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Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

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Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#221
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Britain they're called "gold sovereigns", though I've never heard of anyone owning one — only from references in James Bond films and so on. I wasn't aware the nominal value was £1.

The Q suitcase with the 50 gold sovereigns from From Russia With Love , was it? Ironically the plot of Goldfinger relies on something which no longer exists: capital controls. The evil Auric Goldfinger was trying to circumvent British control of the export of money by hiding gold in car panels.

There was a more recent Bond movie whose evil plot was about water rights... which had happened, legally, while the movie came out, I think.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, that's still terrible, but how do they feel about the freezing the personal accounts of people[0]? [0] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-60383385

Actually freezing or potentially freezing? As I mentioned in a comment above I'm not aware of any individual that had their personal savings frozen. I recall a lot of reporting that it might happen and I recall a question time in which the accusation was made that it had happened but when pressed no actual details of to whom could be provided. That dates back to about the time of your linked reporting which also talk…

> Actually freezing or potentially freezing?

Either. I don't really understand that anyone would think that a government being able to freeze someone's assets for protesting that government is a good thing.

This isn't the potential for abuse, in a sort of "price of freedom" way. This is an abusive power that, at best, was not used.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#223
We can probably thank Senator Bob Menendez for this. After getting indicted (again!) for taking bribes, his defense is that owning physical gold bars is a great idea.

As an aside, unfortunately for Bob they have him dead to rights this time, there's not gonna be a hung jury.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why people keep thinking that a financial meltdown means societal meltdown. There's plenty of places where the economy is or has already melted down even right now -- Sri Lanka, Argentina, Venezuela, etc. We can observe what happens when political institutions completely and utterly collapse, because it's happened multiple times already . What happens is not immediate apocalypse where people riot a…

I think that prepper scenario is way more likely in a «I got mine, screw you» society like the US. All the countries you list have their issues, but their base level of societal egalitarism is orders of magnitude higher. I would not be surprised if the US is one of the few countries to end up like Mad Max if the world order should fully collapse due to climate change or other large scale events.

We’ve had localized collapse due to hurricanes and other disasters in the USA and it didn’t go mad max and in fact people helped each other.

There’s always a few bad apples but there’s always some counter pressure, too. The story of the deuce and half owner who drove into a hurricane comes to mind.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think that people in Argentina are flocking to Dollar and not to Bitcoin or Gold? When I look at the search trends in Argentina, I see Bitcoin in a very volatile longterm uptrend, Gold in a longterm downtrend and the Dollar being constantly a distant third: https://trends.google.de/trends/explore?date=all&geo=AR&q=go... Over the 20 years which the Peso has been devaluing, Bitcoin has outpaced the others by…

Try now: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=AR&q=g... Not even "Messi" can beat the "dolar blue"

That's impressive! Thanks for introducing me to this term/idea.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you think the US is at risk of collapsing however I would suggest you buy a gun before gold You need friends and allies before you need guns.

> You need friends and allies before you need guns. In one short sentence you may have summarised the difference between other societies and the USA.

Friends and allies are no longer sold in the USA, but guns still are.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#227
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Physical gold might have value in situation where financial institutions and markets start to lose any trust in themselves. Either by manipulation, government confiscation or fraud. But, things will be pretty bad at that point from every viewpoint. As essentially global markets are crashing. On other hand, in even bigger crisis gold won't be that valuable at least for a while. If food and fuel are first priority peop…

You don't need to lose trust in the system as a hole. Only in the fact that the system serves you. Bank accounts gets frozen all the time and for a variety of reasons.

“system as a hole” is my new band name.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#228
post #52
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shiny metal is better for trade than bartering because it is rare and easy to break down into smaller chunks. Its value is that people other than the persons trading with it are also willing to trade with it. Guns and ammo sound like a better alternative but their rarity is unknown and unpredictable and even less people might be willing to trade with them on a regular basis unless it's a literal warzone. Food perishe…

paying with a gun seems like a perfect recipe to get hold up for the things you just bought.

When society gets to that point looters and robbers get bullet.

There’s a class of crime that can only really exist in a rule-of-law situation, without that people just get summarily executed.

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#229
My dad, near the end of his life, was "convinced" by his UBS money managers to move most of his assets into gold. He had a signficant amount of money, and this yielded a major payday for the fucktard at UBS that told him to do it. I can't see any reason for it!

Re: Costco gold bars are selling out within hours

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can see it happening right now in Argentina: the local currency is worthless, and people are flocking to ... US Dollars. Not gold, not bitcoins, but good old benjamins. So gold isn't even a good inflation hedge: if you walked the streets of a failing economy (pick one: Argentina, Venezuela, Sri Lanka, there's plenty more) and tried to exchange gold for goods, you're not gonna get far (and will probably get mugged…

Not exactly. I just sent this link to my (Argentine) friends with a different observation. My observation was: The United States is starting to look like Argentina. You must understand: Most Americans are not accustomed to shoving a third party currency under their mattress, or buying physical gold. The phenomenon of hyperinflation is foreign to them, and there's a steep learning curve. The actual significance of thi…

>Not exactly. I just sent this link to my (Argentine) friends with a different observation. My observation was: The United States is starting to look like Argentina.

As someone who is studying economics in Argentina... You're pretty much the polar opposite of Argentina when it comes to the economy.

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