THE seventh and youngest child of Lithuanian immigrants, Harry Dexter White, was a classic late bloomer.

Orphaned at a young age, White fought in World War I, and eventually finished his doctorate from Harvard at age 40. Despite the late start, White’s crowning achievement came at the Bretton Woods Conference when he succeeded in placing the US dollar at the centre of the post-World War II international financial system. In the decades that followed, the dollar reigned supreme as the very foundation of global finance.

This year, however, the dollar has suffered a decline of almost 10 per cent in value, making this the greenback’s weakest performance since 1973. At least for some, this decline reflects an inflection point, marking the beginning of the end of the dollar era.

A deeper analysis of this dollar depreciation suggests that there might be some volition at play. Important voices from inside the Trump administration, like those of Stephen Miran, have argued that the dollar is structurally overvalued, making US exports uncompetitive. To remedy this, Miran has proposed a summit, the so-called Mar-a-Lago Accord, so that the US would be able to convince other major economies for a depreciation in the dollar. Miran also forwarded the idea of imposing a user fee on foreign governments’ US treasury holdings, another way through which the dollar’s value may be lowered.

In addition, President Donald Trump has pushed very strongly for lower interest rates, dubbing Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell ‘

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