Three years ago, Degussa Goldhandel brought crash prophet Markus Krall on board. But the economist and author is making a name for himself with controversial theses. The company is now releasing him “with immediate effect”.
It is not uncommon for crash prophets to be mainly on their own behalf. One of them is Markus Krall, who has predicted the collapse of the financial system in various doomsday scenarios – and is propagating a return to the gold standard. Now the head of Degussa Goldhandel has been released from the company “with immediate effect”. Krall will “devote himself to new professional challenges”, it said without giving any further reasons.
Krall had been brought in as management spokesman three years ago. Degussa Sonne/Mond Goldhandel GmbH, or Degussa Goldhandel for short, sees itself as the heir and guarantor of “quality and consistency in the world of precious metals”, but was only founded in 2010. As a globally operating company for gold, silver and platinum metals, it has risen to become the market leader among bank-independent precious metal traders. According to the Federal Gazette, under Manager Krall, the annual surplus for 2020 grew from 5.8 million euros to 43.3 million euros, with sales of 2 billion euros. The biggest competitor, Pro Aurum, earned slightly less. But the upheavals and uncertainties of the corona pandemic helped the gold trade to enjoy record years.
But the economist and author Krall is making a name for himself with his theses on the supposedly impending serious upheavals on the financial markets or even the collapse of the system – and thus reaches an audience of millions. Like other so-called crash prophets, he impresses with quite astute analyses. However, the existing dangers for business and politics are often exaggerated and dramatized.
Krall also swore to the end of the euro and the European Central Bank, which he considers defective and not independent. “I demand the separation of the state from money and the central bank,” he proclaims on YouTube, for example, and instead pleads for private central banks and their competition with each other. In the next breath, the gold standard is praised, which in the 19th century – before politicians dumped it – allowed a phase “in which economic growth was at its highest”.
The ECB policy of low interest rates (expropriating savers), the mountains of debt of the states or the rescue packages set up by politicians in successive crises: in the world view of such doomsayers, sooner or later they all lead to the collapse of entire economies and a global recession. The crash prophets warn that the prosperity and private assets of the citizens are also threatened, and usually advise investing in real assets – often in the direction of gold. If the announced collapse doesn’t happen, then it will come later. Markus Krall also predicted the collapse of the banking system with hyperinflation for the end of 2020.
The flood of cheap money and planned economy financial injections alone would have stopped the development of the “zombification” of the economy, which, however, after the turnaround in interest rates will now inexorably drive a quarter of the companies into bankruptcy – with correspondingly catastrophic consequences for the bank balance sheets. According to Krall, corporate transactions would “no longer be possible” and “no longer be carried out” if producer prices increased by around 50 percent because they were unpredictable. A month ago he said he expected production and supply chains to collapse “within months”.
Like many crash prophets, Krall tends to dramatize risks and propagate correspondingly radical solutions. Critics have also located the financial expert and Degussa boss in right-wing libertarian circles that have built an ideological, anti-democratic apparatus in the empire of billionaire and Degussa owner August von Finck, who died in 2021. Von Finck promoted libertarian think tanks and is said to have been a supporter of the right-wing party AfD in the founding phase.
It is said of the main heir to the Finck billions and the Degussa shares, August François von Finck, that he wanted little to do with his father’s ideas. The replacement of Krall may therefore also serve to depoliticize the market leader in precious metal trading with private and industrial customers. There is even speculation in the industry about a possible sale.
In addition to Krall’s future, the further fate of the company with the traditional name Degussa now also seems uncertain. It is possible that the departure of the crash prophet at the top was only the first act of a scenario that he did not write himself in this case. The Board of Directors thanked “Dr. Krall for the successful work of the last few years”.
The article first appeared on Capital.
