Gold World News Flash |
- Will Gold, the Dollar or the Euro Collapse?
- Outlook 2011: Fear and Love in Gold Trading
- International Forecaster January 2011 (#3) - Gold, Silver, Economy + More
- Gold - Bottom or Breakdown?
- Real Silver Highs 3
- Recapitalizing Europe
- New Year Silver Sale
- Is the Gold Bull Market Over?
- Numeraire
- Gold Bull / Stock Market Bear Overview
- Method, Means, Motive, and Opportunity – The Mechanism of Chinese Silver Accumulation
- Guest Post: Presto! 9.4% Unemployment! How The Government Lies.
- “Comparing $30 silver today to $48 silver in January 1980 is grossly misleading, it isn’t even close to being an apples-to-apples comparison.”
- With the Euro waning, dollar is gaining strength – pressuring Silver, Gold and resource currencies like Canadian and Aussie Dollar
- Founder Of Brook Hunt Sees Copper Peaking In Near-Term, Plunging To "Forgotten Levels" Of $1,500 By 2016
- The Charts That Matter In FX Next Week
- Massive Silver Withdrawals From The Comex
- InTrade.com: Sell Sarah Palin Short and Use the Proceeds to Buy Silver
- IRA on a solution to the mortgage mess
- I Was Wrong… What to Do
- Gold Outlook 2011: Irreversible Upward Pressures and the China Effect
- Grandich Client Northern Dynasty Minerals
- Timothy Geithner (wearing disguise) tries to repent for crashing U.S. economy (***)
- A Letter to The Honorable Harry Reid
- 2011: The Dark Year Ahead
- Fun With Numbers
- Another Facebook Privacy Scandal Approaching? WikiLeaks Demands Unsealing Of Google, Facebook Subpoena, If Any
- Weekly metals wrapup, Embry interview posted at King World News
- The S&P 500 & Gold Under Pressure on Friday
- DOJ Secretly Subpoenas Private Twitter Information On Suspected WikiLeaks Associates
- Reckless U.S. Deficit Spending May Reap Inflation Whirlwind
- Macro-Trends – Keys to Macro Profits in 2011, Gold and Silver Ultimate Wealth Protection
- Real Silver Highs
- Market Commentary From Monty Guild
- The Truth About Gold
- Just One Stock: The Gold Explorer Looking for 'West Africa in Nevada'
| Will Gold, the Dollar or the Euro Collapse? Posted: 09 Jan 2011 01:00 PM PST Right now, the markets have pulled gold back in the face of what seemed to be an upward turn in the U.S. economy. Many may feel this is the time to sell gold. The growing Eurozone debt crises could spell the end of the euro as we know it. The debt problems of the U.S. are worse than Europe so it is a time to ask, "Will these three forms of money collapse?"
|
| Outlook 2011: Fear and Love in Gold Trading Posted: 09 Jan 2011 05:00 AM PST Wall Street has been calling gold a bubble since 2005 when it hit $500. Some media naysayers remained negative even as they wrote the headlines proclaiming record highs and saw gold rise almost 30 percent in the past 12 months.
|
| International Forecaster January 2011 (#3) - Gold, Silver, Economy + More Posted: 09 Jan 2011 04:30 AM PST Gold has become again the world reserve currency. It is just that few realize the transition has already taken place. For the past 11 years every major currency has fallen in value versus gold from 13 to 20 percent annually. Versus silver, the figures range from 17 to 25 percent. This is a clear-cut ominous trend of a flight away from all currencies to gold and silver and quite a flight to safety. This movement by worldwide investors cannot be ignored. There obviously are many people that see what we see and in that process are dumping currencies for gold and silver related assets. Unfortunately, Americans are far behind in these changes with only 2% of the population participating. Ladies and gentlemen the second stage of the gold and silver bull market has just begun. Prices have fallen from their highs, what a great time to buy.
|
| Posted: 09 Jan 2011 01:32 AM PST This past week we saw gold have its biggest two-day drop since February of last year ending the third longest streak of trading above its 50-day that the yellow metal has had since 2000. The first streak ended in 2002 with 124 trading days and the second in 2008 with 143 trading days. No bull market goes up in a straight line.
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 06:22 PM PST Thanks to its awesome autumn rally, silver has become something of a rock star in the commodities world. Investors and speculators alike are enthralled with this white metal. But with it just hitting new 30-year highs, many on Wall Street suspect silver is stretching to bull-ending extremes. However once silver's modern history is recast into real inflation-adjusted terms, this metal's secular bull is still looking young.
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 06:04 PM PST
When the economic crash came, it took a second Marshall plan, with the US pouring trillions of US dollars into European banking subsidiaries, helping to prop up the western economic system. The reality is that European bankers did not have the capital to cover the trades they held on their books. Risk management is Risk management. You only have to look to the rogue French trader for context of the risk management controls in place during the build up to 2008. A full two years have passed, and the only area in the world where the economic storm is still unfolding is in Sovereign European finances. The US has many economic issues of its own, but let’s be honest. The US Treasury, with access to the Federal Reserve system as it stands today, has a self funding structure unlike that to which the EU has access. The EU understands it doesn’t have access to real capital on the scale that the US Fed/Treasury do. Ergo, they’ve raised their deposited capital to 10 Billion Euros from its earlier 5 Billion. Yes, those are real numbers.
The ECB is running at triple digit leverage internally. While they can try to print money, they do not have a US Treasury equivalent bond. It is each state for itself. This is what is causing a run on the yield in their weaker states. The lack of a Euro bond to support the overall EU governments borrowing needs. The triple A rated states of Europe do not want to subsidize the overall borrowing costs of the less rated ones. If you look at the bail out of Ireland, so far the only money that has been disbursed is to the Irish Retirement funds. In fact, Europe is trying to get everyone, including the IMF, involved. It’s quite simple. Europe is not properly capitalized to keep up the lifestyle it demands. There is no quick solution to a shortage of an estimated 5 trillion or more of new real capital. That is my estimate. So now it is China’s turn to pour its cash reserve resources into buying European bonds from the failed economic states that make up the EU experiment. They are expected to purchase up to 6-18 Billion in PIIGS debt in the near term. This is happening exactly as Switzerland places Portugal on the do not buy list. This action was taken in such a way as to apply their debt for margin on swaps. It’s a very intentional slap in the face, and one not needed when the real volume of trading in their bonds in Switzerland is considered. It was, however, a very public form of disavowing a struggling financial neighbor, and one that will not be forgotten. If Switzerland, which needed capital from the US Federal Reserve, is intentionally preying on its weakened European sisters, things will get interesting quickly. This is the same Switzerland which lost $30 Billion dollars buying Euro’s, while shorting themselves last year, so anything is possible. If Switzerland is intentionally affecting the bond markets by having their banks short the debt, and then a pulling of the swap markets for effect, it won’t last long. These kinds of events heat up quickly, once the actions become noticeable. Ironically, it appears that the Irish collapse happened about the time that Switzerland was putting Irish debt on the do not buy list internally. As a Zerohedge article by Bruce Krasting pointed out, this smells. The European bluff and bluster of 2008, was to cover up the fact they were broke. Every international action taken by the two world economic super powers (US & China) since has been to prop up the floundering, and now failing, European state. While the US provides currency swap lines with the ECB, China is bidding up the bonds of European states that can’t sell their junk debt in the open market anymore. The jig is up, and Europe is the epicenter for the reality of tomorrow. You only have to look to the “REAL” actions taken by the US Federal Reserve during the crisis. While US Banks, Insurance, Money Markets companies & Automotive industry’s were going BK seemingly overnight, the US Fed was pouring Trillions into Euro institutions to keep them alive. We are not talking about Billions in loans, we are talking about Trillions in liquidity provisions. The amount provided was equal to the US national debt at the time. This is not an insignificant amount of liquidity. There was no nation but the US, which could have provided it to the world at the time. Not China, Not the Middle Eastern Nations. Only America could. So how does Europe fix its finances? It has to do to its banks what the US did with GM and Chrysler to name two… It has to kill the equity holders of the banks. It should convert the Junior debt holders to equity, and only the Seniors continue to stay on the bond side of the balance sheet. This is why these bonds were rated SENIOR when they were issued. The system needs a reset. Debt needs to be converted to equity if the system can’t afford to continue to roll its debt. It will be interesting to watch reality unfold in Europe in the next year or so. They have had their Bear Stears moment, but they have not had their BIG WEEK yet. Next week should be interesting.... Very Interesting.
