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Why The Gold Rush Is Just Beginning, In Six Charts

Why The Gold Rush Is Just Beginning, In Six Charts

A lot of embarrassed investment advisors out there…

Gold blew through $2400/oz this morning:


And the world’s central banks continue to add gold to their monetary reserves. Note that the real action coincided with the outbreak of the Ukraine war, when the US started slapping sanctions on everyone in sight. De-dollarization is a trend with legs.


A case can be made that China alone is driving the current gold bull market. Note how the metal’s price tracks the increase in People’s Bank of China gold reserves.


Silver just pierced its 5-year resistance. If it holds above $30/oz, $35 becomes the next big test.


One of the problems with gold miner stocks has been the fact that mining costs are rising, which offsets some of the benefits of a higher gold price. But that’s changing, as gold rises faster than mining costs, widening miners’ margins and lighting a fire under their stocks. See Finally, Some Good-Looking Gold/Silver Miner Charts.


The Next Price Driver

Is the gold rush played out? Well, 98% of mainstream investment advisors currently have less than 5% of their clients’ money in precious metals. Imagine all the tense upcoming meetings in which clients demand to know why they don’t own the year’s best-performing assets — and advisors apologize and promise to add gold to their mix. Just 1% of global investible capital flowing into gold would send it to the moon.

Irish central bank raises gold reserves by 33%, worried by inflation

Irish central bank raises gold reserves by 33%, worried by inflation

Recently the Central Bank of Ireland joined the ranks of sovereign gold buyers, adding 2 tonnes of gold to its monetary gold reserves in 2 months, consisting of a tonne of gold bought in each of September and October 2021.

While in relative terms, the actual quantity of gold added by the Irish central bank was quite small, in percentage terms it was very substantial, since in August Ireland only held 6 tonnes of gold (supposedly held at the Bank of England), and as of the end of October Ireland now holds 8 tonnes of gold, i.e. a 33% increase (and a significant number for those in the know).

These latest monetary gold purchases by Ireland’s central bank are also notable because it’s not often that a central bank that is a) a Western European country, b) a Euro member country, and c) an OECD member country, buys monetary gold. In this instance, Ireland ticks the boxes on all three.

For example, during October 2021, while three of the four largest sovereign buyers of gold in the world were the notable gold aficionados namely Kazakhstan (6 tonnes), India (3.8 tonnes), and Russia (3 tonnes), the fourth, was Ireland (1 tonne), not what you would expect.

Central Bank of Ireland’s gold reserves rose by 33% over September and October 2021

What sparked the Central Bank of Ireland to add to its monetary gold reserves is unclear, because like all Euro puppet central banks and BIS lackeys, the Irish central bank thinks that it does not need to be democratically accountable when it comes to monetary gold.

On a Need to Know Basis – And you don’t need to know!

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The global reset scam

The global reset scam

This article takes a tilt at increasing speculation about statist global resets, and why plans such as those promoted by the World Economic Forum will fail. Central bank digital currencies will simply run out of time.

Instead, the collapse of unbacked fiat currencies will end all supra-national government solutions to their policy failures. Already, there is mounting evidence of money beginning to flee bank accounts into stocks, commodities and even bitcoin. This is an early warning of a rapidly developing monetary collapse.

Moreover, nothing can now stop the collapse of fiat currencies, and with it schemes to control humanity for the convenience and ambitions of government planners. There can only be one statist solution and that is to mobilise gold reserves to back and save their currencies, which in order to succeed will have to be fully convertible into circulating gold coinage. It will also require the role of governments to be reset into a non-welfare, non-interventionist minimalist role, which can only be achieved after a complete collapse of the current fiat-financed system.

Anything less will fail.

The Deep State and The Blob fuel conspiracy theories

Increasingly, people are beginning to realise that their world is undergoing a period of rapid change, with the future of fiat money now uncertain. For most, it is too difficult to even contemplate. But growing uncertainties are driving wild speculation about what those in authority now have in store for the human race in the form of a global reset. It is a time for conspiracy theorists, aided and abetted by our politicians and central bankers who are being increasingly evasive, because events are spiralling out of their control.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

US Official Gold Reserves Auditor Caught Lying

US Official Gold Reserves Auditor Caught Lying

More false statements by the auditor have appeared, further eroding its credibility.

