The toll station of Hormuz, and the RMB that cannot be bought

Dalio said that we are standing on the eve of a reconstruction of the world order. Whether you agree with this judgment or not, one thing is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore: when war, sanctions, and blockades occur simultaneously, which channel will capital choose?

In the previous article “Whose Dollar? USDT in Hormuz and the Disordered Dollar System,” we tracked the path of the dollar in disorder—it remains the pricing currency of the world, but its permissions are being circumvented. USDT parasitizes on the price of the dollar without going through the dollar's financial channels. An unlicensed dollar is growing in the cracks.

In this article, we will look at another path: the renminbi. It is not a shadow of the dollar, nor is it a parasite. It has its own channels, its own clearing system, and its own national endorsement. But it also has a problem that the dollar has never faced—most people want it but cannot obtain it.

On a night in March 2026, a fully loaded oil tanker slowed down at the narrowest point of the Strait of Hormuz. A Persian instruction came over the radio: stop the ship, pay the fee, otherwise there will be no escort.

The rate is $1 per barrel. A fully loaded VLCC costs $2 million at a time. Accepting USDT, Bitcoin, and renminbi. Not accepting dollars.

This waterway, which carries nearly one-third of the world's oil transport volume, turned into a toll station that spring. Behind anxious phone calls and encrypted messages, a question that had rarely been publicly discussed suddenly became urgent:

If we don't settle in dollars, what else can we use?

A Greek shipowner running routes between the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf had