Opinion | For Russia, It’s All Concerning the Benjamins

Messing with the $100 word in any respect causes panic in Russia. Thousands and thousands of Russians have been alarmed in 1996 when Washington redesigned the $100 invoice to be much less simply counterfeited. Russians, used to dramatic foreign money reforms, frightened their saved {dollars} have been all of the sudden nugatory, with fewer individuals accepting the dated foreign money. In these days Russians held extra U.S. {dollars} than every other international foreign money, and 80% of these dollars have been $100 payments. Although the U.S. Treasury didn’t formally recall the present $100 notes, many Russian industrial bankers warned they’d possible reject the outdated model or require a payment to alter them out.

So whereas sanctions have did not dissuade Mr. Putin’s navy goals, partly as a result of they do little to have an effect on the well-being of most Russians, quickly phasing out the $100 might trigger actual home backlash towards the conflict in Ukraine. Within the present Russian banking setting, there wouldn’t be a straightforward approach to convert these discontinued payments to different foreign money. Russians’ financial savings could be lowered to paper.

It will be inconceivable then to cover the impact of Mr. Putin’s conflict from his base. President Biden ought to say that the $100 invoice is terminated due to the Russian chief’s conflict in Ukraine and the violence he has inflicted on civilians. Mr. Putin can obscure and spin this all he needs, however Russians will nonetheless know that his actions led to their financial savings being worn out.

It might even be a good suggestion to sundown the $100 world-wide. Nearly 80% of U.S. $100 payments reside abroad and a variety of that fuels dangerous actors. Straightforward-to-transport money is a key to international corruption and crime, as former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers has argued. Giant Western payments just like the $100 are what terrorists and drug traffickers use to conduct a lot of their commerce. That is how the still-circulating €500 payments obtained their moniker “bin Ladens.” Eliminating big-denomination foreign money—the best way the U.S. stopped issuing $500, $1,000 and $5,000 payments in 1969—would additionally damage autocratic regimes like North Korea by depriving them of a straightforward approach to launder ill-gotten beneficial properties.

Within the U.S., analysis means that eliminating the $100 invoice might assist curtail tax evasion and industrial theft in addition to that by staff.

Even opening up a coverage debate about eliminating the $100 invoice would stir issues up from Russia to Iran to Venezuela. This alone might do extra to upset the political established order for Mr. Putin than many sanctions.

It’s price making an attempt any nonviolent measure that might dissuade Mr. Putin from his imperialistic goals and save lives in Ukraine. Let’s do away with the $100 invoice.

Mr. Kounalakis is a visiting fellow on the Hoover Establishment, a former Moscow correspondent for NBC Radio and writer of “Freedom isn’t Free: The Worth of World Order.”