Long time ago one of my economic mentors taught me, “Watch what the other hand is doing” when viewing politics. Take for instance Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. He is getting news about his military moves in Syria, but what else is he doing? Something that will have ramifications on the U.S. dollar. Economic Policy Journal has the piece:

Russian central bank governor, Elvira Nabiullina spoke about Russia’s gold and foreign currency reserves on Friday saying Russia intended building them up to $500 billion in the coming years,reports GoldSeek.

She confirmed that Russia continues to see gold reserves as an important monetary  asset – in her words as a “financial cushion.”

According to Russian news agency TASS, Nabiullina said: “Regarding gold and foreign currency reserves, we have the desired benchmark of $500 billion, and not in the three-year term, it could be 5-7 years and more.”

Russia currently has approx, $50 billion in gold reserves.