Not long after billionaire George Soros forecast a so-called hard landing for the Chinese economy, Beijing fired back by calling out the high-profile investor, warning him of betting against its currency, according to media reports Tuesday.
“Soros’ challenge against the renminbi and Hong Kong dollar is unlikely to succeed, there is no doubt about that,” said a government official in an opinion piece widely cited by several media outlets.
The article headlined, ”Declaring war on China’s currency? Ha ha,” was published by the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party which is widely viewed as Beijing’s propaganda tool.
A translation of the Mandarin version of the editorial linked by ZeroHedge includes references to the U.S. suffering from a “Dutch disease” and “financial predators.”
Reports of the People’s Daily’s article follow Soros’ recent prediction that a precipitous slowdown in the Chinese economy is inevitable.
“A hard landing is practically unavoidable,” Soros told Bloomberg Television last week on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “I’m not expecting it, I’m observing it,” he said, referencing his China outlook.
Soros’ ties to seismic currency bets date back to 1992 when he accurately wagered that the pound would fall in value, forcing the British government to withdraw the currency from the European exchange rate mechanism. He also successfully bet against the Thailand baht ahead of the Asian financial crisis in 1997, which pushed several Asian economies to brink of sovereign default.
Although Soros hasn’t directly threatened to bet against China’s yuan, his reputation as the investor who broke the Bank of England might have been enough to draw Beijing’s attention.
Soros has been vocal about China’s recent economic woes, going as far as to warn that global markets are headed for a crisis akin to 2008 as China scrambles to find a new growth model.
Beijing’s admonishment to Soros marks the latest effort by the Chinese government to crack down on those it views as speculators trying to upend its market.
Soros didn't respond to a request for comment via email and a call placed to China’s Ministry of Finance wasn’t answered.
[This is a long article, but worth the read. Below are just the highlights. Consider the contents below in the context of the coming Tribulation]
In the fall of 2015, the world descended into an economic apocalypse that will transform the globe into a single cashless society. This bold prediction is based on trends in nations all over the earth as shown in the article below.
As we enter 2016, we are only beginning to see this Epocalypse form through the fog of war. The war I’m talking about is the world war waged furiously by central banks against the Great Recession as the governments they supposedly serve fiddled while their capital burned.
The governments and banks of this world advanced rapidly toward forming cashless societies throughout 2015. The citizens of some countries are already embracing the move. In other countries, like the US, citizens fear the loss of autonomy that would come from giving governments and their designated central banks absolute monetary control.
The Epocalypse that I’ve been describing in this series will overcome that resistance during 2016 and 2017 as it wrecks economic havoc to such a degree that cash hold-outs will be ready for whatever holds the greatest promise of saving them from their collapsed monetary systems, fallen banks, deflated stocks and suffocating debt. One has only to think about how quickly and readily American citizens forfeited their constitutional civil liberties after 9/11 when George Bush and congress decreed that search warrants were not necessary if the government branded you a “terrorist.”
If this sounds like some wild conspiracy theory, consider the following: no less Sterling standard of global economics than The Economist predicted thirty years ago that by 2018 a global currency would rise like the phoenix out of the ashes of the world’s fiat currencies:
THIRTY years from now, Americans, Japanese, Europeans, and people in many other rich countries, and some relatively poor ones will probably be paying for their shopping with the same currency. Prices will be quoted not in dollars, yen or D-marks but in, let’s say, the phoenix. The phoenix will be favoured by companies and shoppers because it will be more convenient than today’s national currencies, which by then will seem a quaint cause of much disruption to economic life in the last twentieth century. At the beginning of 1988 this appears an outlandish prediction.
As we near their prescient date of 2018, The Economist’s prediction doesn’t appear even slightly outlandish. If it still seems outlandish to you, read on. You’ll see how the cashless movement gained huge momentum throughout the world in 2015 in the articles referenced below where the voices and actions of numerous economists and governments press for the formation of a global cashless society.
It may have been a long time coming, but it’s certainly not hard for anyone to see now that the world’s currencies are, indeed, crashing all around us as we near the coming of this seemingly messianic money that was predicted to resurrect from the ashes of the world’s fallen currencies.
Because the Epocalypse is a global economic collapse that is creating global currency wars and national currency collapses, it will beg for a global economic and monetary solution. That solution is already in the making all over the world. At the same time central banks have been battling the Great Recession, their many member banks and the governments they are supposed to serve have been waging a war on cash. The People’s Banks of China (PBOC) , for example, has been planning to make the yuan a cashless currency since 2014.
