Bullion Vault research director Adrian Ash this week called attention to
what may be the most relevant remark coming out of the London Bullion Market
Association's conference in Lima, Peru.
It's the assertion by the market operations director of the Banque de
France, Alexandre Gautier, that central banks now are managing their gold
reserves "more actively," a remark conveyed to Ash by a colleague
attending the conference. Ash wrote about it Tuesday in his daily commentary
at Bullion Vault:
https://www.bullionvault.com/gold-news/gold-price-111120141
Gautier told the LBMA conference in Rome in September 2013 that the Banque
de France is trading gold for its own account "nearly on a daily
basis" and is "active in the gold market for central banks and
official institutions":
http://www.gata.org/node/13373
According to the slides for Gautier's presentation in Lima, which, as Ash
notes, were posted at the LBMA's Internet site and are copied to GATA's
Internet site here --
http://www.gata.org/files/Gautier-LBMA-Lima-11-10-2014.pdf
-- this more active management of central bank gold reserves mainly
involves gold swaps.
Perhaps as a note of caution to his co-conspirators, Gautier added in his
presentation that "auditability" is "becoming a crucial
issue" for central bank gold reserves. So hooray for gold's friends and
their clamor in Germany and Switzerland.
Of course as the March 1999 report of the staff of the International Monetary
Fund disclosed, surreptitious gold swaps and leasing are primary mechanisms
of secret intervention in the gold and currency markets by central banks:
http://www.gata.org/node/12016
http://www.gata.org/files/IMFGoldDataMemo--3-10-1999.pdf
So if, as Gautier told the LBMA conference this week, central banks are
getting more active in managing their gold reserves through swaps, they
almost certainly have been intensifying their efforts at gold price
suppression, which would explain the price's steady decline in recent months.
A warning to mainstream financial journalists: Though the official
documentation is plainly laid out for all to see --
http://www.gata.org/taxonomy/term/23
http://www.gata.org/taxonomy/term/21
-- and Gautier's employer, the Banque de France, has, as do all other
central banks, a street address, telephone number, and e-mail address --
https://www.banque-france.fr/en/banque-de-fra...contact-us.html
-- don't ask central banks critical questions about their secret activity
in the gold market and their increasingly comprehensive intervention in all
major markets --
http://www.gata.org/node/14385
http://www.gata.org/node/14411
-- unless you are prepared to be told to drop dead and want to be
transferred to the East Overshoe bureau. Actual journalism involving
central banks is a punishable offense.
