Loading ...This will be almost impossible after 80 years. To verify the gold requires:
a) physical presence. OK, this bit is easy. You count the bars. You weigh the bars. You scan the bars. You record serial numbers or marks. And at the end of a few months of hard slog (no using AI, algorithms or any other whizzo techniques) you have lists of bars which confirm yes sirreeee, we have 4,529 tons of the finest 24ct gold you ever did see and some magnificent biceps (you will have physically lifted, several times, about 350,000 400 oz bars). A piece of cake.
b) ownership. This bit is not easy, and may be impossible. You need to verify that a bar with a serial number stamped on it of P68445231 is owned by the US Treasury (or whoever). How, as in transfer of ownership (cash, payment in kind, transfer from foreign power) did the UST acquire it? So firstly when did it first appear in Ft Knox? How do we know that it was then owned by the UST and not stored on behalf of someone? And if it the UST can prove that it owned it in 1946, or 1957 or whenever it arrived, then the UST has to prove that it hasn’t been lent, leased or otherwise compromised since then. This requires rigorous systems in place, a solid paper trail for each bar. Every single one of the 350,000 bars needs to be individually traced back to when the UST first acquired it. This could go back to the nineteenth century.
c) integrity. This is where whizzo techniques can help, to show that the serial number is unique. It might also show if the bar was ever stored somewhere else. If P68445231 was in a London vault at any time, when was it moved? Who owned it then? If not the UST, where’s the paperwork transferring it to the UST?
So it’s not a simple as opening up the 15(?) vaults at FK and seeing hundreds of thousands of bars. That means nothing. Oh, and auditors usually work on assumptions involving reasonable certainty or statistical probabilities. Faced with 15 pyramids of coal weighing 5,000 tonnes you test the density, measure the height and base of the cone and agree with management that yep, you’ve got 5,000 tonnes plus/minus 320 tonnes which in the overall context of the company accounts is an acceptable estimate. Not here. Each one needs to be proven. As I think this will be impossible, then the ultimate action will be to pass a law through Congress authorising the UST to advertise internationally the serial numbers that cannot be proven, asking anyone with a claim on them to come forward within three months or lose it forever.
The audit is essential. But it will take years.