{"text":[[{"start":4.7,"text":"Readers would be forgiven for having failed to pounce upon a European Central Bank update this week on the global role of the euro. But the report did say something important about a different currency: the US dollar. The share of reserve assets that the world’s central banks keep in US Treasury bonds is now lower than their holdings of gold."}],[{"start":25.45,"text":"The demise of the dollar is, of course, wildly over-predicted — more so recently given the impulsive trade tendencies of President Donald Trump. Still, this feels like a milestone. Gold made up 27 per cent of global reserves at the end of 2025, up from 20 per cent a year earlier, the ECB found. The share of Treasuries fell from 25 to 22 per cent over the same period."}],[{"start":52.45,"text":"This is easily explained by the 64 per cent rise in the price of gold last year. Nevertheless, it matches a pattern. Add all dollar assets together and their share in global reserves was 57 per cent at the end of 2025, according to the IMF, down from 64 per cent a decade earlier."}],[{"start":71.6,"text":"It’s not a uniform trend. The New York Fed found that this is partly explained by Russia’s move away from dollar assets since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Other countries that are “geopolitically distant” from the US have added dollar assets."}],[{"start":86.39999999999999,"text":"To date, the phantom menace of trade partners dumping Treasuries in retaliation for capricious US trade and financial policies has failed to materialise. As long ago as 2010, Chinese military officials suggested sales of US government bonds as part of a strategy of attacking via “oblique means and stealthy feints”. While China’s apparent holdings have indeed roughly halved since 2013, official Treasury data doesn’t reflect its vast holdings held in countries like Belgium and Luxembourg."}],[{"start":null,"text":"
"}],[{"start":116.29999999999998,"text":"As a means of exchange, the dollar’s decline is hard to detect. The ECB said the share of global exports invoiced in dollars barely changed this century at about 40 per cent. Separately, the Atlantic Council reckons 54 per cent of exports are invoiced in dollars. China’s yuan makes up just 4 per cent. "}],[{"start":135.85,"text":"And other data shows the dollar not declining, but rampant. According to the Bank for International Settlements, offshore dollar liabilities booked by banks outside the US amounted to $14tn at the end of last year, up from $5tn in 2000. Euro liabilities doubled to about $3tn over the same period."}],[{"start":156.45,"text":"The most reliable measure of dollar dominance is probably the loans and other dollar obligations created outside the US, which the Federal Reserve backs with giant swap lines to foreign central banks. When that trust breaks down, then the dollar’s supremacy will too. In the meantime, shifts in global reserves function more as a reminder that what was once an “if” is now undoubtedly a “when”."}],[{"start":189.1,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1780792116_4318.mp3"}