The end of the American Blitzkrieg
After the first wave of the global financial crisis, some American journalists and politicians have noticed that the US Federal Reserve Service is behaving strangely. Some American turbo patriots even thought that the Fed’s policy, which flooded not only the American but also the global financial system with cheap dollars, was treacherous with respect to American national interests, since it actually provided super-cheap credit resources to US competitors.
American turbo patriots demanded that US cheap dollars stimulate the US economy, rather than flow into other countries through the US Federal Reserve currency swaps and cross-border lending to US banks, which, instead of raising the American economy, went to other countries (for example, China or Russia). ), where consumers of foreign currency loans were willing to pay much more than US businesses.
From the point of view of this straightforward logic, the Federal Reserve Service of the United States really behaved unpatriotic, but life is always much more complicated than it seems to turbo patriots of any country. And the thing is that the Fed has worked according to the scheme of a drag dealer, and not the Central Bank. Moreover, these actions were a key element of the American “New American Century” plan.
American strategic planning is famous for its pragmatism and the desire to endlessly repeat those schemes that have already proven their effectiveness. The USA “won” the 20th century due to the fact that Washington objectively was the main beneficiary of the Second World War, for the victory in which the USSR paid the highest price.
In the context of the systemic crisis of the global economy and the potential crisis of the unipolar world at the beginning of the XXI century, Washington, in fact, went on repeating the scheme, although the form of its implementation was significantly different. The basic principle of this strategy is that the United States does not need to solve its systemic problems to gain a strategic long-term advantage over geopolitical competitors, but it is enough to create problems of even more serious nature for all geopolitical competitors. Roughly speaking, it was enough to “set on fire” the rest of the world (in the XX century, this required a global war) and maintain the relative stability of the United States.
If you look at the actions of the United States over the past 5 years in accordance with this strategy, then all actions by the United States, ranging from the creation of DAISH (a terrorist organization banned in Russia) and the crisis in Ukraine to attempts to link their vassals through the Trans-Pacific and Transatlantic Partnership Pacts understandable.
The Americans tried to conduct a simultaneous blitzkrieg in several directions and against all of their potential geopolitical competitors. In order to undermine the economy of the EU and Russia, ending with any potential for continental cooperation, the Maidan in Ukraine was launched. Prior to this, a direct attempt was made in Russia, but it failed.
DAISH was created and developed as a ram that could hurt the Russian Muslim regions, as well as the very vulnerable and strategically important Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region of China. In order for the PRC to be even more painful, a policy of containment was carried out against it, and the Americans tried to tie China’s potential partners in the region with the help of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The attempt at the "Umbrella Revolution" in Hong Kong was the cherry on the cake for China.
For Europe, in addition to breaking with Russia, the Americans prepared a double blow: the economic noose in the form of the Transatlantic Partnership Agreement, which would actually deprive the EU countries of economic sovereignty, and the political noose in the form of a wave of "refugees" from the Middle East, which was actually organized by American NGOs, managed to organize the most complicated logistics chain to transport "refugees" from all over the Middle East to the European Union. Some of the American strikes hit the target, some were parried, but all of the above attack directions would be almost meaningless without the most important direction - the attack with the “dollar vacuum cleaner” of the Fed.
In just a few years, the Fed was able to put the whole world on cheap currency liquidity. Against the background of the objectively existing need of the rest of the world for cheap lending, the “graft” went off with a bang and to a certain extent contributed to the relief of particularly painful symptoms (not the causes!) Of the first wave of the financial crisis. Not much attention is paid to this, but even companies from the PRC have managed to collect nearly a trillion dollars in dollar loans.
And in 2015, the Americans decided that it was time to make the whole planet very painful, and provoked a "dollar break" or "turned on a dollar vacuum cleaner." The rise in the US Federal Reserve rates, a sharp decrease in the available dollar liquidity and, as a result, a sharp rise in the dollar against all other currencies should have induced the world economy, excluding the USA, a deflationary shock, that is, a sharp depreciation of assets, local currencies, stocks, bonds.
This shock was supposed to provoke a credit crisis for companies and states that were unable to repay dollar loans. Against this background, combined with the “iron” promise of the US Federal Reserve to raise the rate further, the capital had to run to America. Initially, the flight of capital from Europe was to be helped by the war in Ukraine, the flight of capital from the Middle East - DAISH, and the local Maidan and intraelite crises should contribute to the flight of capital from Russia and China. One cannot but agree that the plan was very beautiful and that the Americans did a great and painstaking work to implement it. The problem is that this plan could not withstand a collision with reality at several key points.
