The petrodollar system has survived oil embargoes, financial crises, and the rise of China. It survived 2008 — when a crisis born in American banks sent investors running toward the dollar, not away from it.

But the dollar just posted its worst performance in over fifty years. And this time, the threat didn’t come from Beijing or Moscow.

It came from Washington.

In Episode 3 of our Petrodollar series, we cover the two events that are changing the architecture of global finance in real time: the Trump administration’s chaotic tariff policy — which shattered the dollar’s safe-haven status for the first time in modern history — and the war with Iran, which closed the Strait of Hormuz and turned the world’s most critical oil chokepoint into a yuan-denominated toll booth.

The petroyuan isn’t theoretical anymore. It’s being enforced at gunpoint in the waters where the petrodollar was born.

In this episode: — How the dollar’s safe-haven status broke down under its own government’s policy — Why the Strait of Hormuz closure is the most direct challenge to the petrodollar since 1974 — Iran’s condition for reopening the strait — and what it means that ships paid in yuan — Saudi Arabia’s quiet departure from the 1974 petrodollar arrangement — What the de-dollarization numbers actually show — without the hype or the denial — The British pound parallel — and what it tells us about how reserve currencies actually die

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