Thread: U. of Texas Takes Delivery Of $1 Billion In Physical Gold

A Golden Tipping Point: University of Texas Takes Delivery Of $1 Billion In Physical Gold

Submitted by Tyler Durden
04/16/2011 19:59 -0400
325 comments

Tipping points are funny: for years, decades, even centuries, the conditions for an event to occur may be ripe yet nothing happens. Then, in an instant, a shift occurs, whether its is due a change in conventional wisdom, due to an exogenous event or due to something completely inexplicable. That event, colloquially called a black swan in recent years, changes the prevalent perception of reality in a moment. This past week, we were seeing the effect of a tipping point in process, with gold prices rising to new all time highs day after day, and the price of silver literally moving in a parabolic fashion. What was missing was the cause. We now know what it is: per Bloomberg: "The University of Texas Investment Management Co., the second-largest U.S. academic endowment, took delivery of almost $1 billion in gold bullion and is storing the bars in a New York vault, according to the fund’s board." And so, the game theory of a nearly 100 year old system of monetary exchange has seen its first defector, but most certainly not last. With an entity as large as the University of Texas calling the bluff of the Comex, the Chairman, and fiat in general in roughly that order, virtually every other asset manager is now sure to follow, considering there is not nearly enough physical gold to satisfy all paper gold in existence by a factor of about 100x. The proverbial Nash equilibrium has just been broken.

From Bloomberg: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-1 ... -bars.html

The fund, whose $19.9 billion in assets ranked it behind Harvard University’s endowment as of August, according to the National Association of College and University Business Officers, added about $500 million in gold investments to an existing stake last year, said Bruce Zimmerman, the endowment’s chief executive officer. The holdings are worth about $987 million, based on yesterday’s closing price of $1,486 an ounce for Comex futures.

Years from now, when historians attempt to define who may have started it all, one name may emerge...

The decision to turn the fund’s investment into gold bars was influenced by Kyle Bass, a Dallas hedge fund manager and member of the endowment’s board, Zimmerman said at its annual meeting on April 14. Bass made $500 million on the U.S. subprime-mortgage collapse.

“Central banks are printing more money than they ever have, so what’s the value of money in terms of purchases of goods and services,â€

$1 Billion of Gold Bars Taken Delivery Of By Pension Fund Due to Risk of COMEX Default and Shortages

by Tyler Durden
04/18/2011 06:59 -0400
86 comments

From Gold Core

$1 Billion of Gold Bars Taken Delivery Of By Pension Fund Due to Risk of COMEX Default and Shortages

Concerns that the sovereign debt crisis may be entering a new phase and the risk of contagion has seen peripheral eurozone bonds fall sharply and the euro fall against major currencies and gold today.

Sovereign debt risk, global inflation concerns, geopolitical risk, disappointing European earnings and concerns about Japan's coming reporting season have seen equities weaken and new record nominal highs for gold and silver (all time and 31 year).



Greek bond yields have continued their relentless march higher and have risen above 14.07% (10 year) and Portuguese debt (10 year) has risen to a euro era record over 9.27%.Spanish and Irish debt are also under pressure this morning.



Euro gold has been in a range between €900 and €1,070 for nearly a year (since last May – see chart) and this period of consolidation looks set to come to an end as gold pushes higher. Once the technical resistance at the record high of €1,072/oz (12/28/10) is breached, gold will challenge €1,100/oz .

In the current bull market, euro gold has seen many long periods of correction and consolidation prior to rapid gains and sharp moves upwards. The length of the recent correction (almost a year) suggests that the coming move could be very sharp and see gold rise to €1,200/oz in the coming weeks.



Gold is increasingly being seen as the superior currency in a world of trillion dollar and euro deficits and bailouts. Indeed, the printing and electronic creation of billion and trillions of the major paper currencies is increasingly making gold and silver the currencies of last resort.

Governments and central banks are debasing currencies through bailouts, deficit spending and quantitative easing which is leading to a massive increase in the supply of fiat currencies. Precious metals are rare and finite and this is why major currencies are falling in value versus gold and silver.

One of the largest pension funds in the world, the University of Texas Investment Management Co (which manages the endowment for the Texas teachers pension fund), has realized this and has put 5% of the pension fund into gold bullion (see news).

Unusually, but likely to be seen more frequently in the coming weeks and months, the pension fund has opted to own physical bars worth nearly $1 billion dollars in allocated accounts.

The fund has previously expressed concerns about the counter party risk in ETFs. However, the reason given for opting for taking delivery of 100 oz gold bars in a warehouse was that if the holders of just 5 percent of COMEX futures contracts opted to take delivery of the metal, there wouldn’t be enough to cover the demand leading to a COMEX default.

The risk of a COMEX default increases by the day and appears to be moving from the realms of the “conspiracy theoryâ€