This story and others are available www.jackhbarnes.com
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 06:00 PM PST It's great to be back after the holiday season. Things are as exciting as ever in the markets and around the world politically. Silver rose 83% for the year while Gold rose 29.7%. Not too bad at all. I'm very happy with the way the year played out and the trading and investing decisions I made. I really couldn't imagine it to be much better than last year, but it will be. The mania phase is a ways off still.
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 05:47 PM PST Cullen Roche submits: In part 1 Keith McCullough, Hedgeye Risk Management CEO, and Frank Holmes, US Global Investors CEO, discuss the latest decline in gold and whether it means we are on the verge of much larger declines: Complete Story »
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 05:30 PM PST Run to Gold
|
| Gold Bull / Stock Market Bear Overview Posted: 08 Jan 2011 03:14 PM PST Mark J. Lundeen 07 January 2011 * Author's Note 07 Jan 2011: 10PM * I'm starting with a late Friday addendum to my article below. I'm not going to do a rewrite to fit the following short comments into the body of the text, but I want to comment on Gold & Silver's Bear's Eye View Charts for the week. The talking-heads on CNBC, for the most, part were greatly concerned by the "crashing" price of gold this week. My Bear's Eye View Chart (BEV), with its emphasis on all-time highs (BEV Zeros), and percentage declines from last all-time highs tells a completely different story. Gold has declined less than 4% from its last BEV Zero (last all-time high), seen just this Monday. Silver has fallen only 7.5% from its last 30 year high, also seen on Monday 03 Jan. So far the action gold and silver saw this week is completely normal for a bull market and in no way deserves the hysterical comments expressed by so many TV "experts" in the gold markets. I'm not s...
|
| Method, Means, Motive, and Opportunity – The Mechanism of Chinese Silver Accumulation Posted: 08 Jan 2011 03:08 PM PST January 7, 2011 - I was gratified to see how well my recent article (Is China Behind The Big Silver Short Dec 25th, 2010) was received, when over 50 websites worldwide picked it up in the first 24 hours. But I am afraid that a fair bit of confusion was created by that article, which I want to clarify here. First, I am not presenting this as fact. I am presenting this as a theory that explains the observable facts. With no transparency in the banking industry, we will never get a chance to see the swap books of JP Morgan or HSBC to find out which of their clients are shorting silver, or how much of the money behind silver shorts comes from JPM's own proprietary trading desk, and this is how it SHOULD be. But the presumption IS that the CFTC is monitoring these books, and would perform their duty to investigate any clearly manipulative and excessively large short positions not being held by legitimate hedgers of mine production. Sadly, we cannot depend on the CF...
|
| Guest Post: Presto! 9.4% Unemployment! How The Government Lies. Posted: 08 Jan 2011 02:53 PM PST
Submitted by Silver Shield from Don't Tread on Me Presto! 9.4% Unemployment! How The Government Lies. Hooray…Happy days are here again! That is exactly what the elite would have us believe with the 9.4% unemployment number in this huge CONfidence game otherwise known as the USEconomy. “During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” -George Orwell We were having dinner at my in-law’s house and I had overheard the TV playing in the back ground. At one point, I thought I had heard the squealing of teenagers who were fawning over Justin Beiber. Instead, it turned out that it was someone on the news reporting the new, much lower 9.4% unemployment rate. I could hear the panting of excitement spoken by the breathless reporters who were interviewing very serious economists about this new 9.4% rate. The news aired their personal interest piece about a girl who was just hired at an internet company. She commented with the utmost confidence that the economy was getting better!! You have all heard that saying, “it is a recession when your neighbor loses a job, but when you lose a job it is a depression.” Well, according to her, we are out of her depression. But alas, this is all a dream and the media is using their very best, tried and true propaganda to keep the people from getting too upset with reality. Let me just state that the real rate of unemployment is much, much more than the 9.4% and if the government really reported what was really going on, there would be revolution in the morning. Allow me to destroy this fictional 9.4% number and the billion dollar propaganda machine that provides cover for the trillion dollar banking and government schemes. I will accomplish this magical feat with writing a blog post in my pajamas. That is real magic! “There are three types of lies: Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics.” -Mark Twain. The first thing we need to understand is the birth/death model. It is an estimate/lie that the Bureau of Labor Statistics starts with to figure out how many jobs small companies have created. Since so many jobs in this country are created by small companies, they pull numbers out of a hat to start with. This is a total guess that constantly gets manipulated to hide the truth. Literally 250,000 jobs can be created out of thin air. The rest of the number is determined from a survey. The BLS’s number showed an overall increase of +103,000 jobs.(Can you hear my sarcastic Whoopie!?) The economy needs to create 250,000 a month just to keep up with the growth of the population. A household survey showed an increase of +297,000 jobs and -260,000 fewer people in the labor force. This combined into a drop of 9.8% to 9.4%.
The majority of those jobs are all of those “awesome” seasonal jobs during the Christmas season that will be going away now that we are in the new year. This little bump happens every year and is touted as a great development. Actually, it is sad that in our consumer economy, we have to hire part-time workers to handle the hoards of debt slaves as they spend their way into oblivion. I wish it was seasonal work at a factory like hiring a third shift at a plant actually producing something. Moving on…
The next big thing we need to understand is the labor force participation rate. It reflects people between the ages of 18-64 years old, who are actually working or looking for work. This does not include students, moms, retired, and now more importantly people not even looking for jobs. The decline in the labor participation rate is becoming a cancer as people have been unemployed for a long time and entire industries are gone for good. The labor participation rate is usually around 67-68%, but has just reached a fresh 25 year low of 64.4%. This means on average, the unemployment numbers are lowered by 2.6-3.6% simply because the eligible pool is dropping.