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In my previous post, from March 2018, on the audits of US official gold reserves, I have exposed that during the audit procedures of the US official gold reserves from 1974 through 2008, repeatedly audit staff deviated from the auditing protocol, while internal control meant to prevent this was failing. Many audits and assay reports have been destroyed. For decades a significant share of the metal was excluded from verifications for no apparent reason. And, the US government went to great lengths in withholding information and spreading false information about the audits, among other findings in documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. All in all, these findings made me question the integrity of the auditor.

After my last publication, I have obtained more documents from the US Treasury through FOIA requests, which expose another falsehood that puts the auditor in an even more peculiar position. In conflict with the audit protocol, the permanent seals of the vault compartments have been broken, time and again. In addition, the auditor has lied about these events, and when confronted, it’s unable to explain its actions. By now, I have lost faith in the auditor fully.

Prologue 

It’s been a very long investigative journey that has led me to make bold statements, such as the ones above, about the auditor of the world’s largest gold holding. I wouldn’t claim anything of this magnitude if I didn’t thoroughly do my homework and research every single possibility that could have caused the auditor to have accidentally spread inaccurate material, including asking the auditor for an explanation.

If any of their statements appeared to be false, surely, they would be able to explain what I was missing. The head auditor said during a congressional hearing in 2011 (source video 42:50):

Transparency is our business.  

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

“The Dollar Is Becoming Toxic” – Russian Intel Chief Slams “Aggressive, Unpredictable” US Behavior

With the latest TIC data showing China following Russia’s lead and reducing its US Treasury exposure (to two-year lows), as it increases its gold reserves (for six straight months), the unipolar US hegemon faces an ugly trend among the ‘rest of the world’ attempting to de-dollarize, as Sergey Naryshkin,  director of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, calls the US dollar is an anachronism of the modern world economy.

Countries across the globe, including Russia, China, India, and others, have been working to diversify their foreign reserves away from the greenback.

Kyle Bass Sees Hong Kong Politics ‘Speeding Up’ Pressure on Dollar Peg

And, as RT reports, the head of the Russian intelligence service has now voiced those concerns clearly – that the use of the dollar presents risks and more nations are looking into finding alternative tools for doing business.

“It seems abnormal that the United States, behaving so aggressively and unpredictably, continues to be the holder of the main reserve currency.”

“Due to the objective strengthening of multipolarity, the monopoly position of the dollar in international economic relations becomes anachronistic. Gradually, the dollar is becoming toxic.

And it’s not just talk, as RT notesRussia has taken concrete steps towards de-dollarizing the economy. So far, Moscow has managed to partially phase out the dollar from its exports, signing currency-swap agreements with a number of countries, including China, India, and Iran. Russia has recently proposed using the euro instead of the US dollar in trade with the European Union.

This comes on the heels of Malaysian Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamad proposing a gold-backed currency as a unit of account for trade between East Asian nations.

Infinite growth on a finite planet, what could possibly go wrong?

The only gold the US shows – A working vault at West Point

The only gold the US shows – A working vault at West Point

Every so often, US media coverage provides glimpses into the US Treasury’s gold reserves stored with the US Mint. While this coverage never documents any of the claimed “deep storage” gold of the US Treasury, it contains just enough suggestion for the populace to connect the words ‘gold storage’ and ‘US Government’, and then return to their daily routines, assuming that the US has the largest strategic gold reserves in the world.

Notably, these media features, which span mainstream financial media and coin / numismatic news sites alike, are also only ever limited to one single location where the US Mint stores gold, a ‘working vault’ at the US Mint’s facility in West Point, New York. Images of this vault will be familiar to some readers, images which contain various pallets of 400 oz gold bars in front of a US flag and the walls of the storage room strewn with many years of scribbled visitor signatures .

Such a media feature recently appeared on the WNYW network (Fox 5 New York) in April, when the Fox5NY crew took the trip about 2 hours north of Manhattan to the US Mint’s bullion depository at West Point.

Along with its bullion depository in Fort Knox, Kentucky, and its minting facility in Denver, Colorado, the West Point Mint, located adjacent to West Point military Academy, is one of the three claimed Mint storage locations for the US Treasury’s “deep storage” gold reserves, and according to the US Treasury, there are 11 storage compartments at West Point storing 54 million troy ounces, or 1682 tonnes, of United States Government owned gold reserves. Which would be just over 20% of the 8133 tonnes of gold that the US Treasury claims to hold.

 …click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

China Accelerates Renewed Gold-Buying Spree “To Diversify Its Reserves”

China Accelerates Renewed Gold-Buying Spree “To Diversify Its Reserves”

After China’s official gold reserves rose for the first time in around two years (since Oct 2016) in December, Beijing appears to have joined the global gold rush, increasing its gold reserves for the second month in a row in January to 59.94 million ounces.

