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Termites are slowly feasting away at the foundations of the dollar’s dominanceChomp chomp chomp© APSteven Kamin was previously head of international finance at the Federal Reserve and is now senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Mark Sobel was previously head of international finance at the US Treasury and is now US chair of OMFIF.The dollar’s dominance was built on the foundation of America’s many strengths. But like termites eating away at a house’s woodwork, Trump’s dysfunctional policies are eating away at its support and rendering the US currency acutely vulnerable to future shocks. This remarkable newfound weakness was on full display this week, after President Donald Trump reality-divorced insistence that “the dollar is doing great”. Traders responded by sending it even lower:This is not to suggest that the House of Dollar will tumble down anytime soon. Its value is related but separate to its pre-eminent importance in the global economy. And at present, there are no good alternatives to the dollar for a global currency, not even the euro or renminbi. The US still has the world’s deepest and most liquid open capital markets. The major US banks remain healthy and able to finance far-flung networks of global trade and finance.But whereas a few years back, one would have been hard-pressed to foresee a world without dollar dominance, now one can readily imagine such a disorder emerging in the coming decades.Let’s back up to April 2, which Trump labelled “Liberation Day”. As global investors recoiled in horror at his announcement of sweeping, senseless tariffs on large swaths of the globe — some of them uninhabited — stock markets collapsed and financial volatility soared. Ordinarily, that would have prompted the dollar to rise, since it has long stood as a safe haven in times of crisis and uncertainty. But instead, the dollar plunged, convincing many observers that markets were now turning their back on the world’s pre-eminent safe asset. Indeed, you can see in the chart below, after Liberation Day the dollar plunged below the prediction of a simple currency valuation model, which explains movements on the basis of interest rate differentials and the VIX measure of stock market volatility.Moreover, the sensitivity of the dollar to increases in the VIX switched from positive — as expected in a safe-haven currency — to negative right after Liberation Day. This suggested that the dollar had morphed from a safe-haven currency, as befits the world’s most important asset, to an emerging-market style risky currency. Sure, markets have each time calmed down and the dollar’s safe-haven behaviour has reasserted itself as investors became more inured to Trump’s chaotic policies. However, Trump’s termites continued to feast on the foundations of dollar dominance:— The status of the US as a trusted ally and partner has eroded further, weakening a key pillar of the dollar’s global stature. A constant stream of tariff tantrums, threats to invade Greenland and Panama, support for rightwing parties in Europe, mollycoddling Putin over Ukraine, questioning NATO’s existence, numerous insults to Canada and countless other initiatives have forced others to doubt the reliability, trustworthiness and honour of the US. — The soundness of US macro policy has come into question. Of course, fiscal policy is a long-standing mess which the US political class lacks the guts to confront. But last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill will only worsen US debt dynamics and ensure a future explosion of its debt/GDP ratio. Meanwhile, Trump’s assaults on Fed independence reinforce the possibility that mounting budget deficits will be financed by rising inflation. — Mounting budget deficits and debt threaten the future solvency of the federal government and the safety and liquidity of US Treasuries. Should investors come to question the creditworthiness of the US government, or the Fed’s commitment to price stability, it is game over for dollar dominance.— Institutions are being degraded. Beyond the constant attacks and invective against the Federal Reserve, the Trump administration has assaulted the civil service through its ill-conceived “Doge” and gratuitous firing of public servants. The Supreme Court is increasingly unpopular and Congress is viewed as even less effective than in the past. — The rule of law is being weakened. Global investors may not be concerned by ICE’s behaviour or the weaponisation of the Department of Justice by the While House. But the administration’s intrusions into private business — as well as the taxes on capital flows that nearly made it into the OBBB — should lead them to hesitate before committing long-term investments into the US. With Trump’s termites having steadily worked away over the past year at the underpinnings of dollar dominance, it came as no surprise that his resurgent threats against Greenland, while culminating in his chickening out at Davos, triggered such turbulence in global FX markets.As you can see in the first chart above, after having returned to our model by late last year, the dollar again fell as the Greenland debacle unfolded. The second chart shows that the dollar’s negative correlation to VIX resumed, once again trading like an emerging market currency.While the dollar will probably regain its safe-haven status as markets calm down, the termites will continue to undermine the edifice of our economy. And the eventual consequences of their work will extend well beyond the loss of dollar dominance, to less stable, dynamic, and prosperous American and global economies. The dollar survived a massive jolt early in Trump’s term, and it will probably survive its most recent jolt. But with each succeeding shock, the House of Dollar may wobble a bit more. The question is now: how fast can the termites feast?
