China, Russia and India aren't developing a dollar rival, top official says: 'There's no idea of a BRICS currency'
- China, Russia, and other BRICS countries aren't developing a dollar alternative, according to a top official.
- "There is no idea of a BRICS currency," India's foreign minister S. Jaishankar said.
China, Russia, and other members of the so-called BRICS group of nations aren't working on a US dollar alternative, a top Indian official said this week.
Foreign minister S. Jaishankar said that the five-member BRICS group – consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa – isn't currently planning to develop a greenback substitute for trade and investments.
"On what we will discuss at the BRICS meeting, we'll have to see because there are many other issues – but there is no idea of a BRICS currency," he said, as shown by footage from the Hindustan Times.
"Currencies will remain a national issue for a long time to come," Jaishankar added.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, both Beijing and Moscow have ramped up their efforts to promote de-dollarization, the movement to reduce other countries' reliance on the greenback.
That's because the dollar's dominance of trade is a huge source of economic strength for the US – for example, it enabled Washington to freeze half of Russia's foreign currency reserves and ban its biggest banks from the SWIFT international payments system after war broke out.
China has repeatedly asked its trading partners to settle commodities contracts using the renminbi rather than the greenback, while Putin said last year that Russia was ready to "work with all fair partners" to create a new reserve based on a basket of currencies including the Brazilian real, Indian rupee, Chinese yuan, Russian ruble, and South African rand.
The leaders of both Brazil and South Africa both also questioned the dollar's dominance last month, with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa saying that currencies would be "on the agenda" when the BRICS group next meets in Johannesburg in August.