Koos takes a sharp jab at how the government bureaucracy operates, inveighing (with cause) that it should be clear that the Deep Storage gold has not been audited by professionals, but the precious metals have been verified by imbeciles.. And the vault has also been a setting place for several movies, the most famous being the 1964 James Bond film, Goldfinger when the titular character foiled a plot to contaminate the bullion, Mnuchin said it was the first time Fort Knox opened its vaults to outsiders since a Congressional delegation and some journalists were let in to view the gold for the first time in 1974. Find out what Uber drivers really think of you! Part of the Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday & Metro Media Group. Scales at the Mint used to weigh the bars often didnt work properly. A separate post will be dedicated to KPMG. Try Army A-Z . *For the audits performed in 1975, 1976, 1978, 1979, 1982, 1983 and 1984 under the continuing audits program allegedly 1 in 50 melts has been assayed, although there are no audit reports, nor assay reports, nor do we know who the assayer was. Until 1953, there were serial number audits of the gold and some assaying as I explain but that became costly and time intensive. The vaults were last opened to the public in the 1970s, and the last treasury secretary visit was in 1948. The last full audit was done in 1953 . Compared to the samples taken in the 1950s and 60s, the standards for the integrity of the sample size had fallen sharply. *In 1974 the New York assay office tested 95 bars. The last time Fort Knox had opened its vault to civilians was more than 40 years earlier. Thank you for signing up with United States Mint! Republican frontrunner Donald Trump hinted at the idea that there just might be no gold in the U.S. Exhibit 7.1. The only audit that has ever been done of the gold inside Ft Knox was done days after Dwight Eisenhower became President in January of 1953. Part One, We use cookies to enhance the user experience and to analyse traffic. Maybe a room or two full of gold but the rest is gone. Page Last Modified: 8/26/19, 2:56 PM Fort Knox, KY. Our Nation's Gold Standard Army Home. Inside the famed vaults at Fort Knox, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell held a 27-pound gold bar in his hands Monday as part of the first civilian delegation to see most of the country's bullion reserves in more than 40 years. Fort Knox was thrown open on that Monday afternoon for about 2 hours to some 150 reporters and glad-handing politicians, crowding narrow passageways and elbowing each other for a . According to official statistics, the United States holds far and away the largest gold reserves of any sovereign nation or supranational institution. The reports were not present at the National Archives, the OIG or at the Treasury Department. di Of course,strange things have been stored in the vault, like morphine and opiumduring the early '90s. In June 1975, the Treasury Secretary authorized and directed a continuing audit of U.S. I personally believe that rumor and the bulk of it has been sold off to the rich elites. This suggests the gold at the FRBNY was stored so it could be easily transportedin and out of the vaults, possibly through a corridor to the adjacent private vault at 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza read this post by BullionStar gold researcher Ronan Manly for more information on the construction of the FRBNY vault and the connection to the vault across the street that was owned by JP Morgan, but recently bought by Fosun (October 2013), a Chinese investment conglomerate. I am glad to report that everything at the depository looked to be secure and in order. The Fort Knox facility, a hyper-secure fortress in Kentucky that is part of quintessential American lore, is . Buy, ship and store bullion with BullionStar in/from different countries. *In 1977, presumably, one bar in every fiftieth melt (one melt is approximately 20 bars) was assayed, irregularities were found in two melts, the vault had to be opened twice more in the presence of the Joint Sealing Committee and the gold reevaluated. But theories exist regarding other possiblecontents of the vault -like the body of Jimmy Hoffa. FORT KNOX MINE ICMC SUMMARY AUDIT REPORT . More than half of . All your favorite.50 games all in one club! US citizens were required to sell their gold bullion - bars and coins - back to the State. Kids, Gifts for However, if that intruder had turned to the west he would have . For the sake of simplicity, lets say I have both audit reports, 1980 and 1981. Exhibit 1. The US official gold reserves are the worlds greatest by far at 8,134 metric tonnes. Currently the Office Inspector General of the Treasury is responsible