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Gold/Mining/Energy : Gold Price Monitor -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Richnorth who wrote (50438)	3/16/2000 5:54:00 AM
From: Alex	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 117272

The Great Gold Give-Away LONDON: Wednesday, 15 March 2000 - Members of the public are being invited to take part in a gold "give-away" as part of a new campaign by the World Gold Council to draw attention to the government's plans for continuing gold sales from the UK's reserves. They are being offered the opportunity to win one of a hundred gold sovereigns - worth œ70 each - in the next phase of the WGC's "Hold onto our gold" campaign. Advertisements in national newspapers over the next few days will provide details of the scheme which is being announced ahead of next week's fifth sale in the government's current series of sales. The sale by auction of 25 tonnes of gold takes place next Tuesday - Budget Day. "On Tuesday afternoon Chancellor Gordon Brown will deliver his Budget in the House of Commons. Earlier in the day, his Treasury team will have overseen something in which they should take less pride - the sale by auction of yet another 25 tonnes of Britain's gold reserves", said Miss Haruko Fukuda, chief executive of the London-based World Gold Council. "The previous four auctions, since July 1999, have lost the British taxpayer tens of millions of pounds, by selling the gold reserves at what are even today historically low prices." The UK Treasury has already announced that it will continue with the bi-monthly sales of 25 tonnes for the next year. The intention is to dispose of 415 tonnes from a total reserve of 715 tonnes and reduce the proportion of gold in the nation's gross reserves to around 7%. Most of the other major European nations have between 30% and 50% of their reserves in gold. "We believe these sales are inadvisable as they undermine Britain's economic independence", said Miss Fukuda. Last summer in the aftermath of the first sales, which drove the gold price down to 20-year lows, more than 70,000 people signed up to the WGC's "Hold on to our Gold" campaign. Last week the World Gold Council published the results of a MORI survey conducted in Britain, which showed only 12 per cent support for the gold sale, against 48 per cent opposition, with the other 40 per cent either don't know or holding no firm opinion. Two-thirds of those interviewed also wanted more than 15% of the UK's reserves to be in gold. "The British public will be able to participate in a highly unusual symbolic gesture to demonstrate just how little they back Gordon Brown's gold give-away, which is now established to be one of the most unpopular moves by this government," said Miss Fukuda. "These advertisements will, hopefully, prompt greater public awareness of these unpopular gold auctions, and perhaps galvanise growing opposition to their continuation throughout the rest of this year and into 2001." Ends Note: Modern gold sovereigns weigh 7.98 grams, slightly more than a quarter of an ounce, and are minted in 22 carat gold and contain 7.315 grams of gold, slightly less than a quarter of an ounce. Since January 1, 2000 they can be bought VAT-free within the EU. gold.org