What 's up with gold in the world?

I. Austrian government announcement that it was restricting the sales of precious metals to $20,000 a time.
II. France bans cash pay of PM to 600 $.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/france-bans-cash-sales-of-gold-silver-over-600.html

Goverments trying to know who own or who is trying to change cash into PM's?

 

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They're all watching you. Better buy only pre-1933 gold; all contemporary bullion from the US Mint has built-in RFID for tracking.

Seriously, there's nothing particularly sinister here. Governments want to collect taxes. This is nothing new.

 

Could be those governments are thinking of taxing the buyers or sellers. Nowadays, I wouldn't worry about the US government getting my gold. For one thing, I only have a handful of coins and for another the world has learned full well that governments mess up in a big way and there's tons of people who don't want to give up their gold to the gov't so they would have a fight on their hands. A huge fight!!

 

Or it could be people are using gold as a money launder. The seedy side of PM is there have been many, many instances of people converting illegal proceeds to PM and then cashing out the gold at a later time, "laundering" the money. They pay taxes on the gold, "that their grandma left them", and the resulting proceeds are fully accounted for and clean.

Yes, it may be the government is watching, but maybe its not for the reason you think.

Chris

 

A sign that a currency is getting ready to fail is when the government starts placing restrictions on the purchase of gold. This law makes it impossible to buy a one ounce gold coin in cash now. If gold was just a simple commodity, then certainly the goverment wouldn't care.

 

But the same restriction applies to steel, iron, copper, etc. which I doubt few would sanely argue were not commodities. Gold is not treated differently. Put the cash in a bank and immediately ( or after posting) buy the gold with a check or money order.

 

You do have a point except that people don't usually buy these in their physical form in quantities that would trigger the restriction. It's obvious this is an attempt to restrict and/or track bullion sales, because, it is a substitute for money.

 

I think that's a pretty spurious argument. Average citizens are NOT investing in physical base/industrial metals, but they are investing in traditional coinage metals because they do not trust the fiat currencies that their respective governments have set up for them, while their governments are desperately trying to prop up those currencies.

 

when is it going to fail?

next year

next year

next year

anyone can make dire predictions and act like they are right when anything bad happens.

 

I suppose one had to define failure first. What do you consider to be a currency failure? Then we can talk about when and where.

 

let's use your definition then.

 

Nowhere in the article does it mention the form of the metal , such as coins, dust or what ever. Reference is made to electrical wiring, which reinforces the idea that copper, aluminum, steel and other commodity metals are , if not the major concern, an equal one. Perhaps you have not purchased electrical copper wire , or copper tubing for water, or steel rebar for concrete work, but you will see how the cost can easily exceed the $600 per transaction mark.

 

Contractors rarely pay cash for these materials of any quantity.

 

The reference to electrical wiring was made by an American observer, who in turn was referring to wording in "independent reports", not the French law.

“According to *independent reports*, the law was passed to curb the illegal sale of stolen metals like copper, steel, etc. Given the rampant rise in thefts of these metals from telephone poles, construction sites and businesses here in the United States, we can certainly see this as a reasonable assessment for why the French passed this law,” writes Mark Slavo."

However, the French law covers *retail* purchases of metals

“Any transaction on the *retail* purchase of ferrous and non ferrous (metals) is made by crossed check, bank or postal transfer or by credit card, not the total amount of the transaction may not exceed a ceiling set by decree. Failure to comply with this requirement is punishable by a ticket for the fifth class,” going on to confirm that any amount over €450 euros or $600 US dollars “must be paid by bank transfer”.

Someone selling scrap to a scrap dealer is not selling retail-- they are selling wholesale, so the law would apparently not cover such transactions and thus it seems unlikely that this law was meant to counteract theft and fencing of scrap base metals. Essentially, the vast majority of retail customers for large amounts of base metals would be companies, not individuals. On the other hand, the largest group of customers for retail gold and silver would be individuals. Thus, the law appears to be a thinly disguised attempt to curb retail purchases of precious metals by severely limiting retail buyers' payment options to means which can easily be traced.

