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Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

aljazeera.com

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Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#161

Post by imtringued »

SQueeeeeL wrote: post #90
fernandohur wrote: post #82

Small reminder: ghana's consumption of oil is 0.1% of the worlds total oil consumption (Source: https://www.worldometers.info/oil/ghana-oil/ ), essentially a rounding error. Take this into account before making any statements about the ending dominance of the dollar.

Ahh yes, small changes never preclude larger shifts in large geopolitical entities. But also if anyone tells you they know the future, they're probably trying to sell you something. If I were in charge of Ghana's finances, I'd be pretty cautious of standing in front of any windows for the next few years.

Brexit was supposed to be the end of the EU.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#162

Post by Hayvok »

rayiner wrote: post #147
Hayvok wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Mono world order” is a fun euphemism for “boo hoo we’re not allowed to run around the planet conquering other people”. You’re free to “divest” as you put it… But you’re still expected to behave & play nicely with your neighbors.

“Mono world order” is the appropriate term when the US can go around conquering other people in their perceived self interest (Iraq, Afghanistan) but says nobody else can.

If you want the real-politick answer then “yeah, absolutely”. What’s your point?

But the U.S empire has been pretty amazing for a pretty amazing number of people across the globe, and it is shockingly easy to stay on the good side of U.S. foreign policy.

Be reasonably democratic, don’t genocide undesirable elements of your population, don’t pick on other reasonably democratic countries, don’t threaten world trade and resources, don’t steal all the Americans’ stuff by suddenly socializing industries in your country, don’t fund terrorist activity against them.

Yeah you can find exceptions to every one of those listed items - welcome to global politics.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#163

Post by kyboren »

danielschonfeld wrote: post #94
norswap wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Could this mounting unrest be as a result of the seeming inability of the US Federal bank in checking inflation of the US Dollar. This is completely backwards. The problem right now is that the dollar is too strong , meaning expensive wrt other currencies. In this context, inflation of the USD supply, leading to devaluation of the USD would actually help other countries that are suffering from the strong dollar. I'…

And there in lies the rub. To keep countries placated we need to create more debt, a metric ton of more debt and hence more broad currency. But doing so at the moment is political suicide as is proven by the left's efforts (deficit spending blah blah etc). Triffin paradox predicted in the 60s at it's full glory. It's also worth noting that at the moment both the Fed and the Treasury (obv) are mandated to be operating…

I don't think this should be downvoted. I believe this is all 100% correct.

Maybe because of the "left's deficit spending" part, which is not wrong, but ignores the right's historical deficit spending (e.g. TCJA). Or perhaps the "political suicide" part is misinterpreted: It would be political suicide for a politician to interfere with Fed policy and undercut their blunt force effort to reduce domestic inflation.

But any way you slice it, right now the Triffin dilemma is indeed exactly what we're experiencing.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#164

Post by nequo »

Majromax wrote: post #155
nequo wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not going to say that I have strong views on this right now. But the reason I used EBITDA is that GDP is the total value added of the economy. EBITDA is the total value added of the company.

> EBITDA is the total value added of the company. I don't think that's quite the right interpretation. EBIDTA is the value added of the company net its employees (and I'd quibble over depreciation and taxes), whereas GDP includes the labour share. Imagine we had a single-company country, where every worker was also a customer, all costs were internalized, and capital did not depreciate. The GDP of the country would b…

Yes, that’s a good point.

In principle, Twitter’s market value is the net present value of its future profits, which excludes input costs. So the closest concept to parent’s comparison (GDP vs. market value) is GDP vs. profits.

> The GDP of the country would be equal to the profit of the company plus the wages of the employees.

Also plus any other input costs, like rent, electricity, loans, etc., right?

So GDP vs. revenue would be the comparison that would include both profits and input costs.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#165

Post by latchkey »

> Ghana produces crude oil, but it has relied on imports for refined oil products since its only refinery shut down after an explosion in 2017.

Sounds like South Sudan, which Indigo Traveller recently visited... tl'dr: it is a huge mess.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXulruMI7BHj3kGyosNa0jA/vid...

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#166

Post by steve76 »

rayiner wrote: post #147
Hayvok wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Mono world order” is a fun euphemism for “boo hoo we’re not allowed to run around the planet conquering other people”. You’re free to “divest” as you put it… But you’re still expected to behave & play nicely with your neighbors.

“Mono world order” is the appropriate term when the US can go around conquering other people in their perceived self interest (Iraq, Afghanistan) but says nobody else can.

No post body was provided.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#167

Post by analog31 »

notahacker wrote: post #125
luciusdomitius wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What prevents them exchanging gold for $ like all other gold producers are doing? This is probably what they themselves were doing beforehands?

This sibling comment has the answer to that: it helps disguise the margin the government makes on gold it compulsory purchases from local miners in local currency https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33742853 Also helps to look like you're doing something about a debt crisis even if the net effect is minimal or negative...

It shouldn't be hard for the miners to guess that margin, given that the market price of gold can be looked up.

Gold is, for all intents and purposes, usable as money, at least between sophisticated parties such as governments. It lacks some of the features of USD, but if Ghana is out of USD, then those features don't matter to them.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#168

Post by imtringued »

pwm wrote: post #12

I know a lot of people dislike bitcoin here but I'm wondering (with the huge assumption that its value stabilises over time) would it not actually be a better solution? Not just from an obvious logistical but also from an environmental perspective? I'd imagine gold mining to be much more destructive (both to nature and to human life).

Honestly hell would freeze over before that happens. It would be more likely that IMF SDRs will be used as an alternative to dollars than Bitcoin.

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#169

Post by bobthepanda »

rich_sasha wrote: post #27
kaladin_1 wrote: post #3

Interesting the pressure is increasing. More and more countries questioning why they need to base their foreign transaction on the US Dollar. Could this mounting unrest be as a result of the seeming inability of the US Federal bank in checking inflation of the US Dollar. Also, some of these Nations can no longer determine what benefit it is to them is using the US Dollar as their reserve currency and trading currency…

I think this take is somewhat over-reacting. I'm pretty sure you'll find that the price they agreed is really in USD, and only the medium of exchange is gold (even if the paperwork or agreement doesn't even reference USD). So really they are paying X USD's worth of gold - with both oil and gold price being fixed in USD somewhere abroad. USD is so incredibly ubiquitous, it won't easily go away. Reserves are a little d…

EUR is still not a great managed currency. The Euro crisis could, technically, happen again.

RUB backing economy is pretty much one major export.

JPY makes American debt look chaste in comparison

CHF does not want the job, primarily because its use as a basket currency already makes it too strong

CNY does not want the job, and their past history of capital controls make America look chaste

Re: Ghana plans to buy oil with gold instead of dollars

#170

Post by steve76 »

cauefcr wrote: post #152
KptMarchewa wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You’re referring to the U.S. right? You must claim to be very sarcastic! No, I'm refering to only country in XXI century that literally decided to annex other country's territory - two times. All that while losing war, and deciding to unleash hell on civilians they claim to be "their kin". At least we can cheer our hearts looking at fields littered with dead russian soldiers and see that there are countries of the w…

So the US policy on Latin America is just fine? Embargoes and CIA financed take-over of many states are all fine?

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