for the audits of the gold reserves at the US Mint. When thinking about these re-audits, threescenarios pop to mind: Why else wouldso much gold have been re-audited? Us, ALL Let me show you an example of Fort Knox. Others claim the goldis actually justtungsten bricks painted to look like the precious metal. Answer (1 of 2): Internally, it is done annually. From 1993 to 2008 the remaining 3 % of the gold reserves stored at the US Mint hasbeen audited I assume. His visit was the one and only time a gold vault was opened for inspection for anyone other than authorized personnel. Company Registration No. The documents also include new details about Mnuchin's activities at Fort Knox, where the Treasury stores a stockpile of gold with a market value it estimates at $190 billion. Lets have a look. In 2008, presidential candidate Ron Paul unsuccessfully called for an audit of the US Federal Reserve and Fort Knox,but his skepticism echoed that of other conspiracy theorists. The initial intention is clear to us, the FRBNY was supposed to be audited; the gold to be counted, weighed, assayed and the compartments to be sealed (these were the audit procedures of the continuing audits committee). Based on glaring conflicts among the Treasury's own documents, this staggering amount of gold disappeared without a trace from 1961 to 1971. . The OIG audited 3 % from 1993 2008. He also mentioned that despite this being the first visit by a group of politicians and journalists to Fort Knox since 1974 - he was the first serving Treasury Secretary to visit since 1948. Jansen is a longtime gold insider and journalist reporting on, for example, the goings-on of the incipient Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE). At the end of Fiscal Year of 2008, all 42 compartments had been audited by either the GAO, the Committee for Continuing Audit of the U.S. These could be better understood, or clarified, if we could obtain all audit reports from 1974 1986. Bear in mind that another FOIA request for internal email correspondence relating to the initial inquiries revealed that the official who provided this exaggerated estimate of how difficult the task of producing the documents would be was an auditor himself and among the authors of the documents that Jansen sought in the first place! Royal Mint Launches First Coin in Myths and Legends Collection, Numismatic Crime Counterfeit Notes Sold Over Facebook, 1776 Continental Dollar Offered by David Lawrence Rare Coins, Grade This 1936-S Cincinnati Commemorative Silver Half Dollar, First King Charles III Coin From Pobjoy Celebrating the Accession, Dakota 1875 $5 Bank Note in Stacks Bowers Spring Auction. Matt Bevin. No outside experts were allowed on the site for the audit, either, providing fodder for all kinds of conspiracy theorists. Over 640,000,000 ounces of real money sat behind those massive locked doors. Theoretically, if the seal hasnt been tampered with, this is as good as verifying the metals themselves. Government-owned Gold" for the years 1975, 1976, 1978, 1979, and 1981-1984. Since there are far too many gold bars to count at once, the audit is carried out piecemeal and only small samples are taken for assaying. At the congressional hearing of the Gold Transparency Act (H.R. The other two-thirds, however, have not been inventoriedthat is according to my understandingor assayed since somewhere between 1975 and 1986. Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin visited Fort Knox on August 21. ByI forget which date it was, I believe by 1986, wehold on just one second here, I got it. Despite continued inquiries, the US Mint refuses to offer up proof of the exact amount of gold held at Fort Knox. Also, the assay test results from last year's gold audits at Fort Knox and West Point were ', 'I assume the gold is still there,' he said. And the problem goes far beyond missing audit reports. Liberty, Bush The controversial 'trauma expert' interviewing Prince Harry: Gabor Mat was warned by the Canadian A big Beckham birthday! 'It's not even the annual funding level for some of our large departments in the federal government,' he said. Ideas, Gifts for While the gold at Fort Knox was partially audited in the past, the gold at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York was never looked at. ', 'All I will say is that it is freakishly well secured,' he said. What his dogged FOIA requests have failed to reveal, unfortunately, is anything that would put the questions about the Fort Knox gold to rest. You may consider submitting a FOIA request directly to the Treasury Department. Our staff conducted a search using the National Archives Holdings Management System under the following records group numbers: RG 50 Treasurer of the United States, RG 56 