Post by jeffolie on Dec 24, 2012 12:25:42 GMT -6
Gold "CombiBars", beware
Sceptical me wonders:
1. How much profit, mark up goes to the manufacturers, middle men distributors, vendors for the Gold "CombiBars" ?
2. How quickly counterfeit Gold "CombiBars" will be very common?
my jeffolie view: beware reinventing the wheel, metals promoted as currency as Gold "CombiBars" appears likely to be faked, counterfeited quickly
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia "Pieces of eight" redirects here.
" ... The Spanish dollar (also known as the piece of eight (peso de ocho), the real de a ocho or the eight-real coin) is a silver coin, of approximately 38 mm diameter, worth eight reales, that was minted in the Spanish Empire after a Spanish currency reform in 1497. Its purpose was to correspond to the German thaler. ... The Spanish dollar was widely used by many countries as international currency because of its uniformity in standard and milling characteristics. Some countries countersigned the Spanish dollar so it could be used as their local currency. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_dollar
Cash (Chinese coin) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Chinese cash coins originated from the barter of farming tools and agricultural surpluses. Around 1200 BC, smaller token spades, hoes, and knives began to be used to conduct smaller exchanges with the tokens later melted down to produce real farm implements. These tokens came to be used as media of exchange themselves and were known as spade money and knife money. ... As standard circular coins were developed following the unification of China by Qin Shi Huang, the most common formation was the round-shaped copper coin with a square or circular hole in the center, the prototypical cash. The hole enabled the coins to be strung together to create higher denominations, as was frequently done due to the coin's low value. The number of coins in a string of cash varied over time and place but was nominally 1000. A string of 1000 cash was supposed to be equal in value to one tael of pure silver. A string of cash was divided into ten sections of 100 cash each. Local custom allowed the person who put the string together to take a cash or a few from each hundred for his effort (one, two, three or even four in some places). Thus an ounce of silver could exchange for 970 in one city and 990 in the next. In some places in the North of China short of currency the custom counted one cash as two and fewer than 500 cash would be exchanged for an ounce of silver. A string of cash weighed over ten pounds and was generally carried over the shoulder. Paper money equivalents known as flying cash sometimes showed pictures of the appropriate number of cash coins strung together.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cash_(Chinese_coin)
============================================
Demand For Gold "CombiBars" Soaring
12/24/2012
One of the biggest complaints about gold - always a parallel currency to paper, and soon to be serial, once the world shifts to a post-paper currency reality in which faith in infinitely creatable electronic paper money is finally destroyed - is that it would be an impractical medium of exchange, as the traditional denominations are so large one would be unable to trade one ounce (and certainly one bar) for every day needs. This is also one of the main reasons various retail investors prefer silver over gold. All this may be changing courtesy of Swiss refiner Valcambi which has created a CombiBar, a credit-card sized, 50 gram block of 99.9 gold, which is precut, and which can easily be broken into one gram pieces which can then be used as forms of payment in an emergency. And since one gram of gold has roughly the value of two ounces of silver, it is a far more practical lowest common denominator unit of exchange than the traditional one ounce minimums in broad circulation.
More on this novel, and practical, use of gold from Reuters:
Swiss refinery Valcambi, a unit of U.S. mining giant Newmont Mining Corp., wants to bring its “CombiBar” to market in the United States and build up its sales presence India – the world’s largest consumer of gold where the precious metal has long served as a parallel currency.
"The rich are buying standard bars or have deposits of phsyical gold. People that have less money are buying up to 100 grams," said Michael Mesaric, CEO of Valcambi "But for many people a pure investment product is no longer enough. They want to be able to do something with the precious metal."
Mesaric said the advantage of the "CombiBar" - which has been dubbed a "chocolate bar" because pieces can be easily broken off by hand into one gram squares - is that it can be easily transported and costs less than buying 50 one gram bars.
"The produce can also be used as an alternative method of payment," he said.
Valcambi is building a sales network in India and plans to launch the CombiBar on the U.S. market next year. In Japan, it wants to focus on CombiBars made of platinum and palladium.