Germany proposes ‘two-speed’ EU to hasten defense buildupThe initiative reflects a strategic recalibration in Berlin’s European partnerships.By Linus HöllerPRAGUE — Germany is spearheading an initiative to create a “two-speed” European Union, proposing that a core group of six major economies bypass the bloc’s traditional consensus-based decision-making to accelerate defense cooperation and industrial competitiveness amid mounting geopolitical pressures.German Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil and his French counterpart, Roland Lescure, jointly convened finance ministers from Poland, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands on Jan. 28 for a video conference to establish what is being called the E6 format of the six leading European economies.“Now is the time for a Europe of two speeds,” Klingbeil said at a Berlin event ahead of the meeting.In a letter of invitation to his colleagues, obtained by Defense News, Klingbeil presented a four-point agenda that makes defense spending a priority alongside a Savings and Investment Union, strengthening the Euro and securing critical raw materials.“Europe has to become stronger and more resilient,” Klingbeil said in the letter. “Work towards this goal needs to be sped up in all dimensions. Continuing as before is not an option.”Klingbeil’s two-page document calls for enhanced collaboration on defense spending and urges making defense a key focus in the next EU multiannual budget. The letter also calls for “turning defense into an engine for growth” for the continent’s economy.The German finance minister described the Jan. 28 call as a kick-off meeting, saying that he hoped to have a follow-up meeting on the sidelines of the next EUROGroup meeting, a gathering of finance ministers of the Euro-zone.The two-speed concept for deeper European integration, while not entirely new to EU discussions, is gaining fresh momentum as the bloc confronts what many here describe as an urgent need to reduce dependence on the United States for defense.However, the approach risks fracturing European cohesion by alienating EU members who are on board with deeper integration but are not part of the group of six. German officials have indicated that the format would remain flexible and possibly open to additional participants.The initiative also reflects a strategic recalibration in Berlin’s European partnerships.Chancellor Friedrich Merz signed a comprehensive German-Italian “Protocol on a Plan of Action for strategic cooperation” with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Jan. 27, which commits both nations to “urgently and jointly achieve European defence readiness by closing capability gaps and strengthening the European pillar in NATO.” They will collaborate on integrated air and missile defense, unmanned systems, naval vessels, electronic warfare, and potentially a common land combat platform.Simultaneously, Berlin is deepening ties eastward: Merz announced in November that Germany and Poland are drafting a new defense policy agreement to be concluded in 2026, with the Bundeswehr already increasing joint exercises with Polish forces and expanding cooperation on drone detection and neutralization.The initiative comes as Germany itself undergoes a historic military buildup. Berlin’s 2026 budget allocates €82.69 billion ($98.92 billion) for the Bundeswehr, with an additional €25.5 billion ($30.5 billion) from a special defense fund, as Merz pursues his stated goal of making Germany “the strongest conventional army in Europe.”At the World Economic Forum in Davos on Jan. 22, Merz reaffirmed plans for Germany to increase defense spending to 5% of GDP, calling it “a huge increase” necessary to assert European sovereignty.All this comes against the backdrop of strained relations in the EU’s traditional Franco-German growth engine, precipitated by an impasse in the Future Combat Air System project meant to design Europe’s next-generation fighter jet, and the challenges posed to collective EU action by unanimity rules among the Bloc’s 27 member countries.