We have now heard of the 99ers. They are people at the end of their 99 week of unemployment benefits/hush money. Well let’s get into our little time machine and travel back 99 weeks ago. That would have been smack dab in the middle of the 2008 financial crisis that set off this huge mess. So people who still have not found a job since the economy turned for the worst in 2008 do not count. We know that the crisis may have started two years ago but the firings did not happen right away as people tried to hang on. We can expect this decline in the labor participation rate for sometime, hiding some of the pain out there.
The government does keep track of these discouraged workers in another unemployment number. ( Although they do not have their minions in the press shout it from the top of their lungs.) The U-6 number measures the 9.4% unemployed number from above plus short term discouraged workers and people working part time because they cannot find suitable employment. This underemployment rate the government admits to is 19%. Wow, that is a much scarier number but like the commercials say, “but wait, there’s more!” If you added in long term discouraged workers that the government dropped from their number in 1994, you would have close to 25% unemployment. 25% unemployment should be torches and pitch fork numbers. We have been so thoroughly enslaved that people are more excited about American ‘Idle’ The unemployment nightmare does not stop there. What about all of those good paying jobs that are gone forever like in finance, housing, manufacturing, etc.? If you lose a $100k job in one of those industries and you get the only job you can working at Costco of $25k a year, then you are employed according to the unemployment number. What is not shown, is the quality of the jobs that are out there. When you see 5,000 people applying for an $8 an hour job at Walmart, something is seriously wrong.
Another factor you will not hear in the main stream media is how many of the jobs that are out there are government jobs. Nationally, if you include federal, state and local workers, the Government employs 17% of the work force. This growth in government jobs is hiding probably another 8-10%. Now I do not need to go into the fact that economically these workers provide very little to the overall economy. Right now there are more people in the government than in the manufacturing economy.
“Yeah, but government jobs are “good paying jobs.” The government produces nothing and its only source of income is the productive efforts of those in the real world, like you. The real sick thing is an average government employee makes again on average, when you include their benefits, TWICE of what the average civilian makes. This is an unsustainable situation, to say the least. Here’s another factor that is hidden from you. What about all of those companies and industries that received government contracts or even worse, got bailed out through the government largesse? How many of the private sector jobs were as a result of more government spending? So let’s break this down. If we added to the official 9.4% unemployment rate to all of the short and long term discouraged unemployed, the underemployed, the retired, the moms, the babies, the government workers, the bailed out industries, the heavily subsidized farmers, the private government contractors, etc., we are just left with you and me that provide anything of value in this country. Since I am in my pajamas and on my second cup of coffee, I think we can even rule me out. So get back to work! The world’s paper ponzi scheme depends on you depends on you.
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 02:00 PM PST Real Silver Highs 3 Silver stayed above $30 real more or less continuously between August 1979 and April 1981! Any price that persists for 19 months is nowhere close to being a bull-killing topping level. The popular mania that drove silver stratospheric in late 1979 saw it exceed $100 real on just 20 trading days, [...]
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 11:40 AM PST The Charts That Matter In FX Next Week MK: The buzz on the street is suggesting continued strength in the US dollar and weakness in PM's this coming week – with a possible 180 degree flip in the primary PM bull trend and dollar bear trend in the short term. Does this matter? No. Gold [...]
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 09:41 AM PST
Simon Hunt, founder of Brook Hunt, puts a dent in the dreams of all those who expect to see a continuing surge in copper prices throughout 2011 and further. The copper specialist, who has since left the firm he founded and is now head of Simon Hunt Strategic Services which specialises in copper, global economics and China, is arguably one of the premier experts on the topic of copper. It therefore behooves the copper bulls to pay attention to his latest interim note which contains "our principal reasons why copper prices this year won?t live up to the hopes of so many bulls." And his long-term vision is about as scary as they get: "Peak prices for 2011 will be experienced in the first quarter of the year, if they have not already been seen. Prices will then fall until around the start of the fourth quarter, hitting a low of some $5500. Recovery will follow rising parabolically in 2012 to some $14,000 by the end of next year. This will signal the end of the gaming of copper prices. A return to global recession, deflation and the destruction of large end uses of copper will see prices crashing to levels long since forgotten - to under $1500 by 2016. It will be at that point that the real restructuring of the industry will take place. Future trend growth rates for world refined copper consumption will be below 2% a year implying that marginal producers will be closed down. It is not a shortage of supply that will shape the future of copper but a shortage of required material for furnaces." Full note attached. The likely pattern for copper prices in 2011 and beyond This is the time of year when markets make fools of us analysts. It is the time to guess at how copper prices will perform for the coming year. In recent years, forecasting copper prices have become increasingly complex because of the huge intrusion of the financial sector into copper and other commodity markets, which has resulted in there being established a direct correlation between equity markets, the US$ and copper prices. This is a brief interim note to be followed by a detailed report later this month, but it contains our principal reasons why copper prices this year won?t live up to the hopes of so many bulls. The year started with a bang; the US$ was weak, equity markets were strong following encouraging data from the USA and copper prices rose to $9750, since pulling back. However, the financial sector remains fragile with substantial sovereign and private sector debt to be rolled over, many in the early months of this year. It has been the performance of China?s economy which has driven global growth and, on its path, equity and commodity markets. China is now in that murky period of a leadership transition made even more complex than usual by an avowed wish to establish a new economic model which would bring economic growth down to lower but sustainable levels. In the process, domestic consumption is seen as the future driver of economic activity with exports being given a lesser role. Such changes bring with them their own conflicts, conflicts between what Beijing sees as the future and what coastal governments have experienced as their principal source of growth. In the meantime, notwithstanding China?s CPI data, which significantly understates real inflation, there are real concerns within the PBOC and others by the rising cost of living and input costs to manufacturing Chart 1: China Corporate Goods Price
A little used series of price data, produced by the PBOC - and thanks to Jim Walker for supplying this data - is the China Corporate Goods Price Index. It is virtually a wholesale price index covering all commodity inputs for manufacturing and others. The graph since 1999 shows just how volatile has been the index, in contrast to other indices and GDP data. The index is now rising rapidly being 8.6% higher in November than a year ago and quite possibly being in double digits for December. Our recent report "More on China" set out the main issues as we see them, suggesting that money and credit will be especially tight in the first half of this year, a result confirmed by talking with some of our industry friends in China. This will have a significant impact on some key copper consuming sectors - power cables, building wire and other products sold into the construction sector. For the moment magnet wire remains a strong market, but we think it could fade as the year progresses. High copper prices and tight credit are forcing semi-fabricators and end use industries to manage their businesses in a very prudent manner. We now expect that China?s refined copper consumption (not demand) will actually fall this year, led by a decline of 10% or more in power cables, contrary to our earlier thinking. There are large stocks of cathode held outside the reporting system in China. Either by dictate or credit, some of these large stocks may be liquidated which would bring added pressure on the pricing of copper. There is a way of measuring how much copper is being warehoused outside the reporting system in China. The ICSG measures China?s consumption on an apparent consumption basis using official data on production, imports, exports and stocks. If we then compare what we and others think was material that actually went into furnaces then there is a difference either positive or negative which must reflect changes in stocks outside the reporting system. We have not only used our own data but those of an institution considered by many to be the best, but in recent years producing higher consumption data than our own. Somewhere between the two the real figures will rest.
