What if the  Gold Sovereigns you were looking to buy had been up someone’s bum?

The Royal Mint has been known for beautiful gold and silver bullion products at the national mint level. Their Britannia is not so common in the US, but is in Europe and, of course, the United Kingdom.

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Markets did not know what to do after election results poured in, although many markets had been pricing in a possible Trump victory for about one month prior to the election, as polls were too close to call and also the accuracy of many mainstream polls were thrown into question.

Gold futures fell precipitously Friday, their lowest finish since June, thanks to strength in the U.S. dollars and equities. The Federal Reserve, according to many analysts, might increase interest rates next month. The main reason for precious metals decline is similar to why global currencies have fallen: the strength of the dollar. Read More

Marijuana for medical purposes? President-elect Donald J. Trump is for it. Helping people when they come to the US asking for help? “Absolutely,” he says, with a caveat: “People have to come into the country legally.” Man buns he admits have “never been my thing.” 

As for bringing back the gold standard, the global economy order until World War II, President-elect Trump thinks it will be hard but is open-minded.

“Bringing back the gold standard would be very hard to do, but boy would it be wonderful,” he said. “We’d have a standard on which to base our money.” Read More

Gold prices increased 5% as election results rolled in and declared Donald Trump the U.S. presidential elect, and on November 9th skyrocketed to $1,330 before a hard correction to pre-election levels. The yellow metal currently sits at $1251.30 heading into Friday morning eastern standard time in the US.
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The Mariana Mining disaster, considered the largest environmental disaster in Brazil’s history, left unforgettable memories of devastated landscape and lives. It separated families in Mariana.

As Deutsche Welle describes: “Among the few homes left – almost all without doors and windows – a bush is trying to grow on on of the mountains of debris left throughout the village of Bento Rodrigues.”

The rural town located in Brazil’s state of Minas Gerais, located in the country’s southeast, still has the color brown mud throughout much of it when, on November 5, 2015, the mines Fundão dam (Samarco mining company) collapsed. 19 people were killed.

“Over the past weeks, the movement of workers and heavy machinery at the site has became more intense,” Deutsche Welle writes. “Construction work on a new dam, called S4, are in a race against time.”

The structure is planned to be opened in January, at the height of the rainy season.

“The lake will be created in the area already impacted,” said Eduardo Moreira, manager of the Samarco works.

“From a technical point of view, it is an important alternative within the waste containment system,” he said in reference to other measures.

As Deutsche Welle describes: “The ruins of a chapel, built in 1718, will be saved – but will keep a mark from the tragedy. 70-year-old José do Nascimento de Jesus, a Bento Rodrigues community leader, said he will not go back there to give his service.”

Rodrigues said: “We go there and see only mud.”  The devastation displaced many.

“Where we used to live, everything will be flooded,” said Irene de Jesus. “Now people are hoping, expecting to move soon to the new Bento, to have our home. And, who knows, to be happy as before.”

About 3,000 laborers in shifts work around the clock, “rebuilding infrastructure and the barriers between the poisonous debris and the Gualaxo River, which flows into the Doce.”

the Brazilian environmental institute Ibama surmises the efforts will fail to prevent Brazil’s largest environmental disaster.

On the streets in Mariana’s downtown, merchants and taxi drivers complain about the lack of customers and complain about the difficult financial situation. The local government is struggling to balance its books since it stopped collecting taxes when the mining company stopped operating. It was among the main source of revenue for the city.

Fitbit Alta is one of the second biggest selling fitness trackers in the US thanks to a tracker, with a screen. Now, it’s going gold.  FitBit is going designer thanks to this new gold-plated style.

The Gold series Alta comes in 22 karat gold-plated edition with a black or pink sport band for $149.95. It comes with an optional shiny, gold-plated bangle named the Alta Luxe Metal Bangle for just an extra $129.95. Altogether – that’s just $280. Read More

Make money today, sell gold. You can set up affiliate links on your gold related website – or any website – and possibly start earning today but probably not. Read More

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Despite a strong year so far, gold was down for its first month in 2016 in May. While the fundamentals most goldbugs champion – uncertain economic conditions and central bank policy – remain, demand could fall as younger generations turn to a new type of gold – digital gold.

In particular, millennials have less interest in physical gold. This isn’t necessarily a value statement. They simple have less experience of it. They don’t recall the days when the US dollar were on a semi-gold standard.

Today, they are more interested in digital gold, and Bitcoin has long been marketed as digital gold. Many young people claim that, although it is relatively new, Bitcoin offers similar savings aspects as does gold. Many, however, claim that Bitcoin is merely speculative, and thus very risky.

There are many parallels between Bitcoin and gold. For instance, when he designed the digital currency, Satoshi Nakamoto incorporated a mining aspect, similar to how gold is mined, but for computers.

Many millennials working in the Bitcoin industry, furthermore, are hoping to put gold on a blockchain. Projects like BitGold, Digix and others highlight this.

Older generations have bought gold because of the absolute privacy it offers. One can buy physical bars, and store them in a closet where nobody knows. It’s more similar to cash under a mattress than a gold stock. It seems, millennials interested in versions of digital gold are okay with sacrificing a bit of privacy, although many proponents claim blockchain technologies like Bitcoin and others are private. Still, it’s hard too argue they can be more private than bullion.

