Born in Switzerland in 1931, Ferdinand Lips, was a well-established and respected authority on gold and the gold market. His roots were in banking where he started his career, and became a co-founder and a managing director of Rothschild Bank AG in Zurich.
In 1987 he opened his own bank, Bank Lips AG, also in Zurich. He retired in 1998 when he sold his equity interest in the bank. Not being one to sit around idly, Mr. Lips continued to be very active in the banking, gold and financial fields. He was on the Board of various companies, among them African gold mining companies. He was also a Trustee of the Foundation for the Advancement of Monetary Education (FAME.org) in New York.
He has written two books previously (Das Buch der Geldanlage in 1981 and Geld, Gold und die Wahrheit in 1991). Gold Wars is his third book and expresses his views on gold, the gold standard and the gold exchange standard as well as the various attempts to manipulate gold and eventually push it aside. As a Swiss, he dedicated an important part of the book to the events leading up to the partial, but substantial, sale of Swiss gold reserves.