U.S. Mint Buys Drug Cartel Gold and Sells It as 'American'

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/26/world/americas/us-mint-gold-drug-cartel-colombia.html

by mikhael • 3 months ago

43 14 3 months ago

AngryData• 3 months ago

Of course it does. Gold has been used for currency since forever in large part because it is easy to hide its source. A simple melt in a pot will erase every bit of history and political baggage from a piece of gold. Any large institutions dealing with gold are knowingly trading in the global black market with large criminal organizations and corrupt governments.

m463• 3 months ago

kind of funny how bitcoin, which doesn't even exist in the physical world, has more traceability.

duxup• 3 months ago

Gift link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/26/world/americas/us-mint-go...

msuniverse2026• 3 months ago

Wish I understood what was going on with the gold price. Shit goes gangbusters when nothing is happening, and when straits are closed and countries invaded it goes down.

zulux• 3 months ago

"Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent"

consumer451• 3 months ago

"It's a big club, and you ain't in it."

tastyfreeze• 3 months ago

Gold price has more to do with dollar devaluation than anything. When the money printer goes brrr the price of gold will go up in delayed response.

defrost• 3 months ago

This might shed some light:

Gold, a 'safe haven' in uncertain times: Why is it crashing amid a war?

31 days ago | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47526511

kingstnap• 3 months ago

Gold is largely a speculative asset just like any other, despite what you might believe given the culture we have that reveres gold as "real" value.

There is much more gold mined then used in jewelry or electronics. And the jewelry often gets recycled since people don't tend to carelessly throw out their gold jewelry.

The super majority of demand is just making bars to sell to banks and individuals to keep in vaults. This naturally means what controls its price is largey the amount of stockpiling going on.

Gold going gangbusters was mostly a sell off of US treasuries over the tarrif chaos last year which ended up chasing gold. It couldn't for example chase housing in China given the massive slump in their housing markets for years.

The straight being closed doesn't really signal to central banks or individuals that they need to sell more goverment bonds and swap into gold. If anything they will probably be tempted to sell to cover goods inflation from oil shocks.

readthenotes1• 3 months ago

Türkiye sold, literally, tons of it at the start of the war and that's one of the reasons the price went down.

Before the war central banks were buying it up like crazy. Iirc, it has surpassed US treasuries as assets for the first time quite a while.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkish-gold-reser...

lvl155• 3 months ago

Gold has been a vehicle for cartels for a very long time. It’s shifted to crypto in recent years but gold is still the cleanest (and most economical) way to clean money.

pwg• 3 months ago

And entire article to say: "gold is fungible".

Cider9986• 3 months ago

Which is more fungible, gold or Monero?

johnea• 3 months ago

"The founding principles of our country": He who has the gold makes the rules...

U.S. Mint Buys Drug Cartel Gold and Sells It as 'American'

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