Are PetroDollar Days Numbered?

The 11/01/07 posting asked the question: Are PetroDollar Days Numbered?

Well, this question certainly was a hot topic at the recent meeting of OPEC heads of state.


RECENT HEADLINES
---Financial Times, 11/16/07: "Gulf states' dollar peg comes under threat"

---Financial Times, 11/17/07: "Opec nations clash over weak dollar"

---Financial Times, 11/19/07: "Opec looks at switch to strong currency"

---Financial Times, 11/19/07: "Opec in bid to seal deepening rifts over the dollar"

---Financial Times, 11/20/07: "Debate grows in the Gulf states over revaluation or depegging"

---WSJ, 11/20/07: "Wealthy Nations In Gulf Rethink Peg to Dollar"

---Financial Times, 11/20/07: "Dollar loses grip on Asian debt sector"

---Financial Times, 11/20/07: "Chinese join chorus of alarm on weak dollar"

---Sovereign Society A-Letter, 11/21/07: "The Dollar Divide: Why the World is Choosing Sides Over the Falling Buck"


QUOTES
---Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: "They get our oil and give us a worthless piece of paper. We all know that the US dollar has no economic value."

---Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez: "The fall of the dollar is not the fall of the dollar. It's the fall of the North American empire; we have to be prepared for that."

---Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Saud al-Faisal in what he thought was a private discussion, warned Opec ministers before the summit that the dollar could "collapse" if the oil cartel mentioned its weakness in the leaders' closing declarations. "The mere mention that Opec is studying the issue of the dollar is going to have an impact."

---Ecuador President Rafael Correa said that Opec needed to sell its oil in a "strong currency....If we continue to trade it in a weak currency {the dollar}, we are transferring rents to developed countries."

---United Arab Emirates Governor Sultan Nasser al-Suweidi said that the dollar peg has "served the economy...very well in the past. However, we have reached a crossroads."