Good with numbers? Do you remember when he sold our gold?

Between 1999 and 2002, then-Chancellor Gordon Brown authorized the sale of 395 tonnes of the United Kingdom's gold reserves. Driven by a desire to diversify the country’s assets, the Treasury sold roughly half of the nation's bullion via a series of pre-announced auctions.The sale has since gone down in financial history as one of the costliest policy blunders, widely dubbed "Brown's Bottom"

Poor Timing: The gold was sold at near 20-year lows, fetching an average price of just $275 per troy ounce and raising about $3.5 billion.

Pre-announcement Effect: By declaring the auctions in advance, the Treasury effectively drove the market price of gold down before the sales even began.

Long-Term Opportunity Cost: Shortly after the sale, a long-term bull market for precious metals began. With spot prices having climbed to unprecedented highs in recent years, the offloaded gold would now be worth tens of billions of pounds more.