G-20 and Beyond: The Push for Global Finance

Where is your mark? You cannot buy or sell unless you have the mark!” Imagine being unable to purchase food, medicine, gasoline, clothing, or anything else you need for yourself and your family—and being unable to sell, as well. Such will be the situation for people who reject the Antichrist during the second half of the future Tribulation, when the False Prophet will require everyone to take the mark of the Beast on his or her right hand or forehead in order to conduct business (Rev. 13:16).

There is no leader today who holds power over the entire world and could carry out such a command. But the time is coming. A global financial-economic system controlled by a global-government leader will one day emerge. And a plan is already in place to put all the important financial institutions in the world under the authority of a single regulatory agency.

A Look at the FSB
The impetus for such a move is due in part to the economic and financial crisis of 2008 that saw an unprecedented collapse in the credit markets of the major developed nations. Many banks teetered on the brink of failure; and some large, long-standing banks went out of existence. To stanch the hemorrhage, governments pumped cash into various financial institutions to keep them alive and maintain the flow of credit. Today’s economies are built on credit. Without it, businesses can’t expand; and people can’t purchase large-cost items, such as homes and cars. During 2008, virtually all investments lost value as investors lost confidence in the credit markets and, consequently, the economy.

The world is no stranger to recessions. However, world leaders responded to this crisis very differently than in the past. Many saw this recession as a turning point in world history. The national leaders of the Group of 20 (G-20)—a collection of finance ministers and central bank governors from the world’s 19 largest economies, including the United States, Japan, China, and Russia, plus a representative from the 27-member European Union—held a summit in April 2009 to lay the framework for a new world order. The banking crisis and global recession became the catalyst to call for radical change.

In the days leading up to the G-20 summit, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown declared, “Historians will look back and say this was no ordinary time but a defining moment: an unprecedented period of global change, and a time when one chapter ended and another began.”¹ He continued: “The scale and the speed of the global banking crisis has at times been almost overwhelming, and…now is the time for leaders of every country in the world to work together.”²

The G-20 summit concluded with the adoption of a Global Plan that, among other things, calls for uniform regulations and bylaws that will be governed by the Financial Stability Board (FSB) made up of central bankers from each of the G-20 nations and European Union. The FSB received a mandate “to set a framework of internationally agreed high standards that a global financial system requires.”³

This is a significant development because all of the G-20 nations, including the United States and European Union, have agreed to place all of the important financial institutions, instruments, and markets—in other words, all their financial systems—under the authority of a single regulatory agency: the FSB.

The establishment of the FSB is an important first step toward a one-world financial system. What makes this development even more amazing is the speed at which world leaders, including U.S. President Barack Obama, have embraced the concept. Speaking in Prague following the G-20 summit, President Obama declared, “All nations must come together to build a stronger, global regime.”⁴ British Prime Minister Brown commented, “I think a new world order is emerging with the foundation of a new progressive era of international cooperation.”⁵

There is a strong European flavor to this move toward a global financial system. In the fall of 2008, it was European leaders who called for a global summit “to establish a new world order for regulating the banking system.”⁶ Then, after last year’s G-20 summit, Europe emerged with six of the 12 national members on the FSB. The pro-European bias is clear, wrote commentator Dick Morris: “The United States, with a GDP [Gross Domestic Product] three times that of the next largest G20 member (Japan) will have [just] one vote.”⁷

One-World Currency
The 2008 credit crisis also spurred foreign nations to call for the establishment of a global currency and banking system. In the words of writer Paul Joseph Watson, Stephen Gallo, head of market research for Schneider Foreign Exchange, told CNBC in February 2009, “The financial crisis will lead to the creation of a global central bank and a global single currency within 15 years.” Watson quoted Gallo as saying the single currency is “where we are headed globally on a monetary basis over the course of the next 10 to 15 years.”⁸

In fact, last March The Wall Street Journal reported that China “called for the creation of a new currency to eventually replace the dollar as the world’s standard, proposing a sweeping overhaul of global finance.”⁹ Russia, Brazil, and other nations have joined in the call for a new world currency and banking system. Even U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner “let slip” that Washington is “open” to the idea of a world currency.¹⁰

The U.S. dollar is not likely to be replaced soon, but the winds of change are blowing; and the world is more open than ever to the idea of a single world currency.

The Prophetic Perspective
The book of Daniel tells us the Antichrist is the prince of the people who destroyed the Temple (Dan. 9:26). In A.D. 70 the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem. Thus the Antichrist will emerge from one of the nations encompassed by the old Roman Empire, which was a European kingdom. It hardly seems a coincidence that Daniel points to the Antichrist as coming from Europe and that today’s Europe is a strong influence toward a one-world financial system.

According to Scripture, a one-world government and financial system will be in place during the Tribulation. Around the midpoint of that seven-year period, the Antichrist will be mortally wounded and “healed.” So amazing will this event be that the entire world will marvel and follow him (Rev. 13:3-4). Yet he will quickly use this universal adoration to consolidate his political and economic power to rule the world (Dan. 7:24; Rev. 17:12–13). To do so, he will need a global financial system that he controls.

As for the Antichrist’s “chief of staff,” the False Prophet, he will only be able to restrict buying and selling to those who have the mark if there is a worldwide financial regulatory system and, more important, a single world currency.

Truly, the world is marching steadily toward a one-world financial-economic system. Further developments will no doubt unfold in the days ahead. However, moving from the concept of a global banking system to the reality of it will not be easy. Without a one-world government, who will control the world banking system and set fiscal policy? It is a political question that will require a world political leader to solve.

The full realization of such a system may have to wait for the coming of a one-world leader. Yet the fact that our world leaders are diligently working toward globalism on a grand scale may suggest we are living in historically exciting times as we witness the prelude to the coming Tribulation.

ENDNOTES

1. Gordon Brown, “The Special Relationship Is Going Global,” March 1, 2009 <timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article5821821.ece>.
2. Ibid.
3. Dick Morris, “The Declaration of Independence Has Been Repealed,” April 6, 2009 <dickmorris.com/blog/ 2009/04/06/the-declaration-of-independence-has-been-repealed>.
4. “Remarks by President Barack Obama,” Hradcany Square, Prague, Czech Republic, April 5, 2009 <whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-By-President-Barack-Obama-In-Prague-As-Delivered>.
5. Andrew Porter, Robert Winnett, and Toby Harnden, “G20 Summit: Gordon Brown Announces ‘New World Order,’” April 3, 2009 <telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/g20-summit/5097195/G20-summit-Gordon-Brown-announces-new-world-order.html>.
6. Parmy Olson and Miriam Marcus, “Bringing the Banking Mess to Broadway,” October 16, 2008 <forbes.com/2008/10/16/europe-summit-investors-update-markets-equity-cx_po_mlm_1016markets39.html>.
7. Morris.
8. Paul Joseph Watson, “Global Bank, Global Currency Within 15 Years,” February 27, 2009 <bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/sociopol_globalbanking40.htm>.
9. Andrew Batson, “China Takes Aim at Dollar,” March 24, 2009 <online.wsj.com/article/SB123780272456212885.html>.
10. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, “A World Currency Moves Nearer After Tim Geithner’s Slip,” March 26, 2009 <telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/5051075/A-world-currency-moves-nearer-after-Tim-Geithners-slip.html>.