"
Game changer it is not — at least not yet," said Gal Luft, co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, a Washington based think tank focused on energy security. "But it is another indicator of the beginning of the glacial, and I emphasize the word glacial, decline of the dollar."
Beijing faces skeptical global oil markets and global perceptions it exerts too much state control. Those factors will hinder its drive to build a viable oil pricing benchmark that's able to compete with more established benchmarks like West Texas Intermediate or Brent (both dollar-denominated).
The architects of the "petro-yuan" face an uphill struggle in dislodging the "petrodollar" and, with it, more than four decades of U.S. dollar-priced oil. Attracting interest from entrenched and active markets in Europe, the U.S. and the Middle East — used to price more than two-thirds of the world's oil worth trillions of dollars – poses another major challenge.
"Many, many futures contracts are launched because they make some sense from a logical market point of view and they get a lot of attention. But then they die because the key is liquidity," said Jeff Brown, president at FGE, an international energy consultant.
There are really only a handful of truly global oil contracts from which all else is based, Brown explained, adding: "It will be extraordinarily difficult to change that."
Reply With Quote
....probably about the same time China announces the petroyuan)
Originally Posted by Swordsmyth
Connect With Us