Nobody believes that Gold can make a true reversal here. Sentiments are at total extreme. We have the capitulation in gold miners and, maybe, this is the sign of the end of this gold bear market.
In Europe so far; Germany has been repatriating gold since 2012 from the US and France, The Netherlands has repatriated 122.5 tonnes a few weeks ago from the US, soon after Marine Le Pen, leader of the Front National party of France, penned an open letter to Christian Noyer, governor of the Bank of France, requesting that the country’s gold holdings be repatriated back to France, and now Belgium is making a move. Who’s next? And why are all these countries seemingly so nervous to get their gold ASAP on own soil?
VTM-nieuws has just reported the Belgium central bank has confirmed it’s investigating to repatriate all its gold reserves.
Our country is investigating to repatriate all gold reserves. The Belgium central bank has confirmed this to VTM-nieuws.
This is all I could find for now. This post will be updated when more news comes in.
Koos Jansen reports that just before Swiss Gold Referendum The Dutch Central Bank has repatriated 122.5t of Gold from US. China has cut interest rates as well today - trading in Gold will be interesting.
Nobody believes that Gold can make a true reversal here. Sentiments are at total extreme. We have the capitulation in gold miners and, maybe, this is the sign of the end of this gold bear market.
The Dutch central bank, De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB), has repatriated in utmost secret 122.5 tonnes of gold from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) to its vaults in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, according to a press release from DNB published today (November 21).
DNB states it has changed allocation policy from 11 % in Amsterdam, 51 % at the FRBNY, 20 % in Canada and 18 % at the Bank Of England (BOE); to 31 % in Amsterdam, 31 % at the FRBNY, 20 % in Canada and 18 % at the BOE. According to the World Gold Council’s latest data DNB has 612.5 tonnes in official gold reserves.
Source: the WGC, DNB
Translation DNB press release:
DNB Adjusts Gold Reserves Allocation Policy
Press release, date November 21, 2014.
De NederlandscheBank hasadjustedits allocation policyfor its gold reserves.To achievea more balanceddistribution ofgoldover the various locations, DNB has shipped gold from the US tothe Netherlands.
Inthe old situation11% ofthe gold reserves were located in the Netherlands, 51% in the US, with the remainderin Canada (20%) and the UK(18%). The locationdistribution according tothe revised policyis asfollows:31%inAmsterdam, 31% in NewYork, while the percentages forOttawaandLondon with20 and18 % remain unchanged.
This adjustment of DNBjoinsother central banksthat store alarger share of theirgold reservesin their own country. Next to a more balanced distributionof the gold reserves over thedifferent locations, this canalso contribute to more trust towards the public.
The distributionof gold stocksover various locationsisoftensubjected to change.For example, inthe period after theSecond World War untilthe early seventiesDNBaddeda lot to its goldreserves -underBrettonWoods- especiallyin NewYork.Since then,more mutationsoccurred. The main reasonsfor this have been thegold salesoverthe past decadesand the closure ofthe vaults of theReserveBank of Australia, which made DNBship gold from Australia to the UK in 2000.
A few weeks ago I heard a rumor that the Netherlands were repatriating some of their official gold reserves from the FRBNY. From one of my sources I even heard which security logistics company is shipping the metal, but I was kindly asked to not share this company’s name.
Last week I was approached by a financial journalist, Theo Besteman, from the biggest newspaper in The Netherlands,De Telegraaf. He asked me if I knew anything about the repatriation of Dutch gold from the FRBNY as he heard from several sources DNB was following the German central bank in repatriating gold (for the ones that are under the assumption Germany has ceased its repatriation program, please read this). I told him I heard some rumors about it and that the source was one of the big security logistics companies. He wanted to know which one, but I couldn’t tell him that. Apparently the rumors were true and Besteman did a good job finding out what was happening. The front page of De Telegraaf today: Gold Shipped In Utmost Secret.
De Telegraaf reports that for years there have been doubts at the DNB if the Dutch gold was still in New York. After a very secret and almost military operation DNB has shipped gold from Manhattan to Amsterdam, to bring about a more balanced allocation of its gold reserves and give theDutchcitizensmore confidence by storing the goldon ownsoilto guidethe country, ifnecessary, through a followingmajor crisis. In the previous weeks many armored trucks were seen at the DNB in Amsterdam. Quote from De Telegraaf:
“It is no longerwise tokeep half ofour goldinone part of theworld,” said aDNBspokesmanon themassive operation of shipping gold barsto Amsterdam.“Maybe that was desirable during the Cold War,not now.”
Global Consequences
The impact of the Dutch gold repatriation can be huge. First of all, because it underlines more and more countries are getting nervous about their gold reserves stored in the US. Venezuela repatriated most of its reserves from abroad in 2012, the year Germany also announced a repatriation schedule from the US and France. While Germany settled with the US to ship 300 tonnes spread over 8 years, the Dutch set a new trend to insist on immediate delivery. If more counties will follow there can be a global run on gold.
Recently the Swiss people also got nervous about the Swiss National Bank (SNB) its gold policy and asked for a referendum to store all of the official gold reserves on Swiss soil. The Swiss referendum is held on November 30 and will most likely be influenced by the 123 tonnes of gold repatriated by The Netherlands.
