To:John Barendrecht who wrote (279) From: Bobby Yellin Monday, Jul 7, 1997 2:34 PM Respond to of 80032
for all we know the USA could also be buying the metal at bargain basement prices....I thought Rubin had made some comment before about our not selling gold to fund the IMF or something like that...anybody remember? hopefully 275 will be the limit...just spoke with somebody quite quite knowledgeable who said we could have a rally back to 340 and then one further test of the low...nobody knows..not even the shadow... :) (RH note -12/2001 - We now suspect Clinton was loaning gold into the market to break every rally)
To:Bobby Yellin who wrote (281) From: John Barendrecht Monday, Jul 7, 1997 3:12 PM Respond to of 80032
Trust paper currency: from 2 franc for 1 US dollar to 170,000 per US dollar: US, Luxembourg Firms to Print Congalese Franc By Arthur Malu-Malu
KINSHASA (Reuter) - The Democratic Republic of the Congo has chosen companies from the United States, Luxembourg, Germany and South Africa to help produce Congolese francs to replace the discredited zaire currency of ousted dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.
Finance Minister Mawampanga Mwana Nanga told reporters on Sunday that the notes would range from one franc to 100 francs and that coins would be minted as well.
Mawampanga was speaking in the presence of representatives of 15 international firms which had bid to print the new notes.
``American Bank Note of the United States and Agrima Ltd of Luxembourg will produce and deliver the notes of 10, 20, 50 and 100 francs,'' said Noel Tshiani, a World Bank official who is advising the finance minister.
``Giesecke & Devrient of Germany and South African Banknote of South Africa will supply us with the originals of the bills of one franc and five francs to be printed at the (Congolese) Central Bank,'' Tshiani said.
He said companies had not yet been selected to mint coins, but that the Royal Mint of England and Royal Canadian Mint were at the top of the list.
``The whole operation will cost over $10 million, at least in the first stage of the monetary reform, involving the purchase of money paper and the payment of the printers' bills,'' another adviser to the finance minister told Reuters.
President Laurent Kabila, who ended Mobutu's 32-year dictatorship in May after a seven-month military campaign, has pledged to revamp the chronically sick economy of the former Zaire, since renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Mobutu, who is stricken with cancer and fled into exile, left behind an economy ruined by decades of corruption and mismanagement.
Mobutu replaced the original ``Congolese franc'' with the ''zaire'' in 1967 when one zaire was worth two U.S. dollars. It crashed to 170,000 zaire to the U.S. dollar at the time Mobutu was ousted and is now valued at 115,000 to the dollar.
Kabila has said the congolese franc will be a strong and ''cleansed'' currency.
Mawampanga declined to say when the new banknotes would be introduced.
``The timing is known, but we can't disclose it. It will be done by surprise to avoid speculation on the currency market. Let's wait until the president makes the announcement,'' Mawampanga said.
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