The most important problem of the plan was that at the penultimate stage of its implementation, all interested parties got to the core of it. Before turning on the "dollar vacuum cleaner," key characters of international politics, such as Christine Lagarde, a representative of the "old Europe", and the Minister of Finance of the People's Republic of China Lou Jiwei. They repeatedly appealed to the Fed with requests do not raise, and Lagarde directly said that such an action The Fed will provoke an international crisis.
However, the Americans needed an international crisis. In a short period of a “strong dollar”, it would be possible to hurt the rest of the economies very badly and buy the most interesting assets on the cheap, and only then start hyperinflation in the United States in order to “burn” the overwhelming American debts in it. The most important condition of this plan was the so-called decoupling - isolation of the US financial markets from external shocks. In other words, against the background of a general collapse, they were supposed to grow.
In August, 2015, the rate hike was postponed due to the fact that the US markets began to fall off after the Chinese, and this did not suit the Fed. At the end of the 2015 of the year, from the point of view of the Fed, "the stars came together correctly," and the Americans pulled the trigger, despite warnings from the IMF, European politicians and Chinese officials. The result was impressive, but not sufficient for the success of the American Blitzkrieg.
Yes, there is a shortage of dollars in the world, and we will still see a full-scale credit crisis in emerging markets. Yes, many currencies came under severe pressure, which was aggravated by the flight of capital against the backdrop of panic forecasts of pro-Western "financial gurus". Yes, the economies of the competitors of the USA were seriously damaged, but they all managed to avoid a rapid collapse.
Capital was taken out of China for a trillion dollars a year, and the Russian ruble collapsed, but neither Russia nor China are going to plunge into chaos, despite the negative predictions of George Soros, who is credited with using evil tongues by the “dollar vacuum cleaner” plan. Even the European Union, despite the refugee crisis, continues to resist entropy and refuses to sign the enslaving Transatlantic Partnership Agreement.
The most important failure of the American financial blitzkrieg is that it did not work out to collapse the world markets instead of the American ones - now they are falling together. And this is not at all what Washington wants. Let's look at the behavior of the main American S&P 500 index after the Fed rate hike:
Instead of growing, the American market collapsed. Investors do not rush to the “American safe haven”, preferring, for example, to buy gold:
By the way, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation occupies a prominent place in the gold buyers club, what causes fierce envy in the German media, which is easily explained by the inability of the Germans to return their gold, sent for "storage" in the US Federal Reserve. In this sense, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation in a good company: the Central Bank of the People's Republic of China also actively replenishes its gold reserves.
The fall of US markets stopped after representatives The Fed announced a temporary waiver of further increases in rates.. At least, this is how the market perceives the current situation.
Under these conditions, a seemingly illogical propaganda campaign in the United States aimed at promoting the idea of banning cash, which allegedly is needed only for drug addicts, terrorists and communists, becomes noticeable at first glance. To begin with, it is proposed to liquidate the one hundred dollar bill, which almost leading US media have already written about, from Washington Post before the magazine "Half". And in support of the ban banknotes made the most influential Lawrence Summers, the former US Treasurer.
The ban on large banknotes (the EU is now actively discussing a ban on a euro banknote in 500) is a sure sign of preparation not only for a reverse rate cut, but for the introduction of negative rates that are aimed at making businesses and citizens spend money today, not trying to save anything for tomorrow. Usually, citizens and firms respond to such a policy with a massive "cash out" and keeping money under a mattress or in a personal safe that is actively practiced in Japan and Switzerlandwhere negative rates have already spawned huge demand for safes and large bills.
In fact, the United States prepares the ground in advance not for a further increase in interest rates, but for an era of negative interest rate policy (POPS), which will not bring the world anything good. Although before the start of the global hyperinflational shock there will be a certain period when it may seem that the global economy (including the Russian one) has returned to the path of trouble-free growth.
How quickly Americans will be forced to resort to this latest “argument” of monetary war depends on a large number of factors, but the direction of movement is most likely impossible to change.
Good news lies in the fact that the Americans did not succeed in disconnecting their economies from the world economy, which means that we will all burn in the fire of hyperinflation, and after the fire, those who survive will be able to build something new and beautiful. We have every chance for this, but this is a topic for a separate material.
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