According to a survey by Global Metal News, millennials (age 19-35) showed better knowledge about lithium than gold, underscoring young people’s fading interest in gold – they are more interested in lithium.

Lithium is having its own Gold Rush of sorts, with hedge fund managers, pension funds and young retail investors entering investing in the commodity. Lithium is important for ion batteries, needed in the devices becoming more common. Lithium is also important electric vehicles. One need not look further than Tesla’s $5 billion lithium-ion battery subsidiary. The idea is that Tesla is going to be consuming lots of Lithium.

Millennials and younger in the coming years will likely be more enticed by digital gold than they are by gold bullion. There has already been a major motion picture about Bitcoin, Dope, on which the popular musician Pharrell Williams was an executive producer. There is no such equivalent Hollywood film portraying the gold industry. What’s more, it’s currently cheaper to buy one bitcoin than it is to buy one ounce of gold.

On the popular social media website, Reddit, a Bitcoiner expressed his relationship to gold and Bitcoin: “I had both for a while, but the practical aspects of Bitcoin ended up disillusioning me on gold, I no longer believe in it strongly enough to hold it.” Others recounted similar experiences.

Goldbugs who were adamantly against Bitcoin have turned towards it. Peter Schiff, a leading gold advocate who appears regularly on mainstream media, being one. Andrew Hoffman of Miles Franklin, Andy Hoffman and Chris Duane have also warmed up to digital gold as gold prices cooled off following their enticing 2011 price increases.

“My first few investments were in gold bullions back in 2007/2008. My portfolio was ~90% metals at that time,” another Reditor related. :They now make up ~3% of my portfolio while crypto makes up about 75%.”

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Gold prices have had quite the struggle over the past five years as the global economy has slowly recovered from the financial crisis of the late 2000s. The precious metal has posted annual losses three years in a row now, with 2015 seeing a 12% loss alone.

So as 2016 begins to take shape and investors take a look at what’s worth a buy, are we looking at a fourth year of losses? The answer is most likely.

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Northwestern University scientists discovered a cost-effective and environmentally sound method to isolate gold from raw materials by using cornstarch.

The method is considered a green alternative, compared to modern methods, to extracting gold from other materials, such as consumer electronic waste.

Current methods involve the use of highly poisonous cyanides, which contaminates the environment. Gold-mining companies exclusively use this toxic method.

“The elimination of cyanide from the gold industry is of the utmost importance environmentally,” said Sir Fraser Stoddart, the Board of Trustees Professor of Chemistry in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. “We have replaced nasty reagents with a cheap, biologically friendly material derived from starch.”

Sir Fraser’s team found the process by accident via test tube chemistry and then tested rigorously their findings.

GoldSilverBitcoin – People’s Bank of China will release on October 28, 2015 the 2016 Panda coin set.

The coin’s pattern will show the Beijing Temple of Heaven, and feature the country name, reign. The reverse patterns will show a panda climbing a tree, published denomination, weight and fineness. This is different from the 2015 version, which left out weight and fineness, and troubled many precious metals dealers due to this lack of detail.

“I won’t sell it,” one wholesaler told me, who chose to remain anonymous. “Without the date, fineness, and all the details you normally get on not only a government issued coin, but also a private coin, I wouldn’t trust it.” Chinese Pandas are already known as one of the more counterfeited coins on the market. Read More

GoldSilverBitcoin – In many shipwrecks, gold is among the items found on-board a fallen vessel. For goldbugs, that is what makes a recent shipwreck discovery in Greece so intriguing.

A joint Greek-American archaeological expedition in the small Fourni archipelago, an area of merely 17 square miles, has turned up one of the great archaeological finds of 2015, according to Discovery. Read More

GoldSilverBitcoin – Entering into the gold business and starting your own gold dealing site is easier than ever. As goldbugs and silverbugs might notice, there is quite a bit of turnover in the online bullion retail scene. Moreover, the general websites that are highlighted are not the only ones. There are many, many online gold dealers who have carved out their own niche. The industry itself has gone through a lot of flux lately. We highlight in this article how you – Yes, YOU – can enter into the gold selling space. While we can’t go into certain technical details, this guide will make you aware of the tools you need. Here’s how.

There are numerous products precious metals oriented online retailers focus on, such as bullion gold, silver, platinum and palladium coins and bars, semi-numismatic gold and silver coins such as Morgan Dollars and Saint Gaudens (Pre-1993 gold coins), tube holders and survival gear. One thing many people, in my opinion, do not consider while opening a precious metals shop is jewelry. While precious metal coins oft carry small premiums – save for the Pre-1933 gold coins – jewelry has higher margins.

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At the third GOP presidential debate Wednesday night, moderator Becky Quick asked Ted Cruz how we could “try and help” working women in the US who “still earn just 77 percent of what men earn.” In a stumbling manner, Cruz ultimately landed on the gold standard to help women.  In a disjointed tirade Cruz began:

“Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders and all the Democrats talking about wanting to address the plight of working women, not a one of them mentioned the fact that under Barack Obama, 3.7 million women have entered poverty. Not a one of them mentioned the fact that under Barack Obama and the big government economy, the median wage for women has dropped $733. The truth of the matter is, big government benefits the wealthy, it benefits the lobbyists, it benefits the giant corporations. And the people who are getting hammered are small businesses, it’s single moms, it’s Hispanics.”

