Book Review: Gold Wars

Jim Puplava interviews Ferdinand Lips, author of Gold Wars: The Battle Against Sound Money as Seen From a Swiss Perspective (2002). From the book's introduction:

"A 'gold war' is an attempt by the government upon the constitutional rights of the individual. Why do governments resort to gold wars? Sometimes they want to wage shooting wars without raising taxes; at other times they want to indulge in 'social engineering' through the redistribution of income. But in every instance there is one common thread: governments have correctly identified gold as the only antidote against their effort to build the Tower of Babel of irredeemable debt."

Mr. Lips was born in Switzerland in 1931 and he is a respected authority on gold and the gold market. He started his career in banking where he became a co-founder and managing director of the Rothschild Bank AG in Zurich. In 1987 he opened his own bank, Bank Lips AG, retiring in 1998 on an equity sale.

Mr. Lips continues to be very active in the banking and gold world and he is on the board of various African mining companies, among them, Randgold Resources Limited and the Afrikander Lease Limited. He is also a trustee of the Foundation for the Advancement of Monetary Education, the publisher of the book. Mr Lips states:

"Gold sales by central banks have always been announced three times. First when the central banks announce the sale; second, when they sell the gold; and, third, when the gold is sold. But they never tell the public who bought. Somebody's buying. I think it's Eastern people who are buying. Gold is moving from West to East."

"The Turks are buying. The Indians are buying. The Chinese are buying. The Russians are buying. Asian people know the value of gold. There has always been a market for gold, and it will become more dramatic when Western investment managers and portfolio managers discover that the stock market will be a problem for the next five to ten years. Then, they might also buy some gold for their portfolios. Then it will become interesting."