Solar NewtSources and credits
Why the World Can't Quit the Dollar
In August 1971 the United States stopped trading gold for dollars, the one hard promise the world's money rested on. 55 years later central banks still keep 57 percent of their currency reserves in dollars. This page lists every source behind the video's claims and credits every piece of footage, image, sound and music in it.
Figures are dated in the video and below. Snapshot numbers were current when the video was locked in September 2026 and will move.
Chapters
- 0:00The promise that ended in 1971
- 1:22Bretton Woods and the $35 ounce
- 4:03The network that held
- 5:34The dollars outside America
- 7:32What the privilege is worth
- 9:43The freeze, and the turn to gold
- 12:37The dollar's bad year
- 14:11Stablecoins, the new rail
- 15:55Why the world still runs on it
Sources (72)
Grouped by the part of the story they support. Where accounts vary, the video says so: the eurodollar's origin story is the usual account, Connally's famous line is attributed rather than recorded, and the privilege is given as a range of estimates, never one number.
The promise, 1944 to 1973
- U.S. Department of State, Proceedings and Documents of the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, Bretton Woods, 1944 (FRASER)
- Federal Reserve History, "Creation of the Bretton Woods System"
- Dellas and Tavlas, Hoover Institution Working Paper 25106, 2025; Federal Reserve History, "Gold Convertibility Ends"
- Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958 to 1960, vol. IV, doc. 41
- Robert Triffin, statement to the Joint Economic Committee, October 28, 1959 (FRASER); IMF Staff Papers, 1961
- U.S. Gold Commission, Report to the Congress, vol. I, 1982, table 2-1 (FRASER)
- Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964 to 1968, vol. VIII, doc. 36, on France's gold policy
- Richard Nixon, Address to the Nation Outlining a New Economic Policy, August 15, 1971 (Public Papers, American Presidency Project); Nixon Library almanac; Executive Order 11615 and Proclamation 4074
- John Connally to G10 finance ministers, Rome, late 1971: the line is widely attributed, its date and wording vary across accounts, and no verbatim record exists, so the video calls it attributed
- Federal Reserve History, "Smithsonian Agreement"
- Barry Eichengreen, Exorbitant Privilege, 2011; OMFIF obituary of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, December 2020; Charles de Gaulle, press conference of February 4, 1965 (INA)
The network today
- IMF, Currency Composition of Official Foreign Exchange Reserves (COFER), data brief of July 1, 2026
- Federal Reserve, The International Role of the U.S. Dollar, 2025 edition (FEDS Notes), including the IMF COFER series and export invoicing after Boz, Casas, Georgiadis, Gopinath et al. (2022)
- IMF blog, "Dollar's Share of Reserves Held Steady in Second Quarter When Adjusted for FX Moves," October 1, 2025
- Bank for International Settlements, Triennial Central Bank Survey, April 2025 (published September 30, 2025)
- SWIFT, Global Currency Tracker, September 2026
- Federal Reserve, The International Role of the U.S. Dollar, 2025 edition (Dealogic data); Governor Christopher Waller, speech of February 15, 2024
- U.S. Treasury, Treasury International Capital (TIC), Major Foreign Holders of Treasury Securities, September 2026 release
- U.S. Treasury, TIC historical holdings file
- Business History (2023), on the Paris eurodollar market; the origin story is the usual account and accounts vary
- Bank for International Settlements, International banking and financial market developments, April 2026
- BIS Quarterly Review, December 2022, on dollar debt in FX swaps and forwards; BIS Annual Economic Report 2025
- Federal Reserve H.4.1, central bank liquidity swaps (FRED series SWPT)
- Bloomberg, "The Untold Story Behind Saudi Arabia's 41-Year U.S. Debt Secret," May 30, 2016; Radio Free Asia fact check, July 2024
- JPMorgan (Natasha Kaneva) estimate of non-dollar oil trade in 2023, via OilPrice.com
What the privilege is worth
- McKinsey Global Institute, An Exorbitant Privilege? Implications of Reserve Currencies for Competitiveness, December 2009
- Weeks, University of Mississippi honors thesis 3558, 2025
- Federal Reserve, International Finance Discussion Paper 840, 2005
- Federal Reserve, The International Role of the U.S. Dollar, 2025 edition; Judson, "How Much U.S. Currency Is Held Abroad?", FEDS Note, October 2021; H.4.1 release of September 17, 2026
- Du, Keerati and Schreger, NBER Working Paper 35000
- Jiang, Krishnamurthy, Lustig and Richmond, CEPR VoxEU, July 20, 2026
- NBER Working Paper 35742, September 2026
- Stephen Miran, A User's Guide to Restructuring the Global Trading System, November 2024
- Joseph Gagnon, Peterson Institute for International Economics, 2015; Barry Eichengreen, 2011
The freeze, and the turn to gold
- Congressional Research Service, IN12532, on Russia's immobilized assets, March 25, 2025; Bank of Russia, Annual Report 2022
- Euroclear, H1 2026 results
- European Commission, COM(2026)20; Council of the European Union
- Earlier freezes of central bank reserves (Iran 1979, Afghanistan 2021, Venezuela): secondary summaries; only Afghanistan's is spoken, as about 7 billion
- Council of the European Union, timeline of restrictive measures against Russia
- World Gold Council, Gold Demand Trends, full year 2025 and Q2 2026, central banks
- European Central Bank, The International Role of the Euro, June 2025 and June 2026
