Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Today's report from Sputnik News, a division of the Russian government's international information agency, shows just how closely that government is watching not just the gold market but also, it seems, GATA's work. That is, the report addresses suspicions raised by GATA's friends in Germany's "Repatriate Our Gold" movement and reported almost exclusively by GATA that Germany's gold reserves vaulted with the United States were never more than gold credits until the Bundesbank sought to repatriate the gold in recent years.

Russia's special interest in gold and GATA's work appears to date from June 2004, when the deputy chairman of Russia's central bank, Oleg Mozhaiskov, spoke to the summer meeting of the London Bullion Market Association at the Baltschug Kempinsky Hotel in Moscow and used only four English words in his address: "Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee":

http://www.gata.org/node/4235

While surreptitious intervention in the gold market remains a prohibited subject in the government-controlled Western financial news media, it is a subject of great interest in the government-controlled Russian news media, and GATA will continue its efforts to make the issue of interest everywhere.

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.
CPowell@GATA.org

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Germany Gets the 'Wrong Suitcase' While Repatriating Its Gold Reserves from U.S.

From Sputnik News
(Rossiya Segodnya, Moscow)
Saturday, February 11, 2017

https://sputniknews.com/business/201702111050571970-us-germany-gold-repa...

Germany has completed repatriation of 300 tons of gold bars from the United States. According to Russian economist Vladimir Katasonov, initially the American side was not ready to give the bullion back but finally came up with a plan.

Germany's central bank has established the return of its gold reserves to domestic vaults by the end of 2017, three years ahead of schedule.

Earlier this week the Associated Press reported that the Bundesbank had completed relocation of 300 tons of gold from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

According to the bank, 111 tons of gold were repatriated from the US in 2013. It also returned 105 tons from Paris.

According to data from Marketwatch, by the end of 2016 47.9 percent of Germany's gold reserves had already been stashed in vaults in Frankfurt, with 36.6 percent remaining in New York, 12.8 percent at the Bank of England in London, and 2.7 percent at the Banque de France in Paris.

In January 2013 Berlin announced that it was planning to store half of Germany's 3,378 tons of gold reserves in its own vaults, with the other half remaining in New York and London. According to the original plan, the Bundesbank would transfer 300 tons of the precious metal from New York and 374 tons from Paris to a facility in Frankfurt by 2020.

Katasonov, a professor at the International Finance Department at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, suggested that the United States disposed of Germany's gold bars at its own discretion.

"There are a lot of signs that the gold was not physically present in the New York vaults when Germany called it back. Of course, the U.S. began to return it to Germany but there is one interesting detail. When you leave your suitcase in the luggage storage, you expect to get back the same suitcase. But Germany took the wrong 'suitcase,'" Katasonov told Radio Sputnik.

According to the economist, the gold bars that Bundesbank repatriated have different labels. He suggested that the U.S. might have replaced the German bullion with different gold bars bought from the market.

Katasonov explained that the U.S. managed to return the yellow metal thanks to favorable conditions in the precious metal market.

"I think there was a favorable environment in the market and the Americans managed to quickly buy the gold and give it back to Germany. They were not ready for this, but finally managed this replacement," he concluded.

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 -- Published: Sunday, 12 February 2017 | E-Mail  | Print  | Source: GoldSeek.com

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