Cruz later tied “loose money” to the plight of women. “I think the Fed should get out of the business of trying to juice our economy and simply be focused on sound money and monetary stability, ideally tied to gold,” Cruz said.

Cruz is not the only Presidential candidate to support the gold standard. Rand Paul has called for similar. “We need to think about our currency that once upon a time had a link to a commodity, and I think we should study it,” he once said.

Of course, in the end, it doesn’t seem like Cruz answered the question at hand.

People have bought domains since the advent of the Internet for business, projects and investment purposes. This trend continues to this day and there are implications for the precious metals space. Consider the recent story of the record sale of gold.co.uk. It comes on the heels of a major purchase of another precious metals domain: silver.com. 

British entrepreneur Rob Halliday-Stein paid a record £600,000 for “gold.co.uk“,  the highest price ever paid for a .co.uk domain name. It took him seven years to acquire it. Halliday-Stein trades gold and silver bars and coins. The previous record for a .co.uk domain name was £560,000 for “cruise.co.uk” in 2008.

“Whilst this is a significant amount to pay I strongly believe the domain will prove to be great value over the long term,” Halliday-Stein said of the purchases. In 2012, JM Bullion acquired Silver.com for $875,000.

“We decided we needed a domain name that would help us become the largest online precious metal retailers in the world and believe we have found that with Silver.com,” said Kendall Saville, an investor in Silver.com. This domain purchase was the largest of 2012.

The British billionaire has been in the gold business since 2008. He merely wanted to purchase a small amount himself. He became disillusioned with the poor customer service in the industry, and entered into the space.

“Given what I knew about online marketing, ecommerce, and customer services, I thought that this [bullion trade in the UK] could be done better. So I contacted someone who ran the UK branch of a big European refinery, who offered to do the gold side of the business while I took care of the marketing and customer services,” Halliday-Stein told Vice.

“My intention was to be the UK’s number one online bullion dealer,” said Halliday-Stein, who foresaw the profitability of selling bullion via e-commerce. For a domain he settled on “gold.co.uk.”

In 2008, the domain name belonged to Jack Gold, who requested £50,000 for it. Halliday-Stein opened a lease on the domain. Vice explains what happened next:

But disaster soon struck. Gold separated from his wife, reneged on Halliday-Stein’s agreement, and sold the website to someone else for a quick cash fix.

Halliday-Stein ultimately purchased “bullionbypost.co.uk” instead.  Today, his business does £100 million a year.

“Someone found me out for the purchase of the domain because we were now the biggest gold dealer. They offered a significantly increased price, but to be honest, I wanted the domain—there was a bit of ego at play,” he said.

“It’s a strong brand and it gives us significant SEO benefits of around £100k a year as well,” told Vice. “The thing about the ‘bullion by post’ brand was that it wasn’t right for higher net-worth individuals. It was always aimed at smaller to medium investors. Now our average order on gold is already about three times what our ‘bullion by post’ order is.”

The Bundesbank recently published the list of all its gold bars on its website in its inaugural report. This is the first time the country has done so. Germany has been in the limelight in recent years after requesting that the New York Fed return its gold. The bank has seemed to turn away from storing 65% of its gold reserves overseas with central banks in London, paris and New York. The Bild-Zeitung, in 2012, ran an article entitled “Bring Our Gold Back Home.” Bundesbank officials began making moves in 2013.

Wednesday’s move for Bundesbank to report where its gold bars are to the public is a move in the direction of re-establishing gold as a concept in the global economic dialogue.  The nearly 3,400-tonne reserve of the metal is accounted for in the 2,300 page list.

“Half of Germany’s gold reserves will be stored in Germany by 2020 at the latest,” Carl-Ludwig Thiele, a member of the Bundesbank’s board said. The list is due to be updated annually.

“There were a lot of conspiracy theories about the gold not being there,” said Guntram Wolff, a German who heads Brussels think tank Bruegel, pointing to ‘disenchantment’ among ordinary Germans who have seen the value of their savings dwindle.

“Trust in the Bundesbank has suffered,” said Peter Boehringer, author of a book entitled ‘Bring our gold home’. “The Bundesbank must prove that the gold is there.” Bundesbank officials see practical reasons for the move.

“The gold reserves show stability. The German people are happy to know that the Bundesbank is watching over this wealth, which belongs to them,” said a former Bundesbank official.

“It could be helpful, for instance, in covering some of the costs were Germany to leave the single currency.”

Why are US Mint gold sales on the rise? When you look closely at the news in silver market, of potentially two month delays on many products, the picture becomes clearer. Purchase of gold ETFs has increased, and the US Mint sold 7,500 ounces in gold coins and 871,000 ounces in silver coins. Sales splits in gold coins include 6,500 ounces in American Gold Eagles and 1,000 ounces in American Gold Buffalo coins.

Silver has been the attention of investors this year, in particular with long delays in the metal over the past month. Nevertheless, gold sales have remained robust. American Buffalo 1-ounce gold coins sales in 2015 are ahead of 2014 levels. As of September 23, the Mint reported sales for the year to authorized purchasers of 169,000 of the 1-ounce gold coins.  In the first nine months of 2014, the Mint sold 139,500 Gold Buffalo coins.

