COMMODITIES: Get Ready! Get Set! Gold!

Beginning this week, Americans can buy, hold and trade gold bullion for the first time since Franklin Roosevelt banned private ownership of the yellow metal 41 years ago. The lifting of the ban, effective Dec. 31, is surely the most passionately awaited marketing event since Repeal reopened the nation's borders to the world's eager distillers. In hopes of an American stampede into bullion, speculators from Amsterdam to Zurich to Johannesburg have engaged in a considerable gold rush of their own. Last week alone, the price of "free market" gold traded on the...

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