As we previously notedChina has long been silent on its holdings of gold as many countries are turning away from the greenback.

The value the country’s holdings of the precious metal reached US$79.319 billion, increasing by more than $3 billion compared to the end of last year. 

China is also trying “to diversify its reserves” away from the greenback, according to Jeffrey Halley, senior market analyst at currency broker OANDA. The analyst told the South China Morning Post that the state of affairs in global politics, including a trade war with the US, are driving China’s interest to buy gold as a “safe haven hedge.” 

In January, China dropped to sixth place among the world’s largest holders of the yellow metal behind Russia. With its 67.6 million ounces of gold, Russia now stands in fifth place behind the US, Germany, France, and Italy.

Crucially, the size of the gold addition are far less important than the signaling effect – why did China decide now was the right time to publicly admit its gold reserves are rising?

After months of seeming stability in the yuan relative to gold, Q4 2018/Q1 2019 saw China seemingly allow gold to appreciate relative to the yuan

One wonders if Alasdair Macleod is on to something when he notes that if the yuan is to replace the dollar for China’s trade, officials will have to back it with gold

 …click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Separating truth from fiction in China’s golden game of Poker

Separating truth from fiction in China’s golden game of Poker

This month the Chinese central bank reported that in December 2018, its gold reserve holdings increased by 10 tonnes, the first claimed increase in Chinese monetary gold holdings since October 2016.

Based on previous patterns reporting patterns, a two year hiatus in reporting gold holdings is not unprecedented for the Chinese central bank and its reporting agency SAFE. What is strange, however, is that after an extended absence of reporting, the Chinese are coming back to the table with not a lot to show for it.

It is extremely difficult to believe that the Chinese central bank has not been accumulating gold throughout the last two years. Having said that, the claimed 10 tonne gold addition in December is worthy of analysis in regards to its timing and what it may signal. However, it is also important to keep in mind that there is huge and justified skepticism about the true size of the Chinese State’s monetary gold holdings held through the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), and to this we can probably now add skepticism about the real accumulation pattern of PBoC gold.

A 10 tonne teaser

News of December’s central bank gold purchase was initially published on the web site of China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) in it’s December 2018 ‘Official Reserve Assets’ report. Note that SAFE reserve asset updates don’t actually state the quantity of gold the PBoC holds but instead report a US dollar figure valued at the corresponding month-end US dollar gold price.

So for example, the PBoC’s gold holdings were valued at US$ 72.122 billion at the end of November, which at a month-end November gold price of US$ 1217.55 was 1842.5 tonnes, while the stated gold valuation at the end of December was US$ 76.331 billion, which at an end of December LBMA gold price of US$ 1281.65 was 1852.5 tonnes, i.e. a 10 tonne increase.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Sign of Things to Come: China Adds 1,853 Metric Tonnes to “Official” Gold Reserves

A Sign of Things to Come: China Adds 1,853 Metric Tonnes to “Official” Gold Reserves

While Western governments continue to ravage each other viciously, seemingly unable to come to terms on even the simplest of agendas, the East, led predominately by the financial juggernaut that is China, continues to chug along, slowly but surely carrying through on their long term plans.

While we look inward and fight among one another, becoming increasingly polarized and isolated into our various political “camps”, ceasing any form of communication with each other, our economic rivals are racing past us, forming partnerships and making plans.

Russia and China are two such countries that I have often talked about in past articles, highlighting how the West has forced these two countries into a partnership that threatens to overtake the West as the economic powerhouse of the world.

While our financial “gurus” continue to shuffle pieces of paper back and forth between each other, trading digital numbers in ever increasingly quantities, as if they had any real, true intrinsic value.

Russia and China are happily making moves around the world, acquiring physical, tangible assets that will play key roles in the coming economic conflict that the world will inevitably face at some point in our not too distant future.

Although their demand for oil, rare earths and various other forms of assets is seemingly insatiable, there is one asset class above all others that I am particularly interested in, precious metals.

Both countries have made it blatantly obvious that they are not happy with the current “status quo” and would love to see an eventual change. That change being a toppling of the US Dollar as the reserve currency of the world.

