20 Comments

I'm sure Russia and China have much more gold than they admit to. And the US has no gold.

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Chris, why would two dictatorships adopt a gold standard, a real gold standard where you can convert paper money to real money (gold)? They would lose control over their currency, the printing, and what is the medium of exchange. Putin and China are not buying gold because they will back their currency with it, they are buying it because they want to use it to transact between them, and probably the BRICS, instead of the dollar.

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Per recent Edward Slavsquat article on Substack, Nabiullina is not even considering. Slavsquat lives in Russia. Your argument makes sense but Russia saying otherwise. Could be Russia propaganda tho.

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Got GOLD?

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There is so much to unpack in this thesis. first, I fear you attribute more importance to the Russian economy and its decisions than actually exists. this will become clearer as the sanctions continue and the Russian ability to pump all that oil become increasingly impaired and shut in, thus reducing their capabilities. Second, what other currencies are they discussing. I understand gold as a concept given its permanence, but virtually every other asset than gold and land is consumable and when used is gone. What is the value of a currency whose basis is a constantly diminishing group of commodities because at some point, those commodities will not be sufficient to back the currency.

And given the ongoing digitization of the world, I have a hard time putting the idea of a commodity backed currency into play. is the implication that Russian people will be able to take their new rubles and convert them to aluminum or gold or silver or gasoline? I would be quite skeptical of that idea. remember, a gold standard meant that the government was willing to exchange its paper (or in this case the digital bits in an account) for physical specie. is that what you are implying? seems far fetched. because if there is not actual convertibility both ways, either buying or selling the underlying commodities, then it is not really commodity backed in the strictest sense. after all, as your chart shows, the US has >8k metric tonnes of gold, so arguably, the dollar is already gold backed.

I will not dispute that there are changes coming to the monetary system around the world, I am just not sure this is as big a deal as you make it. at least not without a committed bloc of countries saying the gold<=> currency trade goes both ways.

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I don't think I have ever seen an accounting for the amount of Gold that the USA has in it's storage places (Ft. Knox etc) other than 8,100 tons (approx.) for over 60 years of my life, yet mining companies keep going at it. With earth supposedly having 400,000 tons of Gold and only 1/2 of it having been mined, it doesn't appear that many countries are raising their levels of Gold to a notable level.

So really.....what's your money really worth?

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May 4, 2022·edited May 4, 2022

If you use the Reserve currency as a cudgel, it won't remain the Reserve currency for long.. I see a lot of comments saying Russia and China are not trusted or liked, so it won't work. A very large portion of the globe doesn't trust or like the US or Nato. Pay attention to you perception, it is often not reality. A large portion of the world also believes that Nato provoked the Ukraine crisis. The Pope came out and said Nato provoked the crisis, and the western MSM called him a conspiracy theorist. Not a good look. The narrative is looking shaky, and people are starting to ask questions about where the aid for Ukraine is coming from.

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Nobody cares, though. Because Governments all throughout human history have backed their money by gold, and literally just lied about how much gold they had -- printing way too much money than they held in actual gold reserves. Same shit different day.

Nobody likes Russia and nobody likes China. Neither Russia nor China have anything resembling a transparent monetary policy or any kind of economic reporting -- so everyone will just assume they're lying about literally everything.

The more you talk about Russia or China (two completely doomed nations that will not even exist as we know them today in 50 years) as if they matter is hilarious.

it's even more hilarious that you think gold matters -- it doesn't.

The only countries that matter are the ones legalizing Bitcoin -- because Bitcoin is the only reserve currency that will come out on top.

Because no Government on earth can LIE about how much of it they have or how much of it is in circulation...etc.

Gold is dead, dude. Russia is dead. China is dead.

For such a smart guy, you really can't see the writing on the wall.

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- Who will trust Russia, that you can always exchange your rubbles to gold?

- Where is Russian gold? Some is not in Russia

- Who will trade with Russia now?

- Does Russia is really that smart, plays 5d chess and competent as people think it is? 2 months ago people thought that they have 2. army in the world. Now it looks like they are first army of third world. You want to get a grasp how things are in Kremlin now, you should watch Chornobyl series

- Does some of this claims are based on sources like Zero Hedge, which is pure Russian propaganda? Look at articles about Russia and try to write opposite comment. Or on their twitter account.

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1996 was my first year at the stockmarket. I guess since then I read thousands of articles about the upcoming gold standard. Maybe someday.... But probably not. Nobody wins.

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I have been listening to numerous podcasts featuring Keith Weiner of Monetary Metals, and if I understood one of his assertions correctly, we aren't at a gold standard until we aren't talking about the USD:gold or Ruble:gold ratio (pegs are game-able) and instead, financial transactions are done directly denominated in some measure of gold (or, the US constitutionally has a silver standard https://mises.org/library/constitutional-dollar)

https://monetary-metals.com/oil-the-ruble-and-gold-walk-into-a-bar-part-iii/

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