On March 31, the Basel III regulation takes effect. It's got nothing to do with Baselworld, which will actually happen soon, from March 21 to 26. In or blog message from February 9, we mentioned it.

 

So, Basel III. We'll briefly sum it up, with a few personal comments. It's all about a rule that seeks to regulate banks' solvency, or sanity if you will.

 

Every bank needs reserve capital. The more, the better the institution can resist a crisis situation. In order to estimate how healthy a bank is, Basel I to III contain several directives. But at the end of this month, there will be a very important change. Until now, gold only counted at a 50 % rate and now, just like cash, this will become 100 %. What's with those percentages? High-risk investments and similar loans get 'bad grades'.

 

Finally, gold gets the credit it deserves. Big banks, particularly national banks, are currently stocking up on gold, at favourable prices. OK, there will always be rate fluctuations, but unlike shares, for example, gold can never be worth zero. Far from it. So it's still a good choice to invest part of your capital.

 

Banks aren't really generous when it comes to this information. For whatever reason, they refuse to sell gold to their customers. The investor then often gets more high-risk and / or less profitable bank products on a plate. A golden one? A gilded one, at most...