Did You Hear the One About Chiasso

So two Japanese guys were stopped at the Italian border with Chiasso, Switzerland. Some reports said that the two gentlemen worked for the Japanese finance ministry. In either case, they were found with $134 billion in U.S. Treasury bonds. This happened in June of 2009; but, I just now got around to writing about it.

The United States was called in to verify if they were real and there seems to be some confusing and conflicting data on the answer. Eventually the government said that they were probably fakes, probably.

Oh, the two men, we don't know who they were and they were allowed to leave. In fact, nothing has been said what became of the two. I find that a little odd. Each bond was for about $500 million. Now, who could you possibly sell them to, anyone would verify that they were good before accepting them. The total dollar amount is staggering and there is no way to use them without them being verified first.

In 2009 two Philippine nationals were stopped with $180 billion in U.S. Treasury bonds and then in 2011 in Italy, six people were caught with $20 billion in U.S. Treasury Bonds. What is interesting about the Italian case is that the people involved are being charged with receiving stolen goods. Doesn't that mean that the bonds were real?

So what are we supposed to believe? What the heck is going on. Either all the bonds are fake, in which case you have to ask why anyone would bother faking them or the bonds are real in which case, who could possibly think to move such amounts of money? While Glen Beck mentioned the Chiasso incident on his show, it failed to get any real attention in the mainstream media.