Russia has already invested over 35 billion dollars developing this area for a future Arctic civilization. The narrative in the United States, which has a limited Arctic footprint compared to Russia, has been more desperate. Its story began as man-made global warming, now simplified to climate change. The US is hurrying to meet a 2030 deadline and is looking to acquire Canada and Greenland, which would give it the ability to dominate the Northwest Passage, the alternative Arctic trade route to Russia’s NSR. The European Polar Coordination Office, EPCO, in Sweden’s Arctic region. China’s Arctic engagement can be found in their Polar Silk Road, an extension of the Belt and Road initiative in polar waters.

China has declared itself a near-Arctic state and has been investing in Russia’s Arctic projects in exchange for access. In 2025, it has completed a record number of container voyages through Russia’s NSR and designates the Arctic as a strategic new frontier. We are living through the most consequential reorganization of world power since 1945 and the geological advantage for all nations is clearly centered in the Arctic region. The new multi-polar world order is forming and with it a new financial system is being built. A new world order in which energy, food, and metals become the new reserve assets.

Each of the major players is constructing financial systems designed to function independently as well as internationally. In the USA, there is Hedera’s digital hashgraph, which is governed by institutions including Google, IBM, Boeing, LG, and FedEx. Hedera is not a replacement for the dollar. It is a faster, more programmable upgrade of the US dollar system that works along with stablecoins such as USDC. In China, there is CIPS, Cross Border Interbank Payment System, which was launched in 2015 as a SWIFT alternative. But unlike SWIFT, which only handles messaging, CIPS handles actual clearing and settlement.

There is also the digital UN, which has already reached 2.25 billion wallets, more than China’s entire population. And there is Embridge, China’s most ambitious project, a multi-CBDC platform developed with Hong Kong, Thailand, and the UAE, allowing direct settlement between digital currencies. In Russia, there is the Digital Ruble and the Mirror Card Payment System, which has issued nearly half a billion cards and processes two thirds of all domestic transactions. SPFS, System for Transfer of Financial Messages, is Russia’s SWIFT alternative and is now connected to 557 financial institutions in 20 countries.

There are four emerging blocks in this multi-polar world order. The American block, which is looking to include all of North America, Latin America, and Greenland. The Middle East is being fought for right now. The Russian block is looking to include much of its former Soviet states, as well as parts of Africa and the Balkans. The Chinese block is looking to include South and Southeast Asia, as well as parts of Africa. And the European block is looking to include the core EU and its surrounding periphery. What appears to be a series of unrelated events is more likely the controlled demolition of the unipolar world order and the birth pangs of the new multi-polar world order.

And through a pipeline of central banks and private think-tank institutions, all roads lead to the bank for international settlements in Basel, Switzerland. Greg Reiss reporting. The Reiss Report is now fully funded by my substack subscribers. Subscribe today and support my work at gregreiss.substack.com. you
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