Gold World News Flash |
- The Summer of 2012
- Battlefield USA: The Gray State Is Coming – By Consent or By Conquest (*Movie Pitch Trailer*)
- Deflation: As Good As Gold?
- We Are Now Seeing Huge Orders For Physical Gold & Silver
- There Is More to Gold than Mere Capital Appreciation: John Hathaway
- On The Mystery Rally Of Summer 2012
- Gold Alternate Count a C Wave Triangle
- A Step Toward Gold Confiscation?
- At the top of China's government, a plan for getting gold
- Guest Post: A Step Towards Gold Confiscation
- Got Physical Gold?
- Big buying appears in gold and silver, CMI's Haynes tells King World News
- Ron Paul’s Legacy: A Complete Audit Of The Secretive Banking Cartel?
- Marshall Auerback: Central Banks Will Need to Recover Their Gold
- Why dost thou whet thy knife so earnestly?
- The Gold Price Rose $4.20 Still Trying to Bust $1,625 but Closing $1,617.10 Higher Prices to Come
- The “New” Migration To Gold And Silver
- The CFTC Silver Investigation
- Margin Hiker-In-Chief Fires First Warning Shot As CME Raises Crude Oil Margins
- Treasury used ESF cash to insure money-market funds
- There's a massive Asian buyer in the gold market, Davies tells King World News
- Dimitri Speck: A high-frequency attack on gold
- Target Date for a Bubble Bursting
- Gold Seeker Closing Report: Gold and Silver Gain With Dollar
- Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Coil and Cap
- Gold Resource Corporation Reports Second Quarter 2012 Results; Increases Production by 8% Over Prior Year Quarter
- From the Field: Kiyuk Lake Summer Program Update
- The Dispossessed Majority
- Gold, Silver, Corn, And Brent Are Best Performers On The 5-Year Anniversary Of The Great Financial Crisis
- Gold Technicals Portend Impending Breakout: Similar chart patterns in seven major currencies signal potential for resumption of secular bull market
| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 11:56 PM PDT from Fabian4Liberty: We are living in The Summer of 2012, events are shaping up that may change the course of history forever. Whether record droughts sweeping across America or the continued economic collapse taking place across the banking sector many realize something is about to break. Have the global elites decided to pull the plug on our Republic? Does humanity have a chance to defeat the system? Only time will tell.
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| Battlefield USA: The Gray State Is Coming – By Consent or By Conquest (*Movie Pitch Trailer*) Posted: 09 Aug 2012 11:50 PM PDT from SHTFPlan: You're about to experience one of the most frightening conceptual film trailers you've ever seen; what makes it so scary is that it could very well become reality in the not too distant future. The world reels with the turmoil of war, geological disaster, and economic collapse, while Americans continue to submerge themselves in illusions of safety and immunity. While rights are sold for security, the federal government, swollen with power, begins a systematic takeover of liberty in order to bring about a New World Order. Americans, quarantined to militarized districts, become a population ripe for tyrannical control. Fearmongering, terrorism, police state, martial law, war, arrest, internment, hunger, oppression, violence, resistance – these are the new terms by which Americans define their existence. Neighbor is turned against neighbor as the value of the dollar plunges to zero, food supplies are depleted, and everyone is a terror suspect. There are arrests. Disappearances. Bio attacks. Public executions of those even suspected of dissent. Even rumors of concentration camps on American soil. This is the backdrop to an unfolding story of resistance. American militias prepare for guerilla warfare. There are mass defections from the military as true Patriots attempt to rally around the Constitution and defend liberty, preparing a national insurgency against federal forces, knowing full well this will be the last time in history the oppressed will be capable of organized resistance. To learn more about how you can help make this a full blown motion picture, learn more about the film effort:
You can visit this web site for more information about how you can help. Also check out the Gray State Youtube channel.
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 11:36 PM PDT Biwii
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| We Are Now Seeing Huge Orders For Physical Gold & Silver Posted: 09 Aug 2012 10:01 PM PDT  Today forty year veteran of the metals markets Bill Haynes told KWN, "Right now we are seeing very large physical orders for both gold and silver. It is very interesting because these are entities with large existing holdings of both physical gold and silver, but for some reason, right here, right now they are adding sizable quantities to their existing positions."
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| There Is More to Gold than Mere Capital Appreciation: John Hathaway Posted: 09 Aug 2012 10:00 PM PDT by The Gold Report, Casey Research:
The Gold Report: John, you predicted $2,000/ounce (oz) gold prices. After rising to $1,900/oz last fall, the price has hovered at $1,500–1,600/oz much of 2012. What will cause it to take the next leg up? John Hathaway: There are several factors that I think will drive gold higher. On the monetary side, central bankers and treasury secretaries are bobbing and weaving, making it up as they go. They lack a comprehensive solution to the sovereign debt crisis in Europe, to the forces that are pulling the Eurozone apart or to the stagnation in the world's key economies. Ultimately, all of this will further debase the value of paper currency.
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| On The Mystery Rally Of Summer 2012 Posted: 09 Aug 2012 09:53 PM PDT Six weeks ago we detailed how watching intra- and inter-asset-class correlations can tell investors a lot about what is behind market movements and as Nick Colas, of ConvergEx, highlights in his monthly review of asset price correlations - it reveals a key feature of the "Mystery Rally of Summer 2012." The move from the early June lows for U.S. stocks has come with increasing correlations across a wide array of asset types and industry sectors. That's unusual, because rising markets over the past three years more commonly bring lower correlations. For example, the rally from January to early April of this year saw industry correlations within the S&P 500 drop from +95% to 75-80% as the index went from 1270 to 1420 (a 12% return). Conversely, the move from 1278 to 1400 (early June to present day) has come with increasing industry correlations – 82% in May to 86% currently. To us, that's an important "Tell" about what's been taking us higher – hopes for further Federal Reserve liquidity at the next FOMC meeting in September and ECB liquidity to support the euro. The rest of August will likely feature the kind of light-volume tape that loves to drift higher, but increasing correlations represent a flashing yellow light signifying the need for caution in trading over the balance of the month.
Nick Colas, ConvergEx: Into the Air, Junior Birdmen
I have a pet hobby of searching for oddball sporting events with big-ticket prizes. For several years the best example I could muster was the FLW Outdoors sport fishing tournament series, where competing fishermen (and women, I assume) vie for $100,000 first prizes by bringing in the biggest catch over a four day tournament. Purses have gone as high as $1 million, and the top talent in the sport now have big-name sponsors, with their fishing jackets resembling NASCAR uniforms. Walmart is a key corporate supporter of the top series, and there's even an online "Fantasy Fishing" tournament for fans with a $100,000 first place cash prize at the end of a season. I think I have finally found a better case study: the "South African Million Dollar Pigeon Race." It is held every year in Sun City; the next event is scheduled for February 2013 if you would like a head start on making reservations. As the name implies, it is a race for a specific kind of bird – the "Racing Homer" pigeon – with a $200,000 top prize and a total of a $1 million purse, with every bird in the top 300 getting at least $500. A little bit of research online finds that this pastime is not limited to South Africa. There are pigeon racing events in the U.S., not to mention an American Racing Pigeon Union based out of Oklahoma City with a spiffy website and a quarterly newsletter. One of the taglines for the sport is that it has "A single starting gate and a thousand finish lines." Pigeon owners bring their birds to a race location, release them, and time how long it takes them to navigate their way back to their home coop, wherever that might be. The birds use whatever avian magic they have (some say it is the magnetic field of the Earth) to determine where home might be and then fly back to it. The winning bird is essentially the fastest one through the air and back to its nest, as determined by increasingly high-tech pigeon-identifying devices that resemble the systems used to time elite marathon runners. Our feathered athletic friends may not know it, but the structure of a pigeon race is pretty much how equity markets are supposed to work. Every stock essentially starts the year in the same place, and it is a race to see which ones are the fastest to discount their own particular improving/deteriorating fundamentals. To borrow from the old Wall Street saying, "It's a race of pigeons, not a pigeon race." At the end of the year, some stocks are winners, some are losers, and a lot just peck around and get lost on the way home. Or eaten by a falcon. That seems to happen a lot in pigeon racing, by the way. That's how stock markets are supposed to function – now let's talk about how things really are. Since the 2007-2008 Financial Crisis, asset price correlations (how much precious metals, fixed income, currency, and stock prices move together/apart) have been a great "Tell" about what is really driving capital markets and investor behavior. We've been tracking these numbers for 19 different asset classes and industry sectors since then – check out the graphs and tables immediately following this note for some history around these numbers. Over the last four years – no surprise – asset prices have moved largely in sync with each other. At first, this was understandable since an investment theme of "Hey, the world's not ending tomorrow" is going to be a tide that lifts all boats. Sharply. But as the global economy shifted into slow-growth mode, correlations should have dropped. They didn't, largely because of still-lingering macro risks and the binary nature of fiscal and monetary policy responses required to address them. Over time, I have come to think of the asset price correlation we gather as a measure of "Normalcy." When correlations fall, it is a sign that global markets may be getting back to something akin to the old model of capital markets. Good stocks go up, bad ones go down. Precious metals do their own thing. Fixed income trades somewhat independently. And when correlations rise, it's because all the pigeons/stocks are essentially lost and looking for direction wherever they can find it. Historical 30-Day Correlations Against S&P 500
Here are my three key takeaways from this month's data:
And our more granular single-name, bottom-up equity and credit correlations show a similar pattern to Nick's - with a quite pronounced jump in short-term pairwise-correlation across the 100 names of the S&P 100...
