Because of its scarcity and perfect natural attributes, gold has long been regarded as a symbol of wealth and has been playing an important role in the development and changes of the international monetary and financial system. In the gold standard period, gold is the representative of a country's economic strength. The more gold, the stronger its purchasing power and strength, so European colonialists will grab gold everywhere. From 65438 to the beginning of the 09 th century, the gold standard system and the Jinyuan standard system were implemented, and the aristocratic status of gold entered its heyday. Until most of the 20th century, gold has been acting as the world currency, active in economic circulation and international financial markets. After the Jamaica Agreement 1978 came into effect, the status of gold as a world currency was cancelled at the institutional level, but it did not mean that the monetary function of gold disappeared in real life. Just as Keynes cursed the gold standard as a "barbaric relic", he had to admit that gold was "the last guard and reserve in an emergency, and there was no better substitute". Today, the charm of gold is still reflected in its functions of money, and it still plays a huge role in the modern financial system, especially in ensuring national economic security.

1 Fully understand the position and role of gold in national economic security.

1) gold will remain the basis for countries to maintain their monetary system and their confidence in it for a long time to come. The reserve function of gold will still be of special significance and an important guarantee for national economic security.

Although in today's economic situation, gold is no longer used as a universal equivalent to measure the value of other commodities, central banks still regard gold reserves as an important part of foreign exchange assets in their balance sheets and remain the largest holder of the world's gold stock. As the world's international reserve assets, gold still maintains a fairly high proportion. According to the statistics of China Gold Association, the official world gold reserve in September of 20 1 1 year was 30707. 1t, accounting for 2 1.93% of the total gold stock of 140000t that has been mined at present. In the United States, Germany, Italy and France, gold reserves account for more than 50% of all foreign exchange reserves (table 1). This shows that gold still has reserve value, and a considerable proportion exists in the financial field. The central bank can adjust the diversity of its international reserves and balance of payments through the international gold market. In the domestic market, we can also adjust the base money supply by buying and selling gold. In addition to political purposes, an important consideration for reserving gold is to strengthen the security and independence of the country in the current international monetary system and ensure that the liquidity and value of the reserve currency are not limited by the will of other countries.

Table 1 Top countries, regions and organizations in the world 10

Note: The information source is the World Gold Council.

Although some countries are considering reassessing their gold reserves, the reduction of gold reserves worldwide is not large, and many countries often use gold throughput to balance their foreign exchange receipts and payments. Although the euro and the dollar are the two strongest currencies in the world, gold is still an important asset for countries that do not use the euro and the dollar. Having the world's largest gold reserve is the basis for the strength of the US dollar. Once the dollar weakens, gold may once again evolve into a tool to stabilize the exchange rate. Facts have proved that some countries sometimes obtain foreign exchange by selling gold when they are short of foreign exchange or need to import a lot, or sell some or all of the gold they produce as the main source of foreign exchange income, such as South Africa, and sometimes 5 1% of foreign exchange income comes from selling gold. In addition, under the premise of full marketization of gold, the exchange rate is linked to the gold reserve, which can prevent the risk of inflation and the sharp fluctuation of the US dollar and the euro.

2) Gold is a safe haven for financial crisis and the best hedging tool to deal with serious emergencies such as social unrest, war and natural disasters.

In today's period when the dollar and euro are strong, gold is greatly eclipsed, but this is based on the good economic growth momentum of the United States. However, there is a huge bubble in the American economy, especially in its stock market. Historical facts have proved that gold is the best hedging tool in the event of serious emergencies, such as financial crisis, social unrest and war. A major financial crisis will make the common currency depreciate rapidly, while the gold standard currency will operate safely. Once the American economy is in crisis and the dollar is hit hard, gold can avoid risks.

