mandag 6. juli 2015

Gold is the color of revolutions

As the happy owner of one Troy ounce of gold in the guise of a Canadian Maple Leaf coin, I am sorry to say I hardly qualify as a gold bug. Nevertheless, I do qualify to become a member of the Gold Bug Tribe because I distrust Norway’s Central bank (Norges Bank) and their attitude towards my saving account. Norges Bank is trying its hardest (and succeeding) to engineer a 2 percent yearly inflation and reducing the interest rate to next to nothing. My money is wilting away in the Norwegian banking system.

There are not many Gold Bugs in Norway, and some of them have apocalyptic arguments for investing a little of their money in gold. They believe that the American dollar will collapse in a not so distant future because the Americans print too much money and own the rest of the world billion upon billions of dollars. They also believe that the consequence of an American monetary collapse will lead to the collapse of the Norwegian Oil Fund. Norway’s investments are locked in funds and stocks and junk bonds, and not in infrastructure, schools, hospitals and other sensible projects. These facts are not willingly mentioned by the Chairman of Norges Bank in his speeches. After all… he is not a harbinger of possible bad scenarios. He is paid to give the people a positive view of the state’s investments.

Conspiracy theorists are suggesting that something is amiss at the core of global finance.. However, if you argue against The Powers That Are, you are thought an unrealistic madman. And fanatical Gold Bugs are Mad Hatters straight out of Alice in Wonderland. They have probably been sniffing gold dust for breakfast. But then again X-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said gold is so universally treated like money itself, it’s as if it’s “inbred into human beings”. Russia has noticed this phenomena, and the Russian central bank has been a heavy buyer of gold. It has been tripling its holdings since 2005. World Gold Council statistics (March 2015) state that Russia have got 1034.7 tons of gold in stock. The country bought another 30 tons in March alone. Vladimir Putin’s growing stockpile reflects a kind of skepticism for the American dollar. Probably he might reason that it is better to be safe than sorry and therefore stock some gold in the vaults. Norges Bank should look to Russia and Germany and buy a few hundred tons of the precious metal. If the shit hits the fan and we get another financial crisis and the price of oil falls another 50 %, the Chinese will gladly trade with gold as a substitute for devalued western currencies.

What now, little man? Well, my subconscious has made a decision as I was writing this. Based upon my now conscious mind I will at once buy a 1/20 ounce Australian Year of the Goat gold coin and present it in Coin Weekly. Then I will have yet another gold coin in my pocket.

fredag 3. juli 2015

We want our Gold back!

European Central Banks do not trust the Federal Reserve Bank in New York and they want their gold sent home. The Germans tried and failed when they wanted to ship home 300 tonnes.

The German delegation was denied to see their gold first hand, which triggered the belief that the Federal Reserve Bank did have any gold at all.

21. November 2014
This press release from De Nederlandsche Bank shows just how nervous they are for their precious metal: De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) has adjusted its gold stock location policy and has shipped gold from the United States to the Netherlands to spread its gold stock in a more balanced way.
   Under the previous policy, 11% of the gold stock was located in the Netherlands, 51% in the United States, with the remainder held in Canada (20%) and the United Kingdom (18%).
   Under the new policy, the breakdown by location is as follows: 31% in Amsterdam, 31% in New York, with the relative holdings in Ottawa and London remaining unchanged at 20% and 18%, respectively.
   Following this adjustment, DNB is in line with other central banks holding a greater part of their gold stock in their own countries.
   Beyond realising a more balanced distribution of the gold stock across the different locations, this may also have a positive effect on public confidence…De Nederlandsche Bank Press Release

Bank of No-Way
But why all this worry when the Norwegian Central Bank (Norges Bank) claims that gold in itself is uninteresting as a National asset? And The Norwegian oil fund got 8000 billion NOK (1200 billion US dollars) to diversify into gold…  … and also have a positive effect on the Norwegian “public confidence”. A press release extract explains why: Norges Bank has sold 16 tonnes of gold bars in January and is planning to sell the remainder of the Central Bank's holdings of gold bars at a later time. (Another 20 tonnes were later sold)… … The background to the sale is that gold only accounted for just over one per cent of the Bank's international reserves, and thus contributed little towards diversifying the risk associated with the reserves. The return on gold has historically been low.  Norges Bank Press Release