General Records of the Department of the Treasury, RG 82 Federal Reserve System, RG 101 Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, RG 104 U.S. Mint, and RG 425 Financial Management Service. The gold at Fort Knox is stored in one of the most secure facilities in the world. Kate and Prince William 'are keen' for Prince George to have official role in King Charles' coronation - but Royally hard work! However, as Ive written in my post Where Did The Gold In Fort Knox Come From? Coins, Precious I did read one time that the queen of England a. Because this is the department currently responsible for the audits I was surprised my request to obtain all audit reports wasnt honored. Several more examples of these blurry situations are shown in the released documents. Technically its possible the OIG assayed exactly the remaining stash of 9999 gold, though chances are slim given the fact the 9999 gold wasspread over multiple compartments at multiple depositories. RSS Feeds . Secretary Mnuchin's statements were not helpful. Then, from 2005 to 2008 the assay tests were conducted by White Sands Missile Range, which is a subsidiary of the US army. On this sheet 5 physical gold audit reports are listed, framed in red. I can say that without any hesitation, because I have observed the gold and the security of the gold reserves myself. The US government wished to open the vaults of audited gold to lease or sell the metal on the open market. While this sum is unreasonable, a crowdfunding campaign donated the total in less than 24 hours (strangely enough, the Mint never actually cashed Kooss check, and nearly all of the money was eventually refunded.). We are a community that loves Silver, Period. Your request was received in this office on March 3, 2015 and assigned FOIA case number RD 45578. The Fort Knox Gold was last audited in the 1950s. Fort Knox claims billions of dollars worth of gold are stored away in its secret vault. The auditors from the Treasury will be drawn from the Office of the Secretary, the Bureau of Government Financial Operations, the U.S. Customs Service, and the Bureau of the Mint. Why havent we ever seen any assays of coin bars? In addition, the committee will include technicians from the Bureau of the Mint who are trained in assaying and weighing gold bullion. In 1974, after the US closed the gold window, congressional support grew for inquiring into the US gold stock. In 1983 the OIG found out something was amiss with the audits performed 1974 1982. Connecting thereto, from Thorsons opening statement: My office began conducting annual audits of the gold reserves in Fiscal Year 1993. This was the first time the OIG was responsible for the audits of the gold at the Mint (note, this same OIG is still responsible for the audits). US Mint Releases New Fort Knox Audit Documentation. More from 1981 report: The continuing audit is being conducted on a cyclical basis because of the enormous quantity of gold to be handled and the related costs. Weve focused on the first audits of the gold stored by the US Mint. The first screen shots below are from a gold verification at Fort Knox in March 1998. At Fort Knox, we are about people - great service members, outstanding civilians . The First Critical Observations. Built in 1936, security access for the facility make it difficult to get access. After the Congressional inspection, the Bullion Depository will once again be closed to visitors. Quoting from the 1981 report: Gold at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York is audited periodically by examiners of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Members of the Committee for Continuing Audits of United States Government-owned Gold representing the Mint and BGFO observed the audits at the invitation of the Board and the Federal Reserve Bank. I'm not a professional auditor (if you are one please contact me), but common sense suggests that when irregularities are found the sample size . The last Congressional visit prior to this occurredin 1974. Koos mainly provides unique insights about Chinese gold market. There was no assay report included in the audit report. But Bevin, speaking on WHAS radio, divulged a few more details. Sevenreports are missing. Test yourself with this Cockney Rhyming Slang quiz. By gathering information from audit reports from 1974 1986 (the ones I could get my hands on) and statements made at the congressional hearing in 2011 well analyze our way through this. The assayer is unknown and there was no assay report included in the audit report. Located in Kentucky, Fort Knox is a United States Army base whichhouses most of the US's gold reserves. As a freebie trip for 4 select political insiders, last Monday's trip to Fort Knox was undoubtedly a memorable one . The assayer is unknown and no assay reports have been included in the audit reports. He said it took 'quite a bit of time' to get in and out of the facility, and said officials had to cut a seal to open the vault for them. July 1986 12,477,777.638 [this number Icopied from the 1986 report]. Ron Paul introduced a bill that would require the Fed to manually audit every U.S.