Does anyone know if the Reserve Bank/Australian Government or the Major Banks are building up gold reserves?. We sold our gold in the late 90's and so did the UK...Now that was a mistake. Hope someone in Australia government including the Future Fund is building up our gold supplies. Does anyone know how much gold the nation has now? Regards Errol 43
Here's the answer from.... Shaun Micallef - Reserve bank of Australia explained [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLfvAQF2J2E[/youtube]
Just add up all the in ground reserves of all the gold mines in the country and that's how much gold the nation has. In a true world crises all they have to do is nationalize all the mines and produce whatever gold is needed to get out of the shit. Why would you bother confiscating little amounts from lots and lots of individuals ? - much quicker and easier to just take over a few big mines.
Or simply determine the provable gold reserves of a mine and sell it off for hard currency with the condition there will be no future taxes. Dont even have to dig the stuff up to get hold of cash in a tough time.
You reckon? Mining gold is not free. Ave cost/oz worldwide in the first quarter of 2011 was about $640/oz. In Australia it was over $770/oz. It's not a cash cow otherwise every gold mine would be a "gold mine" (pun intended) and every shareholder would be a millionaire. To raise $1billion in gold, the Australian gov't would have to inject about lots of $$ if it nationalised the mines. Edited for my shyte math
Or just tax them more lol... then they shut down, stop producing... less gold on the world market, prices shoot higher.... becomes cost effective to reopen... and the game starts again hahah
...but then the potential buyer turns around and says "Sorry, if you don't hold it, you don't own it".
I think that the 'cost' is fairly irrelevant to the Govt, when the cost is in $$, and the product is 'gold'. $$ can be procured easily enough for such purposes, and the amounts required would not significantly add enough base money to create significant inflation/currency devaluation - if you get my drift.
Who would pay for it then if the gov won't have trouble finding $$. If it gets to the stage where the gov wants gold that badly, then no one's going to take their $$ - if you get my drift?
Gold : barbarous relic 79 tons (no #35) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_reserve#Officially_reported_gold_holdings Rank Country/Organization Gold (tonnes) Gold's share of national forex reserves (%)[10] 1 United States of America 8,133.5 76.6% 2 Federal Republic of Germany 3,396.3 73.7% 3 International Monetary Fund 2,814.0 N.A. 4 Italian Republic 2,451.8 73.4% 5 French Republic 2,435.4 71.8% 6 People's Republic of China 1,054.1 01.8% 7 Swiss Confederation 1,040.1 15.3% 8 Russian Federation 883.2 09.2% 9 Japan 765.2 03.5% 10 Kingdom of the Netherlands 612.5 61.9% 11 Republic of India 557.7 09.6% 12 European Central Bank 502.1 35.0% 13 Republic of China (Taiwan) 422.4 05.9% 14 Portuguese Republic 382.5 89.2% 15 Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela 372.9 67.7% 16 Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 322.9 03.3% 17 United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland 310.3 17.6% 18 Republic of Lebanon 286.8 32.2% 19 Kingdom of Spain 281.6 39.2% 20 Republic of Austria 280.0 57.0% 21 Republic of Turkey 240.0[11] 12.8% 22 Kingdom of Belgium 227.5 41.2% 23 People's Democratic Republic of Algeria 173.6 79.5% 24 Kingdom of Thailand 152.4 04.6% 25 Libya 143.8 05.6% 26 Republic of the Philippines 142.7 10.4% 27 Republic of Singapore 127.4 03.0% 28 Kingdom of Sweden 125.7 13.6% 29 Republic of South Africa 125.0 13.8% 30 Bank for International Settlements 119.0 N.A. 31 Hellenic Republic 111.7 81.3% 32 United Mexican States 106.3 04.0% 33 Romania 103.7 11.3% 34 Republic of Poland 102.9 05.3% 35 Commonwealth of Australia 79.9 09.5% 36 State of Kuwait 79.0 13.8% 37 Arab Republic of Egypt 75.6 14.8% 38 Republic of Indonesia 73.1 03.5% 39 Republic of Kazakhstan 73.6 12.5% 40 Kingdom of Denmark 66.5 04.1% 41 Islamic Republic of Pakistan 64.4 18.9% 42 Argentina 54.7 06.4% 43 Plurinational State of Bolivia 49.3 22.9% 44 Republic of Finland 49.1 24.6% 45 Republic of Bulgaria 39.9 12.0% 46 Republic of Korea 39.4 00.7% 47 Republic of Belarus 38.5 41.4% 48 West African Economic and Monetary Union 36.5 12.9% 49 Malaysia 36.4 01.5% 50 Republic of Peru 34.7 04.0% 51 Federative Republic of Brazil 33.6 00.5% 52 Slovakia 31.8 67.6% 53 Ukraine 27.9 04.5% 54 Ecuador 26.3 32.0% 55 Syrian Arab Republic 25.8 07.9% 56 Kingdom of Morocco 22.0 05.6% 57 