@paulblustein
Ex-newspaper guy (WashPost, WSJ) turned book author Latest book, "King Dollar," on USD dominance (Yale Univ. Press, pub. date 3/18/25) Sr. Associate @CSIS.org Resident of Japan, perpetrator of many gaijin faux pas www.paulblustein.com
But no good will come from indulging in fantasies about how the dollar is doomed.
If you want to know more…have I got a book for you!
(In paperback April 14, with a new preface)
Not that the dollar’s continued dominance is an unalloyed blessing. The dollar weapon gives Trump a tool for bullying foreigners that’s probably even more potent than tariffs—all the more relevant following the SCOTUS tariff ruling.
More evidence, if any were needed, that all those stories about de-dollarization may have been a tad…overstated? Hyperbolic? Even—dare I say it—wrong?
via @axios.com
www.axios.com/2026/03/05/i...
Squint harder, @mcopelov.bsky.social! Harder! No, I mean squint REALLY, REALLY hard!
Okay, *now* do you see how today's market moves show that "US safe haven status is in peril?"
Yeah, me neither.
Every time you think Trump can’t go any lower, he does.
And every time you think @alanbeattie.bsky.social can’t produce a more beautifully crafted and insightful zinger, he does.
One of my gurus
One of the few reasons I'm glad I'm as old as I am. (74)
Touché.
Hilarious. How did I miss this? I must resolve to doomscroll more assiduously henceforth.
Yet another reason why it can't go by soon enough.
Three more years Paul. We can't count our chickens yet!
And if you want to know more about why Team Dominance has got it right, have I got a book for you!
(Out in paperback, with a new preface, April 14)
I feel like I'm on a team with real momentum here!
See the headlines and excerpts from recent pieces by me, Eswar Prasad, @hakyungkim.bsky.social and @robinwigglesworth.ft.com.
(What shall we call ourselves? Team Dominance?)
Speaking of praiseworthy pieces by FT journalists debunking dollar doomerism, I somehow missed this one by the estimable @robinwigglesworth.ft.com a couple of days ago, but better late than never!
www.ft.com/content/89b9...
Plus, I not-so-humbly submit that KING DOLLAR beats the competition in the dedication category.
Indeed--new books by Barry Eichengreen and @bhgreeley.bsky.social are coming soon, as well as the paperback edition of Ken Rogoff's book.
But I humbly submit that, for insight into why the $ will remain dominant, and $ sanctions will remain potent, you'll learn more'n a thing or two from my book.
It gives me no pleasure to be saying this. In the new preface I’ve written for the paperback edition, I write that I wish the dollar’s global dominance didn’t give Trump such formidable powers of coercion.
But no good will come from pretending that it ain’t so.
Hooray for the SCOTUS ruling!
But:
Next time Trump wants to bully foreigners, and can’t whack them with tariffs, he’s got an even more potent weapon at his disposal—the US dollar.
If you want to know more, have I got a book for you! (Paperback edition, w/new preface, coming in mid-April)
"it may not be for a lack of trying, but the Trump administration has not managed to change the dollar’s basic position in the world economy."
Well put, @hakyungkim.bsky.social!
www.ft.com/content/ef0d...
Paperback edition coming in mid-April, with a new preface that takes account of the past year's craziness. Thanks, @waterstones.bsky.social, for this offer that should not be refused!
My argument about dollar dominance has taken flak from some pretty high-powered economists and other experts, so it's good to know that I'm aligned on that issue with a scholar of Eswar's status.
As the author of KING DOLLAR, which contends that global dominance of the USD is all but impregnable, I’m enjoying Eswar Prasad's newly-released book THE DOOM LOOP, especially these highlighted bits in chapter 2, “Currency Competition.”
One other thing that’s unchanged in the paperback, needless to say, is the book’s dedication.
/fin
But no good will come from pretending that it ain’t so.
As I write in the preface to my book’s forthcoming paperback edition: “It is deeply troubling, but ineluctable, that the world’s dominant currency is issued by a country under the grip of its current leadership.”
Let me emphasize: The implications of continued dollar dominance are not cause for celebration. America’s ability to weaponize the dollar for sanctions purposes means that Donald Trump has even more formidable coercive power than tariffs to bully other countries.
I look forward to a spirited debate in the spring, when Eichengreen’s new book MONEY BEYOND BORDERS is published, along with @bhgreeley.bsky.social’s THE ALMIGHTY DOLLAR and the paperback edition of Rogoff’s OUR DOLLAR, YOUR PROBLEM.
And just this week, the Wall Street Journal’s Greg Ip wrote an excellent column that ended thusly:
Even after carefully reading and listening to their arguments, I’m unpersuaded, for reasons spelled out in my op-ed above.
And I’m not a lone voice howling in the wilderness.
Eswar Prasad has a book coming soon that, according to this review, deems the dollar’s supremacy to be durable.
