I’m more and more inclined to think they are the real deal.
First, why bother smuggling that large an amount of counterfeits? Esp knowing that out of all the countries in the world that would know if they were good or fake, Switzerland is the country that would know.
I mean if you were smuggling fakes, you’d smuggle them in to South Africa or something.
If you are smuggling the real thing, you smuggle them into Switzerland, where you effectively have a world wide discreet market for them.
Exactly. Plus, I read early this morning (when the story appeared briefly and then disappeared) that 5 of the bonds were in denominations made only for states.
I’m less inclined - because bearer bonds in the US have not been issued for more than 30 years - 1982 for US Treasury debt and 1983 for a lot of muni/state debt.
But put that aside: the amount is very fishy. Why would anyone want to pack around all that value (if this were real paper) in ONE shipment? Anyone who has handled bearer bonds knows that you have ALL the face value of the bond at risk in the physical existence and possession of that bond.
If I were a nation-state, I would have moved them in a diplo pouch. No inspection, no taxation, no nothing.
If I were an individual in possession of this amount of bearer bond paper, I would never, ever have moved this much paper in ONE bag, on ONE person, in ONE shipment. Never. Start with the fact that the ONE person (even two people) you’ve entrusted with this amount of wealth could simply ..... walk off. Unless you’re holding their families hostage, that amount of negotiable money in their possession is enough to buy off anyone.
If I possessed $135B in bearer bonds, it wouldn’t have been moved in shipments of more than about $1B at a time in the open like this, the mules would have been paid quite well - and I’d still be holding their families hostage.
Since none of this is in evidence (yet) I increasingly have to go with the “fake paper” explanation. I could be completely wrong on this, but the mechanics, dates, human nature, etc — just don’t add up here.