The death of money The coming collapse of the international monetary system

In this book, Rickards--economist, lawyer, and author of Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crisis (2011)--sets forth a series of cogent reasons why a collapse in the international financial system and loss of the US dollar's position as the world's reserve currency is only a matter of time. Threats to the dollar's current supremacy include financial warfare conducted by the nation's adversaries, either price inflation or deflation brought about by a 400 percent increase in base money due to Federal Reserve policies or underlying economic weaknesses that have not been addressed, and a market breakdown. Threats also result from regulatory incompetence, banker greed, and tendencies for complex systems to fail. The author argues that with the dollar's demise its role will be replaced by the euro of the European Union, the special drawing rights issued by the International Monetary Fund, or a return to some form of an international gold standard presaged by a recent accumulation of gold reserves by national central banks. The book concludes by identifying signs of impending disintegration and listing suggestions for how a portfolio may preserve wealth by converting unreliable money into gold, land, fine art, and other long-term stores of value. --Edward Leonard Whalen, Clarke College