From 65438 to 0997, an event was destined to be written into the world financial history-South Korea's "donating money to save the country", which triggered people's re-understanding of the value of gold. 1997 the Asian financial turmoil swept through southeast Asia. Wherever the storm went, the wealth of the rich "shrunk", the poor were poorer, the local currency depreciated sharply, the property price fell by half, and the works of art were even more neglected ... Strangely, only the gold handed down from ancestors and the gold ring bought at the wedding survived the financial storm, and the price of gold denominated in local currency more than doubled compared with that before the crisis. In the financial turmoil, foreign exchange reserves of various countries were exhausted, making it difficult for countries to make payments. Gold once again revealed the true face of "a hero in troubled times". People see on TV that South Korea, from the president to the common people, from the gold ingot at the bottom of the wardrobe to the necklace around its neck, is "donating money to save the country". In just a few months, South Korea raised 700 tons of gold from the people, worth more than 7 billion US dollars, which eased the balance of payments of South Korea and the won began to stabilize.

After the "9. 1 1" incident in the United States, the international gold price rose rapidly by more than 20 dollars. Subsequently, the international gold price embarked on a road of no return, hitting a 24-and-a-half-year high, and gold became a high-profile safe-haven asset choice.

Since 2005, the most striking thing is probably the instability of the international situation. The deadly bombings of three luxury hotels in London, Jakarta, Indonesia, Helmand province in southern Afghanistan and Amman, Jordan all caused the international gold price to rise sharply. However, the market worried about the inflationary pressure faced by the United States after Hurricane Katrina, and bought gold to hedge, thus pushing the international gold price to rise against the trend. Since 2008, the debt crisis in Greece, Portugal, Spain and other European countries has been spreading, and the debt crisis in the United States has once warmed up, making the price of gold hit record highs. All countries in the world regard gold reserves as an important means to prevent domestic inflation and regulate the market. Gold is still an important tool for countries to cope with the financial crisis and improve the balance of payments.

20 1 1 gold price showed a rapid upward trend. 20 1 1 In July, the international gold price once broke through the 1900 USD/oz mark, and it is still above 1600 USD/oz, so is the domestic gold price. The gold trading price of Shanghai Gold Exchange is 2060.

It can be seen that all countries in the world regard gold reserves as an important means to prevent domestic inflation and regulate the market, and gold is still an important tool for countries to cope with the financial crisis and improve the balance of payments.

Increase China's gold reserves to ensure national economic security.

By the end of 20 10 and 12, China's foreign exchange reserves stood at $28,473.38, ranking first in the world. However, from the perspective of reserve assets, the structure is relatively simple, and even in the current situation of the depreciation of the US dollar, it is still dominated by US dollar assets. These foreign exchange reserves are mainly US government bonds. According to the published data, gold reserves are about 1054. 1 t, accounting for 1.6% of foreign exchange reserves, which is lower than the general standard of 3% ~ 5% adopted by other developed countries. Increasing gold reserves is a major event involving national economic security. Especially when the RMB continues to appreciate against the US dollar, the United States has been holding down the appreciation of the RMB, which will lead to the shrinking of foreign exchange reserves. In the case that all countries' currencies will depreciate, our government is bound to increase the proportion of gold reserves. With the substantial increase of China's foreign exchange reserves, it is an inevitable trend to increase the proportion of China's gold reserves.

First of all, from the perspective of maintaining and increasing value, we should strengthen the diversification of China's foreign exchange reserve structure, including increasing the proportion of gold reserves. In the historical period when the dollar gradually withdrew from the role of the world currency, if no other country's currency can replace the dollar as the new world currency, gold will surely regain the throne of the world currency. It shows that the share of gold in the hard currency reserves of various countries will become larger and larger. The price of gold (relative to other countries' currencies) will continue to rise, and the later it rises, the faster it will rise. Therefore, before other countries sell dollars and buy gold, establishing large-scale gold reserves as soon as possible is not only related to the country's major economic interests, but also has significant strategic interests. Because, "in the long run, the structural share of the country's foreign exchange reserves to ensure financial security should increase the proportion of gold reserves, which is safer than increasing the monetary assets of any country." Because once the dollar depreciates sharply, China's foreign exchange reserves will shrink sharply, and China's economy will suffer a heavy blow.

Secondly, with the rising status of RMB as an international currency, its exchange rate system will be gradually liberalized. In order to maintain the important position of RMB in the international currency market and maintain its relative stability, there will be a certain amount of gold support. Moreover, with the gradual realization of the free floating and convertibility of RMB exchange rate, gold, as a natural international currency, will become an important part of the asset portfolio of residents and institutions and become the main choice for people to preserve and hedge. At present, due to the rising inflationary pressure, RMB appreciation and other factors, people begin to consider the issue of asset preservation and hedging. In the future asset portfolio, people will allocate assets in RMB assets, foreign exchange assets and gold. Private storage of gold also meets the needs of national economic security.

3. Intensify the exploration and development of gold minerals to meet the national demand for gold to the greatest extent.

1) In the 20th century, gold has always been a hot spot in global exploration and development, and has been highly valued by governments all over the world.

Since the 1970s, the gold industry has been the most attractive industry, and the investment in gold exploration in various countries has been increasing, which has set off a gold-seeking upsurge all over the world. Gold exploration investment has always ranked first in solid mineral exploration investment, so it is also the largest number of newly discovered minerals in recent years.

In recent years, many countries have introduced new mining policies, strengthened the management of gold exploration and development, highlighted the strategic position of state-owned gold resources, and restricted or even prohibited foreign investment in exploration and development. For example, Russia, Venezuela and other countries restrict or even close the door to foreign investment in their own gold fields. At the beginning of 2005, the Russian government published the first list of strategic minerals, including gold. In fact, in the past seven years, Russia was not allowed to auction any large natural resource producing areas.

2) The situation of gold exploration and development in China is good, and the gold industry has entered a rapid development track and made great achievements. However, the sustainable development also faces problems such as the shortage of reserve resources.

Since the Eighth Five-Year Plan, half of China's solid mineral exploration costs have been invested in gold, and its reserves and output have increased substantially, making it one of the major gold-producing countries in the world. By the end of 20 10, gold reserves ranked third in the world, and gold production ranked first in the world for four consecutive years. However, due to insufficient capital investment, geological prospecting is difficult, and there is still a big gap between the newly added proven resources/reserves and the resources/reserves consumed by mines every year. According to the statistics of National Mineral Resources/Reserves Bulletin, China's gold reserves/resources show a downward trend, and the static guarantee degree of gold geological resources is less than 6 years, which seriously threatens the sustainable development of gold industry. The urgent task is to speed up exploration and increase reserves.

It is an inevitable trend to increase the proportion of China's gold reserves. Every increase of one percentage point means buying 400 t gold; If the gold reserve ratio is raised from the current 1.6% to the international average level of 10%, more than 3,000 tons of gold will need to be purchased. At the same time, the demand for private gold is on the rise, and the difference between supply and demand reaches 20% ~ 30%. All these put forward higher requirements for the current and future gold industry.

When formulating the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, the state has listed gold as a strategic resource and a specific mineral subject to protective mining, emphasizing its extremely important role in the national economy. During the 11th Five-Year Plan period, policies have been introduced to impose new restrictions on foreign investment in gold. The contents related to gold exploration and mining in the Catalogue of Industries Directed by Foreign Investment have been adjusted, and the original encouraging projects such as "Mining and Selection of Low-grade and Refractory Metallurgical Mines (limited to joint ventures and cooperation, and foreign investors can be solely invested in the western region)" have been modified to be limited to joint ventures and cooperation, and the contents of "Foreign investors can be solely invested in the western region" have been cancelled. It highlights the strategic significance of gold in national economic security.

At a time when the world geological prospecting work is in an active start, China should overcome the impact and crisis caused by the depletion of exploration resources, seize the opportunity, strengthen gold exploration, maintain the sustainable development of the gold industry, and change the world ranking of China's gold resources 15.

(Written by Qing Min)