The Death of Money (44 page)

an initiative that requires all Swiss gold . . .
:
Luzi Stamm, “‘Gold Initiative’: A Swiss Initiative to Secure the Swiss National Bank’s
Gold Reserves,” Volksinitiative Rettet unser Schweizer Gold, press release, September
20, 2011, http://www.goldinitiative.ch/downloads/goldinitiative-english.pdf.

“I don’t know . . .”
:
Katharina Bart and Albert Schmieder, “Swiss Right-Wing Forces Referendum on Banning
SNB Gold Sales,” Reuters, March 20, 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/20/us-swiss-gold-idUSBRE92J0Z320130320.

The remainder is divided . . .
:
Jaco Schipper, “90% of Dutch Gold Reserve Is Held Abroad,”
Market Update,
January 7, 2012, http://www.marketupdate.nl/nieuws/valutacrisis/90-of-dutch-gold-reserve-is-held-abroad.

The international monetary debate . . .
:
For a scholarly, in-depth study of efforts at reform of the international monetary
system including the C-20, the Jamaica Meeting, and the Second Amendment to the IMF
Articles of Agreement, see Kenneth W. Dam,
The Rules of the Game: Reform and Evolution in the International Monetary System
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982).

“You are . . . asking this to someone . . .”
:
Mario Draghi, lecture at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum at the Institute of Politics,
Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., October 9, 2013, https://forum.iop.harvard.edu/content/public-address-mario-draghi.

Chapter 10: Crossroads

“a chronic condition of sub-normal activity . . .”
:
John Maynard Keynes,
The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money
(San Diego: Harcourt, 1964), p. 249.

Based on duration if not strength . . .
:
John H. Makin, “Third Time Unlucky: Recession in 2014?” American Enterprise Institute,
July 30, 2013, http://www.aei.org/outlook/economics/monetary-policy/third-time-unlucky-recession-in-2014.

Despite cheerleading in late 2013 . .
:
Daniel Alpert, “The New Sick-onomy? Examining the Entrails of the U.S. Employment
Situation,”
EconoMonitor,
July 24,
2013, http://www.economonitor.com/danalperts2cents/2013/07/24/the-new-sick-onomy-examining-the-entrails-of-the-u-s-employment-situation.

By August 2013, total student loans backed . . .
:
“The Rolling Student Loan Bailout,”
Wall Street Journal,
August 9, 2013, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323968704578652291680883634.html.

“the test of a first-rate intelligence . . .”
:
F. Scott Fitzgerald,
The Crack-Up
(1936; reprint New York: New Directions, 2009).

The bitcoin phenomenon began in 2008 . . .
:
Satoshi Nakamoto, “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System,” November 1, 2008,
http://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf.

the history of barter is mostly a myth
:
David Graeber,
Debt: The First 5,000 Years
(Brooklyn, N.Y.: Melville House, 2011), pp. 21–41.

“Sept. 11 was not a failure of intelligence or coordination . . .”
:
Thomas L. Friedman, “A Failure to Imagine,”
New York Times,
May 19, 2002, http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/19/opinion/a-failure-to-imagine.html.

Chapter 11: Maelstrom

“The broad question is whether central banks . . .”
:
Arthur F. Burns, memorandum to President Gerald R. Ford, June 3, 1975, U.S. Department
of State, Office of the Historian, http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76v31/d86.

“We . . . feel strongly that some safeguards . . .”
:
President Gerald R. Ford to Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, June 6, 1975, Gerald R. Ford
Library, Ann Arbor, Mich., http://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0351/1555807.pdf.

the secret Gold and Foreign Exchange Committee . . .
:
Adam Lebor,
Tower of Basel: The Shadowy History of the Secret Bank That Runs the World
(New York: Public Affairs, 2013), p. 189.

“In May 1996, the market traded the equivalent . . .”
:
Dino Kos, Gold and Foreign Exchange Committee Discussion on Gold Market, April 7,
1997, http://www.gata.org/files/FedMemoG-10Gold&FXCommittee-4-29-1997.pdf.

“information relating to swap arrangements . . .”
:
Kevin M. Warsh, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, to William J. Olson,
September 17, 2009, http://www.gata.org/files/GATAFedResponse-09-17-2009.pdf.

“We bought 300 tonnes of gold . . .”
:
Eisuke Sakakibara, conversation with the author, Seoul, South Korea, May 31, 2013.

The gold was transported to Japan . . .
:
Retired official of Brinks, conversation with the author, Hickory, N.C., November
10, 2013.

The most notorious and heavily criticized case . . .
:
Holly Watt and Robert Winnett, “Goldfinger Brown’s £2 Billion Blunder in the Bullion
Market,”
Sunday Times,
April 15, 2007, http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/Test/politics/article63170.ece.

“Around 90% of customer placements . . .”
:
Bank for International Settlements, Financial Statements, updated June 24, 2013 ,
http://www.bis.org/banking/balsheet.htm (accessed July 21, 2013).

“The Bank transacts . . . gold on behalf of its customers . . .”
:
Bank for International Settlements, 83rd Annual Report, March 31, 2013, p. 110, http://www.bis.org/publ/arpdf/ar2013e7.pdf#page=44.

“Gold loans comprise fixed-term gold loans
to commercial banks
”
:
Bank for
International Settlements, 80th Annual Report, March 31, 2010, p. 158n15, http://www.bis.org/publ/arpdf/ar2010e8.htm;
emphasis added.

“Gold loans comprise fixed-term gold loans”
:
Bank for International Settlements, 83rd Annual Report, June 23, 2013, p. 133n15,
http://www.bis.org/publ/arpdf/ar2013e7.pdf.

on September 18, 2009, the IMF authorized the sale of 403.3 tonnes . . .
:
Information in this extended analysis of IMF gold sales comes from “Questions and
Answers, IMF Gold Sales,” International Monetary Fund, updated May 16, 2013, http://www.imf.org/external/np/exr/faq/goldfaqs.htm.

“China’s acquisition of gold makes sense . . .”
:
Dr. Min Zhu, conversation with the author, New York City, November 8, 2012.

“Somebody’s got to own it . . .”
:
High-ranking intelligence official, conversation with the author, McLean, Va., December
13, 2012.

“I never hear any discussion . . .”
:
James Himes, conversation with the author, Southport, Conn., July 15, 2013.

Mishkin warns that the Fed is dangerously close . . .
:
David Greenlaw, James D. Hamilton, Peter Hooper, and Frederic S. Mishkin, “Crunch
Time: Fiscal Crises and the Role of Monetary Policy,” U.S. Monetary Policy Forum,
February 22, 2013, rev. July 29, 2013, http://dss.ucsd.edu/~jhamilto/USMPF13_final.pdf.

“In the extreme, unsustainable fiscal policy . . .”
:
Ibid., pp. 61–62.

Conclusion

“The piecemeal engineer will, accordingly . . .”
:
Karl Popper,
The Open Society and Its Enemies
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1971), pp. 157–59. Popper is quoted
in George Soros, “How to Save the Euro from the EU Crisis—The Speech in Full,”
Guardian,
April 9, 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/apr/09/george-soros-save-eu-from-euro-crisis-speech.

the state is well armed with SWAT teams . . .
:
Radley Balko,
Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America’s Police Forces
(New York: Public Affairs, 2013).

Author Jonah Goldberg has documented fascism’s history . . .
:
Jonah Goldberg,
Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left from Mussolini to the Politics
of Meaning
(New York: Doubleday, 2008).

More ominous was his remark . . .
:
Quoted in Balko,
Warrior Cop,
p. 333.

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