Euro firms must ditch Uncle Sam's clouds and go EU-nativeOpinion: Just because you're paranoid about digital sovereignty doesn't mean they're not after youBy Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols4 min. readOpinion I'm an eighth-generation American, and let me tell you, I wouldn't trust my data, secrets, or services to a US company these days for love or money. Under our current government, we're simply not trustworthy.In the Trump‑redux era of 2026, European enterprises are finally taking data seriously, and that means packing up from Redmond-by-Seattle and moving their most sensitive workloads home. This isn't just compliance theater; it's a straight‑up national economic security play.Europe's digital sovereignty paranoia, long waved off as regulatory chatter, is now feeding directly into procurement decisions. Gartner told The Reg last year that IT spending in Europe is set to grow by 11 percent in 2026, hitting $1.4 trillion, with a big chunk rolling into "sovereign cloud" options and on‑prem/edge architectures.The kicker? Fully 61 percent of European CIOs and tech leaders say they want to increase their use of local cloud providers. More than half say geopolitics will prevent them from leaning further on US‑based hyperscalers.The American hypercloud vendors have figured this out. AWS recently made its European Sovereign Cloud available. This AWS cloud, Amazon claims, is "entirely located within the EU, and physically and logically separate from other AWS Regions." On top of that, EU residents will "independently operate it" and "be backed by strong technical controls, sovereign assurances, and legal protections designed to meet the needs of European governments and enterprises for sensitive data."Many EU-based companies aren't pleased with this Euro-washing of American hypercloud services. The Cloud Infrastructure Service Providers in Europe (CISPE) trade association accuses the EU Cloud Sovereignty Framework of being set up to favor the incumbent (American) hypercloud providers.They're not wrong.You don't need a DEA warrant or a Justice Department subpoena to see the trend: Europe's 90‑plus‑percent dependency on US cloud infrastructure, as former European Commission advisor Cristina Caffarra put it, is a single‑shock‑event security nightmare waiting to rupture the EU's digital stability.Seriously. What will you do if Washington decides to unplug you? Say Trump gets up on the wrong side of the bed and decides to invade Greenland. There goes NATO, and in all the saber-rattling leading up to the 10th Mountain Division being shipped to Nuuk, he orders American companies to cut their services to all EU countries and the UK.With the way things are going, they're not going to say no. I mean, CEOs Tim Cook of Apple, Eric Yuan of Zoom, Lisa Su of AMD, and – pay attention – Amazon's Andy Jassy all went obediently to watch a feature-length White House screening of Melania, the universally-loathed, 104‑minute Amazon‑produced documentary about First Lady Melania Trump.Sure, that's a silly example, but for American companies to do business today, they're kowtowing to Trump. Or, take a far more serious example, when Minnesota company CEOs called for "de-escalation" in the state, there was not one word about ICE or the government's role in the bloodshed. It was the corporate equivalent of the mealy-mouthed "thoughts and prayers" American right-wingers always say after a US school shooting.Some companies have already figured out which way the wind is blowing. Airbus, the European aerospace titan, has put out a €50 million, decade‑long tender to migrate its mission‑critical applications to a "sovereign European cloud." Airbus wants its whole stack – data at rest, data in transit, logging, IAM, and security‑monitoring infrastructure – all rooted in EU law and overseen by EU operators. As Catherine Jestin, Airbus's executive vice president of digital, told The Register: "We want to ensure this information remains under European control."Who can blame them? Thanks to the American CLOUD Act and related US surveillance statutes, US‑headquartered providers must hand over European data regardless of where the bytes sit. Exhibit A is that Microsoft has already conceded that it cannot guarantee data independence from US law enforcement. Airbus is betting that "data residency on paper" from AWS‑styled "EU sections" is not enough. Real sovereignty demands EU‑owned and run operations with full contractual and legal firewalls. Sure, your data may live in Frankfurt, but your fate still rests in Seattle, Redmond, or Mountain View if an American company owns your cloud provider.Besides, do you really want some Trump apparatchik getting their hands on your data? I mean, this is a government where Madhu Gottumukkala, the acting director of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, uploaded sensitive data into ChatGPT!In response, Brussels is pushing an open source‑led exit from hyperscaler lock‑in. Ministries are standardizing on Nextcloud‑style collaboration stacks instead of Microsoft 365 to fund Euro‑native clouds via the European Cloud Alliance. Some countries, like France, are already shoving Zoom, Teams, and other US videoconferencing platforms out the door in favor of a local service.If you're running an EU‑based firm in 2026, the takeaway isn't that AWS‑in‑Frankfurt is evil; it's that for certain workloads, especially national security, industrial IP, or high‑profile consumer data franchises, EU‑native cloud and services are no longer a nice‑to‑have but a business continuity plan requirement.It's time to get serious about digital sovereignty. The clock is ticking, and there's no telling when Trump will go off. ®
Creo que la criptoestafa es dimensiones aún mayores que la de la IA.