Not only as the US Mint seen an increase in sales. As Reuters reported in September, gold coins sales have surged in the US and Europe, with sales from the US Mint reaching levels not seen since the 2013 prices crash. In the third quarter 2015, gold American Eagle sales have had the highest quarter since 2013.

“The industry has been on an absolute tear for the last three months,” Scott Spitzer, chief operating officer at Manfra, Tordella & Brookes in New York, told Reuters. “Every time there’s been a break in the price and there’s been volatility, there has been enormous growth in retail interest.”

Mainstream pundits apparently are warming up to gold. A number of recent bank reports, as noted by NewsMax, have viewed the metal’s near term future somewhat optimistically. Moreover, on the television characters like Jim Cramer have been positive on gold.

For instance, UBS recently asked in a bank report: “Time to warm up to gold?”  UBS states that the market will turn around in gold.

“But the possibility that the market may be overestimating the terminal rate suggests that current weak sentiment and price expectations may also be overdone,” UBS analysts stated. “Positioning has declined considerably over the past couple of years and has now become very light. There may be an opportunity, especially for long-term oriented participants looking to diversify portfolios, to rebuild positions at more attractive levels.”

“Any further downside is likely to be contained, and we expect the market to ultimately find stability, which should provide the foundations for a moderate recovery over the coming years.”
HSBC also recently wrote positively of gold: “It has managed to hold above and build on gains over $1,100/oz. and in non-USD terms, it is back above EUR1,000/oz.,” the bank stated.  “The recovery in oil prices, which … if sustained, may lend additional support to gold. Chinese demand, as indicated by persistent Shanghai premiums, implies decent levels of imports of gold into China. This is offsetting the slowdown in Indian demand. Retail demand for gold and silver coins is also strong. On the negative side, we are unsure about central-bank demand, at least at the moment.”

According to Commerzbank, “Switzerland exported 173.9 tons of gold in August, 8% more than in the previous month. Nearly 70% of this total was shipped to Asia…50% more gold was exported to China. Exports to Hong Kong were actually more than twice as high as in July, which suggests that China also imported more gold from Hong Kong last month.”

“Increased gold demand in India and China should lend support to the gold price,” said the Commerzbank report. On CNBC recently, a trader outlined why current economic conditions could be good for gold.

In the following video, Jim Cramer – popular amongst gold bugs for his negative view of the metals – seems positive on gold prospects.

US and New Zealand researchers recently  found massive gold and silver deposits in reservoirs underneath a volcanic range on New Zealand. Project researcher Stuart Simmons told Quartz that find could be worth between $50 million and $250 million, though that is speculation. As Simmons explains:

Taupo Zone [is]…similar to Yellowstone National Park in the US, volcanic magma enriches underground water with heat, chemicals, and in some instances, precious metals.

 The steam from the area’s hot springs is used as a source of geothermal energy, Simmons explained, and when the hot water moves toward the earth’s surface, it is sometimes caught in the pipes of geothermal production wells—which are designed to generate power from hot water in the earth. Over time, thin films of silver and gold build in the pipes of these wells.

Treasure hunters discovered $4.5 million in gold coins off the Florida coast last month, including several which were minted for the king of Spain, Philip V, in the early 1700s, according to Florida Today. 

The July 30 and 31 finds were made off the coast of Vero Beach were not announced until Wednesday by Bret Brisben, captain of the S/V Capitana. Brisben and his crew claimed to have found 350 gold coins, nine of which – called Royals – are worth $300,000 each.

The coins were aboard the 1715 Fleet shipwreck. Their discovery was made on the 300th anniversary of that July 30, 1715 tragedy. An entire fleet of 11 ships were lost when they were traveling from Havana to Spain after it got swept up in hurricane conditions. More than 1,000 people perished in the tragedy.

“It’s been magical,” Brisben told CBS This Morning. “What’s amazing about this is we found it on the actual anniversary. We found over 230 gold coins on the 30th, and the hurricane started on the evening of the 30th (in 1715).” Brisben knows everyone loves treasure stories.

“It resonates with everybody — every demographic, young and old, rich and poor,” Brisben told the newspaper. “People freak out that we’re literally 10-15 feet off the beach in 2-3 feet of water.”

The State of Florida is entitled to 20% of the recovered artifacts in order to display in its Tallahassee Museum. Brisben’s most recent discovery comes but one month after a subcontractor of his, Eric Schmitt, discovered 52 gold coins worth in excess of $1 million. Schmitt discovered the gold just 150 feet off the coast of Fort Pierce Florida, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

A “finders claim” has been filed in a district council in Poland for an “armoured train” carrying precious metals onboard. Many have speculated this is a so-called Nazi “ghost train” which was carrying the spoils of the Second World War. In the final days of that War, the train reportedly went missing.  

Filed in the south-west Polish town of Walbrzych, local media reports write the claimants, who are Polish and German, have claimed to find a 500-foot long “armoured train” with artillery platforms and is carrying “precious metals.”

Soldiers inspect Nazi gold after the War. Getty Images

Under Polish law people who find treasure can keep 10 percent of the value of their find. The historical account of the train states that Nazis loaded the train with gold and other treasure as the Red Army advanced on the city of Wroclaw. The train went south west.

“Lawyers, the army, the police and the fire brigade are dealing with this,”  an official at the Walbrzych district council, Marika Tokarska, told Reuters. “The area has never been excavated before and we don’t know what we might find.”

