China set to hike official gold reserves to 5,000 tonnes next to combat its growing financial crisis? Posted on 22 January 2014 with 3 comments from readers
The Internet is abuzz with rumours that China may be about to reveal its new official gold reserves with a total of up to 5,000 tonnes way above its previous 2009 tally of 1,054 tonnes. Last week the world’s second largest economy pumped in $42 billion to shore up its faltering credit system.
Raising official gold reserves to become the second largest holder of the monetary metal is another card China can play to underpin its economy as it struggles to grow exports. These are the savings from the good times to help the country through less easy days.
Monetary metal
‘Currency Wars’ author Jim Rickards says: ‘This should be an earthquake. Even the gold deniers, the gold doubters, the Nouriel Roubinis of the world are going to have to sit up and take notice. If gold is a barbarous relic, if gold has no role in the monetary system, if gold is a stupid investment – and that’s not my word, that’s their word; they say the people who invest in gold are idiots and fanatics and a lot of other less acceptable words – well, if that’s all true, why would the Chinese have 5,000 tonnes?
‘The minute you think of gold and paper money side by side, or having some relationship, this is how you get to these price levels of $7,000-9,000 an ounce.
‘They’re not made up. They’re not there to be provocative. They’re actually the math. Those are the numbers you get when you simply divide the money supply by the amount of gold in the market.’
Gold solution
So when will China show its hand? It’s absolutely no secret in the gold industry that huge amounts of physical gold have been heading into China for the past few years.
Only last week we heard that the Shanghai Gold Exchange delivered a record 2,197 tonnes in 2013. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
It’s unbelievable that Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley persist in frightening markets with talk of $1,000 an ounce gold knowing this. Then again they could well be buying everything they can buy at current low prices or acting as an agent for the Chinese. Gold is the very stuff of conspiracy theories.
The rumours say that China will make its new reserves public in the first quarter. All gold price forecasts will be transformed if they do and our gold stock picks will surge ahead.
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