-owned gold . The facility also featuresvideo cameras, motion detectors, and secret microphones, all set to pick up the presence of anyone or anything that doesn't belong. . In addition to facilities in West Point and Denver, the Fort Knox facility-known as the U.S. Bullion Depository -stands out for its reputation as an impenetrable fortress. To date,only one US president has been inside the vault - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who served as president when the US Bullion Depositorywithin Fort Knoxwas established. In the excel sheet with the bar list of gold stored by the US Mint, published a few years ago, we can see nearly all the gold is low purity roughly 90 % pure very little was 9999 fine. "Dear US Mint, We Gave You The FOIA Funds, Now Give Us The Fort Knox Audit Documents!", November 2016 "US Mint Releases New Fort Knox "Audit Documentation". Buy for Vault Storage in the United States Fort Knox is also on the list of these 10 forbidden places that no one is ever allowed to visit. Between July 1983 and July 1985 the gold was audited in accordance with the plan approved by the Treasurer, as follows. An excuse was needed to break the seals. U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin initiated the visit, along with U.S. Rep. Brett Guthrie and Gov. The official story from OIG is that 100% of the gold stored at Fort Knox was audited in between 1974 and 1986, although there is no US government department that has the audit reports. In 1977 the New York assay office, which is a subsidiary of the US Mint, conducted the assays. On top of this, a decades worth (1993-2003) of Joint Seal inspections from the Denver and West Point depositories are not accounted for. Koos Jansen is a precious metal analyst from the Netherlands. The Fort Knox facility was opened within the year, and took its first shipment of gold in 1937. Two tetrahedron-shaped chips were removed form the top and bottom of each bar assayed. The Fort Knox Mine was initially certified in full compliance with the Cyanide Code in February 2008 and was recertified in September 2011, in February 2015, and in August 2018. The 1974 Fort Knox audit by the GAO has been acknowledged and adopted by the continuing audits committee, so this it becamepart of the continuing audits. "good delivery" bricks of gold found gutted and filled with tungsten within the confines of LBMA approved vaults in Hong Kong. *Its likely 97 % of the audited gold by the continuing audits committee has not been assayed by an independent assayer. Given all the protection, it seems obvious that billions of dollars worth of gold (or something) indeed resides at Fort Knox. The Eisenhower Administration Conducted The Last Audit Of Fort Knox. China Gold Import Jan-Sep 797t. . *For all other publicly available audit reports (1980, 1981, 1985, 1986) its very briefly mentioned assay tests were conducted, presumably for one in every fiftieth melt. Official records claimed 20,000 tons in the 1950s. For this post well focus on the continuing audits of U.S.-owned gold, as these audits should proof there is gold in Fort Knox. On February 25, 2015, I submitted a FOIA request in orderto obtain the audit reports drafted by the Continuing Audits Of U.S.-Owned Goldcommittee in 1975, 1976, 1978, 1979, 1982, 1983 and 1984. Submitted to: . Only one president has ever been inside -and the US Mint remains largely mum on the contents of the vault -making Fort Knox a hotbed for conspiracy theories. Fort Knox is supposedly filled with 400 oz. You can change the usage of cookies in your browser. When the mint finally produced the audit documentation, Jansen received 134 lightly redacted pages (rather than the estimated total of 1,200 pages). July 21, 2017 7:24AM. I would like to stress the importance of this failure to deliver the audit reports of 97 % of the official US gold reserves by the department directly responsible at this point in time. Then, something very strange happened in 1983. Fort Knox is home to more than 30 commands and organizations with a daytime population of about 26,260 Soldiers, civilian employees and Family members. My FOIA request had disappeared, or did it? Mnuchin said it was the first time Fort Knox opened its vaults to outsiders since a Congressional delegation and some journalists were let in to view the gold for the first time in 1974. Monetary Gold Stock of the United States At its peak, 649.6 million ounces were stored at Fort Knox on December 31, 1941. Gold verification at Fort Knox March 1998, page 2. The last time that Congress audited it was 2019. Fort Knox sits on over 100,000 acres and houses 30,000 military personnel. 