Bottom line: there is somewhere between 3MT and 4MT of cathode warehoused outside the reporting system in China. In short, China will not be the same prop to the world of copper that it has assumed to have been in recent years. On the contrary, the influence will be negative, certainly in the first six months. Outside China, economic conditions are mixed. The burst of business activity seen in Europe last year is starting to fade with some mills going on short-time. Exports will slow as China?s economy hunkers down in the first few months of the year anyway. The US economy has given encouraging indications of recovery but without a real recovery in housing, the current burst of consumer spending may not be sustained. Our summary of World Refined Copper Consumption is set out below.
A few comments are appropriate. In 2009, China built up a large stock of semis, around 500kt. Take that out of the equation and world refined consumption would have fallen by 8.3%, much more in line with falling intensity of use and the global decline of IP. For last year, China liquidated most of that inventory of semis (we don?t think all), hence China?s refined consumption actually fell last year. For 2011, we have assumed for this exercise that China?s consumption will be almost flat on last year, though in reality it should be down by some 5%. The point is that world intensity of use is falling sharply at a time when real business activity is fragile and very likely to deteriorate post 2012. It is against this background of a very flat trend in world real consumption (not demand) that we need to measure the supply of refined production. Refined production is made up of three components: primary smelter output, secondary production and SxEw. Regarding the first, we have assumed a very flat profile for primary smelter output until 2012. This component accounts for around 65% of refined production. High prices have encouraged a ready supply of secondary feed to smelters and refiners. Last year cathode production from secondary materials rose by 20% over 2009 and should have another large jump in 2012. SxEw output has consistently grown faster than that of concentrate output. We have however been cautious in its build up during this period, despite generally high prices. Our refined production profile is summarised below.
The reported stock data hides many sins. It is hardly logical, for instance, that in 2008 and 2009, when world refined production rose by 290kt and 77kt respectively at a time when world consumption fell by 446kt and 933kt also respectively that world stocks should rise by just 132 in 2008 and 267kt in 2009. China?s official data on consumption is a farce. Anyone talking to manufacturing and fabricators in the second half of 2008 and first quarter of 2009 will appreciate that the numbers we quote are closer to the truth. Small mills rapidly closed down; their business was transferred to the large mills. Even then business was weak. China has been used as a dumping ground for surplus material. Throughout the second half of last year, bar a small window in October, the arbitrage was not enough to cover costs, yet material continued to pour into China. It is being warehoused outside the reporting system. One day it will come out to surprise the market. So what does all of this analysis mean for prices? The first thing to understand is that prices are not being driven by the industry. The "trade" has been sidelined by High Frequency Trading or algorithmic trading, the Dark Pools of Liquidity and Trading Arcades. The sophistication of these trading systems, which have nothing to do with the industry itself, whether copper, other metals, commodities or equities, but which catch minute discrepancies in prices, can send prices rocketing one way or another giving the appearance of high liquidity and volatility when in fact it is only someone with an HTF program and a large order. These developments could have important structural effects on the way that the fabricating industry uses the LME. A very interesting blog on the Traderight website using sugar as this specific example but applying equally to copper had this to say. "I sense a groundswell of opinion in the commercial trade, including end-users and producers as well as trade houses and their futures brokers, that the current situation is becoming untenable and that #11 is no longer fit for the purpose. Meaning that it does not serve the purpose of the commercial trade any more in relation to price discovery and accepted hedging practices, including price fixation of physical sugar contracts." An integral part of the shift in pricing from the trade to the financial sector has been the banks and merchants acquisition of warehousing complexes such as Henry Bath, Pacorini, Metro and NEMS at top dollar prices in order to gain control of stock movements and to reduce the cost of finance of both LME and non-LME metal. As another blog on Traderight wrote, "The resultant drawdown of LME metal was inevitable and the non-availability has been exacerbated by the proposed launch of the LME warrant backed ETFs. Those investors who were persuaded to invest in forward copper at the depth of the price trough in 2008-9 needed higher spot prices in 2010-11 to eliminate the cost of carry they had borne for two years and some of the returns were guaranteed or underwritten by banks in 2008-9 to try to get risk off their books while they were seeking central bank funding. These chickens would come home to roost unless a positive roll could be achieved and this in turn would only come through a backwardation, which could only be justified and maintained if stocks were reduced or if undeliverable stock in the form of rod, wire and metal in non-LME warehouses is hedged on the market and the hedges need rolling as the metal is non-deliverable." These developments are exacerbating price movements on the upside so long as the „risk-on? trade is maintained. But, in a world where growth is liable to falter and sovereign debt problems to escalate, the „risk-off? trade can easily return. When that happens not only will the longs move to liquidate their long physical and futures positions, but prices will be pushed even lower by the very same people who have pushed them up to the current giddy heights. The large-scale intrusion of the financial sector, with the apparent support of most large producers, creating a structure that makes the copper market seem tight and thus able to push prices continuously higher, is destroying the very foundations of the industry. Demand destruction is widespread and will deepen even more as manufacturers throw funds at R&D to design copper out of their products, a subject we have explored at some depth for some time. The real question is how long can this new structure last. The answer really is until the second global credit crisis hits the world. This will probably begin later this year and explode in 2012 to be followed by a return to global recession and deflation. Copper prices will be conditioned by these developments. Peak prices for 2011 will be experienced in the first quarter of the year, if they have not already been seen. Prices will then fall until around the start of the fourth quarter, hitting a low of some $5500. Recovery will follow rising parabolically in 2012 to some $14,000 by the end of next year. This will signal the end of the gaming of copper prices. A return to global recession, deflation and the destruction of large end uses of copper will see prices crashing to levels long since forgotten - to under $1500 by 2016. It will be at that point that the real restructuring of the industry will take place. Future trend growth rates for world refined copper consumption will be below 2% a year implying that marginal producers will be closed down. It is not a shortage of supply that will shape the future of copper but a shortage of required material for furnaces. Today?s focus on short-term copper prices has sown the seeds for its own destruction. History does not always repeat itself but it frequently rhymes. As in the mid-1980s, material warehoused outside the reporting system will be thrown onto markets as investors/speculators will demand cash against their investments. Simon Hunt was one of the founders, in 1975, of top metals analysis consultancy Brook Hunt, which still bears his name. He left at end-2005 to start up Simon Hunt Strategic Services which specialises in copper, global economics and China. For further information please contact Simon Hunt at Simon Hunt Strategic Services on +44 20 7859 111 or simon@shss.com - website www.shss.com h/t Ed
|
| The Charts That Matter In FX Next Week Posted: 08 Jan 2011 09:19 AM PST
And now back to finance. From John Noyce of GS FX sales, one of the better chartists out there, here are the charts that matter in the next week. Of particular note: dollar strength, silver weakness, range bound rates, rate-USD correlations, some interesting observations in a secondary pair of EURKRW, the bullish key day reversal in the USDJPY, the derivative nature of the AUDCAD as a China/US proxy, and more.
|
| Massive Silver Withdrawals From The Comex Posted: 08 Jan 2011 08:21 AM PST |
| InTrade.com: Sell Sarah Palin Short and Use the Proceeds to Buy Silver Posted: 08 Jan 2011 07:33 AM PST InTrade.com Share this:
|
| IRA on a solution to the mortgage mess Posted: 08 Jan 2011 07:01 AM PST
I have a lot of respect for Chris Whalen and the folks at International Risk Analytics. I think of them as being sort of centrists on some of the critical economic issue. They don’t support the Fed, they most certainly are not supporters of the big banks. They are no fan of “kick the can down the road” plans. On the flip side they are not in the camp that says that all must be torn down before we find a sensible base that we can move forward with.
