London Stock Trader Urges Move to 'AMERO'

World Net Daily ^ | 11/28/06 | Jerome R. Corsi

[Kimberly GG]

In an interview with CNBC, a vice president for a prominent London investment firm yesterday urged a move away from the dollar to the "amero," a coming North American currency, he said, that "will have a big impact on everybody's life, in Canada, the U.S. and Mexico."

Steve Previs, a vice president at Jefferies International Ltd., explained the Amero "is the proposed new currency for the North American Community which is being developed right now between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico."

The aim, he said, according to a transcript provided by CNBC to WND, is to make a "borderless community, much like the European Union, with the U.S. dollar, the Canadian dollar and the Mexican peso being replaced by the amero."

Previs told the television audience many Canadians are "upset" about the amero. Most Americans outside of Texas largely are unaware of the amero or the plans to integrate North America, Previs observed, claiming many are just "putting their head in the sand" over the plans.

CNBC asked Previs whether he thought NAFTA was "working and doing enough."

He replied: "Until it created a lot of illegal immigrants coming across the border. I don't know. You get the pros and cons on NAFTA. For some people it is a good thing, and for other people it has been a disaster."

The speculation on the future of a new North American currency came amid a major U.S. dollar sell-off worldwide that began last week.

Yesterday, the dollar also reached new multi-month low against the euro, breaking through the $1.30 per euro technical high that had held since April 2005.

At the same time, the Chinese central bank set the yuan at 7.0402 per dollar, the highest level since Beijing established a new currency exchange system in 2005 that severed China's previous policy of tying the value of the yuan to the U.S. dollar.

Many analysts worldwide attributed the dramatic fall in the value of the U.S. dollar at least partially to China's announcement last week that it would seek to diversify its foreign exchange currency holdings away from the U.S. dollar. China recently has crossed the threshold of holding $1 trillion in U.S. dollar foreign-exchange reserves, surpassing Japan as the largest holder in the world.

Barry Ritholtz, chief market strategist for Ritholtz Research & Analytics in New York City, in a phone interview with WND, characterized today's downward move of the dollar as "wackage," a new word he coined to convey that the dollar is being "whacked" in this current market movement.

Ritholtz told WND that yesterday's downward move "was a major market correction that points to the risk of subsequent downside to the dollar."

Asked whether he would characterize the dollar's downside move as signaling a possible collapse, Mr Ritholtz told WND, "Not yet."

Ritholtz pointed out market professionals had long looked at a dollar collapse as a "low probability event," but the recent fall suggests "the probabilities have increased of a major dollar correction, or even of a collapse."

U.S. trade imbalances with China have hit a record $228 billion this year, largely reflecting a surging flow of containers from China with retail goods headed for the U.S. mass market.

Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez is in Bejing leading a trade delegation of more than two dozen U.S. business executives.

"The future should be focused on exporting to China," Guiterrez told reporters in Bejing, noting that this year, U.S. exports to China are up 34 percent on a year-to-year basis, surpassing last year's gain of 20 percent.

One way to improve the U.S. trade imbalance may be to ease up on restrictions of exporting high-tech products and allowing technology transfers to China, a move likely to be politically charged in the U.S.

The decline in value of the dollar will also make U.S. exports more attractive and Chinese exports to the U.S. more expensive.

In February 2007, a virtually unprecedented top-level U.S. economic mission is scheduled to travel to China. Included in the mission are Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Jr., Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.

Previs declined to be interviewed for this article, telling WND in an e-mail he did not want to be quoted directly in any article that may express a political point of view.

[William Terrell]

Was your father an American or a European? Did he have a more dependent interest in European currencies than in the American dollar, or Canadian currency?

Why is consolidating all European currencies into one a political, and not economic, project, and consolidating all North American currencies into one an economic, and not political, project?

[hedgetrimmer]

I cannot emphasise strongly enough that this is utter bullshit

Your foul language aside, I remember all the arguments in Britain against the Euro, how unpopular it was, how it would change british culture, how it would lower living standards for the wealthier countries in the EU.

Back in the early 1990s,most british people never thought the Euro would come into existance. So much for them.

[hedgetrimmer]

monetary unions are all the rage, not just 'conspiracy theories.

Gulf single currency on track for 2010: GCC chief

The launch of a single currency by the six-nation oil-rich Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is still on track for 2010 and no member state has asked for a delay, the GCC chief has said.

"The timetable for the single currency is still as planned. It will be launched in 2010," GCC secretary general Abdurrahman al-Attiyah told reporters in response to a question on whether a delay was on the cards.

"In fact, we have not received any request for a delay," Attiyah said when asked to comment on reports that Oman had asked for the launch to be postponed.

But the GCC chief added: "There are viewpoints which are in the common interest" of the member states. He did not elaborate.

