Explain why you sold Britain's gold, Gordon Brown told

beer_tins

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Slight difference. If worldtraveller had been advised by many around him not to sell., and then he sold anyway, you could reasonably say he was a little silly in hindsight.

Brown was not the only single person sitting there determining things. His advisors advised against selling off of gold, but Brown went ahead anyway.

I'm quite sure you already know this anyway.

So he was a little silly. Oh no.

It was a bad decision. But look at it in the context of Britains reserves and budget as a whole. It's not on the scale that is being suggested.

Graham_Devon

chucky wrote: »

hindsight is a wonderful thing when your sitting on your DFS sofa

you'll be telling me next that the Chancellor of the Exchequer works in the Financial Services industry...
oh you've done that one once before already... :wall:

You suggested that Brown couldn't predict the future....what with your palm reader stuff.

All I'm saying is, he couldn't predict the future no. BUT, his advisors were warning against what he did...therefore somewhat predicting the future as much as they could. He took no notice and went ahead anyway.

Theres no need to get silly about it all.

chucky

beer_tins wrote: »

So he was a little silly. Oh no.

It was a bad decision. But look at it in the context of Britains reserves and budget as a whole. It's not on the scale that is being suggested.

it wasn't even all the gold reserves i believe - i think it was somewhere around 50%. a large percentage of it nevertheless...

the ignorant and those logically blinded or have the anti-Gordon Brown hatred disease would know this already though...

Nosht

StevieJ wrote: »

Did he not sell it at the market price at the time?

He was advised by the Bank Of England NOT to do this.
Oh that they still had the power that the FSA do not use.

N.

apt

I suppose those people who are slagging off Gordon Brown for selling gold near the bottom of the market are also praising him for flogging the mobile licences at the top of the market.

A._Badger

beer_tins wrote: »

"unparalleled power"? You are suggesting that Gordon Brown was the most powerful man in history at that time? Unparalleled :rotfl:

I'm sorry you appear to be having some difficulty understanding. By unparalleled, I mean there was no one to stop him. He had unlimited power in this regard.

beer_tins wrote: »

So he didn't take advice, thought he new best and messed up. Surely it's no surprise he's not going to be playing this up?

What - our honest and straightforward son of the manse, with the famous moral compass? You are joking, surely?

beer_tins wrote: »

Has he lied about it? When?

Brown lies by obfuscation and denial. Whenever he has been questioned on this act of rank stupidity, he has retreated behind his usual barricade of bluster and misdirection.

So let's get it straight, shall we? Against the advice of experts, for reasons he has never satisfactorily explained, this towering genius told the market he was about to sell a massive amount of the UK's gold reserves, thus forcing down prices. He did so, regardless of the views of wiser heads and lost an estimated £7 billion of the country's money.

Since then, no one from his party has been able to suggest even the most remotely convincing explanation of why he did it.

Allow me to suggest one. He is a doctrinaire idiot. A man whose much trumpeted PhD was in some footling aspect of the history of the Labour party in Scotland. A man with almost no experience of business or finance, who was finally let loose to run the economy with nothing to guide him but a long background in the grubby in-fighting of the Labour party and all the immersion in sub-Marxist dogma that entails.

beer_tins wrote: »

Yes, a bank manager or director would be in trouble. But they wouldn't be in a position to sell billions of pounds of gold. They would be working on a much smaller scale. The decision would look bad. Some may even face the sack if it's not an isolated incident. But they would not end up in court over it.

Tell that to Nick Leeson.

A._Badger

apt wrote: »

I suppose those people who are slagging off Gordon Brown for selling gold near the bottom of the market are also praising him for flogging the mobile licences at the top of the market.

The salient point seems to have escaped you. He created the bottom of the market. It was the action of a fool.

Kohoutek

A._Badger wrote: »

It was the action of a fool.

Selling at a historic low and pre-announcing the sales in advance is so commercially inept that it's hard to believe someone would be that stupid. The alternative is that it was the action of a traitor.

A._Badger

chucky wrote: »

it wasn't even all the gold reserves i believe - i think it was somewhere around 50%. a large percentage of it nevertheless...

the ignorant and those logically blinded or have the anti-Gordon Brown hatred disease would know this already though...

Oh, well, if it was only half the country's gold reserves, that hardly matters, does it?

Why all the fuss, like the Times 2007 headline: "Goldfinger Brown’s £2 billion blunder in the bullion market"?

I mean, it's just a few bob, really. Just a trifling £50,000 for every family in the country, it has been suggested.

I wish I were as rich as you appear to be! I'd quite like £50,000!

Former_Spice

A._Badger wrote: »

Oh, well, if it was only half the country's gold reserves, that hardly matters, does it?

Why all the fuss, like the Times 2007 headline: "Goldfinger Brown’s £2 billion blunder in the bullion market"?

I mean, it's just a few bob, really. Just a trifling £50,000 for every family in the country, it has been suggested.

I wish I were as rich as you appear to be! I'd quite like £50,000!

£ 2 Billion divided by £50000 is 40,000. Do you really think that there are only forty thousand families in the country? It's more like £50 a family, not the ridiculous figure you came out with.