5 ms·

Is this a human writing in the style of LLMs? The exemption is diplomatic, not commercial. The Yuan Dimension I hate it.

• realpolitik9 5mo ago
  Fair cop on the headers, I write these at 2am and it shows. But on the diplomatic/commercial thing. Iran charges ~$1/barrel in yuan through Kunlun Bank. That's real money through real channels. And the access list keeps expanding, started with 5 countries in March and now it's 10+. If this were purely diplomatic the list would be stable, but it's growing like a customer base. You could argue the fee follows the politics and not the other way around but then why yuan specifically, and why route it through Kunlun Bank with a per-barrel rate structure. Every transit builds volume through yuan settlement channels that bypass dollar clearing. The Danish Sound Dues ran for 400 years on the same logic, different rates for different nations depending on who Denmark was allied with. None of this is new, it's just never been done at 20% of global oil supply before
  • icegreentea2 5mo ago
    I don't think its meaningful to talk about commercial/diplomat as such clear categories at this level. Bypassing dollar clearing is only really a commercial concern because it is a political/diplomatic concern. Diplomacy is the act of non-violent interactions between countries. Commerce is (generally...) a non-violent form of interaction between countries. High level diplomatic actions enable commerce (of various forms and levels), while commerce creates incentives for diplomacy, and creates the strength for a party to perform diplomacy.
    • readthenotes1 5mo ago
      Most US diplomacy historically (including the "by other means") seems driven by commercial interests. Nothing special there though
  • Gud 5mo ago
    1$/barrel “in yuan”, please just write in yuan. In a decade or two the yuan will be the world currency anyway, might as well get used to it. It is interesting times, as the Chinese proverb goes.