Lower interest rates/duration in existing mortgage through new or expanded GSE guarantee programs.
The conforming loan size limit should be made permanent at $729,750, going up to 130% of this limit in high cost areas.
Allow for discounted payoff of underwater mortgages so that homeowners have at least 5% positive equity.
Second liens should be written off in the case of principal reduction on the first lien.
The losses from the write-down of principal of the first and second liens would be borne by the bond/loan holders.
These losses should be treated as full tax credits, accounted for as a Treasury Strips on the balance sheets of the institutions who take the principal loss.
Non- US taxpayers (like German Landesbanks and Cayman Island hedge funds) get nothing. This should cut the cost to the Treasury by 30% (estimated) and spread it out over 7 to 10 years.
As a matter of equity, homeowners with written-down mortgages would be subject to higher taxes.
Principal reduction will count against taxpayer's $500,000 exemption from capital gains tax on the sale of the primary dwelling. If you get a principal reduction, you have to pay capital gains taxes until the IRS gets the amount of the principal write down back. Reduction of capital gain exemption will last for 20 years and apply to the gain from the sale of any residential real estate, not just the home associated with the principal reduction.
This scheme may not work for every homeowner; some will die before the gain is repaid.
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 06:15 AM PST By Dr. Steve Sjuggerud Saturday, January 8, 2011 "It's Finally Time to Sell Stocks," I said on December 20. But since then, the stock market has continued a bit higher. Did I get it wrong? What should we do? Well, here's what I wrote in the December 20 essay: Over the next three months or so, the risk is not worth the potential reward. The smart play is to pull back your leverage and move to higher ground. So in True Wealth, we're selling a good number of positions. I stand by that advice. What I didn't tell you, though, was that in my True Wealth newsletter, we sold our riskiest (meaning most-leveraged) holdings… but we KEPT a lot of speculative positions, too. We kept gold and silver stocks, a fund of microcap stocks, and more… So we didn't just turn tail as soon as we saw the signs of a market top. I left something out of Thursday's DailyWealth, too… My conclusion was: I've made my biggest gains when investors are terrified and things are ...
|
| Gold Outlook 2011: Irreversible Upward Pressures and the China Effect Posted: 08 Jan 2011 06:09 AM PST "SLV has a 1.7 million ounce silver withdrawal...and the Comex has a 1.8 million ounce silver withdrawal. The Bank Participation Report shows that U.S. and foreign banks are getting out of Dodge...and much more. " Yesterday in Gold and Silver Well, my worst fears did not come to pass on Friday...and I'm oh so happy about that. Although both metals spiked down for a very brief moment at the New York open, most of the real price damage had been done by the time I filed my Friday column at 5:00 a.m. Eastern time. Gold began to sell off around 2:00 p.m. Hong Kong time...and reached an interim low at the London a.m. gold fix at 10:30 a.m. GMT. From there, the gold price traded sideways into the New York open...with the low of the day [1,352.00 spot] coming moments later. Then the gold price took off to the upside and, according to Kitco, printed a New York high price of $1,380.10 at 11:00 a.m. Eastern time. From that high, gold got sold down ten bucks going into...
|
| Grandich Client Northern Dynasty Minerals Posted: 08 Jan 2011 05:21 AM PST The following is automatically syndicated from Grandich's blog. You can view the original post here. Stay up to date on his model portfolio! January 08, 2011 09:41 AM Dahlman Rose & Co has issued a research report on NDM with a $71.02 price target: Excerpts from Report Below: Recommendation Rating: Buy Price Target: $71.02 Expected Return: 421.4% Enterprise Value (MM): $1,234.7 Expected Total Return: NM We Expect The Company To Release A PEA In Early 2011 Northern Dynasty principle asset is the giant Pebble project in southern Alaska, where Anglo American is in the process of earning in a 50% interest. The asset contains an estimated 55Bn lb copper, 67MM oz gold and, 3.3Bn lb molybdenum in measured and indicated resources. Once developed into operation, the Pebble project would be among the ten largest copper producers in the word and among the world’s largest producers of molybdenum and gold. In our view, production could commence as early as 2016. The joint venture has bee...
|
| Timothy Geithner (wearing disguise) tries to repent for crashing U.S. economy (***) Posted: 08 Jan 2011 05:10 AM PST MK: My brother makes an excellent point: "We need to start circulating Silver bullion in the hood and get rid of this paper." So true. Paper money is slavery. Silver is the new emancipation proclamation. Let's get real. Brothers and sisters in the hood can support Ron Paul and other 'hard money' advocates by jump [...]
|
| A Letter to The Honorable Harry Reid Posted: 08 Jan 2011 04:00 AM PST The Honorable Harry Reid Dear Mr. Leader, I'm writing in response to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's appeal to you to raise the debt ceiling. I understand that you didn't ask for my opinion. And with no political positions on my curriculum vitae, you may not even recognize my name. But I have co-authored two books warning about the United States' fiscal situation, starting with Financial Reckoning Day in 2003 and followed by Empire of Debt in 2005. I mailed copies of the latter to you and the other members of Congress free of charge. While it may not be sitting on your nightstand, I trust that you're at least aware of the book. After we published the book, I wrote and produced a documentary, I.O.U.S.A., which was screened in competition at the Sundance Film Festival, nominated for a Critics Choice award and shortlisted for an Academy Award. The film attempts to present the fiscal crisis facing the United States in a way that the average American could understand. The film took two years to produce and premiered on Aug. 22, 2008 – almost a month before Lehman Bros. declared bankruptcy, kicking off the Panic of '08. So after a decade of attempting to bring the root causes of our economic woes to light, I humbly suggest that the shortsighted tone of Mr. Geithner's appeal is itself part of the problem. It is, in fact, no different than Secretary of Treasury Hank Paulson's frantic three-page proposal that kicked off the bailouts in September 2008. Sir, in short, by raising the debt ceiling, we're delaying the day of reckoning yet again. Instead of paying for our excessive spending today, we'll pass that burden on to our children and grandchildren. I have three young children. And I, like many Americans, already find it a challenge to educate them and provide for their health care. Now I must also worry about what their future is going to look like…what opportunities will they find when it's their turn to join the work force or start businesses? Mr. Geithner shares his fears of a default in his letter to you. But his request simply means my children – everyone's children – will have to deal with that default on their own. Do we really want our children burdened by higher taxes, excessive government regulation, higher mortgage rates, reduced incentives to start their own businesses and, as things are going, the end of the freedoms that you, Mr. Geithner, the rest of the American public and I cherish? Freedom is the very promise that America bestows on history. But now, through our own malfeasance, we are in a position of telling the world, "We cannot afford to offer you the opportunity to enjoy that freedom anymore." How did it come to this? And why perpetuate the very malfeasance that threatens our future prosperity? For most of America, understanding the fiscal condition of the nation is no easy task. For that, they place their trust in you. No doubt, it's easier to do exactly what our Treasury secretary is asking you to do – ignore the problem and continue to kick the can down the road. But I'm asking you, on behalf of future generations, to think deeper about the problem and begin addressing it today. To help you with your decision, here are some images you can use to illustrate the magnitude of the national burden. As Mr. Geithner stated in his letter to you, "In February of 2010, Congress passed legislation to increase the debt limit to $14.29 trillion." To grasp that staggering figure, imagine stacking $100 bills on top of one another. To reach $14.29 trillion, your stack would soar 9,721 miles into the sky! Said a different way, that's like 1,767 mountains of $100 bills the size of Mount Everest piled on top of each other. Of course, the current debt wouldn't be a problem if tax revenue were exceeding our spending and therefore reducing the debt. But we both know that is not happening. Even if we taxed all Americans 100% of their income for an entire year, we still wouldn't be able to pay off our $14.29 trillion hole What's more, the interest we're paying on the current debt is forcing us deeper and deeper into the hole. According to the TreasuryDirect.gov website, the interest payment on our debt was a massive $1.13 billion per day – for a total of $413 billion – in 2010. The interest payment alone amounts to record-breaking deficits hit during the Bush administration just a few short years ago. If you agree to raise the ceiling, you effectively agree to drive up the interest payments until they exceed tax revenue – creating a situation in which we'll be forced to default, eventually. And the longer it takes to happen, the worse it will be for our children. The Treasury secretary outlines how catastrophic a default would be for the financial system and the integrity of the United States: Default would effectively impose a significant and long-lasting tax on all Americans and all American businesses and could lead to the loss of millions of American jobs. When, I ask you, do we begin addressing the root problem? When do we admit that we're spending beyond our means and begin to address the problem in earnest? "We can live beyond our means for a very long time," to paraphrase a leading financier from I.O.U.S.A., "and we can do it on a very large scale – but we cannot do it forever." The United States is like a private company suffering from a pension burden it did not plan for and that is losing market share because its products are no longer competitive. And it is as if the management has decided to take an extended vacation, rather than hold a meeting to find a way out of the hole. In Congress, you don't address the real problems. You talk around them, play politics with them and then make frantic appeals at the 11th hour to borrow more money to paper over the problems again for yet another year. At this pace, how do you honestly believe the government will ever balance its books again? In the era of uncertainty created by mayhem in Washington and ever-increasing global competition, how do you expect the economy to get back on track? Let's put the numbers aside for a second. I'd like to ask you a simple question: Imagine for a moment that you've chosen to smoke cigarettes all your life. You've ignored the warnings about them that appear all around you. Then, eventually, and unfortunately, you get diagnosed with lung cancer. Luckily, you've caught the disease in its very early stages. The doctor presents you with two choices. First, you can enter chemotherapy. The road to recovery, the doctor tells you, will be harsh. You'll suffer extreme nausea. You'll hardly be able to swallow from the ulcers you develop in your mouth. In short, you'll go through hell in an attempt to beat the disease. But because you caught the disease after the first symptoms appeared, you have a high chance at a full recovery. The doctor also offers a second alternative. He's worked out a deal that allows you to rid yourself of the disease instantly. No pain. No suffering. No hell. All you have to do is agree to give the disease to your 2-year-old grandson. Would you make that deal, Mr. Leader? I trust you'll make the right decision about our nation's fiscal health. At the very least, there needs to be an honest debate over raising the debt ceiling. If you provide the rubber stamp Mr. Geithner is asking for, you will be as guilty as he of passing the buck. Each time the buck gets passed, the stakes get higher. The default Mr. Geithner fears only looms more ominous in our future. The newly elected speaker of the House, John Boehner, has gone on record saying he'll agree to increase the debt limit because we have to be "adults" about addressing the fiscal crisis the nation faces. What, may I ask, is "adult" about failing to address this issue altogether? Sincerely,  Addison Wiggin cc: A Letter to The Honorable Harry Reid originally appeared in the Daily Reckoning. The Daily Reckoning, offers a uniquely refreshing, perspective on the global economy, investing, gold, stocks and today's markets. Its been called "the most entertaining read of the day."
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 03:48 AM PST (snippet) More Here..Can we say roller coaster at the police state park? Yup, the US economy is about to take its next plunge and this one is going alllll the waaaaay down, folks. The first thing to fully melt down will be the collapse of the municipal bond market, which in the past 4 weeks has already seen its foundation rumbling and shaking. No this will not be pretty. We are talking bread lines, wiped out cities, mass rioting and of course a total police force clamp down. The country with the most people in jail and the most laws on the books to make sure those jails are not empty is about to expand that little industry five fold. Yes, the work camps will be churning with Chinese style factory slaves, basically, if you are discontent and protest or to poor to pay the ever growing and multiplying taxes and fines, you will be put to productive labour, what other nations might call slave labour, but what nations like China, N.Korea and soon the USA, will call "its human advantage". At the same time, the total disintegration of the Mexican state will fully spill over into the border regions of the USA, especially into Texas. Murder rates already extremely high will only grow. When Texas moves to close its borders, the Federal American government will ban them and will instead demand that the land is off limits to citizens. That along with the attempted seizure of the right to control air quality, and thus industry and economics, something the US Federals have threated that if they do not get control of, they will close the Texas economy, will finally push this former republic to become its own Republic, again. Will this be peaceful, oh hell no, the American Federal are more than happy to exterminate to their black void of a heart's content to make sure everyone stays in their claws, especially their most industrialized and resourced state. There Will Be Blood, as the movie title goes and the Texans will fight, especially when the arrests starts. The only hope of the Republic of Texas will be to see just how discontent the rest of the Confederacy is. As for the Republicans, well, they'll sell out, but they will make sure to show their bonifieds by making us their enemies at every opportunity. After all, the Americans need a boggy man. With luck, Russia will pull out its investments from the Big N.Korea of N.America and as the 4th largest investor that will hurt. Obama Eyeing Internet ID for Americans
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 03:00 AM PST Let's have some fun with numbers. According to the official figures, the national debt currently stands at $14.01 trillion dollars. That's more than $45,000 per citizen, or almost $127,000 per taxpaying American. If you add in debt held by households, state and local governments and financial institutions, that number (the total US debt) blows out to well over $55.5 trillion, or more than $680,000 per average family. How much in savings does the average family have to offset this amount? $7,918. "Now just hang on a second," we hear our fellow reckoners moan, "wasn't this supposed to be fun with numbers?" Wait for it… Letting these figures run for a few years, based on their current trajectories, we see that, in 2015, the national debt explodes to over $22 trillion dollars. Per citizen, we're now looking at close to $70,000, or $184,000 per taxpayer. Total debt, as measured above, has now grown to over $63 trillion and the average family's share of that stands at nearly three-quarters of a million dollars. Average savings per family, by the way, have now fallen to just $2,791. And this doesn't even account for unfunded liabilities, which are growing like mould on cheese. According to Professor Laurence Kotlikoff's estimate, total US off-budget and on-budget debt comes in at more than $200 trillion. We'll leave you to do the math on everyone's share of that one. Of course, by the time you read this, these numbers will be yesterday's news, new and larger ones having taken their place. So where's the fun, you ask? Where are the rib-ticklers, the knee-slappers and the side-splitters? Glad you asked. With the national debt currently standing at $14.01 trillion, the US is just weeks away from busting through its so-called "debt ceiling" of $14.29 trillion. As usual, politicians have gone out of their way to miss the point entirely. Earlier this week, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner wrote a letter of concern to Congress. You might expect it to contain a desperate warning about how grossly enlarged the debt had become. Not quite. Geithner's letter, instead, warned of the "catastrophic consequences" of not raising the debt ceiling! Consequences, said he, which "would last for decades." Right, because the consequences of running up gargantuan deficits against your global competitors never carry lasting consequences. The problem, apparently, is that America doesn't have enough debt. She obviously needs room to accrue more, to really hit her gluttonous stride. Just look at all those nations throughout history that have successfully borrowed their way to prosperity! There's…um…er…hmmmn…. The letter continues, "Never in our history has Congress failed to increase the debt limit when necessary." Gee, could that be part of the problem? Are you laughing yet, Fellow Reckoner? No? What a wonderful comedy this would be…if it weren't so darned tragic. In response to Geithner's letter, Agora Financial's executive publisher, Addison Wiggin, penned his own letter to Congress. We urge you to read it, here. Joel Bowman Fun With Numbers originally appeared in the Daily Reckoning. The Daily Reckoning, offers a uniquely refreshing, perspective on the global economy, investing, gold, stocks and today's markets. Its been called "the most entertaining read of the day."
|
| Posted: 08 Jan 2011 01:48 AM PST
As Zero Hedge wrote earlier, following revelations that the DOJ was going through line items of private data, including personal financial information on Twitter, WikiLeaks has demanded that Goldman darling Facebook as well as the firm that "does no evil" Google reveal any subpoenas they may have received, if any. And all signs point to yes: after all why would the DOJ go after just Twitter which is not a repository of any notable private data, unlike the other companies, one of which already has been in much hot water in the past due to its privacy policy, and especially now that Goldman's SPV has full access to who knows what information: courtesy of the brain dead parasitic zombies at the SEC nobody knows just who knows what vis-a-vis Goldman's "private placement." And since a positive answer will most likely not do anything good for the brand reputation of either firm, as it will be spun in the way that these firms not only did not disclose an incursion in user privacy, but only did so following a fluke act by Twitter, and may well be working behind the scenes with who knows who else on providing gobs of private data on a silver platter to whatever is the government's witch hunt organization du jour, then maybe, just maybe, the world's infatuation with MySpace v2 (and Friendster v3) may finally start to wane, explaining why just as there are buyers, no matter how wealthy and sophisticated, in Goldman's latest PR fiasco, so there are sellers, who just happen to be wealthier and more sophisticated. From the Guardian:
In the meantime, Assange is certainly not making friends in the Department of Truth.
Regardless, if the Assange "drama" is rising to fever pitch again, then something of far greater significance is likely happening somewhere else.
|
| Weekly metals wrapup, Embry interview posted at King World News Posted: 08 Jan 2011 01:23 AM PST 9:20a ET Saturday, January 8, 2011 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold (and Silver): The weekly precious metals market review with Bill Haynes of CMI Gold & Silver and Dan Norcini of JSMineSet.com has been posted at King World News here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2011/1/8_KWN_We... And audio of the King World News interview with Sprott Asset Management's chief investment strategist, John Embry, which was summarized briefly for you Wednesday, has been posted here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2011/1/8_John_E... CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Sona Drills 85.4g Gold/Ton Over 4 Metres at Elizabeth Gold Deposit, Extending the Mineralization of the Southwest Vein on the Property Company Press Release, October 27, 2010 VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Sona Resources Corp. reports on five drillling holes in the third round of assay results from the recently completed drill program at its 100 percent-owned Elizabeth Gold Deposit Property in the Lillooet Mining District of southern British Columbia. Highlights from the diamond drilling include: -- Hole E10-66 intersected 17.4g gold/ton over 1.54 metres. -- Hole E10-67 intersected 96.4g gold/ton over 2.5 metres, including one assay interval of 383g of gold/ton over 0.5 metres. -- Hole E10-69 intersected 85.4g gold/ton over 4.03 metres, including one assay interval of 230g gold/ton over 1 metre. Four drill holes, E10-66 to E10-69, targeted the southwestern end of the Southwest Vein, and three of the holes have expanded the mineralized zone in that direction. The Southwest Vein gold mineralization has now been intersected over a strike length of 325 metres, with the deepest hole drilled less than 200 metres from surface. "The assay results from the Southwest Zone quartz vein continue to be extremely positive," says John P. Thompson, Sona's president and CEO. "We are expanding the Southwest Vein, and this high-grade gold mineralization remains wide open down dip and along strike to the southwest." For the company's full press release, please visit: http://sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR19_2010.pdf Join GATA here: Yukon Mining Investment e-Conference http://theyukonroom.com/yukon-eblast-static.html Vancouver Resource Investment Conference http://cambridgehouse3.com/conference-details/vancouver-resource-investment-conference-2011/15 Cheviot Asset Management Sound Money Conference Phoenix Investment Conference and Silver Summit Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal Or a video disc of GATA's 2005 Gold Rush 21 conference in the Yukon: Help keep GATA going GATA is a civil rights and educational organization based in the United States and tax-exempt under the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. Its e-mail dispatches are free, and you can subscribe at: To contribute to GATA, please visit: http://www.gata.org/node/16 ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Drills 71.17 Metres of 0.52% NiEq Prophecy Resource Corp. (TSX-V: PCY) reports that it has received additional assays results from its 100-percent-owned Wellgreen PGM Ni-Cu property in the Yukon, Canada. Diamond drill holes WS10-179 to WS10-182 were drilled during the summer of 2010 by Northern Platinum (which merged with Prophecy on September 23, 2010). WS10-183 was drilled by Prophecy in October 2010. Highlights from the newly received assays include 71.17 metres from surface of 0.52 percent NiEq (0.310 percent nickel, 0.466 g/t PGMs + Au, and 0.233 percent copper) and ended in mineralization. For more drill highlights, please visit: http://prophecyresource.com/news_2010_nov29.php
|
| The S&P 500 & Gold Under Pressure on Friday Posted: 08 Jan 2011 01:13 AM PST With the holiday season in the rear view mirror and volume slowly creeping back into the marketplace, I can’t help but wonder what lies ahead. The optimist in me is hopeful that the economy will continue to repair itself and the financial issues that plague the federal government, state government, and local governments will just go away as the economy rebounds. The only problem with my hope is that massive debts and deficits do not simply disappear and I fear the problem will be a long and lasting one.
