NYT Investigation: U.S. Mint Bought Drug Cartel Gold and Sold It as 'American'
The finding
A New York Times investigation, traced over months by three reporters, concludes that the U.S. Mint has been buying gold sourced from foreign pawn shops and drug-cartel-controlled mines — and reselling it stamped as 'American'. With gold prices at record highs, the industry's compliance guardrails have, in the Times' words, 'broken down'.
How the supply chain works
1. Cartel-run illegal mines extract gold inside Colombia, sometimes within earshot of military bases.
2. The metal is laundered through pawn shops and small refiners in Latin America, the Middle East and the U.S.
3. Major U.S. refiners sell to the Mint, which by law is supposed to source domestically.
4. Coins and bars are sold to retail and institutional buyers as U.S.-origin.
Reporters say they directly observed an industrial-scale cartel mine inside the perimeter of a Colombian military base; officers denied it existed.
Why it matters
- Law: The Mint is governed by 'Buy American' procurement rules; the report alleges those rules are routinely circumvented via paper trails.
- Sanctions: Some of the smelters in the chain have previously been flagged by Treasury for trade-based money laundering.
- Markets: Sustained record gold prices give cartel-mined output a new economic gravity that the existing compliance system was not built for.
What's next
Expect congressional questions, Treasury and Mint statements, and a possible audit of recent Mint procurement. Refiners named in the chain will be under sustained pressure from institutional buyers — pension funds and central banks — to disclose suppliers.
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