- Federal Reserve, "Why Gold Didn't Actually Overtake Treasury Securities as the World's Favorite Reserve Asset," FEDS Note, September 3, 2026
- LBMA Gold Price PM
- ECB June 2026 · WGC FY2025
- IMF COFER, 2026 Q1; European Central Bank, The International Role of the Euro, June 2025
- CIPS annual statistics; The Clearing House, CHIPS annual statistics
- Bank for International Settlements, remarks on the future of finance and Project mBridge, October 31, 2024
- American Presidency Project, statement of November 30, 2024, on BRICS and the dollar; coverage of the 2025 Rio and 2026 New Delhi summits (The Diplomat, CNBC, South China Morning Post)
- ECB blog, Christine Lagarde, June 17, 2025; ECB, The International Role of the Euro, June 2026
The 2025 to 2026 stress test
- PwC/Strategy&, Macro review, 2025 (LSEG data); Bloomberg, June 30, 2025
- ICE U.S. Dollar Index (daily history)
- BIS Bulletin 105, "The US dollar's slide in April 2025: the role of FX hedging," June 20, 2025; Federal Reserve Bank of New York, August 14, 2025
- U.S. Treasury, TIC release of June 18, 2025 (April 2025 data)
- Moody's downgrade of the United States to Aa1, May 16, 2025, as reported by CNBC
- Supreme Court of the United States, Trump v. Cook, No. 25A312, June 29, 2026; Congressional Research Service, LSB11449
- Federal Reserve Board, biography of Kevin Warsh; Bloomberg, May 13, 2026
- Bloomberg, February 20, 2025, on the "Mar-a-Lago Accord"; Federal Reserve Board biographies
Stablecoins
- Public Law 119-27, the GENIUS Act, July 18, 2025
- Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, News Release 2026-9; Federal Reserve rulemaking under the GENIUS Act
- Congress.gov, S. 3755, 119th Congress
- DefiLlama stablecoin data; BIS Paper 170, on the impact of stablecoins on the international monetary and financial system
- Tether, BDO attestation as of June 30, 2026
- Circle, July 2026 examination report
- BIS Working Paper 1270, "Stablecoins and safe asset prices," May 28, 2026
- U.S. Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee, April 30, 2025; IMF Departmental Paper 25/09; Citi projections
- U.S. Treasury, press release sb0197, July 18, 2025
- BIS Annual Economic Report 2025, chapter III, "The next-generation monetary and financial system"
- European Central Bank, Financial Stability Review, May 2025
- Chainalysis, The 2024 Geography of Cryptocurrency Report
- Brookings, "Stablecoins after GENIUS," August 2026
- BRICS 2026 (Indian chair), About Us; member list checked September 24, 2026
Map data
- Natural Earth, public domain
Credits
- Archival filmNewsreel of the Bretton Woods conference, July 1944, Office of War Information / United News, National Archives (NARA 39018), public domain. Richard Nixon's Address to the Nation, August 15, 1971, White House Communications Agency film, Richard Nixon Presidential Library, public domain.
- Archival photographsCamp David, August 1971 (WHPO 7014, 7018, 7020), White House Photo Office, Richard Nixon Presidential Library, public domain. Gasoline line, Portland, Oregon, 1973 (NARA 555457, 555459, 555460), Documerica, National Archives, public domain. Dollar Savings Bank, New York, 1946, and Treasury check machines, Library of Congress, public domain.
- PortraitsChristine Lagarde, 2020, European Parliament, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, 1964, Joop van Bilsen and Harry Pot for Anefo, Nationaal Archief, CC0. Harry Dexter White, 1939, Harris & Ewing, Library of Congress. John Maynard Keynes, 1929, photographer unknown. Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes, Savannah, 1946, International Monetary Fund. Richard Nixon, 1972, U.S. Army Audiovisual Center, National Archives. John Connally, 1961, U.S. Navy, and 1971, White House, National Archives. Official portraits of Stephen Miran, Lisa Cook and Kevin Warsh, Federal Reserve Board; Scott Bessent, U.S. Treasury. All public domain unless marked, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Documents shown on screenThe Public Papers transcript of the August 15, 1971 address (American Presidency Project); Robert Triffin's statement to the Joint Economic Committee, 1959, and the U.S. Gold Commission report, 1982 (FRASER); Bloomberg, May 30, 2016; Stephen Miran, A User's Guide to Restructuring the Global Trading System, November 2024; the joint statement on further restrictive economic measures, February 26, 2022 (White House archives); the FEDS Note of September 3, 2026; Public Law 119-27; Treasury press release sb0197; CNBC, May 16, 2025. Shown briefly as evidence, each cited on screen.
- Aerial imageryGoogle Earth, imagery Airbus: Mount Washington Hotel, Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, and the North Quarter, Brussels.
- Stock footageStoryblocks, under license: city, port, tanker, farm, currency and government-building footage.
- MusicYouTube Audio Library: "Drop Of A Hat," The Grey Room / Density & Time; "Sarabande," Joel Cummins; "No Rush," Dyalla; "Things I Could Have Said," Adam MacDougall; "Cafe Regrette," "Heartbeat Of The Wind," "Kiss The Heavens" and "Lament Of The Ancients," Asher Fulero; "Trilogy," Telecasted.
- SoundTypewriter (Erika 5) and running film projector recordings by Work With Sounds, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0. Page turn, Wikimedia Commons, public domain. Title and end-card stings, tuesdaynight; tick, soundshelfstudio; paper slide, oxidvideos; pop, creatorshome; stamp and marker sounds (Pixabay). Coin and pencil sounds, YouTube Audio Library.