Venezuela to move its Gold out of USA, UK and European banks.

You should check your history. The Monroe Doctrine was directed towards Europe. It had nothing to do with domestic politics of the Latin countries themselves.

 

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This story is about a Leader or Dictator, what ever you want to call him, protecting his property from a banking system he has lost trust in.
Put yourself in his position and then ask yourself if you would do the same thing.
I am sure, the answer would be yes.
Look at all the foreign assets that have been frozen by other goverments in the past few months. Maybe he feels he is next on the list.

 

If you look at what has happened or is happening to some of the dictators in the world, perhaps he wants the option of taking what ever he can with him; if things start to turn against him in his own country. I think there are some countries and organizations which would offer him assistance or safe haven for a share of it.

 

Since it is still being held in reserve, I doubt it will affect the price at all. If it was released into the market, it might, but changing safes doesn't alter the supply. IMHO

gary

 

Lot of big money belts

 

There's a lot of nonsense going on in South America. The Chinese and their desire for Taiwanese repatriation is behind it all. Chavez is just a pawn...(imho). Of course, moving that much gold around isn't trivial.

 

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If you look at various background news on this, He was about to get hit with financial sanctions by US and others due to his operations with Iran and also from previously private owned oil and mining operations in Venezuela. Venezuela has already nationalized Gold mining in 1977, so only the government has authority to mine, but government cronies and criminals are thought to have taken advantage and opened illicit mines.

Also Venezuela has depended on oil ( 95%) so much for prosperity, that with oil down 20% and low expectations of an upturn soon due to reduced production by the world economies, Venezuela is going to be in a hard place. Probably he is trying to set it up so it looks like the sanctioning nations are keeping his gold in greed rather than pending world court cases.

I don't feel it is someone worried about decreasing dollar value, but someone who will possible feel a reverse of popularity when hardship hits. He will get the publicity benefit currently, but mark it as a high point for him , IMO.

Jim


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...-us-europe-amid-plan-to-nationalize-industry/

 

I'm not sure that I would consider news from one of Rupert Murdoch's subsidiaries very credible on the matter. However if he was worried about sanctions, getting his gold out of the Anglo-American banking system is probably a very prudent move. I'd say the man is smarter than 95% of the other heads of state out there. On the matter of Venezuela depending on oil for prosperity I'm not seeing what is particularly wrong with that since we have China & India, with more than a 3rd of the world's population willing to buy. Look what the USA is left with for creating the image of prosperity in comparison. If it was such a good thing, we wouldn't be here talking about gold bullion.

 

Apparently just the 99 tons coming from the BoE will require, according to Zerohedge, 40 shipments by sea to move the 17,000 400 ounce bars. Think of the piracy issues. It's a very expensive and public statement. It's something that one would not do if the idea would be to liquidate the gold for cash to be put in Hugo's private bank account. IMO, he is doing right by his people.

 

This is about $12 billion in gold, and if what Adrian Douglas says is true about 45 ounces being loaned out for every actual ounce, may require between $500 billion and $1.2 trillion in capital (other estimates at 100:1 instead of 45:1) to unwind the paper positions needed. While that it is quite substantial it's not undoable. So I think it will be able to be covered, and it probably won't single handedly impact the price nearly as much as if they weren't able to deliver, but it will have some impact from the banks needing to buy out some of their customers which would have the effect of selling into the market (potentially at magnitudes of 45 to 100 times greater than the 211 tons Chavez is asking for) and may actually decrease the price of gold (at least on paper). More importantly I think this could cause other nations to follow suit which would have much more far reaching implications. We closed our gold window in 1971, but apparently Europe's is still open. If and when it closes I would expect the price to rise accordingly.

The 40 shipments would be for if the gold needed to be insured, but would come with a high risk of criminals trying to hijack the ships, and there aren't many who would be willing to insure it. So they might need to use their Navy, or potentially fly them in on jets which has been done before (link #1). Another alternative I've heard suggested was to offer citizens a premium for bringing their gold in for exchange of owning gold in the Bank of England so that they could systematically acquire the gold without having to have it all shipped. No matter how you slice it they are going to be paying a high premium just to transfer it. Chavez wants to make sure he is getting the same gold he sent out, but I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up getting some of the 400 oz gold plated tungsten bars supposedly floating around (link #2). I am interested to see if he plans on drilling into any of them.

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/22/139859316/chavez-wants-gold-holdings-transferred-to-venezuela

http://news.goldseek.com/GoldSeek/1258049769.php

 

Indeed. it sounds as if the plan is to send it by boat. Yeah, I've heard the stories about the tungston and it would be my guess that Hugo has as well. It would be my guess if the banksters pulled this trick on him, he would make a very public statement about it.