This has led to a rapid accumulation in precious metals by Russia, who have forecast their purchases on an almost monthly basis.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Irish Central Bank Refuses To Discuss If Gold Reserves Are In Bank of England Vaults

– As Brexit looms, the Central Bank of Ireland has refused to discuss the location and value of Irish gold reserves
– No date given for removal of “commercially sensitive” gold reserves from Bank of England vaults

– Bank of England vaults in London believed to hold almost €200 million of Irish gold
– Ireland’s financial system & economy is hugely exposed to a Brexit downturn

via Irish Independent:

IRELAND’S Central Bank has refused to say if it plans to move almost €200m worth of gold bars from the vaults of the Bank of England as a result of Brexit, insisting that any such move would be “commercially sensitive”.

The gold reserves have been held by its UK counterpart for a number of years, and the Central Bank has traditionally been coy on the precise details of the reserves, and the terms of the arrangement it has with the Bank of England.

It refused to be drawn yesterday on whether the reserves would be removed from the Bank of England either before or after the Brexit deadline of next March.

“It is for the Central Bank to determine how Ireland’s gold reserves ought to be managed,” a spokeswoman told the Irish Independent.

“The Central Bank’s portfolio is managed in line with approved parameters, which are kept under regular review and we report on key activities and developments in our annual report,” she added.

“The Central Bank’s transactions in gold are commercially sensitive and no further comment can be made at this time,” she said.

The latest Central Bank annual report shows that it had €209.3m worth of gold and gold receivables on its books at the end of 2017.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Why buy gold now? Because I don’t know

Why buy gold now? Because I don’t know

From 2000 through 2012, the price of gold increased every year, rising from around $280 an ounce to nearly $1,700. It was an unprecedented run.

Then, in 2013, gold took a nose dive, losing over 27% of its value.

It was widely reported that the Swiss National Bank, the former bastion of monetary conservatism, lost $10 billion that year just on its gold holdings.

As you probably know, central banks hold a portion of their reserves in gold. The practice goes back to when central banks actually had to have gold on hand to trade in and out of paper money (or even trade for goods and services).

And central banks still hold reserves in gold today, even though they don’t need it to transact like they used to.

So that begs the question, did the Swiss National Bank actually lose $10 billion? It still had every ounce of gold in its vaults. And gold, after all, ismoney.

Plus, the SNB wasn’t holding gold to speculate…

Today, central banks hold gold as a hedge against fiat money. These are the guys with their fingers on the printing press… so they know exactly the effect they have on money.

And right now, banks are buying up gold hand over fist. Central banks currently hold 20% of all the gold ever mined—33,000 metric tons.

And JPMorgan Chase says they’ll buy another 650 tons this year and next.

Why?

Gold is for the I don’t knows.

And right now, there are a LOT of I don’t knows.

Markets have been going crazy over the past few months.

After a record bull run for stocks, we are now seeing massive volatility with the Dow regularly jumping 500+ points in a single day. Just yesterday, the Dow fell a whopping 800 points.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Gold Reserves Surge 1,000% In Hungary As It Joins Poland, Russia, China and Other Central Banks Buying Gold

Gold Reserves Surge 1,000% In Hungary As It Joins Poland, Russia, China and Other Central Banks Buying Gold

News, Commentary, Charts and Special Podcast on Direct Access Gold

Here is our Friday digest of the important news, commentary, charts and videos we were informed by this week including our special podcast on Direct Access Gold.

From our perspective, the most important developments were the IMF’s financial warnings and the escalation in central bank gold buying with Hungary increasing its gold reserves by a whopping 1,000% due to increasing “safety concerns.”

For the first time since 1986, Hungary’s central bank is buying gold bullion – a lot of gold bullion.

The Eastern-European country announced that it had boosted its gold reserves ten-fold, up to 31.5 tons. It not only dramatically increased its reserves but also repatriated the gold from the Bank of England to Budapest due to concerns about “financial stability”.

Central banks in Europe are diversifying into gold or moving to repatriate and take “possession in country.”

Hungary and Poland are the most recent central banks to do this but they follow in the footsteps of Austria, Netherlands and the powerful German Bundesbank all of which have been repatriating their gold from the Bank of England and the Federal Reserve in recent months and years.


Source: Bloomberg

“Gold is still considered to be one of the world’s safest assets,” in the words of the Hungarian central bank.

This view is shared by the President of the ECB Mario Draghi who in February 2013 spoke about how “gold is a reserve of safety” which “gives you a value-protection against fluctuations against the dollar.”

