Was the one world currency predicted in 1988?

"History is just a version of the past events that people have decided to agree with," said Napoleon, the French Emperor. You can agree with this statement or reject it but it is quite difficult to argue with the fact that the past often becomes the basis of modern perception of events taking place here and now.

In 1988, The Economist magazine in its article "Get Ready for a world currency" predicted the emergence of a new form of world money. What was that? Really, more than 30 years ago we were given a hint about cryptocurrencies? As it often happens, in order to realize and accept any prediction, it must be experienced.

The author of this article called the currency “Phoenix” and wrote that “Americans, Japanese, Europeans and residents of many other rich countries, as well as some relatively poor ones will probably pay for their purchases with the same money.”

Probably, the word "Phoenix" was used as a metaphor, not as a name, but the indication of the new currency was quite specific. “Prices will be indicated not in dollars, yen or marks, but in Phoenix. Phoenix will be popular with companies and buyers because it will be more convenient than today's national currencies.”

In his article, The Economist wrote that "Phoenix will become the most stable, reliable and convenient financial instrument 100% backed by gold." And although this formulation is clearly not suitable for most existing cryptocurrencies, the idea of linking digital assets to real precious metals has already been implemented.

The Economist is famous not only for being able to predict events, but also for how skillfully the magazine's artists manipulate our consciousness with the help of visual images. A huge bird with powerful wings sitting on a "throne" of burning dollars… What's it? A demonstration of the insolvency and imminent collapse of the American currency, or just an image designed to awaken the reader's imagination?

It is important to note that the author of the article, as well as the author of the cover, do not have specific names. They created this work under the pseudonym of the editorial group, giving us for dessert the idea of anonymity, which is one of the main pillars of the cryptocurrency world.

And now some interesting fact that preceded this landmark material…

Five months before the publication of the article, a real financial crisis broke out. In October 1987, the infamous stock market crash occurred, called "Black Monday" and caused by an increase in interest rates. In 24 hours, stock indexes fell by a staggering 22.6%, which is even lower than during the market crash that preceded the Great Depression.

Conspiracy theorists were alerted by two things: the date and shape of the image of the Phoenix coin with the inscription "2018". Coincidentally (or not), Bitcoin reached its peak price in January 2018, when it rose to almost $20,000, after which it began to decline sharply.

And the ideas declared in this article are suspiciously similar to the ideas described by Satoshi Nakamoto in the description of the concept of Bitcoin: "One world, one money, a global monetary union, a politically expedient change in financial policy...”

Of course, there are different ways to treat the predictions of even such an authoritative magazine as The Economist. Now that cryptocurrencies have already become a reality, it becomes obvious that they have not brought a drop of real value into this world, have not made people free, independent and happy.

And this means that the time has come to build new financial systems based on a fair distribution of benefits, responsible choice and real values!