Posted on 11/28/2006 6:10:53 AM PST by 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.
Please look at the post I was responding to. I was not challenging MadIvan.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1745110/posts?page=137#137
I did a GOOGLE using both Previs and Jefferies, together. Know what I got? A page from a SWISS company, from 2004, with the the teensiest mention, buried with a quite extensive page about all kinds of things, on an oil quote. That's it!
Sorry... I'm doing too many things here at one time here.
The search was together... and I got 2380 hits
http://www.google.com/search?q=Previs+Jefferies&btnG=Search&num=100&hl=en&lr=
Or it might have been Previs and Jeffries (vs. Jefferies)
2180 hits
http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&q=Previs+Jeffries&btnG=Search
You typed in ONLY Previs, in the search box.
That's what YOUR link has on it.
Oh and ALL of those "hits" you got? They contain either the name PREVIS or his first name; not exactly 2380 "hits" about Previs or even Jeffries International. :-)
Pardon me? Why are you yelling at me in caps and bold? I simply responded to a post implying that since he couldn't find it in several google searches that Previs was some kind of kook impostor masquerading as a Jefferies employee.
Here's a longer explanation of the Original link I provided. (You will note that the link I posted included "forbes" in it, which was also not in my original search.):
I first typed in both Previs and Jeffries/Jefferies and came up with a list of 2000 some hits (see link I provided). I then scanned down looking for websites more reputable than "market maven", etc. I saw forbes. I clicked on "More results from www.forbes.com" and came up with 20+ pages, all of which I could see showed both Previs and Jefferies in the text. I shortened the link by taking off Jefferies to see if it increased the # of hits or not--it didn't. I posted the shortened link to my original post.
I don't understand why you're getting so worked up about all this. Does it really matter?
"I don't think that this is a credible article about the "amero". There's just nothing to this weird idea."
Yes, there is something to it, and it isn't just an 'idea'...
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=15017
http://www.senate.gov/~foreign/testimony/2005/PastorTestimony050609.pdf
Perspectives on a Potential North American Monetary Union (10 page PDF doc)
Economic Review, Fourth Quarter 2000/Volume 85, Number 4
by Michael Chriszt, director of the Latin America Research Group in the Atlanta Fed’s research department.
Is North America ready for a monetary union?
The idea of a single currency for the United States, Canada and Mexico usually refers to one of two approaches: the unilateral adoption of the U.S. dollar by Canada and Mexico — dollarization — or monetary union, the development of a joint currency that could be managed by all three countries.
In a recent article, Michael Chriszt examines the idea of monetary union in North America. He discusses specific criteria for a single currency for North America as well as the pros and cons of a monetary union and dollarization in the North American context. The article presents evidence suggesting that Canada and perhaps even Mexico are candidates for forming a single-currency area with the United States at some stage.
Chriszt concludes that monetary union appears to hold several advantages over dollarization from the perspective of both the United States and its NAFTA partners. However, an important question remains to be answered: Are the NAFTA countries currently ready for a monetary union? The answer involves both economic and political variables as well as some practical implications. It seems unlikely that the United States, Canada and Mexico will pursue this goal in the near future.
I am sorry to disagree with you, but your two "sources" are Jerome Corsi (also the author of the original article) and Mr. Pastor, of whom Mr. Corsi comments in the first article: 'Pastor has also called for the creation of a new currency which he has coined the “Amero,” a currency that is proposed to replace the U.S. dollar, the Canadian dollar, and the Mexican peso.'
That's thin gruel to base much reliance.
Mr. Pastor apparently is the only proponent of the "amero", a neologism that we are told was coined by this same Mr. Pastor. The only news reporting items both come from Mr. Corsi. One is of comments from Mr. Pastor and the other of comments from a far-from-prominent stock trader in London (not even a currency trader, and London is the leading venue for currency trading) whose expertise on any potential American monetary union has to be just a bit suspect.
As I said originally, I think it would be far more likely that other American states would adopt the dollar rather than the U.S. enter a currency union with Mexico and Canada.
"Well thats just crazy talk."
You think so? The American people want a fence on the southern border. Any politician that talks tough about securing the southern border gets a huge boost in polls. It's what we, Americans, want. There are citizens who have taken to patroling the border on a volunteer basis. No pay, no credit, no support. They do it out of a desire to preserve their country.
Our "leaders" don't want the border closed. It's not closed. The money appropriated to border security will not be used to build a fence.
And you say it's crazy to say we are powerless to direct our leaders? I think you may be the one who's missing the point here.
Good post.
Looks like it will be NAMU vs EMU in our brave new globalized world.
We are not powerless.
Americans need to participate in our constitutional system, and thats just not happening. If they did, there'd be a cartload of politicians impeached, and/or imprisoned right now. We are not powerless, but we are not using our power.
Get off the stick everybody! Our constitutional republic depends on it!
"Americans need to participate in our constitutional system, and thats just not happening."
And therefore, those of us that care are powerless. If is a big word. If there was air on the moon people would live there. Americans don't understand what freedom is. We vote away more and more liberty in each election. A huge number of potential voters don't vote, period. Many of the voters who vote, don't understand what they vote for.
If you polled Americans and asked if English should be the official language of the United States a large majority would be for that. But has it happened? Will it happen?
Our "leaders" simply have to get the MSM on their side and they can run wild. The idea of an American Union is very communist/socialist in it's nature. The MSM would be behind that with it's whole heart.
I watch, I care, but I'm powerless... I simply tend my own garden.
I still don't understand your statement and you didn't answer the above question. I'm puzzled as to the difference.
But, above all, why are you so vehement? What does it matter to you if people are of the belief that there is a move to consolidate currencies into an Amero, whether they are right or wrong? 
Apart from airy fairy discussions, largely between academics, the idea of a single North American currency has gotten precisely nowhere. You see no actual preparations for it, there is no infrastructure ready to handle it, there has been no public awareness campaign, no treaties signed, etc. I despise the kooks for having breathed life into this imaginary demon, and when shown they are wrong, refuse to let it drop.
I hope this makes my position clear.
Ivan
This site has been a 'honeypot' since the name of the site has been given on the TV quite often.
spp.gov = a government site.
spp.gov
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