U.S. Mint Annual Reports Correlate with Tungsten Filled Gold Bars
Bryant Blake
Rob Kirby’s unearthing of the potential huge gold bar salting news got me thinking about all of the changes in the way the U.S. Mint categorizes their holdings of treasury gold. The U.S. Mint’s annual reports can be accessed here
http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/in ... ual_report.
Before I get into the several changes in the Mint reports over the last decade, I have tabulated a table of the gold the Mint holds for the treasury for the years 1997 thru 2008. Up until 2000, all gold held by the Mint was categorized as “Custodial Gold”. Starting in 2001, the gold was broken down into operating inventory and working stock, the starting in 2005, the gold was broken down into deep storage and working stock.
U.S Mint Gold Holdings (Troy Ounces)

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Deep Storage is defined as that portion of the U.S. Government-owned gold and silver Bullion Reserve which the Mint secures in sealed vaults. Deep Storage gold comprises the vast majority of the Reserve and consists primarily of gold bars.
Working Stock is defined as that portion of the U.S. Government-owned gold and silver Bullion Reserve which the Mint uses as the raw material for minting congressionally authorized coins. Working Stock gold comprises only about one percent of the Gold Bullion Reserve and consists of bars, blanks, unsold coins, and condemned coins.
Treasury allows the United States Mint to use its gold and silver as working stock. Generally, the United States Mint will replace its working stock when used in production with purchases of gold and silver on the open market. In those cases where the gold or silver is not replaced, the United States Mint reimburses Treasury the market value of the depleted gold or silver.
What do all of these changes mean, and how does it fit in with Mr. Kirby’s revelations? Starting in 2000, the gold was divided into 2 categories with the working stock available to the Mint consisting of only 1.2% of the total amount of gold. Now the following is a hypothesis, but the shoe seems to fit. If the gold in Fort Knox and West Point was swapped with counterfeit tungsten filled gold bars, then the government could not have the mint accessing the tungsten bars and melting them down for coinage. By dividing the gold into 2 categories and only allowing the mint access to 1% of the gold, no one would ever know about the crime. Not only would no one know, but any senators or foreign central banks that were granted visual access would see room after room of bars that looked and weighed just like gold.
Since this division was made in 2000, not one ounce of gold has been added to or removed from the total of the operating inventory/deep storage gold. If all this is not weird enough, since 2005, there has not been any change to the quantity of working stock gold. I have no idea how the Mint can manufacture 100’s of thousands of gold coins per year and the amount of working stock remains the same year after year.