“In the region we actually two gold train stories,” Joanna Lamparska, local historian, told Radio Wroclaw. “One is supposed to be under a mountain and the other somewhere around Walbrzych.

“But no one has ever seen documentary evidence confirming the existence of such trains.”

Citibank has stated that Venezuela could sell gold reserves to raise funds for the struggling country. David B. Wilson and Aakash Doshi wrote the report.

“Cash-strapped nations could trigger further downside price risk as the temptation to sell gold reserves mounts,” the analysts said in the Aug. 18 report. “Venezuela is one such country at risk.”  Crude oil prices have hurt Venezuela, which receives over 95% of its export revenues from oil.

Earlier this year the country did sell off some of its gold reserves. In March Venezuela was declared a National Security threat by President Obama. With new sanctions on certain officials, China would no longer be able to fund Venezuela. And so Reuters reported that Venezuela’s central bank was in talks of creating a gold swap to monetize $1.5 billion of the metal. That caused the gold price to fall. Venezuela leader Hugo Chavez had put most of the country’s money into gold.

A storm is brewing on the global level. In recent weeks the world has seen numerous nation-states plagued by economic turmoil. China, Greece, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and others have had a taste that the global crisis which shocked the world in 2008 was not in the past. Rather, it remained in the present, as well.  The Chinese stock market crashed, and its the second largest stock market in the world.  Pundits wondered – could the same happen in the US. 

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Numerous nations throughout the world are currently dealing with currency or debt crises of one kind or another. Greece has stolen the headlines where they’ve needed to secure a bailout from the European Union so as to not go broke, and Puerto Rico, a US protectorate, has said it will not have the funds to service its debt. The Chinese stock market has collapsed with the government instituting controls to prop it up, while in Venezuela inflation ravages the food aisle, which have gone bear in recent months.

In China, you see gold is clear winner in the wake of recent turmoil. Included in this article are the regional interest data points from Google Trends.

Interest in gold in China has taken off.

Regional interest in gold

Regional interest in silver in China

Included in this article are the data points for regional interest. In China, regional interest in Bitcoin is different than the other countries. Whereas in Greece, Puerto Rico and Venezuela interest in Bitcoin is tied to the main cities of the country, in China the interest appears more diffuse. 

Regional interest in China in Bitcoin

As you see below, interest in both gold and Bitcoin have increased in terms of Google Trends search queries in Greece. Gold has seen a modest spike, while Bitcoin is clear winner in terms of new, recent interest in Greece.

Gold has seen a small uptick in Greece located search queries, while Bitcoin has seen a considerable spike.

As in the remaining countries, precious metals queries occurs throughout the nation, while Bitcoin queries is more-so located in Athens. 

Here you see Greeks interested in gold live throughout the country.

Here you see interest in silver spread throughout Greece.

For Bitcoin, most Greeks are centered in Athens who query Bitcoin.

In Venezuela, gold and Bitcoin have seen an increase in search queries, silver not so much.

And regional interest in Venezuela: 

 In Puerto Rico, similar trends: 

Interest in gold in Puerto Rico is spread out throughout the island.

Interest in silver in Puerto Rico is more centralized than gold.

Gold antiquities looted from China were returned by a French billionaire after a long effort by Beijing to recoup pillaged art. The antiquities were purchased by billionaire luxury tycoon François Pinault. The four gold heads of prey birds are worth €1 million (£710,000). Mr Pinault, owner of brands from Gucci to Saint Laurent, donated the 7th century BC solid gold works to Paris’s Guimet museum of Asian art  15 years ago.

It was soon discovered the antiquities were stolen in 1992 from the tomb of a noble of the Zhou dynasty in Gansu province. China says the birds of prey were pillaged amid a wave of thefts in the early-to-mid nineties by farmers in the western state of Qins. A corrupt civil servant apparently smuggled the antiques out of China and Mr Pinault bought the birds of prey unsuspectingly.

Chinese authorities filed a complaint 10 years ago, but discreetly maintained they wanted a diplomatic restitution. Art Newspaper reported in April that Mr Pinault handed the four birds of prey heads to the Chinese embassy in Paris and did not ask for compensation.

Another collector,  Christian Deydier, returned 28 other artefacts. China promotes the repatriation of pillaged works, putting pressure on auction houses to cancel sales of items and even buying them via a corporate offshoot of the people’s Liberation Army, the China Poly Group. China  has a big thirst for gold as the world’s largest consumer of gold.

Photo: Rex Features. 

Gold demand in Europe is extremely high. Sovereign gold coins, as Bloomberg covers, were selling at double the five-month average in June, according to the UK Royal Mint.  Sales last week were the highest since Cyprus limited cash withdrawals in 2013.  The Germans, French and Greeks are leading the buying.

“Most of our common gold coins are sold out,” Daniel Marburger, a director of Frankfurt-based CoinInvest.com, told Bloomberg. “When people learned that the Greek banks will be closed, they started to think that it may not be such a bad idea to have some money in gold.”

Some analysts have claimed that there are no gold coins in Europe. It started with Martin Armstrong’s blog here, as people seemingly misunderstood what he was talking about. He cleared that up.

Some people have misread my posting on an observation in Spain. The retail sale of gold coins was virtually nonexistent in Spain. This is not a shortage of gold. In Italy, bullion coins were being sold in stores.

