In the history of money and finance, 1972 was a long year: it began in late 1971, when US President Richard Nixon announced that the dollar would be de-pegged from gold, and ended in early 1973, when the post-war international economic order definitively collapsed. The Bretton Woods Accords, signed by countries in the western hemisphere at the end of World War II, guaranteed affiliated central banks the ability to exchange their American currencies for gold at $35 an ounce. A system of fixed exchange rates was built on this anchoring, which provided mechanisms for the settlement of payments between stronger and weaker economies in order to prevent trade surpluses and trade deficits.
Richard Nixon and Jacques Derrida: 1972 began financial capitalism – culture
