German Gold
Last year there were several articles in the financial news-sheets
about aspects of the euro crisis, and the way Germany may handle any
such crisis should it escalate. One of the themes was, not whether
Greece, or Spain, or Portugal would be forced out of the single
currency, but whether Germany would abandon it.
Politically speaking that view is absolute rubbish, and it is politics,
not economics, which has been guiding the euro. However, the one sign
that we should be looking for would be if Germany were to request the
repatriation of its store of gold. Well, last week the Bundesbank did
just that. They indicated that they were going to gradually repatriate
50% of their gold by the end of the decade.
That's a long time span, and a very slow timetable, but it shows that
even Germany is beginning to get edgy about the continued currency
situation in Europe, and also around the world. In short, the euro
crisis is far from over. The main problem for the Germans is that so
much of their gold is in France. That is all scheduled to be
repatriated. Can there be a clearer indication of what the Germans
think of the French economic machine?
* * * * *
Changing tack to more promising things: For those who want a challenge,
there is still a whole bunch of churches and chapels for sale in the
UK. Churches seem to have gone out of fashion. I'm sure that's a
temporary thing, so maybe now is a good time to enter that particular
market. There are no less than 28 of them on the latest Unique Members'
Bulletin.
For those of you who are still asking whether property is a good place
to park your funds, I dont think so. It may well be a good place to put
business funds; for instance, buy for cash, or a low mortgage, and rent
out the property for a decent income. If the return is more than 10%
then you have to be onto a reasonably good, and safe, deal. If you cant
get 10% then dont bother. Better deals will come along. In short, you
would buy for the ROI (the rent), not for any capital return, or even
as a hedge against inflation. Buying with less than a 10% return wont
be a hedge against inflation as you will have paid too much.
john