The US dollar has experienced accelerated depreciation during the last weeks of January, reaching levels not seen since March 2021. The dollar index (DXY), which measures the value of the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, has fallen below 97 points, approaching four-year lows against the euro and the British pound. This weakness represents the culmination of a structural erosion process that has seen the dollar lose approximately 10% of its value over the past twelve months.

This depreciation is not solely due to typical macroeconomic cycles, but rather to a growing loss of confidence in the global financial model centered on the US dollar. An analysis by Zero Hedge states that "gold's movement is a vote of no confidence in the entire global financial architecture." More than a safe haven, the currency has become a risky asset in the face of the aggressive monetary policy pursued by the Trump administration and Washington's increasing fiscal fragility.

This constitutes a systemic loss of confidence. As Erik Bethel, former director of the World Bank, pointed out , the artificial demand for dollars that sustains the US economy stems from the fact that 60% of the world's central banks hold reserves in this currency. When that demand disappears because global actors no longer want to use the dollar, the system suffers: "All that artificial demand for dollars disappears and we sink," warned Bethel, who anticipates scenarios of massive inflation or even hyperinflation if the trend continues.

2026: Convulsive onset as a symptom of a structural shift

The past few weeks have been marked by extreme volatility in currency and commodity markets . The Japanese yen has experienced sharp movements that have disrupted global stability, and in response, on January 23, the U.S. Treasury Department conducted a rate check to assess a possible intervention in the foreign exchange market and curb the yen's decline against the dollar. This episode, initiated by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, reveals the level of nervousness among U.S. authorities regarding the destabilization of Japanese bond markets.

Yields on Japan's 10-year Treasury bonds (JGB) rose 4.5 basis points, reversing recent gains, as the yen weakened under inflationary pressure (CPI at 2.1%) and five consecutive trade deficits. Some analysts warn that Tokyo may need a US bailout, creating a paradox: who saves the savior?

Meanwhile, precious metals have experienced a historic rally . Gold surpassed $5,100 per ounce on January 26, marking a new all-time high. During 2025, the yellow metal appreciated between 60% and 71%, its best annual performance since 1979. Edu Estallo explains that "gold is the asset that historically wins when stock market valuations are stretched too far and confidence in the fiat system falters."

The S&P 500/gold ratio has touched an overvaluation line that has historically preceded major crises: 1929 (Great Depression), 1968 (the stagflation of the 1970s), 2000 (the dot-com bubble), and 2011. On each occasion, gold outperformed equities for years afterward. Estallo warns that this is the fourth time since 1880 that this pattern has repeated itself, indicating a structural cyclical shift where gold is regaining ground against overvalued equity assets.

• The orange line represents the purchasing power of the dollar, and the blue line represents the purchasing power of gold (Photo: Fidelity Investment)

Silver, meanwhile, has exceeded 161% gain in 2025, driven by supply and demand constraints linked to artificial intelligence and photovoltaic solar panels, trading between $107 and $110 per ounce.

This shift towards physical metals is a sign of the aforementioned "vote of no confidence against the entire global financial architecture." Copper and other industrial metals have also shown strength and reflected a structural rotation of capital towards tangible assets in the face of the deterioration of fiduciary instruments.

Debt vs. gold: A tectonic rupture

2025 has been a dismal year for the US dollar, with the DXY index plummeting by over 9%, its worst performance since 2017. This made it the weakest currency among 17 major global currencies. Such weakness occurred despite the Trump administration's promises to strengthen the dollar and transform the United States into a "Bitcoin superpower."

The recent weakness of the dollar is explained by a confluence of monetary, political, and strategic factors. On the one hand, the Federal Reserve maintained interest rates in a range of 3.5%–3.75% after a series of cuts scheduled to conclude in December 2025, reducing the relative attractiveness of dollar-denominated assets. At the same time, the deteriorating US fiscal situation is eroding the currency's credibility, while, for example, the government struggles to contain the yield on 10-year Treasury bonds, which increases the cost of servicing the debt, already exceeding military spending.

The macroeconomic context that explains this decline is an unprecedented debt crisis. According to The Kobeissi Letter, global public debt interest payments reached $4.9 trillion in 2025, an increase of $1.6 trillion in just three years. Total global debt climbed to $346 trillion, rising by $55 trillion over the same period, and for every dollar of global GDP growth in 2025, ten dollars of new debt were generated. During these three years, while debt expanded, gold appreciated by 142%.