Federal Republic of Nigeria 21.4 03.2% 58 Republic of Serbia 14.1 5.1% 59 Republic of Cyprus 13.9 58.3% 60 People's Republic of Bangladesh 13.5 07.5% 61 Netherlands Antilles 13.1 36.3% 62 Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan 12.8 05.5% 63 Czech Republic 12.5 01.6% 64 State of Qatar 12.4 04.4% 65 Kingdom of Cambodia 12.4 16.6% 66 Republic of Colombia 10.4 01.8% 67 Lao People's Democratic Republic 8.8 36.5% 68 Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka 8.1 05.3% 69 Republic of Latvia 7.7 05.5% 70 Republic of El Salvador 7.3 14.6% 71 Republic of Guatemala 6.9 05.8% 72 Republic of Macedonia 6.8 14.8% 73 Tunisian Republic 6.7 04.5% 74 Republic of Ireland 6.0 15.1% 75 Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal 6.0[12] 76 Republic of Lithuania 5.8 04.1% 77 Kingdom of Bahrain 4.7 78 Republic of Tajikistan 4.4 79 Republic of Mauritius 3.9 06.5% 80 Canada 3.4 00.3% 81 Republic of Slovenia 3.2 15.8% 82 Aruba 3.1 24.2% 83 Hungary 3.1 00.3% 84 Kyrgyz Republic 2.6 07.5% 85 Mongolia 2.3 04.8% 86 Grand Duchy of Luxembourg 2.2 10.6% 87 Republic of Suriname 2.2 13.1% 88 Hong Kong Special Administrative Region 2.1 00.0% 89 Republic of Iceland 2.0 01.3% 90 Independent State of Papua New Guinea 2.0 02.8% 91 Republic of Trinidad and Tobago 1.9 01.1% 92 Republic of Albania 1.6 03.4% 93 Republic of Yemen 1.6 01.8% 94 Republic of Cameroon 0.9 01.2% 95 Republic of Honduras 0.7 01.4% 96 Republic of Paraguay 0.7 00.7% 97 Dominican Republic 0.6 01.1% 98 Gabonese Republic 0.4 00.8% 99 Republic of Malawi 0.4 08.9% 100 Central African Republic 0.3 08.4% 101 Republic of Chad 0.3 02.4% 102 Republic of the Congo 0.3 00.4% 103 Oriental Republic of Uruguay 0.3 00.1% 104 Republic of Fiji 0.2 00.0% 105 Republic of Estonia 0.2 06.0% 106 Republic of Chile 0.2 00.0% 107 Republic of Malta 0.2 01.6% 108 Republic of Costa Rica 0.1 00.1% 109 Republic of Haiti 0.0 00.1% 110 Republic of Burundi 0.0 00.5% Sum 30,623.7
The locals will always take Govt $$ - 'it's the law!' The scenario being the gold is in demand enough for them to nationalise mines - if they really want it out of the ground they can get it out, whether that be by printing money (relatively small amounts, we're talking a few billion probably), owning (and trading) the rights to mine to others (like Chinese maybe), or simply forcing people to work the mines through slave labour if they have to i guess. The first two options are easiest.
The scenario is a world fiat crises where countries lose faith in the current world currency (US dollar) and won't trade with each other. Gold is the last resort international currency - a country can always buy the supplies it needs from other countries if it has gold. Trade within a single country will always continue using the local currency. If Australia is forced to find gold so it can continue international trade, then it can obtain the couple of hundred tonnes per year that are currently mined from the mines. Those working the mines would simply be paid in local currency, which the govt can print at will. We are talking about an unprecedented crises situation, where all bets are off and just about anything would be justified 'for the sake of the nation'. I hope it never happens. As GP said, plan for the worst, hope for the best. Eric Janszen of itulip.com has forecast this kind of scenario as quite possible for a number of years now.... http://itulip.com/ http://fourthcurrency.com/
Surely if it got to this stage we would be doing such things to go back to a gold standard. If so a fully backed (non fractional) Aussie dollar would be used to simply buy up the gold output out of our mines until we reached the "inflation" target and the rest could go into the market for use in jewelry etc.
If the Australian government were to confiscate Australians' gold, wouldn't that mean they'd essentially be cutting off our ability to trade internationally? I can see why nationalising the mines would be a good idea - they gain the ability to "create money" that will actually be accepted overseas - but doing that assumes that being able to trade with people overseas is a desirable thing, so why would they keep international trade open with gold from the newly nationalised mines on one hand and close off international trade by nicking our gold on the other hand? Seems a bit counter-productive to me.
Whatever the government tax the mining companies, whatever amount gold companies pay, it should be in metal not fiat. They get enough fiat from us and every other sucker/business.
@ errol & the original question ....I hope so . They couldnt be that stupid not to could they ? :lol:
