205,000 or 205 tonnes of gold, why commas matter

Karen Hudes latest refers to “The UBS is holding 205,000 MT under the Global Debt Facility for the benefit of humankind” and she provides a link to a letter from UBS and associated gold certificates as proof of the figure.

The letter says that “… volume of 205,000 Metric Tons issued last June 15, 1977 is unrestricted for collateral …”

Unfortunately, given that the letter and certificates are issued by UBS, a Swiss firm, and that Switzerland is one of the countries that uses commas as a decimal mark (thanks Wikipedia), then the “205,000″ figure is actually referring to 205.000 tonnes.

205 tonnes is approximately $8,567,975,000.00 (or $8.5 billion, just in case anyone misinterprets the commas) and while that is a nice sum, I doubt it will be as helpful to “humankind” (a word I note excludes aliens/reptilian life forms) as $8,567,975,000,000 (or $8.5 trillion).