Is the Petrodollar Ending? What Saudi Arabia's Shift Means for XRP

A new Bullrunners video argues that the petrodollar, the 1974 arrangement that tied Saudi oil sales to the US dollar and US government debt, may be coming apart. It points to Saudi Arabia’s central bank settling payments on a China-linked platform, oil trades moving to other currencies, and a bond analyst’s warning that Gulf money is no longer flowing into US Treasuries.

The video then connects that story to Ripple, which it says has been building a presence in the Gulf. For XRP holders, the question is whether a shift in how oil money moves has anything to do with their coins. This article lays out what the video claims, separates the history from the speculation, and lists what is worth checking.

What is the petrodollar and where did it come from?

The petrodollar is an informal system in which oil is priced in dollars and oil exporters recycle their dollar earnings into US assets. According to the video, it grew out of two events.

1. August 1971: President Richard Nixon suspended the convertibility of the dollar into gold. He called it temporary, but the video notes the dollar has never been convertible again. It cites St. Louis Fed data to say the dollar has lost about 86% of its purchasing power since.
2. July 1974: Treasury Secretary William Simon, a former bond trader at Salomon Brothers, travelled to Saudi Arabia to meet King Faisal. The deal, as the video describes it: the US would buy Saudi oil and provide military aid and equipment, and Saudi Arabia would invest its oil surplus in US Treasury bonds.

The king’s condition, per the video, was that Saudi Treasury holdings stay secret. For decades the US Treasury reported them bundled with a group of other countries. The video says this came to light in 2016, when Bloomberg’s Andrea Wong used a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain the 1974 diplomatic cable.

The video describes two loops: oil sold in dollars, and surplus dollars recycled into Treasuries. Its argument is that both are now weakening.

Why does the video say the petrodollar has stopped?

The video’s central source is bond analyst Philip Pilkington, who it quotes as saying the petrodollar machine “may have just stopped.” His argument, as presented, is that Gulf states used to sell oil, build up dollars and recycle part of that surplus into US assets, and that this flow is now effectively off.

The video links this to a drone attack it says hit Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline on March 31, launched from inside Iraq. That pipeline was built to route oil around the Strait of Hormuz. With the disruption prolonged, the video says Gulf states may need to sell some dollar assets to support their currency pegs and economies. That would turn them from buyers of Treasuries into sellers, at a time when, per the video, the US 10-year yield is testing 5%.

The video also cites IMF COFER data on the dollar’s share of global reserves, saying it has fallen from over 70% in 2000. The figures given for the current share are inconsistent within the recording, so readers should check the IMF data directly.

This is one analyst’s interpretation reported by the video. It is a forecast about where flows are heading, not a confirmed end of the system.

How are oil payments moving away from the dollar?

The video lists several developments it says show oil money using non-dollar rails:

Development	What the video claims
BRICS	Saudi Arabia is inside the expanded bloc alongside China, Russia, Iran and the UAE
Project mBridge	Saudi Arabia’s central bank joined in June 2024; the platform processed over $5.5 billion, with about 95% in digital yuan
BIS exit	The Bank for International Settlements stepped back from mBridge in late 2024 over concerns sanctioned countries could use it
CIPS	China’s cross-border payment system says it serves 75 direct participants without using SWIFT or CHIPS
Indian refiners	Bloomberg reported them settling Russian crude purchases in yuan and UAE dirhams in late March
Strait of Hormuz	Iran began charging yuan-denominated transit tolls for tankers; the strait carries roughly 20% of world oil supply

mBridge, in plain terms, is a shared system that lets central banks move digital versions of their currencies across borders directly. CIPS is China’s alternative to SWIFT, the messaging network most banks use for international payments.

What is Ripple doing in the Middle East?

The video’s answer is that Ripple has been building infrastructure in the same region. According to the video:

• Ripple opened a Middle East and Africa headquarters in Dubai about three months before the video and doubled its local team.
• RLUSD, Ripple’s dollar-backed stablecoin, has regulatory approval from the UAE’s central bank, and its market cap passed $1.78 billion by late May.
• The XRP Ledger has passed $1 billion in tokenized real-world assets, meaning traditional assets such as bonds or funds represented as tokens on the ledger.
• Ripple partnered with Absa Bank in South Africa for custody and acquired GTreasury, a corporate treasury software company.
• In a June 26 CNBC interview, CEO Brad Garlinghouse cited about $16 trillion in payments and prime brokerage volume and said around 30% of global payments volume could move to blockchain rails within five years.

The video also notes the UAE sends about $43 billion a year in outbound remittances and Saudi Arabia about $36 billion, a combined $79 billion. It mentions Trident Digital’s planned $500 million XRP treasury as targeting a mid-year rollout.

The host is careful on one point: this is “not a one company replaces SWIFT pitch.” Garlinghouse’s 30% figure is his own projection, not a measured result.

Does this mean XRP benefits from the petrodollar’s decline?

Not necessarily, and the video does not prove that it does. Its argument is that the old system of oil priced in dollars and recycled into Treasuries is losing ground, and that a replacement could involve regulated stablecoins plus a bridge asset settling on a public ledger in seconds.

There are gaps in that chain. Most of the alternative rails the video describes, such as mBridge and CIPS, are built around the yuan and central bank currencies, not XRP. RLUSD is a dollar stablecoin, so its growth reflects continued dollar demand. Ripple’s partnerships and stablecoin volumes also do not automatically require XRP itself. The video acknowledges that XRP has traded sideways in the same range for over a year while these developments happened.

Any claim that XRP’s price is “not pricing in” these events is speculation.

How to evaluate a macro story like this

Big-picture videos mix verified history, recent news and forecasts. A simple way to sort them:

1. Separate history from prediction. The 1974 deal and the 2016 FOIA release are documented events. Statements that the petrodollar “has stopped” are interpretations.
2. Check each number at its source. Look up IMF COFER data for reserve shares and Ripple’s own announcements for RLUSD and partnership details.
3. Ask who benefits from each rail. A shift away from the dollar can favor the yuan or central bank systems as easily as public blockchains.
4. Look for the direct link to the asset you hold. Ask whether a development requires XRP, or only Ripple’s software or RLUSD.
5. Note timeframes. Five-year projections from a CEO are goals, not outcomes.

What to watch next

Watch for updated IMF reserve data, any official statements on Saudi Treasury holdings, and whether mBridge’s participation and volumes keep growing. On the Ripple side, follow RLUSD’s market cap, announcements of specific Gulf banking partners, and whether Trident Digital’s XRP treasury proceeds as planned. Each of these can be checked, which makes them more useful than any single narrative about one system replacing another.