One of the old tricks global central banks tend to pull in order to beef up exports and decreased imports is to purposefully devalue their home currencies.

As the dollar leaves behind the support in the 84 – 85 area on the index, the rate of decline is accelerating. The big questions now, ofcourse, are “How far will it drop?” and “Are we in for a full-blown dollar crisis?” The simple answer to these questions is “a very long way” and “yes”, respectively.

Our bearish views on the United States Dollar have been formed over years of watching what we view as reckless and incredibly shortsighted policy decisions by the Federal Reserve. The chief culprits of this attack on the greenback have been none other than Alan Greenspan and his band of merry sheep spearheaded by Ben “Printing Press” Bernanke and Bob “Lever up & Buy an SUV” McTeer.

The dollar crashed support at 87 as predicted and has plunged rapidly to the next support level. This development was expected to result in a gold breakout above the key $430 resistance level, but it did not.

The biggest change of the banking law in years becomes effective in October 28,2004. This “enhancement” is called Check 21.

The featured article of my February 2004 issue of Financial Insights was entitled: “Will ‘Buy America’ Become the World’s New Mantra?”.

The United States today, as Britain before, has benefited greatly from having the world´s reserve currency as its local currency. This has allowed America to spend 22% more than its income over the past five years. No other country could do that but having the reserve currency means you can write checks and nobody cashes them.

Crude futures close above $51 for the first time ever on the New York Mercantile Exchange. November crude rose $1.18 to close at $51.09 a barrel, eclipsing the previous closing record of $50.12 seen on Friday. Lingering production delays in the Gulf of Mexico, tension in Nigeria, and uncertainty ahead of Wednesday´s U.S. petroleum supply updates fueled the rally. -CBS Marketwatch, October 5th, 2004

Whether you traffic in the circles of belligerent contrarian thought or the mainstream market consciousness, chances are today´s surging crude oil market is among the most popular topics of financial conversations in your world these days.

Who is Alan Greenspan? Any student of recent financial history knows that Alan Greenspan is, above all other things, a political animal.