Will the golden chocolate bar soon replace the one ounce gold coin as the most favored denomination?
The CombiBar is particularly popular among grandparents who want to give their grandchildren a strip of gold rather than a coin, said Andreas Habluetzel head of the Swiss business of Degussa, a gold trading company.
Other customers buy gold for security reasons.
Whatever the final outcome, demand is soaring:
Elsewhere, demand is particularly strong among Germans, still scarred by post-World War One hyperinflation, when money became all but worthless and it took a wheelbarrow full of notes to buy a loaf of bread.
"Above all, it's people aged between 40 and 70 that are investing in gold bars and coins," said Mesaric. "They've heard tales from their parents about wars and crises devaluing money."
“Demand is rising every week,” Mr. Habluetzel said. “Particularly in Germany, people buying gold fear that the euro will break apart or that banks will run into problems.”
Naturally, there are those who are desperate to infuse skepticism toward the new product. After all, one can't print gold, and any form of money that takes away wealth dilution power from the central banks (i.e. printing money), is implicitly disastrous for the status quo.
Stephan Mueller, who manages bank Julius Baer’s $6-billion gold fund, said one problem with using gold as a method of payment is that people have to take its value on blind trust.
“Gold is a useful store of value,” Mr. Mueller said. “However I doubt whether it will succeed as a method of payment.”
True- is is much better to have value in a EUR paper bill, collateralized by such non-blind trust items as Greek geta and Kalamata olives.
One thing is certain: after a record November, December sales of gold in the US Mint have already surpassed the total from 2011, and are set to be third most active gold purchasing month in 2012, recent violent paper smackdown of gold notwithstanding. Perhaps the US population has finally learned that all increasingly more frequent smackdowns of paper gold by central banks and other authorities do, is to make gold more affordable for more people, for longer. And increasingly more are taking advantage of precisely this, not of hopes of striking it rich overnight and then converting hard money once more into worthless paper equivalents.
www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-12-24/demand-gold-combibars-soaring
Sceptical me wonders:
1. How much profit, mark up goes to the manufacturers, middle men distributors, vendors for the Gold "CombiBars" ?
2. How quickly counterfeit Gold "CombiBars" will be very common?
my jeffolie view: beware reinventing the wheel, metals promoted as currency as Gold "CombiBars" appears likely to be faked, counterfeited quickly
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia "Pieces of eight" redirects here.
" ... The Spanish dollar (also known as the piece of eight (peso de ocho), the real de a ocho or the eight-real coin) is a silver coin, of approximately 38 mm diameter, worth eight reales, that was minted in the Spanish Empire after a Spanish currency reform in 1497. Its purpose was to correspond to the German thaler. ... The Spanish dollar was widely used by many countries as international currency because of its uniformity in standard and milling characteristics. Some countries countersigned the Spanish dollar so it could be used as their local currency. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_dollar
Cash (Chinese coin) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Chinese cash coins originated from the barter of farming tools and agricultural surpluses. Around 1200 BC, smaller token spades, hoes, and knives began to be used to conduct smaller exchanges with the tokens later melted down to produce real farm implements. These tokens came to be used as media of exchange themselves and were known as spade money and knife money. ... As standard circular coins were developed following the unification of China by Qin Shi Huang, the most common formation was the round-shaped copper coin with a square or circular hole in the center, the prototypical cash. The hole enabled the coins to be strung together to create higher denominations, as was frequently done due to the coin's low value. The number of coins in a string of cash varied over time and place but was nominally 1000. A string of 1000 cash was supposed to be equal in value to one tael of pure silver. A string of cash was divided into ten sections of 100 cash each. Local custom allowed the person who put the string together to take a cash or a few from each hundred for his effort (one, two, three or even four in some places). Thus an ounce of silver could exchange for 970 in one city and 990 in the next. In some places in the North of China short of currency the custom counted one cash as two and fewer than 500 cash would be exchanged for an ounce of silver. A string of cash weighed over ten pounds and was generally carried over the shoulder. Paper money equivalents known as flying cash sometimes showed pictures of the appropriate number of cash coins strung together.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cash_(Chinese_coin)
============================================
Demand For Gold "CombiBars" Soaring
12/24/2012
One of the biggest complaints about gold - always a parallel currency to paper, and soon to be serial, once the world shifts to a post-paper currency reality in which faith in infinitely creatable electronic paper money is finally destroyed - is that it would be an impractical medium of exchange, as the traditional denominations are so large one would be unable to trade one ounce (and certainly one bar) for every day needs. This is also one of the main reasons various retail investors prefer silver over gold. All this may be changing courtesy of Swiss refiner Valcambi which has created a CombiBar, a credit-card sized, 50 gram block of 99.9 gold, which is precut, and which can easily be broken into one gram pieces which can then be used as forms of payment in an emergency. And since one gram of gold has roughly the value of two ounces of silver, it is a far more practical lowest common denominator unit of exchange than the traditional one ounce minimums in broad circulation.
