Tuesday, November 22, 2011

China's banks use gold as legal currency

"A prominent economist says that China's economic importance is growing strong and steady that the ailing US and EU economies will exchange their gold reserves for Beijing's financial bailouts.


G-20 leaders are facing growing pressure at home over the economic woes of their countries, where protests are being held in some nations on a daily basis.

There are fears that more delays in resolving the eurozone debt crisis could push not only Europe but much of the rest of the developed world back into recession.

Analysts say that the recent hike in the price of gold will add fuel to the flames caused by concerns over the United States' economic outlook, rising inflation, worries over the euro zone debt crisis, and the lowest-ever interest rates in the US.

Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund expects China's economy to expand by 9 percent in 2012, while an increase in domestic product should account for a full quarter of total global growth.

Press TV has conducted an exclusive interview with Dan Collins from thechinamoneyreport.com to further discuss the issue.

The following is a transcript of the interview.

Press TV: The big news coming from China in the past few weeks is that investment demand for gold and silver is up. Give us the numbers.

Collins: Yeah, real big news, Max. Shanghai Gold Exchange reported last week, starting with silver, silver demand's up 750 percent for silver forward contracts. The major buyers here are the large commercial banks of China.

First of all, I'll talk a little bit about silver. They're following the gold pattern here in China which is average Chinese citizens here now can buy silver in their bank account. So, you don't need to keep cash in your bank, you can go online and move your cash into silver or you can move it into gold. And that's really what's driving the increase in gold and silver prices here.

They started the gold trade in the major commercial banks about three years ago. Silver started last year in August, 2010. But what was really shocking is the numbers that have come out. I mentioned the year over year increases.

But if we look at just one Chinese bank, the ICBC, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, first half of this year they sold over 300 tons of silver. 300 tons is roughly about 10 million ounces. So, this year they'll do roughly 20 million ounces of silver which is roughly 2 percent of all the silver mined in one year.

So, we look at the Chinese banking system just starting these new products in China, this year they could take nine or ten percent of all the silver mined in the world. And these products are just getting started. Two, three, four years from now, the Chinese banks could be selling 20, 30, 40 percent of all the silver mined globally. And that's really why we're seeing huge increases in silver..."

at http://presstv.com/detail/211132.html