The London Gold Pool was the pooling of gold reserves by a group of eight central banks in the United States and seven European countries that agreed on 1 November 1961 to cooperate in maintaining the Bretton Woods System of fixed-rate convertible currencies and defending a gold price of US$35 per troy ounce by interventions in the London gold market. The central banks coordinated concerted methods of gold sales to balance spikes in the market price of gold as determined by the London morning gold fixing while buying gold on price weaknesses. The United States provided 50% of the required gold supply for sale. The price controls were successful for six years until the system became unworkable. The pegged price of gold was too low, and after runs on gold, the British pound, and the US dollar occurred, France decided to withdraw from the pool. The London Gold Pool collapsed in March 1968. The London Gold Pool controls were followed with an effort to suppress the gold price with a two-tier system of official exchange and open market transactions, but this gold window collapsed in 1971 with the Nixon Shock, and resulted in the onset of the gold bull market which saw the price of gold appreciate rapidly to US$850 in 1980.
Gold price regulation In July 1944, before the conclusion of World War II, delegates from the 44 allied nations gathered in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, to reestablish and regulate the international financial systems. The meeting resulted in the founding of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), and was followed by other post-war reconstruction efforts, such as establishing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). The IMF was charged with the maintenance of a system of international currency exchange rates which became known as the Bretton Woods system. Foreign exchange market rates were fixed, but adjustments were allowed when necessary. Currencies were required to be convertible. For this purpose, all currencies had to be backed by either physical gold reserves, or a currency convertible into gold. The United States dollar was recognized as the world's reserve currency, as the anchor currency of the system. The price of one troy ounce of gold was pegged to US$35. This agreement did not affect the independent global or regional markets in which gold was traded as a precious metal commodity. There was still an open gold market. For the Bretton Woods system to remain effective, the fix of the dollar to gold would have to be adjustable, or the free market price of gold would have to be maintained near the $35 official foreign exchange price. The larger the gap, known as the gold window, between free market gold price and the foreign exchange rate, the more tempting it was for nations to deal with internal economic crises by buying gold at the Bretton Woods price and selling it in the gold markets. The Bretton Woods system was challenged by several crises. As the economic post-war upswing proceeded, international trade and foreign exchange reserves rose, while the gold supply increased only marginally. In the recessions of the 1950s, the US had to convert vast amounts of gold, and the Bretton Woods system suffered increasing breakdowns due to US payment imbalances. After oil import quotas and restrictions on trade outflows were insufficient, by 1960, targeted efforts began to maintain the Bretton Woods system and to enforce the US$35 per ounce gold valuation. Late in 1960, amidst US presidential election debates, panic buying of gold led to a surge in price to over US$40 per oz, resulting in agreements between the US Federal Reserve and the Bank of England to stabilize the price by allocating for sale substantial gold supplies held by the Bank of England. The United States sought means of ending the drain on its gold reserves. In November 1961, eight nations agreed on a system of regulating the price of gold and defending the $35/oz price through measures of targeted selling and buying of gold on the world markets. For this purpose each nation provided a contribution of the precious metal into the London Gold Pool, led by the United States pledging to match all other contributions on a one-to-one basis, and thus contributing 50% of the pool.
Member contributions The members of the London Gold Pool and their initial gold contributions in tonnes (and USD equivalents) to the gold pool were:
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