The GCC, which groups Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, has decided to establish a common market by 2007 and launch a monetary union and a single currency by early 2010.



GCC central bank governors have agreed in principle to set up a monetary council which would eventually be transformed into a central bank.

[hedgetrimmer]

This consolidation is suddenly happening all over the world.

East Africa: Country Kicks Off Process to Fast-Track EA Federation

Uganda has kicked off the National Consultative Process on Fast-Tracking the East African Political Federation amid scepticism about the East African Community.

The National Consultative Committee (NCC) started the exercise with a media practitioners induction meeting in Kampala on November 21, where fears raised by the Wako Report resurfaced

To safeguard against another collapse, the new treaty provides for a gradual approach to the regional integration process in four phases; customs union, common market, monetary union and finally a political federation.

Sounds kind of like NAFTA, NAFTA plus and the SPP, don't it?

[processing please hold]

I used to think that this was tin foil hat stuff but ever since the election and the Bush Administration's steadfast refusal to do anything at all to secure our borders I've been rethinking my position.

Welcome.

[snowsislander]

I don't think that this is a credible article about the "amero". There's just nothing to this weird idea. We are far more likely to see the dollar adopted by more states in the Americas, such as Ecuador did, than any replacement of the dollar with a transnational currency. You are more likely to see currency union happen in Asia than in the Americas, and I rate any Asian currency union as highly unlikely.

The bit about the dollar taking a beating in the markets over the last week is largely true, but I think that the transition sentence "The speculation on the future of a new North American currency came amid a major U.S. dollar sell-off worldwide that began last week." is an incoherent connector between the fact about the dollar's slip and the dubious idea of a displacement of the dollar for the "amero".

[processing please hold]

but pushed to get our house and property paid off - nice feeling being a property owner.

Congratulations. It's a grand feeling, one that we know.

[processing please hold]

Whoever thought,'In God We Trust' would be written so small on our new one dollar coin, you have to use a magnifying glass to even see it. Beginning of the end for that phrase? The first step in removing God from our money?

[Arizona Carolyn]

I don't know where you were googling, Ivan, but I found plenty of hits for both.

[MadIvan]

Oh do shut up, hedgetrimmer. Britain doesn't use the Euro. We kept the pound.

If you keep nattering on things of which you're only marginally acquainted, someone is going to kick you in the arse for it.

Ivan

[MadIvan]

WHat the flipping hell does that have to do with anything - he has had to deal with people across the globe. I repeat - this is just some random idea some idiot is floating. It's not a political or economic project in process. It's also not a project that one can just be sneaked up on you.

I repeat - anyone who says you're ditching the dollar for the Amero anytime soon is a fantasist or a liar.

Ivan

[calcowgirl]

Read the Bank of Canada's statement in post 37.

For the record, that is not a statement by the Bank of Canada but an article from their periodical Bank of Canada Review*, written by David Laidler who is described at the bottom as follows:

David Laidler is Fellow in Residence at the C. D. Howe Institute and Professor Emeritus at the University of Western Ontario.

*Bank of Canada Review: "A quarterly publication featuring articles related to the Canadian economy and to central banking."

[MadIvan]

Nevertheless, it is a document published by the Bank of Canada and put on their website.

Furthermore, the fundamental truth that American policy makers are not interested in monetary union has not been challenged on this thread with any evidence remotely like the one I've posted. All I've seen is idiotic justifications for paranoia.

One other element to consider is that in order for monetary union to take place, all 3 currencies - Canadian Dollar, US Dollar and Mexican Peso would have to be on equal footing, including part of continuous linked settlement systems. The Mexican peso is not.

The European experience is also telling - it took nearly 10 years for it to occur successfully, and a lot of money spent on infrastructure, public awareness and so on.

To conclude - there is no will at present to do this, there are no plans in place to do this, and it could not be achieved in the dead of night through some conspiracy of governments.

Ivan

[MadIvan]

I'm getting sick of explaining the search terms I used - maybe pictures will work, for the benefit of those who can't seem to understand what I'm saying:

Is it clear now?

[nopardons]

BTTT

[calcowgirl]

>>Jefferies is real, but Steve Previs could be a kook masquerading as a board member, a mythical fart in the wind, or something else entirely.

Funny... I got over 20 hits for Steve Previs and Jeffries, at Forbes.com alone.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=+site:www.forbes.com+steve+previs

[nopardons]

They used SALT, not chocolate, in the really old days. :-)

[nopardons]

Separately or together?

[calcowgirl]

There's only on Steve Previs mentioned in Forbes... the one that is with Jeffries. Follow the link.

[nopardons]

That's NOT the point, nor the correct answer.

Did YOU do the search with Previs and Jeffries separately, or TOGETHER?

It's a simple question and demands a SIMPLE answer!