Here are the details on the 1988 article:

COVER: “GET READY FOR A WORLD CURRENCY”
Title of article: Get Ready for the Phoenix
Source: Economist; 01/9/88, Vol. 306, pp 9-10
A full copy of the text can be found here

They did mention the SRDs when they said:

The phoenix would probably start as a cocktail of national currencies, just as the Special Drawing Right is today.

The phoenix, of course was just used as a metaphor, but it sounds much like the Euro experiment, which seems challenged these days.

In many ways they missed it with:

..national economic boundaries are slowly dissolving

FATCA and CRS seem to have gone backwards, making things worse than ever in so many ways.

They closing paragraph said:

The alternative – to preserve policymaking autonomy- would involve a new proliferation of truly draconian controls on trade and capital flows. This course offers governments a splendid time. They could manage exchange-rate movements, deploy monetary and fiscal policy without inhibition, and tackle the resulting bursts of inflation with prices and incomes polices. It is a growth-crippling prospect. Pencil in the phoenix for around 2018, and welcome it when it comes.