 

I see where you are going Collector1966 but I would disagree that someone going into a scrap yard and selling material is "wholesale". Wholesale is usually defined as business to business, something which a person selling some junk copper to a scrapyard really isn't. I have sold to junk yards and received cash. This is the easiest way to sell off quickly stolen metal, (mine wasn't stolen, but still). It always has been, to the point that police would first look at scrap yards if metal was ever reported missing. About 1995 in Iowa at least they were required to put in cameras, and later required to take photocopies of drivers licenses to show who was selling. They discussed prohibiting cash payments but that law was never put into place, as its too hard to cut small manual checks constantly.

What I am saying is that you may be right as to motives of the law, or Desertgem could be. I would prefer to have more information as to the intent of the law, or the enforcement actions, to be sure.

I know we talk about PM here, but non precious theft is a large and growing problem here, and probably in Europe.

 

If I have the equivalent of what would be $600 worth of scrap copper at current market prices, that would be roughly 200 pounds of copper. But a scrap dealer is not going to pay me anywhere near $600 for 200 pounds of copper scrap. So let's say 250-300 pounds of copper scrap would have to be sold to earn $600. I would thus be selling a large amount at a significant discount to the retail price in order to reach the $600 threshold. That would certainly fit the definition of "wholesale" to me.

 

Now let's look at that from the viewpoint of someone walking into a French coin shop wanting to buy, say, a 40-franc gold coin, which contains 0.3734 ounce of gold or roughly $600 worth at $1600/ounce. The dealer's asking price might be something like $620. The customer puts the equivalent amount of euros on the counter to pay for his coin. But the dealer says, "Sorry, monsieur, but the law says I cannot accept cash. You must pay by another means, which will increase the cost to both of us. I hope you understand the intent of the law, which is ostensibly to prevent sales of stolen copper".

 

Wholesale isn't defined by B2B transactions. It's defined by quantity, namely lack of individual unit pricing. A pack of tomatoes is a retail quantity and pricing. A truckload of tomatoes is wholesale. So a backyard farmer brings in 500 lbs of summer tomatoes to a distributer for resale to supermarkets. This isn't a retail transaction.

The same holds true for people selling scrap metal. Even at today's prices, it would take 267 lbs of copper tubing, 700 lbs of copper wire, 1200 lbs of aluminium siding, 1300 lbs of cast aluminium, and 2 tons of scrap steel to trigger the $600 amount. These are not retail quantities.

Clearly the French law would not address thievery of common metals as there are few crooks walking around with that much metal and even if they did and there was a junk yard stupid enough to pay them for this much metal at one time, it would not be considered a retail transaction. Would it address thievery of PMs? Maybe, maybe not. I don't think there is enough of a problem with gold being stolen that would warrent such a law being put in place just for that. Stolen gold is difficult to sell as most gold buyers are very careful in what they are buying.

What the law does do however is immediately put a record on every single gold coin or bar being bought and sold in France that is greater than 1/3 ounce. It immediately gives the goverment a tool to discover who is buying gold bullion coins and bars. If they are saying it's being done for security, it won't be the first time that people's freedoms have been sacrificed in the name of making us "safer".

 

I agree 100% sir with your post except for quantities of scrap metal. These people deal in container load quantities, so Chris coming in and selling a ton of scrap iron or 100 pounds of copper is small quantities, ie retail. I am just saying the law MAY be intended for that reason, but your explanation of it being to create records of transactions and sacrificing our liberty is more plausible. Sad but true.

We were very close to being in the same position here, except with everything. Thankfully the new 1099 provisions got repealed, but trust me the politicians will try again, probably very soon. "The only problem with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money to spend", Margaret Thatcher.

Chris

 

But dear heart, the law would not apply as this would not amount to $600. Try reading my post again.