Mexico has quietly purchased nearly 100 tons of gold bullion, as central banks embark on their biggest bullion buying spree in 40 years. The purchase, reported in monthly data published by Mexico’s central bank, is the latest in a series of large gold buys by emerging market economies intent on diversifying reserves away from the faltering US dollar.
Central banks turned net buyers of gold last year and cut exposure to debt issued by euro zone members Greece, Ireland and Portugal, an annual survey of the world's reserve managers showed.
The greatest threat to the global economy is not the oil shock itself but the risk that central banks will commit a blunder, compounding the damage by tightening monetary policy at exactly the wrong moment.
Bundesbank chief Axel Weber has pushed his attack on EMU’s policy elites one step further.
The credibility gap is widening, with financial markets looking for one thing and central banks delivering another.
With rising cost inflation and wages failing to keep up Britain's families have it worse than anytime since the 1920's, according to the Governor of the Bank of England Mervyn King (via Daily Mail).
The Central Bank of Russia plans to buy more than 100 tonnes of gold to renew the country’s gold and foreign exchange reserves (or international reserve assets) every year, CBR First Deputy Chairman Georgy Luntovsky told reporters on Monday, giving no details pertaining to the terms.
Irish banks are running out of collateral they can use to borrow from the European Central Bank, turning instead for emergency support from their own central bank on an unprecedented scale.
[[wysiwyg_imageupload:1130:]]By John Mauldin
Long time readers of Outside the Box are familiar with the name of James Montier, who is now with GMO in their London office. Today, James, with his usual acerbic wit, takes on the notion of the "New Normal" and offers us a defense of the "Old Always." James is a value investor and sees mean reversion as still alive and kicking, where some proponents of the New Normal think we should throw out all of the old aphorisms. While I am in the New Normal camp, I also agree with James. This makes for some quick and thought-provoking reading.
[[wysiwyg_imageupload:942:]]By Tim Iacono
Spotted over at The Daily Bail was this short clip from the John Adams HBO movie in which Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton discuss the idea of creating a central bank.
In just about every account I’ve seen or read, Hamilton comes off as being the nation’s first Washington-Wall Street douche bag and this movie is no exception. Aaron Burr probably did the world a favor by cutting his life short in the famous duel of 1804.
