Will the transition to a non-monetary economy end the crisis and revive Lebanon?

Financial and economic proposals put forward to solve crises not only in Lebanon, but also worldwide. Recently, there has been a lot of talk about the adoption of the non-monetary economy in economic transactions and the purchase of needs through banking systems far from paper money circulation. This transformation has advantages and disadvantages.

The Lebanese citizen will find it easy, for example, when paying his bills and fees electronically from his home or from any other place without the need to leave his place, and therefore the Lebanese state will no longer need to print paper currency and formulate money as is the case now, which will lead to a reduction in cost and savings. in the state budget.

The state in Lebanon, for the first time in its history, will have accurate and transparent information about capital and its movement, demand and supply volume in the economy, and consumption volume, which will help in careful planning and studies to advance the Lebanese economy significantly, reduce tax evasion and issue financial statements for all economic sectors in the country.

Over the years, the exchange of goods and merchandise has undergone many great transformations. Historically, the exchange of goods was based on the barter system, "The Barter System". However, this system faced various difficulties, the most important of which was the need of the two parties to the exchange for the exchanged goods. For example, if the first party wants to exchange apples for lemons, it must find a party in the exchange that produces lemons and at the same time wants to exchange it for apples. Therefore, the exchange system did not become a primitive system that did not live long.

With the change of the world, the tools of exchange developed, for example: the people on the island of Santa Cruz in the Pacific Islands exchanged goods and merchandise by bird feathers or the famous scarlet honey bird, “Honey eater bird”, which led to the extermination of more than twenty thousand sparrow a year! In other regions of the world, the exchange was based on dolphin teeth and stone wheels that were used to pull carts.

Later, the exchange method entered the era of gold and silver, specifically the era of the gold standard, but after the First World War, many countries began to stop using the gold cap as a means of exchange. On the fifth of April 1933, the President of the United States of America, Franklin Roosevelt, issued a presidential order requiring Americans to hand over gold before or on the first of May 1933. Then he passed a law prohibiting the acquisition of gold without a license from the state on January 30, 1934. . In 1944 the Bretton Woods Agreement was signed where all coins were valued at gold.

But on the fifteenth of August of the year 1971, President Richard Nixon announced that the United States of America would stop converting the dollar into gold, and this announcement was the end of the era of the gold standard or “The Gold Standard” and all currencies globally became dependent either on supply and demand or on linking them to currencies Foreign currencies such as the dollar and others, as in the case of the Lebanese pound currently.

With the development of computer technology in the second part of the twentieth century, specifically in the year 1990, banks in America and other regions of the world began to transfer money from their central banks to commercial banks electronically. Around the year 2000, money worldwide became electronic.

All financial operations, exchange operations, buying and selling operations and others are done electronically in the non-monetary economy, instead of using paper money. Several countries around the world have begun to gradually transition to a paperless or cashless economy. In this context, the Kingdom of Sweden is at the forefront of the world in the non-monetary economy, as more than 60 percent of all consumer operations are conducted electronically, and Canada comes in second place, with 57 percent of all consumer operations done electronically.

In 2016, India canceled the highest value of its paper currency from circulation, and China is currently working to cancel a large part of its paper currency. e-wallet: The paperless currency constitutes an electronic wallet and has two addresses: a private address that must remain private, as in the case of a house key, and a public address, as is the case in the address of the private mailbox of every citizen.

The most prominent digital or non-fiat currencies are as follows:

1.Bitcoin (BTC): The price of a unit or token is $28,716.38, and the value of BITcoin around the world is approximately $81.57 billion.

2. Ethereum (ETH): This electronic currency was launched in 2015 and is currently the second most popular currency after Bitcoin. The unit is estimated at $142.54 and the total worldwide value is about $15.6 billion.

3.Ripple (XRP): It is the most popular among financial institutions and currently it is the third cryptocurrency in the world, with a unit estimated at $0.21 and a total value of $9.2 billion worldwide.

4.Litecoin (LTC): This cryptocurrency is similar to Bitcoin, except that it is quickly approved for exchange, buying, consuming, etc. The unit is estimated at about $46.92 and the total value is about $3 billion around the world.

5.Tether (USDT): This cryptocurrency was launched in 2014. It has low volatility and stability. The unit price is about $1 and the total value is about $4.6 billion worldwide.

6.Bitcoin Cash (BCH): It is currently the most popular and most popular, and has a capacity that exceeds the ability of Bitcoin in terms of speed of completion of trade operations. The unit value is $240.8 and the global market value is about $4.4 billion.

7. Libra (LIBRA): It is the cryptocurrency that Facebook intends to launch in January 2021.

8.Monera (XMR): This coin was launched in 2014 and this coin is based on absolute privacy. Civil groups and major donors have contributed to its launch. The unit value is about $57.16 and the total value in the world is about $998 million.

9.EOS (EOS): This cryptocurrency was launched in 2018 and is the most centralized than the rest of the cryptocurrencies. Most of this token is controlled by China, so it is considered the most centralized currency with a unit price of about $2.85 and a global market value of about $2.7 billion.

10.Binance coin (BNB): This coin was launched in 2017, and it is the largest in terms of trade. The unit has a value of $14.71 and a global market value of about $2.3 billion.