and a 125-name investment grade credit index...
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| Gold Alternate Count a C Wave Triangle Posted: 09 Aug 2012 09:03 PM PDT courtesy of DailyFX.com August 09, 2012 02:45 PM Daily Bars Prepared by Jamie Saettele, CMT A bearish triangle remains possible but presentation of an alternate count is appropriate given that gold is nearing the top of its range. The alternate would treat consolidation from 1640.80 as a B wave triangle. A break above 1640.80 would confirm that wave C is underway towards 1700 (Fibonacci extension is just below that level and the 2/10 low is just above 1700). “After breaking the triangle pattern, gold has dropped well into its former range. Other than calling this a range, there really is no reason to waste time trying to figure out where this market is headed next. In fact, one can make the argument that the triangle remains underway (latest top composing wave C), in which case this market will get even more frustrating to follow over the next few months.” LEVELS: 1563 1584 1602 1618 1630 1641...
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| A Step Toward Gold Confiscation? Posted: 09 Aug 2012 09:00 PM PDT from Azizonomics:
In attempting to stimulate risk appetite by taking "safe" assets out of the market, the Fed has actually achieved precisely the opposite of stimulating productive investment. First, it has turned bond markets into a race to the bottom as bond flippers end up piling into the very assets that the Fed is trying to discourage ownership of — because who care about low yields when the Fed will jump in at an even lower price floor, thus assuring the bond flippers a profit? Second it has energised other safe asset markets (such as gold) as longer term investors look for alternatives to preserve their purchasing power in the context of a global economic depression. The Fed is firing at the wrong target; the real problem — the thing that is causing investors to scramble for safe assets — is an economic depression brought on by (among other non-monetary causes) the deleveraging costs of an unsustainable debt bubble. Without addressing the problem of excess total debt — and quantitative easing aims to increase lending — the Fed is firing blanks. However, there seems little prospect that the Fed will listen to the debt-watchers who actually predicted the crisis. The likelihood is that the Fed will continue to attempt to take safe assets out of the market. And after treasuries, what will the Fed try to take out of the market?
