In 1944, at the American holiday resort of Bretton Woods, in New Hampshire, the foundations were laid for an international monetary system. During World War II, the allies’ financial experts met there to prepare for peacetime financial conditions. The new system was intended to prevent the mismanagement of currencies, to devise a less rigid system than the gold standard, and to stabilise exchange rates. The new system was no longer based exclusively on gold, but on gold plus the US dollar. The system survived until the early 1970s when President Nixon decided to let the dollar float. The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are two institutions which were created at the Bretton Woods conference.