Sunday, May 22, 2011
7 Fascinating facts about gold – and why they matter
Before we get into why they matters, and actually influence gold prices globally, here are seven interesting facts about gold.
1. There are only 165,000 metric tonnes of gold in existence above ground.
Gold is rare. If every single ounce of this gold were placed next to each other, the resulting cube of pure gold would only measure 20 metres in each direction. This includes all the gold in museums, all the gold in central bank vaults, all the gold jewelry in the world…and every other scrap of gold in existence.
2. The world’s first international gold currency was created in 564 BC.
King Croesus is credited with the issuing the first true gold coins Their uniform gold content allowed ‘Croesids’ to become widely recognised and traded. That said, they were made of electrum, a naturally occurring pale yellow alloy of gold and silver.
But the point here not their purity, but the fact that he took gold and turned it into money. And it has been money ever since.
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