I have not exactly been reticent in my conviction since last autumn that King Dollar was on the precipice of a seminal monetary regime shift that could mean 40% downside risk on its trade weighted index, as in 2001-06. Yet not in my wildest dreams did I anticipate that the New Taiwan dollar would surge 8% against the greenback, its best performance in 42 years, in only 2 sessions, boosted by a FX short covering squeeze on the prospect of an imminent Trump-Xi trade deal and the repatriation of funds back to the PRC’s Renegade Province after an epic dump of American assets.
The biggest bang for the buck of the anti-dollar band wagon on Planet Forex now moves from the G-10 constellation to the rock and roll, lock and load world of emerging market FX. Who is the next obvious candidate for a pop against the buckeroo? The South Korean won, the Polish zloty and once the political calculus forces Lula to drop out of the 2026 election, the Brazilian real.
The Indian rupee has stopped falling at 84 even though Modi has dawned white gloves for his next “surgical strike” on Pakistan. For now, the Aussie dollar is a buy on Albanese’s landslide win and could hit 0.70 if Trump inks a China deal as a gift to the world to celebrate his 79th birthday on June 14, 2025. Vive le roi et gagnant Orange!
It was no surprise that the People’s Action Party (PAP) will continue to rule Singapore with Lawrence Wong as its 4th PM since the state was born after the Father, the Son and the Holy Goh. The Sing dollar is Asia’s Swissie and I would rather trust my savings to the anti-inflation, pro stability, monetary mandarins of the MAS rather than the Yessir, No-sir, Three Bags Full Sir MAGA creepo whom Trump will anoint as Fed Chairman to succeed Powel and inflate America’s obscene debt until the CPI reaches 6% or higher.
I do not want to sound like a broken record but my current project du jour is to research the world’s lowest cost, longest life reserves silver mines with no output hedging overhang. After all, it was not profitable to be a dollar bull in 1978 and the ghost of the Hunt brothers tell me that the white metal was a parabolic monetary paydirt in 1979 and could well be the same in 2026.
Prince Abdulaziz has tanked the price of Brent crude, down 4% to 58 a barrel by yet another OPEC supply surge decision. Saudi Arabia has escalated its price war and strategy to preserve downstream market share from OPEC+ cheaters Kazakhstan and Iraq while positioning the Kingdom for the imminent end of sanctions on Russia after the Ukraine peace deal and even Iran if the smoke signals from the Muscat negotiations bear fruit on the White House lawn as Begin/Sadaat and the Rabin/Rafat handshakes did all those years ago. All bets are now off for downside risk in crude oil
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