'It just kind of came up as a result of a casual conversation,' McConnell said. Here is a rundown of some of Kooss key findings. Talkers Medals, Military In response to a FOIA request the US Mint has finally released reports drafted from 1993 through 2008 related to the physical audits of the US official gold reserves. By using our website, you accept that cookies are used. Even then only 5% of the examined bullion was weighed and assayed to determine its purity. But by 1986, you had 97 percent was audited. Official joint seal number 932 put in place on September 2, 1982, under the continuing audits of U.S.-owned goldstored at the Mint. Because there remains so little information about the contents of the gold vault, a lot of theories crop upregarding what's really inside Fort Knox. The U.S. gold reserves at Fort Knox are broken into different numbered compartments within the gold vault. To access the gold vault at Fort Knox, you'd need to make your way through a network of security measures. Fort . Audit report Fort Knox 1981. ALL COIN PROGRAMS, National Purple Heart Hall of The Fort Knox facilitys reputation is thanks to its world-renowned system of security measures, from countless cameras to U.S. Mint Police guards, military helicopters, land mines, fences of barbed and electric wire, and a virtually impregnable vault door. The Eisenhower Administration Conducted The Last Audit Of Fort Knox In 1953, the US Treasury Department audited Fort Knox, but only around 5% of the gold underwent testing for purity. The Mint estimated that as much as one-third of the gold reserves were examined during this period. In another dubious mix-up, a number of measurements were faulty because the auditors misread where the decimal point was on the scale. Fort Knox Operation . The reports from 1974 and 1977 weve extensively analyzed in my previous post Second Thoughts On US Official Gold Reserves Audits, published on February 9, 2015. Instead, I was advised to contact the Treasury. His advice to me was to try at the General Accounting Office (GAO) and National Archives for more reports. That shipment required a convoy of 33 15-ton trailers to move the gold. While the order is not very detailed, in the years that followed the committee started auditing gold stored at the US Mint and at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY). It was a magnificent golden sunrise that inspired visions of glory, wealth, and beauty. There has not been any movement of inventoried gold since that time. Facilities, Production All the benefits of simply switching from white to brown - AND how purple, Will El Salvador's new mega-prison turn into a bloodbath? No outside experts were allowed on the site for the audit, either, providing fodder for all kinds of conspiracy theorists. Protected by a 109,000-acre U.S. Army post in Kentucky sits one of the Federal Reserve's most secure assets and its only gold depository: the 73-year-old Fort Knox vault. Equal Employment Opportunity. random nose bleed covid. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. Fort Knox Internal Review and Audit Compliance. McConnell said he had never thought about visiting Fort Knox before, but jumped at the chance when Mnuchin offered to take him. Are you already an expert in everything America? Moreover, it showed a number of (at best) inconsistencies in how the mint conducts its bullion inspection for auditing purposes. It saves time and labor costs. It seems these 6 reports (5 documents) are the only ones currently in existence and the remaining 7 have mysteriously disappeared. 45 New Bridge Road, Singapore 059398 Singapore Questions: Donate here, Idaho House Votes to Authorize State Gold & Silver Holdings, 34 Wyoming House Members Thumb Their Noses at Sound Money, Catch-22: Rate Hikes May Fuel Even MORE Inflationary Deficit Spending, Vermont Seeks to Become 44th State to Roll Back Sales Tax on Sound Money, Mississippi Legislature Votes Overwhelmingly to End Sales Taxes on Gold and Silver, VIDEO: President of Money Metals Exchange Joins Gold Standard Podcast to Discuss Sound Money Legislation, Iowa Seeks to End Capital Gains Taxes on Gold and Silver, Mississippi Bill Would End All Taxes on, Invest State Funds in, Gold & Silver, Kentucky Lawmakers Aim to End Sales Taxes on Sound Money, Missouri Senate Votes to End Income Taxes on Gold and Silver, Hold Monetary Metals in Reserve, Legislators Seek Repeal of Wisconsins Controversial Sales Tax on Gold and Silver. Moving on to the assay tests