Welcome to Capital Account. President Obama won re-election last night and during his victory speech he declared “What makes America exceptional are the bonds that hold together the most diverse nation on earth.” Bonds? Does he mean Treasury Bonds perhaps?

This is what makes America exceptional: the ability to issue bonds in exchange for the global reserve currency, which allows the US government to spend despite running trillion dollar deficits. We talk to James Turk about what happens when the “bonds” holding us together are no longer exceptional.

And gold and silver prices rallied ahead of the elections. We talk to James Turk about the recent spike in precious metals. Also, according to an essay published by the Gold Money Foundation, the stock of gold is over-estimated by sixteen-thousand tons, with a nominal value of over 800 billion dollars. We talk to one of the authors, James Turk, Gold Money founder and chairman, about his piece and why it matters.

Plus, the US elections are over but the economic problems facing the country are not.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman, Alan Greenspan, told Bloomberg this morning that he does not think the elections will help avert the Fiscal Cliff: “I’m concerned that the election per se has really not changed the balance very much of what’s going on and I think it will come down to the very last minute before particular action is taken… I think we underestimate the underlying momentum of this deficit and the building up of debt and its consequences.” We don’t underestimate the momentum of the debt and its consequences, nor the expansionary policies we have seen under an ‘Obama central bank.’ Is this reflected in the price of gold? Gold prices jumped 2 percent in the past few days. Also the S&P 500 saw its biggest decline since June, according to Bloomberg. We talk to James Turk, author of “The Collapse of the Dollar, and How to Profit From It,” about what is behind these market moves.

Source: James Turk on the Overestimated Gold Stock, the German Repatriation, and an EU Crisis! | Foreign Policy Journal