Kamath said that in 2019, a quarter of the USD 15 billion of financial assistance was given in local currencies.

In the April 2020 annual board of governors meeting with BRICS finance ministers, president of the bank K.V. The BRICS’s New Development Bank, proposed disbursements in national currencies in 2015. This system is being expedited after US actions during the pandemic. The March 2020 conference of finance ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation that includes China, Russia, Central Asian states, India and Pakistan agreed to send recommendations finalising a roadmap to conduct bilateral trade, investments, mutual settlements and issue bonds in national currencies. Russia and China have initiated several measures like cross-border inter-bank payment systems parallel to the SWIFT. Both have increased gold holdings to back their currencies and initiated national currency swap agreements in several regional and bilateral arrangements where they play a role. Procedures and plans are in process to bypass the dollar in international trade and use national currencies instead. This time around, America’s geopolitical targets are preparing to shield themselves from the dollar hegemony. Wars and retribution can have unexpected consequences. This misuse of the dollar hegemony is not entirely new for the US but has deepened under the Trump administration. Retribution was expected since countries at the receiving end have been preparing to hit back. There have been speculative attacks and unilateral sanctions placed on perceived threats and ‘enemy countries’. President Donald Trump, in recent times, has deeply weaponised the dollar in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.įirst metaphors were mixed when trade with China was labelled a ‘war’.

Inr to other countries currency