Now this could change the world

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So, once all 1,100 tons are mined sometime in the future, it will increase the worldā€™s supply of gold by 0.5%. That shouldnā€™t effect the price of gold all that much, except that it will reduce the amount that China imports.

DB2

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Iā€™m thinking it gives China a far richer trove of gold supply, which backs its currency, which becomes more stable and a bigger threat to the hegemony of the dollar (especially if its economy continues to grow.)

Long game. Not tomorrow, obviously.

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Iā€™m not sure itā€™s a large factor. Last year China imported over 1400 tonnes of gold, more than the total of the new find (whose annual production years from now will be a fraction of that).

ā€œChina imported over 1,400 tonnes of gold in 2023, making it the largest gold importer in the world. It exports a negligible amount, so net gold imports are still about 1,400 tonnes. China is also the worldā€™s largest gold producer, producing 375 tonnes last year.ā€

DB2

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Yes, and they spent hard currency to do so. Instead they will be able to spend significantly less (on employment, say, or housing for workers there), make a substantial profit, and stop send hard currency overseas. This could (emphasize ā€œcouldā€) be a significant boost to their economy and infrastructure, at the price of decreasing one of the largest buyers of foreign gold around the world. Not sure, but I think thatā€™s a pretty big change.

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If you convert that to money, thatā€™s roughly about the size of Chinaā€™s trade surplus. Seems like instead of taking the trade surplus money and putting it into treasuries (like they used to), they are putting it into gold. At least for 2023. And very roughly.

It could also be a kind of insurance policy for the period just after a Taiwan invasion.

Is that pulling it all out of the ground and ā€œconverting itā€ in one year for one yearā€™s worth of trade surplus? Will one yearā€™s worth make that much difference?

Pete

No it wonā€™t. Demographics determine a pretty large part of the future. And they arenā€™t going to have ā€œgoodā€ demographics for quite a while.

ā€¦and at least equally with the demographics, Xiā€™s undoing of Deng Xiaopingā€™s market and party decentralization reforms so as to regain control over, well, everything, fed into an explosion of unchecked corruption. They have nuclear tipped missiles with water in their fuel tanks, enormous expensive infrastructure projects made from ā€œtofu fragmentsā€

and almost all the local and regional governments are in some form of disquised bankruptcy.

Demographics is the next act! First comes marxist-Stalinist-Maoist lunacy showing off why checks and balances are essential to modern governanceā€¦ā€¦

Hmmm. That reminds me of something, something closer to home.

d fb

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But itā€™s not significantly less. Even if all the gold in that new find were extracted in one year China would still be importing gold. Of course, the mine will last 10, 20 years and the change in imports will be small.

DB2

Elsewhere in the worldā€¦

El Salvador could be ā€˜sitting on a gold mineā€™ with $3 trillion in unmined gold
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/el-salvador-could-be-sitting-on-a-gold-mine-with-3-trillion-in-unmined-gold/ar-AA1vAP3C?ocid=BingNewsSerp
In a dramatic shift from its previous environmental stance, El Salvador is reconsidering its landmark 2017 ban on metal mining, with President Nayib Buckle claiming the country is sitting on a potentially transformative economic treasureā€¦

The preliminary studies also suggest the presence of other critical minerals like cobalt, nickel and lithium ā€“ resources considered essentialā€¦

DB2

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