Central bank gold reserves remain very small versus the scale of their massive foreign exchange holdings and their significant exposure to the vulnerable dollar in particular but also the euro and other fiat reserve currencies.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Turkey Repatriates All Gold From The US In Attempt To Ditch The Dollar

After Venezuela, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands prudently repatriated a substantial portion (if not all) of their physical gold held at the NY Fed or other western central banks in recent years, one month ago Turkey announced that it too has decided to repatriate its gold stored in the US Federal Reserve and deliver it to the Istanbul Stock Exchange, according to reports in Turkey’s Yeni Safak. As we reported at the time, it wouldn’t be the first time Turkey has asked the NY Fed to ship the country’s gold back: in recent years, Turkey repatriated 220 tons of gold from abroad, of which 28.7 tons was brought back from the US last year.

And now, according to a report by the Swiss Schweiz am Wochenende, the repatriation is complete with the Turkish central bank withdrawing all of its gold reserves from the U.S. due to the “tense political situation.” However, in a strange twist, instead of moving the physical gold to Istanbul as the Turkish press reported in April, the Swiss newspaper notes that around 19 tons of Turkish gold is now stored at the Basel-based Bank for International Settlements.

It was not immediately clear why Turkey would shift its gold from the NY Fed to the BIS, whose historical “gold rehypothecation” tendencies have been well documented over the years.

According to the latest IMF data, Turkey’s total gold reserves are estimated at 596 tons in May, up 5 tons since April, and worth just under $23 billion, rising 40% over the past year. This makes Ankara the 11th largest gold holder, behind the Netherlands and ahead of India.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Canada has NO Gold but a Mountain of Debt… Things Will End Badly

Canada has NO Gold but a Mountain of Debt… Things Will End Badly

There is precedence in a central bank selling off its gold, and it didn’t work out very well. In 1999, when the price of gold was low at $282.40 an ounce, the United Kingdom sold half of its gold reserves, worth approximately $6.5 billion. The sale raised $3.5 billion. By 2007, the price of gold had risen to $675.00 an ounce, and the UK had lost more than £2 billion. This financial disaster, known as Brown’s Bottom, did not work out well. And Canada appears to be following in its footsteps.

With many uncertainties globally, Canada’s gold sale could have serious consequences.


Fed signaling interest rate hikes = ✔
Fed shrinking balance sheet = ✔
National debt rising rapidly = ✔
Household debt rising = ✔
Weak growth = ✔
Rising inflation = ✔
Geopolitical risks = ✔

But hey, things are going to be fine…


In this age of fiat currency, many people forget that gold is actually money, and has never stopped from functioning as a reliable store of value. Gold is a relatively liquid currency and one of the most highly traded.

According to Canada’s senior Finance Department economist Morneau, the reason for the gold sale was the cost involved in storing the gold and the fact that gold offers a poor return. That seems like strange logic since gold has outperformed the S&P 500 since 2000. The price of gold went from $35.00 an ounce in 1967 to over $1,300 today.

As former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan has said:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Gold Leaving US Vaults: Signs of Upcoming Currency War and Armed Conflict

Gold Leaving US Vaults: Signs of Upcoming Currency War and Armed Conflict

Gold Leaving US Vaults: Signs of Upcoming Currency War and Armed Conflict

The Turkish government has made the decision to repatriate all of its gold reserves that are currently housed in the US Federal Reserve System (FRS). Overall Turkey was storing 220 tonnes, valued at $25.3 billion, in the US, which it repossessed on April 19, 2018.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has toughened his stance against the US dollar (USD), declaring that international loans should be made in gold instead of the American currency. Ankara is seeking to reduce dependence on the US financial system. The gold’s homecoming was partly prompted by the US threats to impose sanctions if Turkey goes through with the signed deal to purchase Russian S-400 missile defense systems.

This is a dramatic move reflecting an international trend. Venezuela repatriated its gold from the US in 2012. In 2014, the Netherlands also retrieved its 122.5 tonnes of gold that were stored in US vaults. Germany brought home 300 metric tonnes of gold stashed in the United States in 2017. It took Berlin four years to complete the transfers. Austria and Belgium have reviewed the possibility of taking similar measures.

Few people believe the US Treasury’s assurances that the 261 million ounces (roughly 8,100 tonnes) in official gold reserves that are stored in Fort Knox and other places are fully audited and accounted for. The Federal Reserve has never been fully and independently audited. The pressure for a full, independent audit of all US gold reserves has always been resisted by the government and in Congress. Nobody knows if the gold is really there. What if the vaults turn out to be empty? It’s wiser to bring your gold home while you can, rather than to just keep on wondering.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Olduvai IV: Courage
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Olduvai II: Exodus
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