According to Reuters reported that while looking through some public information from the Indian Customs, a reporter from this newspaper discovered that India’s largest cement manufacturer, Chaoke Cement Company, recently imported 157,000 tons of coal from Russia and is now loading this amount of coal. A cargo ship carrying 170 million goods is docked near Kandla Port in India.
It’s okay if you just buy Russian coal. After all, New Delhi and are openly buying Russian oil. Energy trade between Russia and India is really not surprising.
But what surprised Reuters was that the currency of settlement was neither Indian rupees nor Russian rubles , but China's yuan. You must know that Sino-Indian relations have not been good in recent years. The conflicts between the two countries in the border areas still exist. In addition, India has always regarded China as a competitor and a target that it wants to surpass.
Logically speaking, if it were not for special circumstances, RMB should not be used for settlement. In other words, if India, which is arrogant and prejudiced against China, can be uncharacteristically different, it can only show that RMB is convenient and easy to use in the transaction process.
Therefore, Reuters analysis believes that the above situation should not be an exception. Affected by Western sanctions and bans, more and more Russian-related trade will use RMB for settlement. In this way, the United States’ containment of Russia will weaken the The role of the dollar in global trade.
In fact, using RMB to do business with Russia is not the first choice for India, because New Delhi itself has also explored the rupee payment mechanism. However, the presence of the Indian rupee in international trade has been too weak, so it has never been able to make it The Modi government got what it wanted.
Although the Russian ruble has gotten rid of its previous decline and has even become a popular currency, its own risks still exist, which makes India, after repeated screening, only accept the reality of payment in RMB.
What's more, Russia is currently selling energy at a price lower than the market. As a major energy consumer, the Modi government has no reason to obstruct its own companies and use RMB to take advantage. Indian officials also admitted that if this trade method is beneficial, RMB payments will become more and more frequent in the future.
Compared with China, Russia and India, which are "trilateral win-win", the pressure is now on Washington. First of all, the economic sanctions against Russia have not achieved the expected results. More than 10,000 sanctions should theoretically completely destroy Russia in a short time. economy.
But the reality has deviated dramatically. Because of Russia's transcendent status in the commodity market, the international community simply cannot bear the impact of the sudden "disappearance" of Russian oil, natural gas , and food. Therefore, countries other than the West should buy or buy. If you can’t use US dollars, then use RMB or other currencies. In short, living people cannot be suffocated to death.
In addition, the United States uses the SWIFT international payment system as a weapon to impose sanctions, further exacerbating the sense of crisis in various countries. This approach of acting as both a referee and an athlete directly shakes the foundation of the international financial order.
Because no one can guarantee that the methods used against Russia now will not be used on themselves in the future, so it is wise to find a way out in advance and avoid the US dollar as much as possible. When countries urgently need a stable and inclusive new settlement currency, the RMB, which is independent from the Western system, has naturally moved to the center of the international stage.
I have to say that after all the operations carried out by the United States, it ended up shooting itself in the foot. It is foreseeable that the process of RMB internationalization may not end the hegemony of the US dollar immediately, but once the trend is formed, it is difficult to predict what will happen in the future.
Judging from the current situation of the United States, even if the hegemony of the US dollar does not collapse, but is only significantly weakened, it is not something Washington can afford. Otherwise, it will not only lose interests, but also shake the country's foundation.
