Tag - Cartel

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Thursday, January 25 2018

Goldman, Citi final bidders for Scotiabank’s metals business

The field of prospective bidders for ScotiaMocatta, the metals trading arm of Canada’s Bank of Nova Scotia, has narrowed to two, three banking and industry sources said on Wednesday.

The two – Goldman Sachs Group and Citi – are undertaking due diligence checks, the sources said.

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Wednesday, September 28 2016

LBMA Appoints Bank of England Veteran Fisher as New Chairman

The London Bullion Market Association said Paul Fisher, a Bank of England veteran who sat on the Monetary Policy Committee for five years, will replace Grant Angwin as its chairman.

Fisher, who later this month will retire from the central bank after a 26-year career, will assume the role on Sept. 5, the LBMA said in an e-mailed statement.

“The Bank of England and LBMA have a close relationship and have always done,” Norman said by phone. “London remains the global epicenter for trading gold.”

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Thursday, November 20 2014

India readies draconian gold import rules

In October Indian jewellers and traders imported 150 tonnes from just 25 tonnes this time last year worth reports Reuters:

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India readies draconian gold import rules

In October Indian jewellers and traders imported 150 tonnes from just 25 tonnes this time last year worth reports Reuters:

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Thursday, November 13 2014

“Paper Gold” and Its Effect on the Gold Price

The Comex futures market structure allows a few big banks to supply gold to keep its price contained. I call the gold futures market the “paper gold” market because very little gold actually changes hands. $360 billion of paper gold is traded per month, but only $279 million of physical gold is delivered. That’s a 1,000-to-1 ratio:

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Friday, October 31 2014

Powers That Be Have Frozen Money For Swiss Gold Initiative

As you know, Eric, I have been involved in the Swiss Gold Initiative. The Swiss National Bank is opposing this initiative. They have admitted that it stops their ability to manipulate markets. The campaign is going well. The public has generously donated because of KWN and other sites. But that came to a stop two days ago when Paypal closed the account for donations and they froze the funds that were in that account without any warning.

So unfortunately the campaign cannot receive some of those donations which were just frozen. Paypal will not even answer the questions we are asking them, but I assume the money will be returned to the donors. Clearly the powers that be did not want the campaign to receive this money.

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Friday, August 8 2014

HMRC And Eurostat Alter Historic UK Gold Trade Data

It was in August 2013 when I started digging into UK gold trade data. While at the time China was importing unprecedented amounts of gold, through customs data I was able to track the source all the way back to the UK, home of the London Bullion Market. In 2013 the only available database for UK gold trade was Eurostat. When downloading the numbers from 2013 and all the years before something quite remarkable appeared to me. According to Eurostat the UK imported 614 tonnes of gold in August 2008 and 1,352 tonnes in September 2008, just from one country; Germany. It was hard to comprehend these numbers, how could Germany export nearly 2,000 tonnes of gold in two months? This had to be a mistake, I thought. Eventually I wrote a post about it leaving it to the reader to decide whether to believe these numbers.

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Friday, July 25 2014

The Strange Case of German Gold - An Interview with Peter Boehringer

A June 23 Bloomberg News story entitled "German Gold Stays in New York in Rebuff to Euro Doubters" made the seemingly straight-forward case that the German authorities had decided to reverse course on a plan announced in 2012 to bring home some 300 tonnes of German gold that had been on deposit at the New York Federal Reserve since the 1960s. According to the article, German representatives had gone to New York, saw their gold, were convinced that it was in good hands, and decided that the hassle of putting it on a plane and sending it back to Germany was simply unnecessary. The article quoted a spokesman for Chancellor Merkel who said "the Americans are taking good care of our gold" and even quoted Peter Boehringer, one of the leading private advocates of the repatriation movement, as saying their campaign to pressure German authorities "is on hold."

When the Germans originally asked for their gold back, the Federal Reserve had countered with a painfully slow eight-year delivery period. This struck many as strange given that the total request only represented 5% of the gold reportedly held at the Fed's New York vaults. The delay severely whipped up concerns that long-held theories about imaginary gold were actually true. The Bloomberg article appeared to dismiss all these concerns and bring the case to a close. Or did it? Almost immediately,people close to the matter cried foul.

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Friday, July 18 2014

Third party sought to run London gold fix

London Gold Market Fixing Ltd, the company operating the century-old global price benchmark known as the "fix", said it is seeking a third party to take over administration of the process, possibly signalling a move to an electronic platform.

The company, working on behalf of gold fixing banks Barclays, HSBC, Societe Generale, and Bank of Nova Scotia, said it had launched a request for proposal (RFP) process with a view to appointing a new administrator for the benchmark, supported by the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA).

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Wednesday, July 16 2014

GLD amendment refers to "unforeseen reasons" for unallocated failure

GLD has some amendments to its terms up for vote, one of which is "that creations may only be made after the required gold deposit has been allocated to the Trust Allocated Account from the Trust Unallocated Account" (hat tip I Shrugged; see here for an explanation of the existing creation process). What is interesting is the explanation of why they are making this amendment:

"This amendment provides additional security for Shareholders by eliminating potential risks related to issuing baskets of Shares against unallocated gold if the Custodian was to become insolvent or if the unallocated gold was otherwise not allocated for some other unforeseen reason."

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Wednesday, November 20 2013

Gold Benchmarks Said to Be Reviewed in U.K. Rates Probe

The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority is reviewing gold benchmarks as part of its wider probe of how global rates are set, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

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Thursday, July 5 2012

Revealed: why Gordon Brown sold Britain's gold at a knock-down price

One decision stands out as downright bizarre, however: the sale of the majority of Britain’s gold reserves for prices between $256 and $296 an ounce, only to watch it soar so far as $1,615 per ounce today.

When Brown decided to dispose of almost 400 tonnes of gold between 1999 and 2002, he did two distinctly odd things.

First, he broke with convention and announced the sale well in advance, giving the market notice that it was shortly to be flooded and forcing down the spot price. This was apparently done in the interests of “open government”, but had the effect of sending the spot price of gold to a 20-year low, as implied by basic supply and demand theory.

Second, the Treasury elected to sell its gold via auction. Again, this broke with the standard model. The price of gold was usually determined at a morning and afternoon "fix" between representatives of big banks whose network of smaller bank clients and private orders allowed them to determine the exact price at which demand met with supply.

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