European Central Bank gold reserves held across 5 locations. ECB will not disclose Gold Bar List.

Table 1: Central bank FX and Gold transfers to the ECB, January 1999

 

The European Central Bank (ECB), creator of the Euro, currently claims to hold 504.8 tonnes of gold reserves. These gold holdings are reflected on the ECB balance sheet and arose from transfers made to the ECB by Euro member national central banks, mainly in January 1999 at the birth of the Euro. As of the end of December 2015, these ECB gold reserves were valued on the ECB balance sheet at market prices and amounted to €15.79 billion. 

The ECB very recently confirmed to BullionStar that its gold reserves are stored across 5 international locations. However, the ECB also confirmed that it does not physically audit its gold, nor will it divulge a bar list / weight list of these gold bar holdings.

Questions and Answers

BullionStar recently put a number of questions to the European Central Bank about the ECB’s gold holdings. The ECB Communications Directorate replied to these questions with answers that appear to include a number of facts about the ECB gold reserves which have not previously been published. The questions put to the ECB and its responses are listed below (underlining added):

Goldman Says There’s an Elevated Risk of a Big Market Selloff

Video available at the source.

 

And it’ll be tough to find a place to hide.

“With the S&P 500 close to all-time highs, stretched valuations and a lack of growth, drawdown risk appears elevated.”

So says Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Managing Director Christian Mueller-Glissmann, who highlights that selloffs in excess of 20 percent for major bourses occur relatively frequently and recently have been brought about by concerns of a global nature. With a possible Brexit, the U.S. presidential elections, and a Fed that appears committed to continuing to lift policy rates, this level of event risk is certainly on the table.

QE’s Creeping Communism

Central banks and respective governments are running out of magical tricks to pull out of the hat.

As already done in America [government takeover of the banking industry (government bailout) and health industry (“Obamacare”)], the next step is the nationalization of industries in other developed nations like we’re seeing now in Japan.

This paves the way for communist rule by stealth, but most people don’t see this so long as the shopping malls are remain open and they can still drink their beer while watching the NFL.

 

Despite its much longer experience with monetary stimulus, Japan’s economy remains listless and has continuously flirted with recession. In spite of this failure, Japanese leaders, especially Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (and his ally at the Bank of Japan (BoJ), Haruhiko Kuroda), have recently doubled down on all prior bets. This has meant that the Japanese stimulus is now taking on some ominous dimensions that have yet to be seen here in the U.S. In particular, the Bank of Japan is considering using its Quantitative Easing budget to buy large quantities of shares of publicly traded Japanese corporations.So for those who remain in doubt, Japan is telling us where this giant monetary experiment leads to: Debt, stagnation and nationalization of industry. This is not a destination that any of us, with the possible exception of Bernie Sanders, should be happy about.

NYSE invokes Rule 48 to curb early swings

Circuit breakers, a plunge protection team (that either doesn’t exist or is doing a very poor job)… and now Rule 48. One has to wonder how many more tricks are in the bag. Perhaps that was the last one, perhaps there’s many more. Even if there’s more, it won’t stop the ever-strengthening avalanche.

 

The New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday again invoked measures meant to promote an orderly opening as the US stock market endured heavy selling in early trading.

In contrast to the wild trading of Monday, August 24, when the exchange also invoked so called Rule 48, activity on Tuesday was mostly orderly in spite of declines, market participants said.

But some complained that it took too long for some stocks to open, which is likely to keep attention on the rule. The S&P 500 fell 3 per cent.

Writing’s On The Wall: Texas Pulls $1 Billion In Gold From NY Fed, Makes It “Non-Confiscatable”

The lack of faith in central bank trustworthiness is spreading. First Germany, then Holland, and Austria, and now – as we noted was possible previously – Texas has enacted a Bill to repatriate $1 billion of gold from The NY Fed’s vaults to a newly established state gold bullion depository…”People have this image of Texas as big and powerful … so for a lot of people, this is exactly where they would want to go with their gold,” and the Bill includes a section to prevent forced seizure from the Federal Government.

Bank Of Japan’s Plunge Protection Desperation: “May Buy Individual Stocks”

Earlier this month, the BoJ surveyed 40 dealers and discovered something shocking: buying the entirety of JGB gross issuance has had a rather dramatic effect on liquidity. In fact, two thirds of the firms who participated reported having “some or a lot” of problems and described bid-asks as “not very tight.” Today, an internal report from the central bank indicates officials are slowly coming to accept the fact that their actions have consequences although as you can see from the following, the fact that the BoJ is literally buying all of the bonds is still low on the list of factors the central bank figures might be negatively affecting liquidity…

Banks approving loans on condition borrowers don’t buy gold

NEW DELHI: With a view to curb appetite for gold, banks are sanctioning advances, including personal loans, only if borrowers agree not to use the proceeds to buy the metal beyond permitted levels.

Banks have placed the condition that borrowers should not use even personal loans to buy gold, a senior official of a private sector bank said.

The measures follow directions from the Reserve Bank of India to banks and NBFCs that are aimed at reining in demand for the yellow metal. The RBI and the government have taken steps to curb demand for gold after imports of the metal widened the current account deficit.

Gold flows from Britain to Switzerland surge in first half of 2013 – Macquarie

The UK exported 240 tonnes of gold to Switzerland in May alone, while its exports over the first half of this year totalled 797 tonnes, Macquarie said in a note.

In contrast, Britain exported just 92 tonnes of bullion to Switzerland in the whole of last year, it said.

BARRON’S: There Were Two Gigantic, Suspicious Sales Of Gold On Friday That Caused The Price To Plunge

A lot of gold bugs think the price is being manipulated somehow, or that there’s some divergence between what’s going on in “paper” gold (gold prices that are tied to ETFs) and what’s going on in physical gold (people buying ingots or jewelery).

Randall W. Forsyth at Barron’s fans the flames of goldbug conspiracy theorists a bit this weekend, arguing that there have been suspicious sales in gold seen on the exchanges (probably driven by the ETFs).

He writes:

These improbable moves have made gold bugs suspicious, which isn’t unusual. Folks who own gold do so because they don’t trust the status quo, especially when it comes to government-issued paper money. But just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean somebody isn’t out to get you. They point to bursts of selling on Friday, April 12, which resulted in prices plunging by more than 5%, and to dumping that resumed the following Monday in Asia, early in the day when markets are illiquid. That culminated in a 9% collapse by the time the New York market had settled. But a seller who wanted to unload a large position at the optimal price would have done precisely the opposite—liquidate as discreetly as possible. Instead, sellers dumped the equivalent of more than 300 tons of the metal in staccato-like blasts during those sessions.