It is France that is after gold coins, demanding no cash sales and reporting on buyers and sellers. Even the rare coin shows have left Paris for the dealers refused to comply with such reporting. The French were driving to Belgium to deal in gold and the French government was complaining about that.

Even the banks are requiring an explanation for every deposit in an account to get a mortgage in the USA. Gold refiners are now required to report to the U.S. government every shipment of gold, reporting where it comes from and where it went.Others echoed this sentiment.

Others financial analysts parroted the reports, but on Reddit a discussion thread started immediately to analyze the notion of problems getting gold in Europe. In this thread, which can be found here, numerous commenters highlight that there are no problems buying gold in Europe.

The gold mining industry has seen $2 billion in projects completed through the first five months of this year, twice 2014’s pace. This points towards that the precious metals industry, despite stagnant prices, remains stalwart amid decreasing demand at the numerous retail levels.

In the first quarter 2015, Paris asset manager Carmignac Gestion purchased 11.65 million shares of Goldcorp. “The perception that mining equities show good value is starting to spread,” according to Hedley Widdup, a fund manager at Melbourne-based Lion Selection Group. “Since the start of this year, there has definitely been a change in sentiment.”

Thomson Reuter’s GFMS holds a $1,170 price target per ounce for this year, with a 2016 forecast of $1,250. “We felt that finally it looked as though you might be able to pick up projects,” said Marc Prefontaine, Chief Executive of Canadian gold miner Orla Mining.

Annual gold mine production grew for the sixth straight year in 2014, increasing 2% to a record 4,114.4 tons. Mine production grew 2%  to 729.2 tons in Q1 2015.  The price decline in precious metals had undermined the bottom line for miners. Demand for gold has fallen across sectors, from technological applications to dental gold.  Overall Jewelry consumption fell 6.7% in Q1 2015 compared to Q1 2014, while retail purchases of physical bars and coins has decreased 17% compared with one year prior.

In the US, physical gold demand declined 6% compared to the same period in 2014 – the lowest level of physical gold demand since Q1 2007. This includes a decline of 13% in retail investment demand, accounting for 31% of US demand during the period.

There are many inherent risks to gold exploration and mining, such as political conflicts, environmental hazards, industrial accidents, unexpected geological conditions, labor force disruptions, unavailability of supply and so on and so forth. Despite all of this, there remains strong demand to tap into this market in consideration of global financial and economic volatility. The GFMS prediction of $1,250 reflects this sentiment.

“There has been more interest from generalists at the broker conferences for meetings,” said David Harquail, Chief Executive of gold royalty company Franco-Nevada Corp. “Often these generalists have no positions in the gold sector.”

“I don’t think commodity prices are going to dramatically go up from here, but I do think that the individual companies’ ability to cut costs will differentiate their performance,” he said. In the gold sector, he favors South Africa’s AngloGold Ashanti.

“There is recognition that there is value in the sector and the market is starting to sense that the companies are better managed now,” said Joseph Forster, portfolio manager at Van Eck.

At the end of last week, BitGold announced it raised $17 million in a deal that began as a $14.8 million offering. This deal is one of many in recent months which has put the company at the forefront of the financial press. Alongside the millions in recently raised capital, BitGold founder Joshua Crumb has stated the company strives to be public and operating in the US by the end of the year.

“Post our acquisition of GoldMoney and the institutional raise, we are taking steps for both main board listing on the TSX as well as a US listing strategy,” co-founder and chief strategy officer Joshua Crumb said. “We would like to be listed and offering services in the US later in the year.” Crumb also stressed how BitGold is different from other online gold platforms; namely, the platform allows investors to buy gold within 1% of real-time prices.

“We built our own exchange to get the best price possible and reduced settlement from a couple of days to instantly,” Crumb said.

In an exclusive interview with James Turk, which only appears in Jeff Berwick’s TDV Paid Newsletter,  Jeff Berwick discussed GoldMoney’s merger/acquisition with BitGold with founder of GoldMoney, James Turk. In the interview, Turk gives interesting insights into why he went forward with the deal, and the benefits of the deal for GoldMoney clients.

Turk has 40 years of experience in international banking, finance and investments, having begun his career at Chase Manhattan Bank.  In 2001, Turk co-founded GoldMoney and remains a director of the group today.

In the interview, Turk mentions that GoldMoney will now enjoy additional regulatory overview since it is a part of BitGold, which is listed on the Toronto Stock Venture Exchange. GoldMoney customers will enjoy the same operation as before, yet with the addition of new products offered by BitGold.

“Technology is evolving rapidly and BitGold is in the forefront of this evolution with Aurum, which represents the latest developments in software and hardware to conduct online financial services efficiently, safely and securely,” Turk tells Berwick. “The services made available by BitGold also enables GoldMoney shareholders to continue pursuing their original vision, to return gold to the center of global commerce by enabling the circulation of digital gold currency.”  Turk tells Berwick that, with GoldMoney’s long history, and BitGold’s new technology in Aurum, the two companies are complementary.

“GoldMoney brings critical mass and 15 years of experience, and BitGold brings technology and a management team with a clear vision of what GoldMoney had always set out to achieve as its long-term goal, the circulation of digital gold currency (DGC).” There are also new products planned by BitGold and GoldMoney.

