Well, I certainly thought that I was correct in remembering that in recent years the ECB and IMF, as part of the bailout negotiations, had placed controls on Greece's economic strategy and sought to have assets, including gold reserves, placed as security against loans. Think this happened in 2012 and 2015.
We clearly were not simply dreaming as googling the topic can find reports of a Miss Katseli, who was a previous Greek labour minister being "......upset that Greece’s lenders will have the right to seize the gold reserves in the Bank of Greece under the terms of the new deal...................... The Reuters Global Gold Forum confirms that in the small print of the Greek “bailout” is a provision for the creditors to seize Greek national gold reserves.........."
It certainly seems that German officials in cahoots with the ECB have at least aspirations towards imposing controls over the economic strategies and assets, including gold reserves, over the EU countries that are placed into servitude via debt:
"...................While many market participants would expect that Greece’s gold reserves would be on the table in the debt agreement, it is the somewhat covert and untransparent way that this is being done that is of concern to Greeks and to people who believe in the rule of law.
Recent months have seen many senior German government officials calling for so called
“PIIGS” nations gold reserves to be used as collateral. Such as Angela Merkel’s budget speaker and his opposition counterpart who urged Portugal to consider selling their gold.
Norbert Barthle, Germany’s governing coalition budget speaker and his counterpart Carsten Schneider from the Social Democrats, the biggest opposition party, urged Portugal to consider selling some of its gold reserves to ease its debt problems. They called for a review of Portugal’s request for financial aid to include gold and other potential asset sales.
The Irish Times reported in November that EU finance ministers’ discussed a wider strategy by the ECB to sound out the possibility of gaining control over the gold reserves of the euro zone’s central banks.
Senior German politician, Gunther Krichbaum, a lawmaker in German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s governing coalition and Chairman of the Committee on the Affairs of the European Union of the German Bundestag has proposed late last year that Italy sell its sizeable gold reserves in order to lower its debt.
Gold’s importance as debt and third party risk free collateral and as the ultimate form of money is increasing by the day.............."
So in a future scenario, that saw Scotland requiring a bailout, it cannot be dismissed as fanciful that any such deal may have comparable conditions of national assets being used as security