As the war on cash escalates, officials from The IMF to China are seeing the opportunity to control the world’s money through virtual (cash-less) currencies. Just as we warned most recently here, state wealth control is the goal and, as Bloomberg reports, The PBOC is targeting an early rollout of China’s own digital currency to “boost control of money” and none other than The IMF’s Christine Lagarde added that “virtual currencies are extremely beneficial.” (“War On Cash Escalates: China Readies Digital Currency“)
The war on cash is happening openly now in societies that have pushed economic stimulus as far as they can.
Transitioning into a cashless society is the ultimate central planner’s dream as it gives central banks total control over money, and money is their proprietary product.
What government wouldn’t want all of that as it seeks solutions to the death of its current currency? And what international bank wouldn’t want that?
As national currencies now collapse, governments will find themselves scrambling for an answer to the Epocalypse — and answer they already want. Many want a currency that ends US hegemony, and President Obama seems more willing to end US hegemony than other presidents have been. All want a currency that smooths international trade. What The Economist thought some might find “outlandish” thirty years ago is now the clarion call of economists around the world and a move that has already begun in many nations:
The Financial Times also notes government has its reasons for wanting to create a cashless society:
Electronic money also permits innovations to reward law-abiding businesses. Value added tax, for example, could be automatically levied — and reimbursed — in real time on transactions between liable bank accounts. Countries that struggle with tax collection could go a long way in solving their problems by restricting the use of cash. Greece, in particular, could make lemonade out of lemons, using the current capital controls to push the country’s cash culture into new habits.
They want to control your spending habits and the things you do to mitigate your risks. It’s all about controlling and monitoring your behavior as a consumer. You see, those businesses that operate primarily in cash might be criminals. Naturally, criminals do love cash because they must have anonymity. The philosophy is rapidly gaining ground, as a result of that truth, that anyone preferring cash may be someone who needs anonymity for nefarious reasons. Then it progresses from “may be” to “likely is.”
Therefore, the article in this highly regarded financial publication advocates that governments start fining people who use cash, as if all of them are bad guys. The writer says that governments should make cash users “pay for the privilege of anonymity” so they will choose to work more with electronic money and, thus, “remain affected by monetary policy.”
Banks really don’t like you having cash at all. Thus, a former Bank of England economist, Jim Leaviss, wrote a similar article in the London Telegraph in May of 2015, describing the move to becoming a cashless society as a panacea:
As I reported in an earlier article, “Cashless Society Has Arrived, and It’s Global,” most Scandinavian countries have already gone this way or have made major strides in that direction. Those Scandinavians love a good socialist answer to everything. So, what you might have thought sounded like conspiracy at the beginning of this article is actually the norm in Scandinavian societies.
So, let this former central bank economist (we know how smart economists are) inform you:
Electronic money is an inclusive and convenient system, giving poor and rural sectors of an economy – where cash machines and bank branches may be few and far between and not all people have accounts – a tool for easy participation in the economy.
You see, cash is cumbersome to the poor. What if they cannot get to a cash machine to get some? (How have they ever managed to get it in the past without cash machines?) Going cashless alleviates their challenging need to find cash machines in rural areas.
Your government is here to save you. Cash is an escape valve that puts you outside of their assistance. According to Leaviss, if you’re standing outside the electronic cash economy, you’re part of the “black economy.” You know, that hole in the eur-ozone that is full of death rays from outer space. You are one of the characters wearing the black hats. Why else would you choose to be so elusive and choose to avoid participating in the government’s control over the economy that is intended for the good of all society?
The prediction of a final, global, economic system goes back a very long way:
He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark….
(The Apocalypse of Jesus Christ 13:16 & 17 — commonly translated “The Book of Revelation” because “apocalypse” actually means “the uncovering” or “revelation,” though it is often thought of in terms of the global holocaust described in that ancient text.)
In case the move toward becoming a global cashless society still seems remote to you, look at how it gained popular momentum in the final quarter of last year as it has been implemented in some societies already:
Other articles from 2015 about the global cashless society movement
OCTOBER 22, 2015: Britain tries cashless society experiment
OCTOBER 31, 2015: Sweden pushes populace into cashless society
NOVEMBER 8, 2015: India and parts of Africa each intensify moves to become a cashless society
NOVEMBER 23, 2015: Terrorism finally cited as good reason to switch to being a cashless society
DECEMBER 1, 2015: Switzerland’s negative interest rates prompt economists to encourage move to cashless society
Also see:
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