Volume II · After Gold · Money Research
After Gold: The Fiat World, 1971–2026 — Research Directory
Companion to the gold-research/ set. That directory ends on 15 August 1971, when the United States suspended official dollar–gold conversion under Bretton Woods. The subsequent IMF reform, effective in 1978, removed gold as the common denominator of its international par-value system, not as every country's reserve asset or domestic policy reference. This directory asks what happened next: how monetary arrangements diversified, what rules and treaties replaced Bretton Woods, how wars were financed, what new currencies were born, and how technology changed the form of money.
Compiled 8 September 2026. Historical material is drawn from standard economic-history sources; present-day figures come from the IMF, the ECB, the World Gold Council, central-bank statements and press reports current to the first week of September 2026. Every file ends with a "Key takeaways" section so the arc can be skimmed by reading only those.
Reading order
| File | Question it answers |
|---|---|
01-the-break-1971-1976.md | How the fixed-rate world was dismantled between the Nixon shock and the Jamaica Accords, and what "floating" actually meant. |
02-oil-petrodollars-and-stagflation-1973-1982.md | How inflation, oil shocks, dollar invoicing and petrodollar recycling interacted after gold redemption ended, and how Volcker's disinflation changed monetary policy. |
03-debt-crises-and-the-managed-dollar-1982-1990.md | The Latin American lost decade, the Plaza and Louvre accords, Black Monday, Japan's bubble, Basel I and the first rules of the fiat era. |
04-cold-war-ends-new-nations-new-currencies-1989-2001.md | The collapse of communism, the birth of some 25 new states and currencies, hyperinflations, the ERM crisis, the euro, and the wave of central-bank independence. |
05-globalization-and-emerging-market-crises-1990-2001.md | NAFTA, the WTO, China's entry, the Tequila, Asian, Russian and Argentine crises, LTCM and the dot-com bubble — and the reserve hoarding that followed. |
06-wars-invasions-and-money-1971-2026.md | Every major war of the fiat era, from Yom Kippur to the 2026 Iran war, and how each was paid for and how each moved oil, inflation, the dollar and gold. |
07-financial-crisis-and-the-age-of-qe-2007-2019.md | The 2008 crash, bailouts, zero rates, quantitative easing, the eurozone crisis, Dodd-Frank and Basel III, and the politics they produced. |
08-innovation-cards-bitcoin-stablecoins-cbdcs.md | How money dematerialised: electronic markets, derivatives, cards, mobile money, gold ETFs, Bitcoin, stablecoins and central-bank digital currencies. |
09-pandemic-inflation-and-weaponized-reserves-2020-2026.md | COVID stimulus, the 2021–23 inflation, the fastest rate hikes since Volcker, the freezing of Russia's reserves, the tariff wars, and where the system stands in September 2026. |
10-rules-treaties-and-institutions.md | A reference table of every agreement, law and institution that governs money since 1971. |
11-master-timeline-1971-2026.md | One consolidated chronology. |
12-glossary.md | Terms used across the files. |
13-sources.md | Sources and further reading. |
The arc in one paragraph
Nixon suspended dollar–gold convertibility in August 1971, and major currencies began floating against the dollar in 1973. The IMF's Second Amendment took effect in 1978. These changes reshaped the constraints on monetary policy, but they did not start the Great Inflation: US inflation had been rising since the mid-1960s. Policy choices, expectations and oil shocks also contributed. Federal Reserve History, “The Great Inflation”.
This volume follows the shift to floating rates, the inflation and disinflation of the 1970s and early 1980s, debt crises, new currencies, financial globalisation, the 2008 crisis, and newer payment and reserve arrangements. The dollar retained a central role in invoicing, banking and reserves. Oil was widely invoiced in dollars and exporters invested some proceeds in dollar assets, but dollars were not redeemable for oil. Alongside new technology and markets came new exposures and rules; the chapters distinguish a payment message from settlement, bank deposits from central-bank money, and a dated observation from a durable monetary mechanism. The recent events and figures discussed here require source-by-source review before they can support a definitive verdict.
Chapters in this volume
- The Break, 1971–1976: From the Nixon Shock to Legalised Floating
- Oil, Petrodollars and Stagflation, 1973–1982: The First Decade Without an Anchor
- Debt Crises and the Managed Dollar, 1982–1990
- The Cold War Ends: New Nations, New Currencies and the Euro, 1989–2001
- Globalization and the Emerging-Market Crises, 1990–2001
- Wars, Invasions and Money, 1971–2026
- The Financial Crisis and the Age of Quantitative Easing, 2007–2019
- Innovation: How Money Dematerialised, 1971–2026
- Pandemic, Inflation and Weaponised Reserves, 2020–2026: Where the System Stands
- Rules, Treaties and Institutions of the Fiat Era: A Reference Table