|
| DOJ Secretly Subpoenas Private Twitter Information On Suspected WikiLeaks Associates Posted: 07 Jan 2011 11:59 PM PST
The DOJ, instead of pursuing actual threats to so-called justice, such as, among other, the fact that the entire US mortgage industry is based on churn-predicated fraud, that Goldman Sachs is an undisputed monopolist in the OTC market, and that JP Morgan uses its cartel power and FRBNY affiliation to control the commodity market, has decided to instead go after private user information on Twitter of all places. And while the excuse is that this is merely another expansion in the ongoing probe against that uber-terrorist organization Wikileaks (which as Salon's Glenn Greenwald points out is "doing nothing more than publishing classified information showing what the U.S. Government is doing: something investigative journalists, by definition, do all the time") it may have actually crossed the line by subpoenaning private data from an Icelandic member of parliament, Birgitta Jonsdottir, a one-time associate of Julian Assange. Furthermore, it appears that Twitter may be just one of many services which have received the DOJ subpoena (Wikileaks suspects that Google and Facebook are two other sites that may have received a Wikileaks-related subpoena but have so far not disclosed it), but is the only one which requested that the original order be unsealed. Most importantly, the question of just who Eric Holder consider a potential "threat" is completely unclear, which means that pretty much anyone can be the subject of complete disclosure of data previously considered private.One thing is certain: if anyone has ever donated to Wikileaks via Paypal or otherwise, they are now likely a target. The Guardian was on the case first, describing how Birgitta Jonsdottir learned that was the target of a DOJ subpoena:
Why is Jonsdottir being investigated:
However, as could be expected in what is now becoming an all out McCarthyist witch hunt, the circle of potential investigation targets is virtually unlimited:
Glenn Greenwald provides more information on what is being sought by the DOJ:
It also appears that this latest escalation in the Wikileaks investigation has been going on for a while and that the Judge who served the orders gave specific instructions that services such as Twitter do not disclose the information to the subject of the witch-hunt. It is only a fluke that Twitter resisted and demanded to at least advise user of what is going on:
Lastly, as noted previously, it is very possible that the DOJ is canvassing private information from far more services than just Twitter. And since the DOJ can use any excuse to find an "affiliation" between anyone and soon to be persona non grata #1, Julian Assange, nobody's private internet data is safe any longer. On the other hand, ever since Goldman, which de facto is the government, has a direct and very private look at Facebook's entire database, this should not come as a surprise to anyone. Again Greenwald summarizes it best:
One thing is guaranteed: the DOJ, instead of actually going after real crimes, is using its vast power to go after the very core premise behind the idea of investigative journalism. After all, who will care about the real crimes perpetrated behind the scenes when the government makes a special-effects filled motion picture about a fake crime involving the 21st century's biggest "witch" spoon-fed to the peasantry on every single TV channel in 24/7, and soon in glorious 3D (using passive shutter glasses sold at Best Buy on one year layaway of course).
|
| Reckless U.S. Deficit Spending May Reap Inflation Whirlwind Posted: 07 Jan 2011 10:26 PM PST Bill Gross, the PIMCO Money Manager, to whom it is often worth listening, cautioned this week that our nations leaders really do not know where they are going. They are mired in the fiscal quicksands of perpetual trillion dollar deficits. I believe as he does that there will be more agony ahead after the present euphoria in the equity markets. Thus I say, “Caveat Emptor-Let the Buyer Beware!” Our leaders are paying scant attention to the “Buck” that is being passed on to our children who are going to be stuck with the bills that we are dumping on them. Today I do not see anybody around to weep for our infants. As the reporter covering the burning of the Hindenburg shouted in horror, “O the humanity!”
|
| Macro-Trends – Keys to Macro Profits in 2011, Gold and Silver Ultimate Wealth Protection Posted: 07 Jan 2011 10:13 PM PST “Nothing has changed fundamentally to improve the outlook for the U.S. economy. It remains in a protracted downturn that has started to deepen anew and that shows no signs of sustainable economic recovery in the year ahead… …the economy in 2011 should remain much weaker than generally is expected, with ongoing negative implications for systemic solvency, for the federal budget deficit and for U.S. Treasury fundings. Such also implies a likely accelerating expansion of the Federal Reserve’s "quantitative easing," reflecting active monetization of U.S. Treasury debt and debasement of the U.S. dollar.
|
| Posted: 07 Jan 2011 10:04 PM PST Thanks to its awesome autumn rally, silver has become something of a rock star in the commodities world. Investors and speculators alike are enthralled with this white metal. But with it just hitting new 30-year highs, many on Wall Street suspect silver is stretching to bull-ending extremes. However once silver’s modern history is recast into real inflation-adjusted terms, this metal’s secular bull is still looking young.
|
| Market Commentary From Monty Guild Posted: 07 Jan 2011 09:41 PM PST View the original post at jsmineset.com... January 07, 2011 03:41 PM The Key Asset Classes For 2011 Will Be: Oil, Gold, And Stocks Economic growth will be fine. The debt overhang will be handled by continuing and accelerated Quantitative Easing. Looking ahead, we are quite optimistic about demand for stocks, gold, and commodities in 2011 Investors are moving from bonds to stocks, and the huge cash balances at money market funds will likely find their way into stock and commodity markets in 2011. This means that inflation and commodities prices are likely to rise faster than wages, and those living on fixed incomes or bond interest will be affected the most, due to the fact that their money buys less of everything; both luxuries and necessities. However, the ramifications of this inflationary trend are also serious for wage-earners. In every inflationary period in recorded history, wages have risen more slowly than inflation. Although government off...
|
| Posted: 07 Jan 2011 07:06 PM PST Biwii
|
| Just One Stock: The Gold Explorer Looking for 'West Africa in Nevada' Posted: 07 Jan 2011 01:15 PM PST William Baker submits:  Several times a week, Seeking Alpha's Jason Aycock asks money managers about their single highest-conviction position - what they would own (or short) if they could choose just one stock or ETF. William Baker is founder of Gaineswood Investment Management, a Baltimore-based RIA that manages equity portfolios for individuals, institutions, and an in-house limited partnership. A 25-year industry veteran, he previously worked as a portfolio manager at Reich & Tang, and spent nearly five years in portfolio management at Oppenheimer Mutual Funds. If you could only hold one U.S.-traded stock position in your portfolio (long or short), what would it be? Complete Story »
|
The implications of the crash of 2008 have made one thing very clear. China has emerged as the engine of growth in the world. The US became the land of sub-prime loans, and Europe is the land of finely dressed paupers. The Europe of today is not the Europe of old.
| You are subscribed to email updates from Save Your ASSets First To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
No comments:
Post a Comment