It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

[lomaxzoltor]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

There's an article in today's FT (behind paywall, sorry) suggesting that the gold will be brought back on planes, with just 3-5 tons per plane so it can be insured. The article cites anonymous "gold traders". If true, that's up to 100 plane loads to get this stuff shipped. 7 years still seems a long time though!

Here's a link to the article that should allow you to go behind the paywall: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/480ff...#axzz2IFuzbnZg. If not, then go to news.google.com and search for 'financial times gold germany' and that should get you there as well. The article is titled 'Germany creates pile of golden opportunities'. Here's the snippet you're referring to:

"Simultaneously, an operation will start to repatriate 300 tonnes of Germany’s 1,500 tonnes of gold on deposit at New York Federal Reserve, this time probably by aeroplane in small batches of 3-5 tonnes in order to be able to insure it, gold traders said."

That would mean they would only be transporting one batch per month if it's going to take to 2020.

[coolhand]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

It is all speculation.

Agreed. But as FDR said, nothing happens by accident in politics. And the gold is in fact moving. And the Germans do in fact make some of the best cars in the world & have constructed an unbreakable currency in the way they structured the Euro...so when they do something, I pay very close attention.

The world is telling you fiat currency is fine. A nation possessing some of the best engineering minds in the world is acting like fiat currency is in trouble.

Watch what they do, not what they say

[don]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

Sixteen Tons

[kriden]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

Hitler Learns German Gold is Tungsten

[don]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

You just KNEW they'd do one of these . . .

+1

[lakedaemonian]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

There's an article in today's FT (behind paywall, sorry) suggesting that the gold will be brought back on planes, with just 3-5 tons per plane so it can be insured. The article cites anonymous "gold traders". If true, that's up to 100 plane loads to get this stuff shipped. 7 years still seems a long time though!

Transport security logistics could easily be handled using a bunch of arms length contracted cargo birds flying roughly every other day with randomized flight timings and point of origin/destination airports between New York and Germany.

My amateur guess would think it could be knocked out in 6 months without breaking a sweat.

Does Germany have any foreign gold holdings?

If so, one would think you could save the trouble of transporting all that gold physically when you could find nation state partners wiling to exchange their German held gold reserves for US held gold reserves.

Firstly, it assumes Germany stores foreign state owned gold.

Secondly, it assumes other nation states would be willing to exchange Germany for the US as the holder of national wealth.

I wonder if that would be a rather awkward silence when looking for a nation to do some swapzies?

[NCR85]

Re: It Will Take The Fed Seven Years To Deliver 300 Tons Of German Gold

I think everybody is missing the point. The gold was put there because we had a gold standard. If you have a gold standard, you have to have your gold ready to trade. If the gold is back home in Germany, that means we will not have a gold standard any time soon. In effect, this means that Germany expects:
A) that the Euro will stay together indefinitely.
B) that the international monetary system will remain in it's current form ( or at least that there will be no gold standard ) forever.

By leaving most of their gold in New York they are hedging that bet. If the gold starts coming home by the truck load, then you can be certain that they think the IMS has stabilized to the point that gold will never be a significant part of it.

What if I they did want to bring back the gold home "by the truck load" but were told behind closed doors that there were certain "complications" that made doing so impossible? We both know who is the stronger party in this transaction. If the US tells Germany to settle for a compromise, that is a matter of relief rather than outrage to them. Meanwhile, though, they've plainly been defaulted on.