“These include a plastic debit card that enables customers to spend their gold balance at any traditional point of sale, where credit/debit cards are accepted, or to withdraw local currency from any traditional ATM,” Turk says. “Also, there will soon be a mobile application for iPhone, Android and Blackberry, allowing full dealing and payments capabilities.”

“In addition to the 400-ounce, kilo and 100-gram bars available through GoldMoney, customers can take delivery of GoldMoney Cubes or BitGold Cubes in as little as 10 gram increments.” The rest of the interview is available by clicking here and subscribing to the TDV Newsletter.

With Greece inching closer to a default, and European partners putting pressure on the southern Greek nation, Greeks have pulled money out of banks to the tune of 2 billion euros this week. Alongside this trend, we see an increasing interest in the precious metals sector, as well as the crypto-currency sector, on Google Trends.

Gold, too, has seen a spike in interest.

And, finally, Bitcoin, which last saw a spike in interest in 2013, has also seen an increase in interest.

Denarium hopes to supply such coins to appease the demand for physical bitcoins.

“What we hope to achieve is to allow everyone to have an easy-to-understand gateway to the world of Bitcoin. Our first product is a simple, low-cost product that anyone can afford,”  Denarium co-founder, Henry Brade, told Crypto Coins News.
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Pre-1933 gold premiums are quite low, leading many to wish to purchase.

The following chart uses an annual premium taken in January of each year, with the high and low premium taken from that 13 year span.

Uncertified Gold – 13 Year Average price vs. Current with historical Hi/Low

You can see that, by historical standards, pre-1933 uncertified gold stands is relatively cheap. The $10 Liberty offers a inexpensive price when compared to past prices, while $20 Liberty Gold and $20 Saint Gaudens are much lower in price than they have been. By historical standards, these premiums are at a near all-time low.

“In my opinion, we’re at the genesis of a new way of looking at rare coins—from an investment perspective instead of a collecting perspective,” said Timothy O’Fallon, senior numismatist with Gibraltar Coins.

The People’s Bank of China has tripled its gold stockpile since 2009, according to the Bloomberg Intelligence report, while, in the meantime, sales of previously owned US homes increased in March to the highest mark since September 2013, according to the National Association of Realtors. The BlackRock CEO has called art and real estate a better store of value than gold. Who is right?

Bloomberg Intelligence estimates the nation’s gold stockpile to be 3,510 metric tonnes, second to the US’s 8,133.5 tonnes. Read More

Texans could soon be allowed to pay with gold and silver coins minted by the federal government for taxes and other government services – namely, the American Silver Eagle and the American Gold Eagle – thanks to a bill proposed by Sen. Konni Burton, R-Colleyville.

Burton argues the option to pay in gold and silver for government services has caught on as the dollar’s purchasing power declines. Read More

Robotic mining has been in the news in recent months. While this technology is geared towards mining numerous types of resources, it will have considerable implications for precious metals, as well.  It could have implications for mining on land, underwater as well as in space.

On land, Timetric’s Mining Intelligence Centre (MIC) estimates that 48% of miners across both Europe and the Former Soviet Union (FSU) plan to make use of autonomous vehicles by 2020. Read More

The Super Bowl’s golden anniversary is coming up this season and the NFL will be celebrating with the ultimate symbol of wealth: gold, the commodity which served man as money for many centuries. During the 2015 season, NFL fans will see gold everywhere as the league prepares for Super Bowl 50, which will be played on Feb 7, 2016.

The “golden celebration”, as it is being marketed, will kick off at the NFL Draft. Each drafted player will be given a team hat with a golden NFL shield logo on the back.

The draft will be held in Chicago and will include a Super Bowl museum with a golden theme, as well. A golden shield logo will be painted onto every field at every NFL stadium across the country, and, alongside the golden NFL shield logo on each field, every stadium will have a gold 50-yard market along the 50-yard line:

The gold markings can be seen as early as the Hall of Fame game in August. Each team will wear the color on their sideline beginning in Week 7. Sideline gear like hats and jackets will be outfitted with gold-trimmed logos. Here is what the Seahawks logo will look like:

The Pro Bowl will also brace the color, which represents gold, a material used as money for centuries by mankind. The Pro Bowl uniforms will consist basically of three colors:

The Super Bowl is on February 7, and the winner won’t just get the Lombardi Trophy, but also a golden 50. The numerals five and zero will be bronzed and plated in 18-karat gold:

CBS Sports NFL Insider Jason La Canora says that each numeral will weigh 33 pounds. Just like the Lombardi Trophy, the “50” will be designed by Tiffany. There’s more:

The above photographed golden footballs will be handed out by players to their individual high schools.

Why might the NFL choose the color gold? It is indeed a loaded color, which much history.

Gold has been highly valuable for centuries, used as coinage and jewelry, as well as for other arts, since long before recorded history began. The gold standard was implemented as a monetary policy within and between nations, though gold coins ceased to be minted for circulation in the 1930s. In 1971, the world moved towards a fiat currency system, which means that government dictates the value of money.

Gold has been considered valuable because of its medium rarity, easy handling and minting, easy smelting, non-corrosion, distinct color, and non-reactivity to other elements. Just 174,000 tonnes of gold have been mined in human history, according to GFMS as of 2012. That is about 5.6 billion troy ounces. That’s less than one ounce of gold for each person on the planet.

