will you cry or cringe after reading this............

tahoe98 · September 24, 2010 8:12AM

...article?

AUandAG · September 24, 2010 8:49AM

I like this part:

"And perhaps the funniest moment for collectors watching was when
Rep. Ed Whitfield of Kentucky revealed that his staff purchased a roll
of Native American dollar coins from the U.S. Mint. They paid $35
for $25 face value. The price is 2,393 percent over melt value, he said."

Good comback!

bob

MsMorrisine · September 24, 2010 9:04AM

you should hear the less than freshman level mistakes made questioning Greenspan during his years as head of the Fed. Reserve.

These guys just don't have a basic understanding of basic financial matters.

It doesn't surprise me that they blow the opportunity to asked pointed questions to these guys. Instead we get sub-rookie mistakes.... as usual.

“Did you know it was overturned the following year?” (!)
The price is 2,393 percent over melt value, he said. (!)

Time to continue crying....

CaptHenway · September 24, 2010 9:53AM

Gack!

JBN · September 24, 2010 10:00AM

Two sayings come to mind:

For Goldline: There is no such thing as bad publicity.

For Rep. Whitfield: Better to keep your mouth closed and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.

baddogss · September 24, 2010 10:03AM

<< <i>Two sayings come to mind:
wrong thread .....

PerryHall · September 24, 2010 10:33AM

Another election year stunt to get some free news coverage.

FredF · September 24, 2010 11:14AM

Here's my problem. Goldline pays for advertising and endorsements from some pretty influential people (such as Glenn Beck who has what, 10 million listeners in a given week?) and then they sell something for 2x its actual value. Mr. Beck gets quite a cut from that. And he does a doozy of an endorsement - the world is coming to an end, the currency is in shambles, the only way to protect yourself is gold... but there's nothing illegal about that, it's a free country.

To me the question is, how do they represent the coins. If they give the weight in ounces of the gold in the coin, then I think they can add whatever other sales pitch they want. The "numismatic value" of a coin is up for debate, by definition it is the premium someone (including the buyer from goldline) is willing to pay over melt value. I can tell you that an ounce of gold in an 1857-O $20 in MS 65 is worth much more than an ounce of gold in a 1909-S $20 in XF40 because of what collectors are willing to pay for each.

Where it would be a fraud in my opinion is if they say look, you can buy this Russian coin that has x hundred grains of gold in it for $500. Or not giving the weight at all and just giving the denomination. The units of measure there are unfamiliar to everyone, it sounds bigger than it is, and it's done to deceive.

I wouldn't say that folks should have to give the melt value of a coin in order to sell it.

-Fred

ricko · September 24, 2010 10:04PM

Another exercise in futility.... typical of what has come to be 'business' in politics. Cheers, RickO

johnny9434 · September 25, 2010 3:44AM

this aint pretty by any means

roadrunner · September 25, 2010 4:29AM

I saw part of this "hearing" and I thought it was very odd. If in fact FDR revoked the gold confiscation from the public the following year as Rep. Weiners contends, then I certainly wasn't aware of it. Anyone have a copy of that presidential order restoring the public's right to own as much gold as they desired? If that was the case did the govt then contact all the citizens who turned in gold and let them know they could now have it back if they wished...and at the pre-1933 price of $20.67/oz? Weiner's contentions seem sort of foolish. The Goldline VP as well as myself think that gold confiscation is entirely possible yet again. How can you categorically rule it out? And the fact that we're no longer on a formal/written gold standard has nothing to do with. With Central Banks still holding 31,000 tons of gold in reserves that's enough of a real-world "gold standard" for me. If they don't trust each other with fiat payments (hence the gold reserves to settle debts) then why should we?

It would have been nice if the Goldline exec had boned up some gold history before going into the hearing. He could have easily made Rep. Weiner backpedal on his questions.

roadrunner

CaptHenway · September 25, 2010 4:42AM

Where's RWB?

I guess you could say that the proclamation of 1933 was replaced by the proclamation of 1934, though I wouldn't say that it was repealed.

TD

roadrunner · September 25, 2010 5:17AM

First of all it was determined that FDR's signed order was not legal, so in early 1934 the Secretary of Treasury signed the order. And a few months later they came out with the gold reserve act of 1934. But nowhere do I see that citizens could still own as much gold as they wanted. The ban on public ownership wasn't revoked until 1974. So I really don't know what our dear Rep. Weiner was talking about with a "repeal" a year later in 1934. Maybe he was just trying to confuse the "facts." Bottom line, there was a confiscation in 1933, the price of gold was officially raised by 70% and the people who turned it in were out by that much....plain and simple. In international trade the dollar would have depreciated by 40%. Would have been nice to have that $50-$100 in gold if you were traveling overseas at the time. So regardless of what Weiner said, gold was confiscated and ordered to be turned in. The people who followed this order were never made whole again. Can it happen again? Were the rules of silver futures contracts changed just to bring down the Hunts? Did the FASB give in to the banks and allow them to continue to value their otc derivatives per model rather than per market? Yeah, confiscation could never happen again to the little people because Weiner said so.

roadrunner

tahoe98 · September 25, 2010 10:08AM

...you can never believe a weiner. or a hot-dog for that matter.

ProofArtworkonCircs · September 25, 2010 2:36PM

<<First of all it was determined that FDR's signed order was not legal, so in early 1934 the Secretary of Treasury signed the order. And a few months later they came out with the gold reserve act of 1934. But nowhere do I see that citizens could still own as much gold as they wanted.>>

On Nov 16, 1933, FDR's surrender order was declared illegal. On Dec 28 1933 came a new legal order, with a deadline finally of Jan 17,1934. So why couldn't one hold as much gold as they wanted from Nov 17, 1933 to Jan 14, 1934? It would be a small comfort since it was soon illegal again.

will you cry or cringe after reading this............

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