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Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

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Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#191

Post by scythe »

razemio wrote: post #165
Aldipower wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As it is correct, that they are virtually not in power, framing them as pro-russia is some sort of false flag. Just because they are not anti-russia, like every other party, does not automatically mean that they are pro-russia. AfD and BSW together got more then 25% of all votes. So, you are correct, they virtually are not in power, but they have some real power just by being there. This HN post here is the best exam…

I think anti-nato, anti eu, pro russian gas and anti urkraine war aid qualify as pro russian. I get your point, but I think you are wrong? Just read this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AfD_pro-Russia_movement AfD has SO many connections to the Kremel. At least a big part of AfD is obiously influenced by russian agenda. BSW is a different topic. They might just align with many points russia likes, but you can not be s…

How many levels of "appear to" are we supposed to tolerate in order to minimize the perspective here? Here's where we started:

>The Germans in this article all appear to be aligned to [...]

So the person we don't like seems like they might be affiliated with a political party which seems like it's pro-Russia — this is unreasonably contrived when you zoom out and look at the whole argument.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#192

Post by FpUser »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #162
FpUser wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So repatriating your own property is now pro-Russian propaganda? Unless country is defenseless what is wrong with keeping one's things at one's place

From World War II, the problem with keeping it at your own place was that, if someone overruns your country, your government-in-exile may be able to keep control of gold that is outside your country. Gold that is inside your country, however, is controlled by the invader. (And may be looted by them. Even if you later get your country back, the gold may be gone.) That exposes you to the risk of the country holding it.…

>"...But for much of recent history, the US was seen as a lesser risk than a Russian invasion. Whether that is still the way the risks balance..."

Can't tell about the past where the risks of war with USSR were valid, but I think Russia invading Germany or Italy in the future is pure BS.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#193

Post by signaturefish »

hoseja wrote: post #83
signaturefish wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the individual scale, something like a Sigma Metalytics resistivity analyser (passes an electric field through the sample, checks to see if resistivity, conductivity, weight or size all match up to what you'd expect from a homogeneous gold sample of that size or weight). On the commercial scale, an XRF spectrometer. Both methods are completely non-destructive, and highly accurate (the XRF more so). (the two scales…

Does XRF penetrate the sample? Isn't it a surface measurement?

XRF will go a millimetre or so into the sample AFAIK - it's mainly useful for finding alloy contamination, e.g. "this is 99.99% gold" vs "this is 73% gold and 27% other things" - you really want to use both techniques. Resistivity/conductivity is about average composition, XRF is about elemental purity.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#194

Post by qwytw »

regularization wrote: post #163
Nifty3929 wrote: post #135

I think people greatly overestimate the importance of gold. Gold cannot feed your people, or win a war or cure a disease. And in a crisis likely won't be useful for buying things that do. Gold is maybe just a bit better than fiat currency. Even in terms of inflation, what would happen to the market value of gold (not in Dollar terms, but in terms of what it can buy) if the government decided to spend down $200B in go…

> And in a crisis likely won't be useful for buying things that do. In a crisis, the value of gold holds more than that of the Papiermark, or even the US dollar - I can buy only one egg for the two I could have bought five years ago. Gold is uniform, portable, divisible and durable - useful attributes in a crisis, and worth more than Confederate dollars. Gold is useful - for filling teeth, for electronic coating. It'…

> It's value has stayed normal for thousands of years - although in times of inflation or crisis it might become a little overvalued temporarily as people flee to its safety

That hasn't been the case after the Dollar and all other currencies were unpegged from gold. Adjusted by inflation it has been a very volatile asset in the last 50 years:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Gold_pri...

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#195

Post by qwytw »

tock wrote: post #188
Nifty3929 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think the value of gold has remained stable, that's only because you're only measuring it during times and places of stability. See how much bread your ounce of gold buys you when there's no bread to buy. In a real crisis, the value of gold drops to near zero, just like fiat money does. No hungry person cares about electronic coating. The best you can say is that gold is tangible, portable and universal. So yo…

Gold is a safe haven against currency risk thats all.

And yet it wasn't a very good asset to hold between 1980 and 2000, despite quite high inflation during the period. It's nominal value barely moved while real value of USD halved.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#196

Post by AnimalMuppet »

FpUser wrote: post #192
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From World War II, the problem with keeping it at your own place was that, if someone overruns your country, your government-in-exile may be able to keep control of gold that is outside your country. Gold that is inside your country, however, is controlled by the invader. (And may be looted by them. Even if you later get your country back, the gold may be gone.) That exposes you to the risk of the country holding it.…

>"...But for much of recent history, the US was seen as a lesser risk than a Russian invasion. Whether that is still the way the risks balance..." Can't tell about the past where the risks of war with USSR were valid, but I think Russia invading Germany or Italy in the future is pure BS.

Well, influential people (that is, people fairly close to Putin) in Russia are saying that, after Ukraine, Russia will take Poland. Yeah, that's not Germany, still less Italy. But it's much closer to Germany than I would be comfortable with if I were German...

[Edit: First example I could find: https://www.newsweek.com/putin-ally-says-poland-next-ukraine...

I believe that Medvedev also said similar things, but I can't immediately find a link.]

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#197

Post by Loughla »

londons_explore wrote: post #190

Why would any country store it's own gold outside its own borders? For any nation state, storage and security costs will be tiny compared to geopolitical risk and leverage they're giving away by storing it abroad.

Store it somewhere safe and stable, that way if you're invaded the government in exile can still access the country's wealth to fund resistance and what-not, or at least keep the invaders from just taking it.

Source: all that stolen wealth in WW2.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#198

Post by littlestymaar »

FpUser wrote: post #103
littlestymaar wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both things can be true at once: the politicians talking can have legitimates arguments while being part of pro-Russian parties that don't have power in Germany and do not represent the German government opinion.

Well then the arguments should be considered on their merits without bringing political BS. Otherwise following the logic if Afd tells Merz not to jump from that bridge he should do the opposite.

It's not the argument made in the top level post, they are just saying “What I'm trying to say is that these two do not represent the German political landscape at all. […] This is not a debate happening in Germany right now and no other party has expressed support of any position.”

Maybe there should be a real debate on that topic, or maybe Germany should even pursue such a repatriation of their gold reserves, but as a matter of fact there's no such debate or plan besides fringes parties, that's it.

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#199

Post by gruez »

Eupolemos wrote: post #181
Aldipower wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As it is correct, that they are virtually not in power, framing them as pro-russia is some sort of false flag. Just because they are not anti-russia, like every other party, does not automatically mean that they are pro-russia. AfD and BSW together got more then 25% of all votes. So, you are correct, they virtually are not in power, but they have some real power just by being there. This HN post here is the best exam…

When another nation wants to subjugate or invade you and/or your neighbors, not being against is being pro them. Being against military expenditures and alliances when the other nation is arming like there is no tomorrow is being pro getting invaded. It is not complicated.

>When another nation wants to subjugate or invade you and/or your neighbors, not being against is being pro them.

"You're either with us or against us"

Re: Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245B of gold home from US

#200

Post by Eupolemos »

Aldipower wrote: post #186
Eupolemos wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When another nation wants to subjugate or invade you and/or your neighbors, not being against is being pro them. Being against military expenditures and alliances when the other nation is arming like there is no tomorrow is being pro getting invaded. It is not complicated.

Straw man argument. Neither Russia wants to invade Germany nor is Ukraine our neighbor (and if it is, then is Russia too). Despite that is the US the most armed country in the world, not Russia. I fear the things are much much more complicated then you think.

No, you are simply gaslighting and being called out.
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