# Think Tank > Austrian Economics / Economic Theory >  Trump Fed pick wants to revive the gold standard. Is this true?

## Cleaner44

I didn't see this posted yet. I doubt this will happen, but I am glad to see it being considered. Has anyone else heard about this?

*Trump Fed pick wants to revive the gold standard. Here's what that means*
As President Donald Trump named his picks to fill two influential seats on the Federal Reserve's Board of Governors, the price of gold surged. That may be because one of the them, Judy Shelton, is a believer in the return to the gold standard, a money policy abandoned by the U.S. in 1971.

Shelton is raising eyebrows among mainstream economists for her views, which include slashing the Fed's benchmark rate to zero and pegging the value of the dollar to gold prices. She's not the first Trump pick for the Fed to advocate a return to the gold standard, with his two previous failed Fed choices -- Stephen Moore and Herman Cain -- also advocating for a revival of the policy.

In picking Shelton, Mr. Trump is aiming to place a supporter on the Federal Reserve, which he's argued is slowing economic growth and depressing the stock market by keeping interest rates too high. The Fed currently is maintaining its benchmark rate in a range of 2.25% to 2.5%, but Shelton has said she wants to lower rates "as fast, as efficiently, as expeditiously as possible." 
_More at link_
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trumps-...ard-explained/

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## Warrior_of_Freedom

i'm pretty sure they'd put a bullet in him before letting him do that if it's true

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## PAF

March 11, 2019


Investors will soon be able to buy gold and stocks in the form of cryptocurrency, the same way they might buy Bitcoin.

Paxos, a New York-based firm that already offers a dollar-backed cryptocurrency (known as a stablecoin) as well as Bitcoin trading services, plans to introduce digital tokens backed by precious metals and publicly traded stocks sometime in 2019.

The company launched its stablecoin, Paxos Standard, six months ago by tying cash reserves to a blockchain—a digital ledger of transactions that is the backbone of any cryptocurrency. Now, it wants to take “any type of asset and put it into a blockchain,” Paxos CEO Chad Cascarilla told Fortune’s “Balancing the Ledger.” The goal is to move assets and settle transactions more quickly and securely and with lower fees, he added.


In order to make it work, Paxos has to ensure that it holds the same amount of inventory—whether that’s dollars, precious metals, or stocks—in the “real world” as are registered on the blockchain. “How you do it with a gold token is how much gold you have in a vault equals how many gold tokens outstanding,” Cascarilla explained. “How do you do it with stocks? How many stocks do I have sitting in an account, equals how many stocks in the blockchain.”

Closest to reality is likely the tokenization of stock market equities and bonds, assets which Paxos has already successfully tested in blockchain transactions, Cascarilla said. “We’re getting pretty close, and I think we’ll see it in 2019.”


Cascarilla believes Paxos is the only cryptocurrency company with an account at the Depository Trust Company, which holds the vast majority of U.S. stocks and bonds, positioning the firm to potentially become the first to bring stock trading to the blockchain. Still, Paxos, which was the first virtual currency company to be licensed in New York, needs additional approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission before it can roll out cryptocurrencies tied to more traditional securities. It’s currently awaiting that approval—something the lengthy government shutdown did not help speed along.

Putting commodities on the blockchain is also underway, and “gold is probably the most obvious,” Cascarilla said, adding that it would be introduced “definitely this year.”

Tokenizing precious metals opens up new possibilities that are currently physically difficult—such as dividing up a gold bar into smaller denominations, transporting heavy quantities more easily, or lending the assets out more efficiently, Cascarilla explained. “Having it sit in a vault but also having it be on a blockchain kind of bridges those two worlds,” he said.


https://fortune.com/2019/03/11/gold-...ks-blockchain/

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## Zippyjuan

> I didn't see this posted yet. I doubt this will happen, but I am glad to see it being considered. Has anyone else heard about this?
> 
> *Trump Fed pick wants to revive the gold standard. Here's what that means*
> As President Donald Trump named his picks to fill two influential seats on the Federal Reserve's Board of Governors, the price of gold surged. That may be because one of the them, Judy Shelton, is a believer in the return to the gold standard, a money policy abandoned by the U.S. in 1971.
> 
> Shelton is raising eyebrows among mainstream economists for her views, which include slashing the Fed's benchmark rate to zero and pegging the value of the dollar to gold prices. She's not the first Trump pick for the Fed to advocate a return to the gold standard, with his two previous failed Fed choices -- Stephen Moore and Herman Cain -- also advocating for a revival of the policy.
> 
> In picking Shelton, Mr. Trump is aiming to place a supporter on the Federal Reserve, which he's argued is slowing economic growth and depressing the stock market by keeping interest rates too high. The Fed currently is maintaining its benchmark rate in a range of 2.25% to 2.5%, but Shelton has said she wants to lower rates "as fast, as efficiently, as expeditiously as possible." 
> _More at link_
> https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trumps-...ard-explained/


Only Congress can adopt a gold standard for the US.  Trump likes her not for that but her promise to drop interest rates to zero as quick as possible- and inflate the money supply to juice the economy so Trump looks amazing. That is contradictory to a gold standard which is supposed to make inflating the money supply more difficult.  She also wrote an OpEd in the Wall Street Journal supporting a North American version of the EU with a single currency  and open borders throughout the US, Canada, and Mexico titled "North America Does Not Need Borders".

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## Zippyjuan

> i'm pretty sure they'd* put a bullet in him* before letting him do that if it's true


Judy Shelton is a "her"- not a "him".

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## r3volution 3.0

She appear to be a political opportunist.




> During the Obama years, she criticized the Federal Reserve’s low interest rates.[11][12][13]  During the Trump presidency, she advocated for the Federal Reserve to  adopt lower interest rates as a form of economic stimulus. (Trump  frequently criticized the Federal Reserve for not lowering interest  rates.)[11][14][2]
> 
> ...Before Trump became president, she was a longtime advocate for free  trade, but after he became president, she supported his administration's  trade war with China.[4][10]
> 
> ...In 2019, she said that she hoped for a new Bretton Woods-style conference where countries would agree to return to the gold standard, saying, "If it takes place at Mar-a-Lago that would be great."[19] Mar-a-Lago is a club run by President Trump.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Shelton

And she's currently calling for a 50 bps rate cut. 

In short...




> Is this true?


No

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## Zippyjuan

> [FONT=verdana][SIZE=2]She appear to be a political opportunist.
> 
> 
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Shelton
> 
> And she's currently calling for a 50 bps rate cut. 
> 
> In short...
> ...


Trump - the Flip Flopper In Chief- was also critical of the Fed lowering rates while Obama was president.  Now he wants them even lower.

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## r3volution 3.0

> Trump - the Flip Flopper In Chief- was also critical of the Fed lowering rates while Obama was president.  Now he wants them even lower.


...which was after he endorsed QE and ZIRP a few years earlier. 



It went something like this:

c. 2008-2011 - "Der, people needz deh moneys, not enough moneys, Fed give dem moneys!"

c. 2011-2017 - "Teh FOX says Fed helping Obama, I Republican now and no like Obama, Fed bad to help!"

c. 2017-present - "Now I needs deh moneys, to builds deh walls, Fed give me deh moneys!"

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