Saudi Arabia were to say 'we want gold!' or 'we want resources!', trade relations would have stopped a long time ago.

[TeMPOraL]

> Wake up, SHEEPLE!

Obligatory XKCD ref: http://xkcd.com/1013/.