 

Controlling Your Own Resources

If I understand you correctly, you seem to believe there is something wrong with having the ability to mine your own resources, from your own country and keeping the profits rather than let some outside corporation pillage the ground for their own bottom line.

I ask, who are we to tell another country, what they can or can not do with there own resources?

Government cronies and criminals are alive and well, in my country as well as yours.​

 

say it aint so....

 

Not at all, what I believe is wrong is to allow or entice foreign or private companies into your country, allow them to use their money to develop the resource and then "nationalize" it for the country or the "President's" profit.

So you think it is OK, for example, for the US to nationalize the Toyota plants that are here and not reimburse Toyota?

 

Nationalization can be fine if done properly. Suadi Arabia did it properly when they nationalized, reimbursing the companies for the nationalization. Most nationalizations, though, are simply theft, especially when done in banana republics.

I have no problem with any nation wishing to control their own destiny, and agree many corporations can treat third world national land poorly. Like Jim said, though, any nationalization should be done reimbursing the company, if not its just stealing.

Btw, you can pretty much tell how a country is going to fare by the way they nationalize. Saudi did it properly, and has run their wells properly, and continue to prosper from oil. Mexico stole the property, and has not run their industry well at all, and produce less oil every year. Eventually their stolen property will be valueless due to their mismanagement. Venezuela will be in the exact same boat, with government cronies being the only ones profiting, not the people.

I do not hate Chavez, but I will ask again of his supporters: Please show me one single example where a country was better off after a socialist dictator leaves power than they were before he came to power. All of the cases I have examined I see a country much poorer, and usually with the dictator and his friends with fat Swiss bank accounts.

Chris

 

Using this criteria, I fail to see why the dictatorship of Saudi Arabia (which you approve of) is better than the government of Venezuela which is not a dictatorship. The only people in SA who have benefitted from the oil is the Saudi royal family and their cronies. The average Saudi in comparison has little opportunity, women there have absolutely no rights at all, there are beatings, torture no human rights, etc. and if it wasn't for USA security, that Royal family would be in dire straits. The dispair is so bad, it was the breeding ground of 19 of the 20 9-11 terrorists. Yet you say Saudia Arabia is properly run. Yet in Argentina, there is none of this, the people for the most part have more rights and freedoms than those of SA, and lest we forget, Chavez was elected by his people.

You failed to make your point using your own criteria.

 

First, I was not talking about civil rights. That is a hard comparison since the nature of their two religions. I was simply talking the economics of their oil industry, with Saudi producing steady supplies and generating reliable returns to their government. Venezuela I believe will follow down the path of Mexico of lower and lower yields.

Most dictators were elected. An election is not what separates a dictator from democracy, it is FAIR elections after the first. Hitler was elected sir, so where most dictators on this world. It is their actions after being elected.

Btw, I have been to Saudi, Venezuela before Chavez, and to third world dictatorships. I understand all of the points you bring up Fatima, and I still say that Venezuela will be the net loser when he leaves. It has nothing to do with Yankee jingoism, as I disagree with numerous policies of the US, its simple economics. Chavez today is simply trying to make himself immune from international sanctions, but I still predict this gold when he is gone will no longer be an asset of Venezuela. For that, I am sad for her good people.

Chris

 

This hasn't been the case. Venezuela, according to OPECs own charts, has more oil reserves than Saudi Arabia, and there is considerable investment there from Chinese and Russian oil companies. In regards to religion, Argentina's is Western Roman Catholicism. i.e. the same as Catholics here in the USA.

You are entitled to your opinion but I don't but it ignores the facts of reality. As I said earlier, if his plan was to liquidate that gold, he could have instantly done it without moving it, and nobody would even know. The BoE would credit him in currency and take possession of the gold. Moving the stuff to his country makes that all but impossible.

 

I meant comparisions in religion between Venezuela's religion and Saudi Arabia's. I am very aware of both region's religions, as I am a student of religious history.

We can just agree to disagree. Maybe I just read too much, and have read too many times after such a leader leaves how many assets that were once there simply aren't. You believing that the gold physically will be unable to disappear once it is in the possession of such a regime I believe is truly faulty, but again you may wish to believe what you would like. Its like you believing that Venezuela could have sold its gold reserves held in foreign banks without anyone knowing. If you choose to believe that, it is your right, but to me him doing that would have been reported in the press in about 8 seconds.

Chris

 

My oh my, politics and religion take over a discussion about moving gold reserves.