Source: The rich man's surplus grain

In recent times, gold has risen rapidly.

Comex gold started at less than $2,600 in early December, and has risen sharply to nearly $3,000 per ounce in just two months - the key is that there has been almost no one in these two months. A decent pullback is equivalent to keeping rising and rising...

According to the traditional gold interest rate pricing theory, in the past two months, it represents the real interest rate in the United States. The yields of TIPS for each period did not show an outrageous decline, so the reason for the real interest rate does not explain the surge in gold prices.

From the scale of gold ETFs closely related to gold prices in the past few months, the scale of gold ETFs in the past two months has actually been declining, which cannot explain the sharp rise in gold prices.

From a geopolitical perspective, the Israeli war against Gaza in the Middle East has ended, and after Trump came to power, the Russian-Ukrainian war stopped or maintained the current situation The probability of a ceasefire for a period of time is extremely high. According to the impact of traditional geocrisis, the price of gold should drop significantly at this stage.

Even from the credit of the US dollar, after Trump came to power, the Ministry of Efficiency (DOGE) led by Musk is conducting a large-scale "audience" of federal spending, from the International Development Agency to The Ministry of Education, and then to social security and even military expenditure, the federal expenditure reduction has become increasingly louder, which is obviously a negative impact on the price of gold...

Even if Trump's tariffs are It will include news like gold, which theoretically can only cause gold to fluctuate for a few days, while the actual gold price has maintained a strong rise in the past three weeks...

Even the so-called central governments of various countries Moms’ gold purchase activities are not what everyone imagines. Take the People’s Bank of China, the largest central bank buyer in the world, for example. During the period when gold prices grew the most in the past three weeks, the gold reserves have only increased slightly. 160,000 ounces, nothing is it?

So, what is the reason for the sharp rise in gold prices?

The reason I personally guess is that Trump's hand stretched toward the US gold reserves.

It is well known that since World War II, the United States has been the world's largest gold reserve. Until today, the United States' gold reserves still exceed 8,100 tons, firmly ranking first in the world. .

The vast majority of gold reserves are kept by the central bank, and their purchase and sale affairs are basically handled by the central bank, but this is not the case in the United States.

The US gold reserves are indeed under the name of the Federal Reserve, but their equity ownership clearly belongs to the Ministry of Treasury - these gold reserves are equivalent to the special deposits of the Ministry of Treasury in the Federal Reserve.

According to the Federal Reserve February 2, 2025According to the latest balance sheet report on the 0th, the total value of US gold reserves is US$11.041 billion.

If you click on the calculator a little, you will find something is wrong - 8133.5 tons of gold, equivalent to 261.5 million troy ounces of gold, the total value is only 11 billion Dollar?

Yes, according to the last time the Treasury Department set the value of gold reserves (when the Bretton Woods system collapsed in 1973), gold was based on the Fed's accounting system 50 years ago The price is calculated.

Yes, you heard it right, based on the price 50 years ago, $42.22 per ounce, so the United States, which has 8,100 tons of gold reserves, has its gold reserves only on the Fed's balance sheet Showing $11 billion.

If calculated based on the current market price of $2935 per ounce, the actual value of this part of gold is $767.5 billion.

Trump's new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently issued a statement:

"Get U.S. industrial assets in the next 12 months Monetization! ”

It is this sentence that has caused huge ripples in the gold market.

You should know that the gold that originally belonged to the Treasury Department in the bookkeeping was US$11 billion on the Fed's account, but the actual value was as high as US$767.5 billion - the Treasury Department can ask the Fed to follow the market again Prices to calculate gold reserves mean that the Fed needs to print an additional $756.5 billion in cash to the Treasury Department.

This is a lot of money for the US Treasury Department, which has been consuming food for the whole time.

How should we view this?

For me, from the perspective of monetary credit, this is shameless + shameless square...

First of all, we need to know why this part of gold is based on US$42.22/ Ounces are priced.

After the end of World War II, the United States led the establishment of a global Bretton Woods system, which stipulates that the US dollar is equivalent to gold.

Any other central bank or Treasury can exchange gold from the US Treasury at any time with USD 35 per ounce.

This is the basis of American financial hegemony since the end of World War II.

The US Treasury Department at that time had 21,300 tons of gold, equivalent to 70% of all gold reserves in the world at that time. It was rich and powerful. For every dollar, there was at least 40% of the gold reserves to support it, so it was done. Such a promise was made.

However, the United States spends money without restraint, and printing the dollar is increasingly dependent on government bonds rather than gold. From 1945 to 1971, other central banks continued to trade dollars for US gold reserves,The country's gold reserves have dropped to 8,222 tons, and the proportion of gold in the Federal Reserve's balance sheet has also dropped to about 20%.

At this time, Nixon began to cheat. On August 15, 1971, Nixon used the excuse that there were too many speculators in the international gold market, so he closed the gold exchange window, which was equivalent to the United States' openly cheating on the world.

After that, after three years of turmoil in the international financial market, the United States and the West finally agreed to determine the official US gold price at US$42.22 per ounce (but no other exchange is allowed). This is the reason for the price of US$42.22. , and, from 2000 to today, the US gold reserves have basically remained between 8130-8200 tons.

So, according to the initial price of the Bretton Woods system of $35 per ounce, the 8,100 tons of gold had been printed as collateral. If the Ministry of Finance had At the current price, let the Fed print additional dollars to the Treasury Department again. Isn’t this shameless square?

This is equivalent to 50 years ago, your house is worth 10,000 yuan, and you mortgaged it all for 10,000 yuan, and you completely spent all the 10,000 yuan, and the house is no longer yours. , But today, you suddenly ask to give you another 790,000 yuan according to the current house price that has increased by 80 times...

Think about it, how shameless people can do this idea?

This is just a possibility for Trump to "revaluate" gold value - in fact, the bigger problem suspected by countless gold investors in the United States and even the world is: >

The United States’ gold reserves are not as much as 8,100 tons!

For many years, the United States has been one of the world's largest gold exporters, and its gold export volume far exceeds the total amount of mineral gold in the United States every year. Therefore, gold investors have always believed that the 8,100 tons of gold reserves on the US books have long been sold out by major commercial banks in the market through gold leasing transactions.

Just on February 18, 2025, Musk, who is head of the Trump Department of Efficiency (DOGE), said he will investigate the audit of Fort Knox gold because there It is the main place for gold reserves in the United States. According to the Federal Reserve documents, gold reserves there are as high as 147 million ounces, accounting for 56.35% of the 262 million ounces of gold reserves. It has always been protected by the U.S. Mint Police. This batch of gold.

Trump said on February 20 that he would go to Fort Knox to ensure that the gold is indeed there.

After the end of the gold standard in 1971, the audit frequency of US gold reserves dropped from once a year to once a decade. It is reported that the last audit of Fort Knox's gold reserves in September 197423rd.

From then to the present, there has been no independent audit department except for the annual "treasury seal inspection" that has verified about 4,580 tons of gold stored in Fort Knox.

Musk said:

"Who can confirm that Fort Knox's gold was not stolen? Maybe there is, maybe there isn't. Gold belongs to the American public! We want to know if it is Still there. ”

The recent soaring gold price is, on the one hand, worried that the United States will really monetize its gold reserves again. The more fatal problem is that investors are worried that the United States' 8,100 tons of gold reserves Just book data, the actual gold reserves are much lower than this amount.

If the US gold reserves, after Musk's audit, were really gone as countless gold investors had guessed, it would definitely make a huge splash in the gold market. It's easy to rise to $5,000 per ounce.