FINAN VIII · Unit 8

Reserve Currency Wargame

Navigate de-dollarization as a central bank reserve manager.

Your country's reserves pay for everything it imports — food, medicine, technology, energy.

As reserve manager, you decide how to invest those reserves. Hold US dollars and you get stability — until America freezes your assets. Hold gold and nobody can touch it — but you can't pay for imports with gold bars. Hold digital assets and you're independent — but the price might crash 30% overnight.

Over four years of geopolitical upheaval, you'll choose a strategy each round. Your choices determine whether your country can keep the lights on.

Simple Choices, Real Tradeoffs

Each round, pick one of three strategies. Each has clear pros and cons. No strategy is safe.

Three Countries, Three Problems

An oil exporter, a sanctioned economy, and the world's factory. Each faces a different version of the same question: how much can you trust the dollar?

Your Stability Score (A through F) tracks four metrics:

Growth — Are your reserves growing or shrinking? High returns boost this score; bad bets tank it.
Liquidity — Can you convert reserves to cash quickly? Dollars are instant; gold takes weeks to sell in volume.
Safety — What percentage of your reserves could a hostile government freeze? Western assets are sanctionable; gold and crypto are not.
Settlement — Can you actually pay your trade partners with what you hold? If China is 35% of your trade but you hold 0% yuan, you have a settlement gap.

Choose Your Country

Each country faces a fundamentally different version of the de-dollarization question. Your choice shapes every decision.

Round 1 of 4

Session Report

Your complete game record. Use this for your discussion post.

Summary

Round-by-Round

Result Code

Include this at the end of your discussion post.