Euro crisis: only root-and-branch financial reform can tame the wolf pack

Source: Guardian

In times of crisis, the complex world of international finance clings to a very old-fashioned store of wealth for reassurance: gold.

The price of this precious metal shot up during the great banking crash of 2008 and hit new highs again last week amid investor fears that the next wave of the financial maelstrom could pull apart the eurozone and flatten our faltering economic recovery.

It is not just professional investors who are worried. Bullion traders report a sharp increase in demand from ordinary savers. Refineries in South Africa say they are overwhelmed by orders from Germany for Krugerrand gold coins. The Austrian mint says it ran out of its stock of similar coins last week, as the price of an ounce of gold broke through €1,000 (£850) for the first time.

In countries scarred by memories of hyper-inflation in the 1930s, the search for an alternative to the plummeting euro is understandable.

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Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/may/16/euro-crisis-financial-reform