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| At the top of China's government, a plan for getting gold Posted: 09 Aug 2012 08:53 PM PDT 10:50p ET Thursday, August 9, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold: China's interest in obtaining gold, as planned at the highest levels of the government, is recounted in a couple of postings at Centennial Precious Metals' USAGold Internet site here: http://www.usagold.com/cpmforum/2012/08/08/chinas-strategy-on-gold/ http://www.usagold.com/cpmforum/2012/08/08/chinas-golden-people/ CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Sona Discovers Potential High-Grade Gold Mineralization From a Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- With its latest surface diamond drilling program at its 100-percent-owned, formerly producing Blackdome gold mine in southern British Columbia, Sona Resources Corp. has discovered a potentially high-grade gold-mineralized area, with one hole intersecting 13.6 grams of gold in 1.5 meters of core drilling. "We intersected a promising new mineralized zone, and we feel optimistic about the assay results," says Sona's president and CEO, John P. Thompson. "We have undertaken an aggressive exploration program that has tested a number of target zones. Our discovery of this new gold-bearing structure is significant, and it represents a positive development for the company." Sona aims to bring its permitted Blackdome mill back into production over the next year and a half, at a rate of 200 tonnes per day, with feed from the formerly producing Blackdome mine and the nearby Elizabeth gold deposit property. A positive preliminary economic assessment by Micon International Ltd., based on a gold price of $950 per ounce over eight years, has estimated a cash cost of $208 per tonne milled, or $686 per gold ounce recovered. For the company's complete press release, please visit: http://www.sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR18_2011-opt.pdf Join GATA here: Toronto Resource Investment Conference New Orleans Investment Conference * * * Support GATA by purchasing DVDs of our London conference in August 2011 or our Dawson City conference in August 2006: http://www.goldrush21.com/order.html Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt: Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal 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: ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Platinum Announces Wellgreen Preliminary Economic Assessment: Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada -- Prophecy Platinum Corp. (TSX-V: NKL, OTC-QX: PNIKF, Frankfurt: P94P) reports the results of an independent NI 43-101-compliant preliminary economic assessment for its fully owned Wellgreen nickel-copper-platinum group metals project in the Yukon Territory. The independent assessment, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case of an open-pit mine (with a mining rate of 111,500 tonnes per day), an on-site concentrator (with a milling rate of 32,000 tonnes per day), and an initial capital cost of $863 million. The project is expected to produce (in concentrate) 1.959 billion pounds of nickel, 2.058 billion pounds of copper, and 7.119 million ounces of platinum, palladium, and gold during a mine life of 37 years with an average strip ratio of 2.57. The financial highlights of the preliminary economic assessment, shown in U.S. dollars, are as follows: Payback period: 3.55 years Prophecy Chairman John Lee says: "We are pleased with the preliminary economic assessment results. The numbers indicate that Wellgreen is one of most exciting mineral projects in the Yukon. The company is drilling to upgrade and expand the resource base. The infrastructure is excellent as the project is only 1,400 meters in altitude and 14 kilometers from the paved Alaska Highway, which leads to the Haines deep seaport. Discussions are under way with support from local stakeholders regarding permitting and logistics." For the complete press release, please visit: http://prophecyplat.com/news_2012_june18_prophecy_platinum_announces_res...
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| Guest Post: A Step Towards Gold Confiscation Posted: 09 Aug 2012 08:05 PM PDT Submitted by John Aziz of Azizonomics, In attempting to stimulate risk appetite by taking "safe" assets out of the market, the Fed has actually achieved precisely the opposite of stimulating productive investment. First, it has turned bond markets into a race to the bottom as bond flippers end up piling into the very assets that the Fed is trying to discourage ownership of — because who care about low yields when the Fed will jump in at an even lower price floor, thus assuring the bond flippers a profit? Second it has energised other safe asset markets (such as gold) as longer term investors look for alternatives to preserve their purchasing power in the context of a global economic depression. The Fed is firing at the wrong target; the real problem — the thing that is causing investors to scramble for safe assets — is an economic depression brought on by (among other non-monetary causes) the deleveraging costs of an unsustainable debt bubble. Without addressing the problem of excess total debt — and quantitative easing aims to increase lending — the Fed is firing blanks. However, there seems little prospect that the Fed will listen to the debt-watchers who actually predicted the crisis. The likelihood is that the Fed will continue to attempt to take safe assets out of the market. And after treasuries, what will the Fed try to take out of the market? Izabella Kaminska writes in FT Alphaville:
A little behind the curve.
The main question if such an event were to occur is just how "compulsory" such purchases might be.
