Let's say some random country follows your advice and decides to go back to the gold standard – is that going to convince people globally to use their currency?

Let's say some random country follows your advice and decides to go back to the gold standard – is that going to convince people globally to use their currency? Probably not. Because even if the currency is on the gold standard today, what stops the country's government from switching back to fiat tomorrow and pocketing all the gold? Or, gradually doing so by introducing restrictions on gold redemption and slowly tightening them over time? Whether a currency is fiat or backed, it is ultimately a statement that you trust the government which controls the currency to take good care of it – and in general, it is easier to have that trust with democracies than authoritarian regimes. And this is part of the argument for fiat currencies – if trust in the institutions ultimately counts for more than what the currency is backed by, why do we really need the backing? Which is why replacing the USD is so hard. I think even if the US starts to go really downhill, people will be looking at currencies like the EUR, JPY, GBP as an alternative. If the IMF allowed private parties to use SDR as a currency – a move the US has always blocked as a threat to the USD, but in a global crisis the US might feel it has no choice but to change its mind – that might become a viable alternative global currency. CNY may become important in trade with China and its close allies, but who outside of China trusts the Chinese government enough to use CNY as a long-term store of value? Only as a riskier bet in a diversified portfolio including safer options.