Leslie Maasdorp is a South African who has run the gamut, working for Wall Street banks—Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays, Goldman Sachs; has been a South African government official in the 1990s; and has long been involved in the World Economic Forum. Now, he is vice president and chief financial officer of the New Development Bank founded by the BRICS nations.
In that capacity, Maasdorp stated in a July 5 interview with Bloomberg TV that the New Development Bank has no immediate plan for the creation of a common BRICS currency. The BRICS members want to trade with each other in their national currencies, Maasdorp said, but “The development of anything alternative is more a medium to long-term ambition,” he said. “There is no suggestion right now to create a BRICS currency.” Bloomberg also wrote: “Still, even the Chinese Renminbi ‘is a very long way from becoming a reserve currency,’ Maasdorp said.” That statement is objectively false. (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-07-05/brics-has-no-immediate-plan-for-a-currency-cfo-of-its-bank-says ) (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2023-07-05/new-development-bank-s-maasdorp-on-brics-plan-video)
