When the International Monetary Fund said several months ago that it would auction off 403.3 tonnes of gold, the presumed buyer in most people's minds was China, which is desperate to diversify its reserves away from U.S. dollars. Instead, it was India that snapped up 200 tonnes from the IMF. So who will buy the rest of the IMF gold? According to Morgan Stanley analysts Peter Richardson, Jeremy Friesen and Hussein Allidina, China is still the most obvious buyer. In a note to clients, they pointed out that buying the remaining IMF gold would raise Chinese holdings by as much as 19%, based on the 1,054 tonnes of Chinese reserves reported in April. [Read more...]