“But there will be a fantastic spa with a beauty center, large mirrors, and huge wardrobes,” she said of the concept yacht, apparently the first designed specifically for women. Read More

There is much literature on the financial conditions of municipal governments in the US. Are things getting so bad financially for local governments that they are considering sorting through your feces for gold?

According to scientists, fortunes are going down the drain in human feces, arguing that the amount of gold going down the drain would be considered commercially viable by traditional prospects. Read More

Six gold coins originating from the time of the Pony Express have been stolen from a Missouri museum.

Bitcoiners have had quite a showing in March compared to most other markets.

Apple has been caught ripping off data storage from its customers. The company is expanding this model to other products like its new Apple Gold.

After Apple’s launch of a number of new products Monday at their “Spring Forward” Event, some of their claims were thrown into question. For one, the battery life of the Apple Watch, according to Tim Cooke, would be 18 hours. The reality is, if you actually use all the functions of that watch, the battery life can drop to as low as three hours. Apple would say they were merely giving best scenarios, but in the process they were misleading. Their Apple Edition Watch, also, has been scrutinized.

Mainstream press, in its difficulty to create engaging material about relevant topics, has created a storyline about how “gold investors have been positively giddy ever since Apple announced it planned to make a high-end watch with 18-karat gold casing.” News sources like CBS cited some pretty off-kilter websites to pull this little tidbit of info.

Any serious gold investor never took seriously the bold claim that Apple’s new phone might use up 30% of the world’s gold supplies. The reality is, Apple will be watering down its gold content. It says this is so the watch is “tougher and more resistant to scratches,” but the reality is this move will likely save the company lots of money on its $10,000-$17,000 watch, which will carry an operating system likely obsolete within a year. The “Edition” Model, the Apple gold watch,  will be made from custom gold alloys of rose or yellow 18-karat gold. But wait – just how much 18k gold?

Apple marketed its custom alloy as a good thing, but the gold blend which Apple’s metallurgists have been cooking up come with a worrisome caveat. Apple filed a patent on a type gold which contains the least amount gold possible…Hmm… Read More

US Mint sales for February ticked downwards as both American Gold Eagle and the American Silver Eagle sold fewer units than in previous months.

Approximately $4.8 million in gold bars were stolen Sunday from an armored truck traveling from Florida to Massachusetts on Interstate 95 by armed robbers, according to authorities. The theft took place in Attleboro, a small town largely secluded.

Two Transvalue Inc. security guards report pulling over to the side of the road 6:30pm Sunday after their armored truck had mechanical problems in Wilson County, according to the sheriff’s office.

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Although terms like “free market” are often used to describe modern life,  evidence of command-and-control markets  keeps finding its way into headlines, most notably with Libor – the rigging of global interest rates (or the price of money) – shocking the world

What fewer know is the consistent investigation by national authorities into the rigging of precious metals prices by major banks.  There have been more than a few. The Department of Justice antitrust division prosecutors investigation into the price-setting process, which was announced yesterday, is merely the most recent. Read More

Amid investigations and fines levied for rigging markets, major global banks have felt a little pressure on their bottom line. The investigations are not stopping. Despite the fact that European regulators dropped a precious metals manipulation probe, US officials have announced their investigation of no fewer than 10 major banks for the possible rigging of the precious metals markets.

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The following interview is by GoldSilverBitcoin with The Dollar Vigilante’s Ed Bugos. To receive more of Ed’s insights, click here. 

GSB: Ed, thank you for taking time to do this! 

Ed Bugos: Justin, thank you for having me.

GSB: When did you become a gold bug and why? 

ED: Justin, I first became bullish on gold in the late nineties, about a decade into my career as a stockbroker, as the “cult of equity,” as Bill Gross called it, reached a fever pitch.  Thanks to the Greenspan Put, you could not go wrong.  By the time 1999 came around nobody remembered the last serious decline in stock prices, at least in the US. Read More

The high-end version of the new Apple Watch might set a new record in terms of cost for Apple, which is planning to order over 5 million units of the Apple Watch for its initial run, according to a Wall Street Journal report Tuesday. Half of those will be the most basic model, which are expected to sell for $350. A third of the initial run will be an  as-yet unpriced mid-tier model. Read More

A major discovery of more than 2,000 gold coins off the north-central coast of Israel could prove to be a part of the largest gold hoard ever found in the eastern Mediterranean, say archaeologists. The discovery highlights the long history of gold as money.

The coins have been identified as dinars, which was the official currency of the Fatimid caliphate that ruled parts of the Mediterranean from AD 909 to 1171. Read More

In recent months a lucky Chinese herdsman stumbled onto a 17-pound gold nugget. But there are now questions swirling around just how lucky he truly is as China’s government may force him to turn over the nugget to the state as it is a public “mineral resource.”

The ethnic Kazak herdsman tripped over the gold nugget, which apparently was lying “on bare ground,” while traversing through China’s far western Xinjiang region about three weeks ago. After the local government appraised the rock and investigated the ownership of the nugget, the government decided it might seize the gold nugget, a move that has triggered controversy across China, as legal experts and laypersons alike debate who should get to keep the gold nugget. Read More

The Royal Canadian Mint (RCM) has made a splash in the silver and gold investment community as late with many of their limited mintage bullion coins, such as the Wildlife Series and others, including the Birds Of Prey silver bullion coins and the Call of the Wild gold bullion coins, the latest coins of which were recently released. Read More