More on this novel, and practical, use of gold from Reuters:
Swiss refinery Valcambi, a unit of U.S. mining giant Newmont Mining Corp., wants to bring its “CombiBar” to market in the United States and build up its sales presence India – the world’s largest consumer of gold where the precious metal has long served as a parallel currency.
"The rich are buying standard bars or have deposits of phsyical gold. People that have less money are buying up to 100 grams," said Michael Mesaric, CEO of Valcambi "But for many people a pure investment product is no longer enough. They want to be able to do something with the precious metal."
Mesaric said the advantage of the "CombiBar" - which has been dubbed a "chocolate bar" because pieces can be easily broken off by hand into one gram squares - is that it can be easily transported and costs less than buying 50 one gram bars.
"The produce can also be used as an alternative method of payment," he said.
Valcambi is building a sales network in India and plans to launch the CombiBar on the U.S. market next year. In Japan, it wants to focus on CombiBars made of platinum and palladium.
Will the golden chocolate bar soon replace the one ounce gold coin as the most favored denomination?
The CombiBar is particularly popular among grandparents who want to give their grandchildren a strip of gold rather than a coin, said Andreas Habluetzel head of the Swiss business of Degussa, a gold trading company.
Other customers buy gold for security reasons.
Whatever the final outcome, demand is soaring:
Elsewhere, demand is particularly strong among Germans, still scarred by post-World War One hyperinflation, when money became all but worthless and it took a wheelbarrow full of notes to buy a loaf of bread.
"Above all, it's people aged between 40 and 70 that are investing in gold bars and coins," said Mesaric. "They've heard tales from their parents about wars and crises devaluing money."
“Demand is rising every week,” Mr. Habluetzel said. “Particularly in Germany, people buying gold fear that the euro will break apart or that banks will run into problems.”
Naturally, there are those who are desperate to infuse skepticism toward the new product. After all, one can't print gold, and any form of money that takes away wealth dilution power from the central banks (i.e. printing money), is implicitly disastrous for the status quo.
Stephan Mueller, who manages bank Julius Baer’s $6-billion gold fund, said one problem with using gold as a method of payment is that people have to take its value on blind trust.
“Gold is a useful store of value,” Mr. Mueller said. “However I doubt whether it will succeed as a method of payment.”
True- is is much better to have value in a EUR paper bill, collateralized by such non-blind trust items as Greek geta and Kalamata olives.
One thing is certain: after a record November, December sales of gold in the US Mint have already surpassed the total from 2011, and are set to be third most active gold purchasing month in 2012, recent violent paper smackdown of gold notwithstanding. Perhaps the US population has finally learned that all increasingly more frequent smackdowns of paper gold by central banks and other authorities do, is to make gold more affordable for more people, for longer. And increasingly more are taking advantage of precisely this, not of hopes of striking it rich overnight and then converting hard money once more into worthless paper equivalents.
www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-12-24/demand-gold-combibars-soaring