• In blue, the growth of global debt and in red the percentage of global GDP corresponding to debt (Photo: Global Debt Monitor)

The United States adds $ 1 trillion to its debt every 150 days and, according to warnings from Bethel, pays more than $1 trillion annually in debt interest alone, exceeding the War Department's budget. This debt spiral has eroded confidence in fiat currency and was financed through printing money, which expanded the M2 money supply by approximately 40% between 2020 and 2022, according to data from the Mises Institute.

The dollar's share of central bank reserves has fallen from 66% a decade ago to 56.92% in the third quarter of 2025, according to IMF data. These institutions have accumulated 9,500 tons of gold since 2010, of which 3,700 tons represent unofficial, undeclared purchases, which have accelerated since the start of the conflict in Ukraine in 2022.

Countries such as Russia, China, and members of the BRICS are diversifying their reserves into physical gold, especially after the freezing of Russian assets in 2022. Basel III, a set of internationally agreed measures to be implemented in 2025 to strengthen the regulation, supervision, and risk management of banks, recognized physical gold as a Tier 1 asset, equating it with Treasury bonds, which has legitimized its role as a pillar of financial stability.

• Gold's appeal is growing as US government interest payments rise and new debt-related vulnerabilities emerge (Photo: Bloomberg)

The struggle for resources and the industrial dependence of the Global North

The decline of the dollar standard coincides with a structural crisis in the supply of critical raw materials. The International Energy Agency warns, in its 2025 annual report , that China dominates the refining of 19 of the 20 key strategic minerals, with an average market share of nearly 70%. In the battery sector, Chinese control exceeds 85% of global capacity and reaches 95% in anode manufacturing.

This geographic concentration creates systemic vulnerabilities on the other side of the planet. More than half of strategic minerals are subject to export controls, and the restrictions imposed by Beijing in 2025 on rare earth elements and battery components have highlighted the fragility of Western supply chains. A 10% disruption in rare earth magnet exports could affect the production of 6.2 million cars, one million industrial motors, and 230,000 civilian aircraft, according to IEA estimates.

In Europe, primary aluminum production has collapsed by 25% since 2010, leaving the continent with a structural deficit of 93% between domestic consumption and production. Slovalco, one of the most technically advanced plants, remains closed because high energy prices make smelting mathematically impossible, as it requires between 13 and 15 megawatt-hours per ton.

Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Associates, has pointed out that we are witnessing the simultaneous collapse of the fiat monetary order, the domestic political order, and the international geopolitical order, placing us "on the brink of war." Peter Schiff, for his part, anticipates that this crisis will be deeper than that of the 1980s: "This time it won't be the United States abandoning the gold standard, but the world abandoning the dollar standard."

The struggle for natural resources—evidenced by tensions over Greenland and trade sanctions or tariffs—is set against this backdrop of growing scarcity. The United States, far from being immune, exhibits a critical dependence on imports of processed minerals and advanced manufactured goods that its domestic supply chains cannot replace. The collapse of European aluminum production and China's control of critical minerals leave the Western bloc in a position of structural vulnerability as it attempts to maintain its monetary hegemony.

The combination of unsustainable debt, trade wars, resource scarcity, and geopolitical fragmentation presents extreme scenarios, including the possibility of internal conflicts in the United States, as some analyses suggest. The question that emerges is not whether the system will change, but how profound the transformation will be and which actors will define the new monetary order emerging from the decline of the fiat dollar.

The military attack against Venezuela demonstrates how the destructive influence of the United States is the only political tool left to a deindustrialized economy that has fallen into such a massive external debt that it now threatens to end the dominant and lucrative monetary role of the dollar.

Or is this an opportunity to reinforce the dollar's hegemony? A deliberate depreciation of the dollar can operate as a tool of structural power. By weakening, the United States pressures the central banks of other countries to intervene in foreign exchange markets to prevent excessive appreciation of their own currencies. This intervention typically takes the form of massive purchases of Treasury bonds, which in turn reduces the yields on these assets. The end result is cheaper financing of the US fiscal deficit, externalized to the rest of the world and free from domestic political costs.

It only remains for the world to finally understand this and decide to break with the chains of subordination and permanent transfer of resources towards a fictitious capital that constantly needs artificial respiration to survive imperially.