Ok, I have a great idea to help out, to become more stable, protect your wealth and provide a more secure financial environment.
What if i was to supply a business that looked after your gold ?. I know its dangerous out there carrying on your person the gold you dug up or sifted for, and i know some people trade with it to not only pay living expenses but to save it too. So what if i was to provide a place where you could bring your gold and have it stored and protected. It will be a secure environment designed to withstand the hardiest attempt to steal it - got to be better than under your mattress or in your saddle bag right?

If you deposit your gold with us then we will create a thing called 'an account' for you. This will record how much gold you have deposited. Of course it us still your gold so you can take it away at any time.
Now comes the clever part: we will give you a piece of paper which promises to pay you back the amount of gold you have... At any time. The more deposits you make the more promissory notes you get... And get this... We will let you trade these notes with others because they are the same for all customers.

We make our money by keeping just a little bit of your gold deposit for ourselves. With your permission of course.

I think this idea might work. Imagine if everybody puts thier gold in our 'deposit bank' the country would be a safer place and everyone's wealth would be secure. They may even extensively trade our promissory notes and just leave the gold where it stored. Can you imagine the huge pile of gold we would have?

But of course the important thing to remember is that it is your gold. If you are nit happy with our service you can bring your promissory note, we call it 'the dollar', and get back the equivalent it promises.

Pretty good idea I think... What do you think?

Originally posted by Faithmaker

But of course the important thing to remember is that it is your gold. If you are nit happy with our service you can bring your promissory note, we call it 'the dollar', and get back the equivalent it promises.

Pretty good idea I think... What do you think?

Time to call your bluff

Pay up sucker

Oh hehe, yeah you have stumbled on a little weakness in my idea. If all our account holders come with thier dollars to claim thier gold... Our business will have to close.
Hmm I will give this problem some thought !

I only wish all the banks where as transparent as you....

Originally posted by Faithmaker

Oh hehe, yeah you have stumbled on a little weakness in my idea. If all our account holders come with thier dollars to claim thier gold... Our business will have to close.

Hmm I will give this problem some thought !

You could always tell the angry mob that you sold thier Gold to God.

That should work, up until most of them decide that God is a bit of a shyster.

Ok this is what I will do. I will take the gold you deposit with the bank and trade it myself with others. Buy things cheap and sell them for more gold than we paid. If i can build up more gold in the bank than promissory notes issued then it won't matter if the customers cash it all in. I could then lend dollars to people who don't have gold to deposit... And of course they will have to give me back the dollars I lent them and a few more on top.
All I have to do is make sure I can trade your gold effectively and find people to lend dollars to.

I shall call this business the Bank of America.

Originally posted by Faithmaker
Ok, I have a great idea to help out,

Nice idea, but I think you're missing a big trick.

There are some people out there who need gold from time to time for various reasons.
You have lots of other people's gold stored away, that chances are, they wont all be collecting again any time soon.
Why dont you lend it to those people that need gold? And charge some kind of interest?
Edit - not the actuall gold of course, just hand them those bits of paper. They'll be happy with that.

Originally posted by Faithmaker
Ok this is what I will do. I will take the gold you deposit we the bank and trade it myself with others. Buy things cheap and sell them for mire gold than we paid. If i can build up more gold in the bank than promissory notes issued then it won't matter if the customers cash it all in.

I could then lend dollars to people who don't have gold to deposit... And of course they will have to give me back the dollars I lent them and a few more on top.

All I have to do is make sure I can trade your gold effectively and find people to lend dollars to.

Yeah ok

That sounds like a great plan Bernie Madoff.

Originally posted by alfa1

Originally posted by Faithmaker
Ok, I have a great idea to help out,

Nice idea, but I think you're missing a big trick.

There are some people out there who need gold from time to time for various reasons.
You have lots of other people's gold stored away, that chances are, they wont all be collecting again any time soon.
Why dont you lend it to those people that need gold? And charge some kind of interest?
Edit - not the actuall gold of course, just hand them those bits of paper. They'll be happy with that.

edit on 6-11-2011 by alfa1 because: (no reason given)

Yeah I had a similar thought. Trade my gold... Sorry I meant your gold, to make more gold. The more I make the mire I can lend. Keeping it balanced so i don't lend more than I have. I want to try and steer away from refering to the gold. Let's just deal in the notes... The less people know about the gold the better. If i lend dollars to people with little chance of paying it back I could take thier belongings and stuff, then sell it for quick profit. After all they were only going to pay me back dollars that I issued on the strength of gold I already have and trade with. This way I get things I don't already own. Cool idea i think... Must lend to people who can't pay it back.

and now we no longer promise to give you your gold back, we only promise to give you another peice of paper. So the question is, did they give everyone thier gold, no they stole it.

LOL, this is exactly how it was done when we were on the gold standard.

Guess your looking to turn back the clock.

Most of the working power can't even afford gold, maybe silver.

I think all things will have a intrinsic value, and you could base value off
a resource based economy.

In other words a 2 x 4 has some value, but not much.

A automobile has considerably more value.

Even human labor would have some value.

But BS like derivatives does not have value because it is based on
financial trickery.

The current financial mess is largely due to the derivatives.

The "first" bailout by itself would have cleared all the bad home loans.

Never mind the looting that has collapsed Iceland, Ireland, Greece,
and plenty more to come to the tune of $1,500 Trillion in global derivatives.