conducted at the US Mint. noting that it was "over 20 years" since the last one. The New Year kicked off . In October 1984, 4,136,046.924 fine ounces gold was reaudited. More than half of the total reserves4,582.95 tonnes, or 147,341,870.463 fine troy ounces of goldare kept at Fort Knox, while more than 1,000 tonnes are stored at West Point and Denver each. Fort Knox is used to store a large portion of United States official gold reserves and occasionally other precious . Answer (1 of 2): Who knows but it is rumored that the majority of the gold in Fort Knox no longer exists! It basically coveredby 1986, 97 percent of the Government-owned gold held by the Mint had been audited and placed under joint seal. By also inviting the press to witness the Congressional inspection, the Mint is clearing away cobwebs and re-assuring the public that their gold is intact and safe. 97 percent of the gold was checked and sealed in an audit that ended in 1986, and annual partial audits by a third-party accounting firm continued after that, he said. From the 1985 report: Atthe congressional hearing in 2011 the IG stated to be 100 % certain all gold stored by the Mint was inventoried and audited, yet his department had accessto only a fraction (4) of all audit reports (13). From the 1985 report: In fiscal year 1985 audits of Government-owned gold were conducted at the United States Mint in Denver and the United States Bullion Depository in Fort Knox, Kentucky. Each and every bar there should be assayed in a full, independent audit. Koos Jansen. In addition to facilities in West Point and Denver, the Fort Knox facilityknown as the U.S. Bullion Depositorystands out for its reputation as an impenetrable fortress. . 35 % first buy in bonus! This effort to audit the Fort Knox gold, the Federal Reserve, and its policies toward gold is now carried on by the younger Paul, Rand, who currently serves as a U.S. Senator from Kentucky, where Fort Knox is located. Government-owned Goldare not in our collection." "The last time anybody went in to see the gold, other than the Fort Knox people, was in 1974 when there was a congressional visit. In an audit conducted at Fort Knox in 1953, 88 ingots were counted for verification. The last time any gold was removed from deep storage at Fort Knox came in 1971, when $500 million worth of gold was delivered to the New York Assay Office. Fort Knox, Kentucky is an Army base with more than one hundred thousand acres stretching across three counties. Buffalo Coins, American Eagle Not that it would be easy to even make it this far, but the door to the vault is made of steel and . The missing audit reports and assay reports feed into our skepticism. However, no outside experts were allowed in during the audit, and only about 5% of the gold was actually tested. Fort Knox is in Romeo (R) time. The audits were conducted in accordance with the revised audit guidelines that required a statistical sample of gold melts within randomly selected compartments at the facilities. Dollars, Native Gold verification at Fort Knox March 1998, page 1. Hisstatement 100 percent of the U.S. Governments gold reserves in the custody of the Mint has been inventoried and audited is impossible to confirm, as well see later on. McConnell was part of a delegation of Kentucky politicians allowed inside the United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox for the first time since 1974. A movie producer before becoming treasury secretary, Mnuchin told a group of Louisville business leaders earlier in the day it was important for him to see the gold to attest that 'it is part of our national assets. Coincidentally almost all the gold assayed by the OIG from 2004 2008 was 9999 fine. One of last year's uproars was the decision by US officials to carry out an audit of these gold vaults. 26 Feb 2017 13:18. For the first time photographing is being permitted inside the Depository.. And we attempted to contact a records management officer at the Treasury Department, but did not receive a reply as of the date of this letter. The monetary gold stock of the United States totals 276.0 million fine troy ounces valued at $11.7 billion at the official rate of $42.2222 per fine troy ounce, and is stored in various federal depositories (table attached), the largest of which is at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Contact Us. Determined to uncover more about the bullion stockpile, BullionStars Koos Jansen submitted a number of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to the U.S. Mint. 147.4 million fine troy ounces, valued at $6.2 billion, is stored in 13 vault compartments at Fort Knox Bullion Depository. In 1936, Fort Knox military base was chosen as the site to build a bullion depository to store this gold.