As they study to boost an international career in finance, experts learn about the effects of international agreements such as Bretton Woods and the institutions they have created. Developing a strong international financial strategy means anticipating the impact of central bank announcements and actions, managed in the same way by national governments and international bodies. The Bretton Woods system was put in place as a more stable replacement for the gold standard under which all currencies were converted to gold. Under the new agreement, the dollar was the standard for international transactions, which were valued at one ounce of gold. The fact that the United States held a large portion of the world`s gold reserves allowed the dollar to play its new role as a standard currency on which the stock markets were based. The Bretton Woods system is a series of uniform rules and guidelines that have provided the framework for the creation of fixed international exchange rates. Essentially, the agreement called on the new IMF to set the fixed exchange rate for currencies around the world. Each country represented assumed responsibility for maintaining the exchange rate, with incredibly narrow margins above and below. Countries struggling to stay within the fixed exchange rate window could ask the IMF for an adjustment in interest rates for which all allied countries would then be responsible.

Despite the disintegration, the Bretton Woods Summit and the agreement are responsible for a number of particularly important aspects in the financial world. First, the creation of the IMF and the World Bank. To date, these two institutions are of paramount importance to the global economy. There was broad consensus among powerful nations that the lack of exchange rate coordination during the interwar period had exacerbated political tensions. This facilitated the decisions of the Bretton Woods conference. In addition, all the Bretton Woods governments agreed that the monetary chaos of the interwar period had brought some valuable lessons. The Bretton Woods Agreement is one of those turning points in the development of modern financial systems, which established the dollar as the standard currency for world trade after World War II. While the Bretton Woods system was demanting during the Nixon administration, the financial institutions created by the Agreement – the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank – remain part of the finances of the 21st century. The name of the agreement comes from the New Hampshire website, where the conference was held. A total of 730 delegates from all 44 allied nations participated.

As part of the agreement, countries promised that their central banks would maintain fixed exchange rates between their currencies and the dollar. If a country`s monetary value became too low against the dollar, the bank would buy its currency back on the foreign exchange markets. Although a compromise was reached on some points, the Bretton Woods participants largely agreed on White`s plan. Below is a brief summary of why global economies were part of the Bretton Woods system, how the system worked, why it failed, and what impact the agreement had on the development of the international monetary system.