Andy Mukherjee: China’s dream of currency supremacy-Has the war in West Asia helped its cause?

I argued in early February that those looking for evidence of the challenge to the US currency in payment flows were searching in the wrong place. For years to come, de-dollarization will remain hidden in additions and alterations to financial plumbing. But that was before the conflict in the Middle East. A lot has changed in the past six weeks. China is the largest buyer of Iran’s seaborne oil. The price its refineries pay stays in “controlled accounts” at small Chinese banks cut off from dollar trade. According to the Atlantic Council, these funds are used to pay Chinese contractors…