This Is It! China Surpasses U.S. As Number One Global Trading PowerBrandon Smith, Contributor This trend, which seemed to take serious root in 2005, was the massive shift by China from an export dependent source of cheap manufacturing and labor, into a moderate exporter, consumer hub, and currency powerhouse. In my view at the time, the evidence suggested that China was positioning itself to decouple from its dependence on U.S. markets and the dollar. I was, of course, attacked as a doom monger and conspiracy theorist. Five years later, the critics have changed their tune For the past decade, China has been slowly but surely issuing Yuan-denominated bonds and securities around the globe, while simultaneously forming bilateral trade agreements with multiple nations and cutting out the U.S. dollar as the world reserve currency. This process has gone mostly ignored by the mainstream financial media. However, I and many other independent analysts could not overlook the red flags. I tried to summarize as much of the situation and facts as I could in my article How The U.S. Dollar Will Be Replaced, which was published in May of last year: http://www.alt-market.com/articles/784-how-the-us-dollar-will-be-replaced The biggest question for me was, if China is one of the largest holders of Forex reserves on the planet, and had the largest savings of any nation, WHY did they feel the need or desire in 2005 to begin issuing Yuan-denominated debt? Why begin borrowing capital from foreign creditors? They certainly didnt need the money. Why were they moving away from export dependency and building a consumer base? And why attempt to proliferate their currency? Wouldnt the pursuit of global Yuan circulation lead to an eventual increase in valuation? Didnt the Chinese want their currency cheap so that they could maintain export superiority? What did the Chinese know in 2005 that we didnt? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-08/china-accounts-nearly-half-worlds-new-money-supply China is flooding the system with Yuan! This means only one thing; China is no longer seeking to maintain the traditional trade relationship it has had with the United States. To make my case even more clear, I would point out that China has not only become the worlds largest gold producer, but also its largest BUYER, recently surpassing India. Official estimates place Chinese gold purchases in 2012 at around 800 tons; an astonishing increase in their stockpile. The U.S. and the Federal Reserve cant even deliver gold it is supposed to be holding for others, including Germany. China has also recently quadrupled imports of rice and tripled wheat and corn imports in only one year. Why? Again, I ask, what do they know that we are not being told? http://ajw.asahi.com/article/economy/business/AJ201302020056 As I have stated for many years, China is being groomed as an alternative economic engine in opposition to the United States, and that this will lead to an eventual dump by them of the Greenback. This scenario is not only based on my opinion, it has also been spoken of openly by elitist financiers, including George Soros: This past month, the same plan has been reiterated by Zhu Min, the deputy managing director of the IMF. In his statement, he proclaimed that the shift by China into a more consumer-based system had been successful, and that the Yuan or RMB, was on the way to becoming a world reserve currency: http://www.wantchinatimes.com/news-subclass-cnt.aspx?id=20130118000075cid=1102 I believe that the moment for the epic changeover, and all the political and financial conflict that comes with it, has begun It has been announced this week that China surpassed the U.S. for the first time ever as the number one trading power in the world: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-09/china-passes-u-s-to-become-the-world-s-biggest-trading-nation.html U.S. exports and imports last year totaled $3.82 trillion, the U.S. Commerce Department said last week. Chinas customs administration reported last month that the countrys total trade in 2012 amounted to $3.87 trillion. China had a $231.1 billion annual trade surplus while the U.S. had a trade deficit of $727.9 billion: It is remarkable that an economy that is only a fraction of the size of the U.S. economy has a larger trading volume, Nicholas Lardy, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, said in an e-mail. The surpassing of the U.S. is not because of a substantially undervalued currency that has led to an export boom, said Lardy, noting that Chinese imports have grown more rapidly than exports since 2007. According to ONeill (Goldman Sachs Jim ONeill), the trade figures underscore the need to draw China further into the global financial and trading architecture that the U.S. helped create. One way or another we have to get China more involved in the global organizations of today and the future despite some of their own reluctance, ONeill said, mentioning Chinas inclusion in the International Monetary Funds Special Drawing Rights currency basket. To not have China more symbolically and more importantly actually central to all these things is just increasingly silly. For those who are still not aware of why this is such a big deal, it is essentially a turning point moment in global trade. There is no doubt that China will now be inducted into the SDR, and that their importance as a trade and consumption center will quickly lead to a move away from the dollar. To put it simply, the dollar is going to lose its world reserve status VERY soon. Many will cheer this change as necessary progress towards a more globally conscious economic system. However, its not that simple. Total centralization is first and foremost the dream of idiots, and in any mutation (or amputation) there is always considerable pain involved. The proponents of this New World Order (their words, not mine) seem to have placed the U.S. squarely in their crosshairs as the primary recipient of this fiscal pain. In my early analysis, I felt it possible that Japan would be inducted willingly into the new ASEAN trading bloc and that they would swiftly fall in line with a dump of the dollar, mainly because their export markets were suffering greatly due to the decline in American purchases. Now it appears that Japan has not been as pliable as the globalists wanted, and so, a war may be on the table in the Pacific. Rhetoric in Chinese newspapers has been very heated and provocative, and the tensions surrounding the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands is reaching a boiling point. The two countries have done everything so far EXCEPT shoot at each other, and that will be happening in due course now that China is allegedly locking offensive radar onto Japanese ships. Even Chinese films released in the past two years have been soaked with anti-Japan propaganda, most of them usually set during WWII around the brutal invasion and subjugation by the Japanese in Chinese provinces. I say again, China has surpassed the U.S. in global trade. A drop of the dollar is the obvious next step You can contact Brandon Smith at: brandon@alt-market.com Alt-Market is an organization designed to help you find like-minded activists and preppers in your local area so that you can network and construct communities for mutual aid and defense. Join Alt-Market.com today and learn what it means to step away from the system and build something better. To contribute to the growth of the Safe Haven Project, and to help us help others in relocating, or to support the creation of barter networks across the country, visit our donate page here: http://www.alt-market.com/donate 