The possible creation of a single BRICS currency awakes great hopes against the background of the "unsustainability" of the US domestic financial system, Ashraf Patel, a senior research associate with the Institute for Global Dialogue and member of the South Africa BRICS Think-Tank Network told Sputnik Africa in an interview.
"BRICS has potential to provide ‘broad-based economic stability ’in world affairs, while simultaneously creating alternative platforms in key areas, one being the BRICS reserve currency. Many mechanisms exist in a geopolitical world order. And BRICS reserve currency is the most promising possibility," Patel said, responding to a Sputnik question about the bloc's single currency prospects.
According to the expert, in 2023, the prospects for a single BRICS currency are "more viable," given the US debt ceiling crisis, which showed that "the US domestic financial system is unsustainable and that debt is re-exported globally through trade wars."
In addition, Patel expressed confidence that the single currency will help boost trade flows between members of BRICS, as it will not involve third countries.
In the political sphere, the expert noted that the BRICS countries are bound together by a similar strategic culture.
"BRICS nations are coherent in terms of a more inclusive balanced order and need for substantive reforms in the multilateral field, confronting climate change, lobbying for fair trade etc.," the researcher remarked.
The analyst's statements follow the meeting of BRICS foreign ministers in South Africa, the agenda of which includes the expansion of the bloc and the creation of a single currency.
Following the meeting, the ministers issued a joint statement advocating the use of local currencies in trade.
Last June, Russian President Putin announced that the bloc was working to create a single currency at the BRICS business forum. Brazilian President Lula da Silva recently noted that he dreams of a single currency for the BRICS members to gain independence from the use of US dollars in foreign trade.