[expat_panama]

When the dollar devalues by 80% sometime this year...

Devalues with respect to what, the Euro?

[agere_contra]

The dollar will devalue by 80% with respect to hard assets: Gold, Silver, Oil, Uranium, Copper, Iron, bread, bullets and so forth.

Some 60% of USD reserves are held outside of the US. When the buying power of those USD reserves contracts by 80%, a lot of fiat currencies backed by USD reserves will devalue sharply as well. Currencies backed by hard assets (e.g. the Canadian Dollar, maybe the Rouble(!)) will do better but I wouldn't like to be in them when the storm comes.

The net result is that the middle class across the world and especially America will lose a great deal of buying power - unless they move to hard assets before D-month.

[Uncle Ike]

” Devalues with respect to what, the Euro? “

A bit closer to real-world home, how about ‘devalues in terms of the purchasing power of Joe Six-Pack’s pocket money’.....

Contrary to the apparently heartfelt belief of many on these forums, most of us don’t, as a First Principle, think in terms of arbitrage....