Talk:Gold standard

Dates of adoption of a gold standard

• 1717: Kingdom of Great Britain 'de facto' following Isaac Newton's revision of the mint ratio, at 21 shillings to a guinea of 129.438 grains (8.38 g), 22 karat crown gold.
• 1760: The Bremen thaler gold worth 1⁄5th a gold pistole of 6.0 g fine gold; the only state within the German Confederacy to introduce the gold standard before the introduction of the 1873 mark.
• 1821: United Kingdom de jure at 20 shillings (£1) to a sovereign of 123.27447 grains (7.98805 g), 22 karat gold.
• 1854: Portugal at 1000 réis to 1.62585 g gold.
• 1858: Canadian dollar, at par with the U.S. gold dollar (1.50463 g gold), and with the British gold sovereign worth $4.862⁄3.
• 1865: Newfoundland, the only country in the British Empire to introduce its own gold coin apart from the British gold sovereign.
• 1873: German Empire at 2,790 Marks (ℳ) to 1 kg gold.
• 1873: United States dollar de facto from bimetallic to gold only, at 1.50463 g gold or 20.67 dollars to 1 troy oz (31.1 g) gold. See Coinage Act of 1873.
• 1873: Latin Monetary Union (Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, France), from bimetallic to gold only, at 31 francs to 9.0 g gold
• 1875: Scandinavian monetary union (Denmark, Norway and Sweden) at 2,480 kroner to 1 kg gold.
• 1875: Dutch guilder at 0.6048 g gold.
• 1876: Spain at 31 pesetas to 9.0 g gold.
• 1878: Grand Duchy of Finland at 31 marks to 9.0 g gold.
• 1881: Argentina at 1 peso to 1.4516 g gold.
• 1885: Egypt.
• 1892: Austrian Empire at 3,280 Austro-Hungarian kronen to 1 kg gold.
• 1897: Russia at 31 rubles to 24.0 g gold.
• 1897: Japan at 1 yen devalued to 0.75 g gold.
• 1898: India at £1 to 15 Indian rupees.
• 1900: United States, de jure (see Gold Standard Act).
• 1903: The Philippines at US$1 = 2 pesos.
• 1905: Mexico at 1 peso to 0.75 g gold.
• 1906: The Straits dollar at £1 to 84⁄7 dollars.
• 1908: Siam Gold Exchange/pound sterling.

References

English POV

Based on French franc, I gather that since 1800, France has been on the gold standard, using a bimetallic standard where silver was used for small change. Even timeline in the discussion fails to note that. Similarly, the Spanish real page indicates that Spain has been using a fixed gold equivalent for its currency since 1566, when the value of silver was also fixed. Can anyone improve the article, so that a reader could understand how did Newton's bimetallism innovated beyond the Spanish bimetallism, and why was the British pound more of a gold standard than the gold napoleons? As is, it seems the article was written with a British POV.

A bimetallic standard is not the same thing as a gold standard. France was on a bimetallic standard from 1803, and only transitioned to a de facto gold standard in the 1870s. Spain made the same move around the same time. What is significant about Newton's bimetallism is that it relatively overvalued gold such that silver disappeared from circulation, which created a de facto gold standard. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Farberbob (talk • contribs) 01:04, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

Reignition of Gold Standard

Hello! I don't see any mention in this article about current advocate of the gold standard Keith Weiner and his company Monetary Metals which pays a yield on gold, paid in gold, in an attempt to give individuals and institutions a way to start their own personal gold standard. Should this be noted on this page as the most recent attempt by a private company to restart a gold based ecosystem? The first Gold Bond in 87 years would be noteworthy for this page I would think? Gold good (talk) 22:10, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

I think that the actions of a private company are not in scope for this page Uneverstop learning (talk) 09:47, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

ongoing issues with bias and the Great Depression

This article has ongoing issues with the gold standard as a cause of the Great Depression section and removal of contrasting view points. I think this doesn't belong on this page and the whole of the "In the United States" section should be moved to the Bretton Woods system article this article should be dedicated to the general concept and historical use of gold as a medium of trade. what are others thoughts on this?

links to relevant past talk topics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_6#Great_Depression https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_6#Neutral_Point_of_View https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_6#Some_of_the_text_in_Great_Depression_section_has_nothing_to_do_with_gold_standard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_6#Reversion_of_my_edit_about_disagreements_with_the_view_that_the_gold_standard_caused_the_great_depression https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#Neutrality_flag_added https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#Article_needs_to_be_tagged_as_biased https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#%22some_economists%22_and_lengthening_of_Great_Depression https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#POV_tag_added https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#Yet_more_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gold_standard/Archive_4#Fringe_opinion Uneverstop learning (talk) 08:25, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

Zimbabwe and its dubious reignition of the gold standard

The new Zimbabwean currency, the ZiG, doesn't appear to be a gold standard currency by any definition. It cannot be redeemed for gold (unlike classical gold standards), has no gold reserve requirement (unlike pre-2000 Switzerland), and has no fixed value against gold (unlike the USA under the Bretton Woods system). The language the Zimbabwean government has used is that its currency is "gold backed". What this effectively means is that the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, which issues the ZiG, also holds gold to protect the value of the currency. The problem with defining "gold standard" this way is that most countries have gold reserves held by the treasury or central bank for this purpose. Farberbob (talk) 01:23, 24 April 2026 (UTC)