Brazilian President Lula is the latest world leader (after Wen Jiabao and  Vladimir Putin) to call for moving away from the US dollar in trade and and for a new monetary and financial order. On the eve of his trip to China this week, Lula suggested in an interview with Caijing (and other news sources) that the two countries should conduct more of their trade in their own currencies rather than the US dollar.

“Between Brazil and China, we need to establish a trade that is paid for in our own currencies. We don't need dollars. Why do two important countries like China and Brazil have to use the dollar as a reference, instead of our own currencies? We've already started doing this with Argentina. Our trade is taking place in our own currencies. Otherwise, we'll be in an absurd situation, where the country that caused this crisis will be the country that gets the most dollars. It's crazy that the dollar is the reference, and that you give a single country the power to print that currency. We need to give greater value to the Chinese and Brazilian currencies.”