On this day in 1971, U.S. President Richard Nixon announced the suspension of the dollar’s convertibility into gold. This event became known in history as the “Nixon Shock.”

Under the Bretton Woods system, 1 ounce of gold was fixed at USD 35, while the currencies of many countries were pegged to the U.S. dollar.

This decision disrupted the core mechanism of the system and later paved the way for exchange rates to be determined more broadly by market forces.

The “Nixon Shock” remains one of the most significant turning points in the formation of the modern global monetary system.