Free Republic

Germany's central bank is bringing home gold reserves stored in places like New York and Paris faster than planned, it said Thursday, as confidence in the euro ebbs even in the heart of the currency bloc after a decade of a sluggish economy. Stashed away at the height of the Cold War in safe havens well out of Moscow's reach, the 3,378-tonne, 120 billion-euro gold stockpile has become a symbol of Germany's economic ascent and a guardian of its stability. But with Europe stumbling from crisis to crisis, the German public has grown uneasy about keeping the gold abroad. Some...

Germany has completed an effort to bring home 300 metric tons (330.7 tons) of gold stashed in the United States, part of a plan to repatriate gold bars kept abroad during the Cold War. The German central bank said it brought 111 tons of gold back from the Federal Reserve in New York last year, concluding in September — the last of 300 tons slated for return. […] Once the transfers are completed, Frankfurt will hold half of Germany’s 3,378 tons of reserve gold, with the rest in New York and London. […] During the Cold War, West Germany kept...

foreward by JS Kim, Managing Director of SmartKnowledgeU Here is a recent correspondence from our friend Lars Schall, an independent financial journalist, and the German Central Bank, the Deutsche Bundesbank, regarding the exact whereabouts and specifications of Germany’s national gold reserve. From the correspondence below, it appears that the US Central Bank had already leased out Germany’s gold reserves in prior years and no longer has it, as the gold bars the US Central Bankers returned to Germany last year were clearly not the same ones that Germany originally deposited with them. The questions Mr. Schall’s revelations now beg is...

  The best indicator of a chess player's form is his ability to sense the climax of the game –Boris Spassky, World Chess Champion, 1969-1972You've likely heard that the German central bank announced it will begin withdrawing part of its massive gold holdings from the United States as well as all its holdings from France. By 2020, Bundesbank says it wants half its gold reserves stored in its own vault in Germany.Why would it want to physically move the metal from New York? It's not as if US vaults are not secure, and since Germany already owns the gold, does...

Germany’s Bundesbank is to repatriate gold reserves held abroad to tighten control and combat currency crises in the future, pulling a chunk of its holdings from New York and all its bullion from Paris. The move marks an extraodinary breakdown in trust between leading central banks and has set off ferment among gold enthusiasts, with some comparing it with France’s withdrawal of gold from the US under President Charles de Gaulle as the Bretton Woods currency system crumbled in the early 1970s. Handelsblatt said the Bundesbank will announce on Wednesday that it intends to relocate the gold to vaults in...

Calls for Germany to repatriate its 1,536 tons of gold reserves held at the NY Fed are intensifying as Der Spiegel reports the Federal Reserve has refused to allow German inspectors to even view the country’s massive gold reserves “in the interest of security and of the control process“. We have stated repeatedly that with repatriation and/or audit requests completed or in progress by Venezuela, Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, The BOE and the Fed suddenly find themselves in a heap of trouble as the situation (and confidence that the Central banks actually still hold the tungsten gold reserves on...