The Statement
A Facebook video claims the United Nations (UN) is planning to introduce a global digital currency which will enable all transactions to be tracked.
The September 25 video was posted alongside the text: “WARNING!! THE UNITED NATIONS PLAN TO IMPLEMENT REVELATION CHAPTER 13 STAY RAPTURE ALERT!”
The video claims UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for a new financial system in a recent report called Our Common Agenda. (video mark 2min 20sec)
“What does he mean by a new financial system? Oh, you are going to love this ladies and gentlemen. A digital one-world currency that allows the tracking of all buying and selling. No joke. That’s what they want.”
At the time of writing, the video had been viewed more than 300,000 times.
It was posted by a Facebook page called Repentance Revival – Pastor Robert Clancy, which posts content purported to be evidence that the second coming of Jesus Christ and the Rapture are near.
The video features James Kaddis, a pastor at a California church. It was posted to the church’s Facebook page on September 23, and it has since been viewed more than 69,000 times. Pastor Kaddis hosts frequent video blogs posted on social media that link international institutions and political leaders to the antichrist and the rapture.
The Analysis
The United Nations is not planning to introduce a global digital currency to track the buying and selling of goods, and the report mentioned in the video makes no mention of such a plan.
The UN’s Our Common Agenda report was released on September 10, 2021. It sets out the secretary-general’s recommendations for how the UN can address a range of global issues – from COVID-19 to climate change -through “reinvigorated multilateralism”.
The key proposals of the report do not include any proposal to introduce a digital one-world currency. A summary of the report includes six key points covering broad goals such as finding “new ways to work together for the common good” and building “a stronger, more networked and inclusive multilateral system” in the UN. It does not mention plans relating to a global currency.
The report itself expands on these main points, but it does not include any reference to introducing a global digital currency. “Currency” and related terms do not appear at any point in the document.
Mr Guterres also outlined the report during a press conference on September 10, however at no stage did he refer to plans for a new digital currency. Similarly, during his speech to the UN General Assembly the same day, he again gave an overview of the report but made no reference to a digital currency.
Stéphane Dujarric de la Rivière, the secretary-general’s spokesman, told AAP FactCheck via email that the UN did not advocate for the use of a single currency that allowed for the tracking of all buying and selling.
The UN has previously discussed the potential need for a global currency, as highlighted in a 2009 CBS News article. This article referred to a report by the UN Conference on Trade and Development which looked at possible reforms to international monetary and financial systems in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis.
One paragraph in the report highlights research that a global reserve bank with a global currency could offer an alternative to the US dollar as the main international reserve currency (page 123). The report does not recommend this be adopted, and it does not discuss digital currencies at all.
The UN also recently had a program called the Digital Currency Global Initiative which investigated the risks and benefits of individual countries introducing digital fiat currencies. A focus group was formed in 2017 to look into the issue and it issued a report in 2019 on the topic, but this did not recommend nor look at the impact of introducing a global digital currency.
The Facebook video also makes various other unfounded claims linked to popular conspiracy theories, including that Mr Guterres called for a “UN-led new world order” in the report – he doesn’t.
AAP FactCheck has previously debunked numerous baseless claims attempting to link the UN and related international institutions to various nefarious plots (see here, here and here), including purported plans for “one currency” as part of its 2030 sustainable development goals.
The Verdict
The United Nations is not planning to introduce a new global digital currency to track all transactions.
The UN report highlighted in the video makes no mention of any digital currency, and a spokesman for the UN secretary-general confirmed the organisation did not advocate for any such plan.
False – Content that has no basis in fact.
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