e-commentary

. . .

J          “Something is happening.”

K          “Sure is.”

. . .

K          “Costco is selling gold.  Costco.  I divided Costco’s total announced sales by the then spot price and determined a ballpark number of likely well-informed and pro-active folks who are concerned and doing something.”

J          “I saw some recently announced updated sales figures.  More folks are flocking to the stuff.” 

. . .

J          “Central banks across the globe seem to be flocking to the stuff.  Someone once opined that gold is ‘central bank insurance’ for the common man.  And one gets to keep the insurance premium.”

K          “In the history of human kind, there is one thing and only one thing and no other thing that has been singularly cherished and sought after across time and space in every state, nation, empire, republic, province, principality, community, sovereignty, monarchy, tribe, borough, book club, motorcycle gang and sewing circle.  Gold.  And Silver.  Think about it.”

J          “But as they say, you cannot eat it and you cannot wear it.”

. . .

K          “Keynes described the gold standard – not gold itself – as a ‘barbarous relic’ without realizing or revealing that policy makers like himself do not like to be restrained by some outside restraint.”

. . .

K          “Stay tuned.”

. . .

[See the Categories on Currency, Gold, Gold Standard and other Categories.]

Bumper sticker of the week:

“Men have chosen the precious metals gold and silver for the money service on account of their mineralogical, physical, and chemical features.  The use of money in a market economy is a praxeologically necessary fact.  That gold–and not something else–is used as money is merely a historical fact and as such cannot be conceived by catallactics.  In monetary history too, as in all other branches of history, one must resort to historical understanding.  If one takes pleasure in calling the gold standard a “barbarous relic,”[*] one cannot object to the application of the same term to every historically determined institution.  Then the fact that the British speak English–and not Danish, German, or French–is a barbarous relic too, and every Briton who opposes the substitution of Esperanto for English is no less dogmatic and orthodox than those who do not wax rapturous about the plans for a managed currency.”  Ludwig von Mises, Human Action

[*]“Lord Keynes in the speech delivered before the House of Lords, May 23, 1944.”

“Fiat currency always eventually returns to its intrinsic value – zero.”  Voltaire

The Petrodollar Pact:  June 6, 1974 – June 9, 2024. ?