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Strategies & Market Trends : Booms, Busts, and Recoveries -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TobagoJack who wrote (51214)	6/23/2004 7:28:15 PM
From: elmatador	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74559

Germany offers little comfort on gold. Jay, Germany is facing the same problem that sunk Argentina and is keeping Brazil on the dumps: Economic stagnation has decrease revenues. Government deficit increased. Only that Germany has margin of maneuver: Plan to sell Postbank, stake in Deutsche Telekom, freeze government new hiring and put the civil servants to work longer hours, increasing journey form 38 and a half hours to 40. They can also sell gold. Germany offers little comfort on gold By Kevin Morrison Published: June 23 2004 20:06 \| Last Updated: June 23 2004 20:06 The release of the German draft budget on Wednesday provided little comfort for bullion owners on the country's plan to dispose of up to 600 tonnes of gold. Germany announced in March that it had an option to sell about 17 per cent of its 3,500 tonnes of reserves as part of the renewal of the Central Bank Gold Agreement from September. However, since then the main proponent of the German gold sale plan, former Bundesbank president Ernst Welteke, has been forced to resign. His successor Alex Weber has been less forthcoming. Mr Weber, in an interview with Die Zeit newspaper, said the decision on how much gold the German central bank would sell depended on the outcome of discussions with other central banks. Mr Welteke had proposed that the gold sale proceeds would set up a research fund, but the German draft 2005 budget released yesterday made no mention of the research fund. The only country so far to commit definite sales to the new agreement is the Netherlands, with a plan to sell 100 tonnes over the five-year period of the new pact. France said in April it was considering selling about 500 tonnes, but has not made any definite decision since. With about three months to go before the existing agreement expires, bullion markets are still waiting for further details about the gold sales. Under the new accord, 15 European central banks plan to raise the limit on annual gold sales to 500 tonnes a year over the five years to September 2009, from 400 tonnes under the present accord.