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 08:00 PM PDT by Byron King, Whiskey and Gunpowder:
People give me grief all the time about recommending and holding gold. "Oh, gold is risky," they say. "Yes, of course," I reply. "Gold has been risky since I started buying it at $300 per ounce, back in 2001." Indeed, gold is risky today. From its current level gold could decline. That would be if there's a massive market crash, and people have to sell gold to raise cash to pay off their margin calls. Remember 2008? Gold sold down from about $1,000 to about $750. Still, that 25% haircut was mild, compared with what happened to the rest of the market. And through it all — the crash and turmoil — gold remained liquid. Somebody bought that gold. So gold is good, especially when people need fast cash. Read More @ WhiskeyAndGunpowder.com
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| Big buying appears in gold and silver, CMI's Haynes tells King World News Posted: 09 Aug 2012 07:54 PM PDT 9:52p ET Thursday, August 9, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold: Bill Haynes of CMI Gold and Silver in Arizona tonight tells King World News that major orders for both gold and silver are being received from "strong hands" who are convinced that the bottom in the monetary metals has been passed. An excerpt from the interview is posted at the King World News blog here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2012/8/10_We... CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Platinum Announces Wellgreen Preliminary Economic Assessment: Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada -- Prophecy Platinum Corp. (TSX-V: NKL, OTC-QX: PNIKF, Frankfurt: P94P) reports the results of an independent NI 43-101-compliant preliminary economic assessment for its fully owned Wellgreen nickel-copper-platinum group metals project in the Yukon Territory. The independent assessment, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case of an open-pit mine (with a mining rate of 111,500 tonnes per day), an on-site concentrator (with a milling rate of 32,000 tonnes per day), and an initial capital cost of $863 million. The project is expected to produce (in concentrate) 1.959 billion pounds of nickel, 2.058 billion pounds of copper, and 7.119 million ounces of platinum, palladium, and gold during a mine life of 37 years with an average strip ratio of 2.57. The financial highlights of the preliminary economic assessment, shown in U.S. dollars, are as follows: Payback period: 3.55 years Prophecy Chairman John Lee says: "We are pleased with the preliminary economic assessment results. The numbers indicate that Wellgreen is one of most exciting mineral projects in the Yukon. The company is drilling to upgrade and expand the resource base. The infrastructure is excellent as the project is only 1,400 meters in altitude and 14 kilometers from the paved Alaska Highway, which leads to the Haines deep seaport. Discussions are under way with support from local stakeholders regarding permitting and logistics." For the complete press release, please visit: http://prophecyplat.com/news_2012_june18_prophecy_platinum_announces_res... Join GATA here: Toronto Resource Investment Conference New Orleans Investment Conference * * * Support GATA by purchasing DVDs of our London conference in August 2011 or our Dawson City conference in August 2006: http://www.goldrush21.com/order.html Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt: Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal 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: ADVERTISEMENT Sona Discovers Potential High-Grade Gold Mineralization From a Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- With its latest surface diamond drilling program at its 100-percent-owned, formerly producing Blackdome gold mine in southern British Columbia, Sona Resources Corp. has discovered a potentially high-grade gold-mineralized area, with one hole intersecting 13.6 grams of gold in 1.5 meters of core drilling. "We intersected a promising new mineralized zone, and we feel optimistic about the assay results," says Sona's president and CEO, John P. Thompson. "We have undertaken an aggressive exploration program that has tested a number of target zones. Our discovery of this new gold-bearing structure is significant, and it represents a positive development for the company." Sona aims to bring its permitted Blackdome mill back into production over the next year and a half, at a rate of 200 tonnes per day, with feed from the formerly producing Blackdome mine and the nearby Elizabeth gold deposit property. A positive preliminary economic assessment by Micon International Ltd., based on a gold price of $950 per ounce over eight years, has estimated a cash cost of $208 per tonne milled, or $686 per gold ounce recovered. For the company's complete press release, please visit: http://www.sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR18_2011-opt.pdf
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| Ron Paul’s Legacy: A Complete Audit Of The Secretive Banking Cartel? Posted: 09 Aug 2012 07:32 PM PDT Wolf Richter www.testosteronepit.com They only bubble up rarely, these scandals at the Federal Reserve System, but when they do, they're doozies, involving huge amounts of money, massive conflicts of interest, all-out manipulation, collusion, favoritism, dizzying cronyism.... And yet, over the 100 years that the Fed has existed, it has done an excellent job in one of its other primary functions, maintaining the dollar, which has lost only 96% of its value—instead of 100%. The latest scandal is the Libor fiasco that is spawning worldwide investigations of the largest banks, going back years. The New York Fed under its President Timothy Geithner knew of the manipulations as early as 2007, and knew it involved banks of which it was one of the regulators. There were some hush-hush contacts with British regulators, and that was it. Nothing changed. Status quo maintained. Just about then, the financial crisis began to expose the house of cards that financial institutions had become. Bear Stearns was saved. During the ensuing bailout mania of 2007 – 2009, the New York Fed, under the same management, handed trillions of freshly printed dollars to the same banks that it knew were manipulating Libor. It was done in secret, and the public wouldn’t have known who got what, how the decisions were made, why Lehman wasn’t bailed out though Goldman was, had it not been for the audit by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) as authorized by the Dodd-Frank financial reform act [for some gory details, read... The GAO Audit of the Fed Doesn’t Call It ‘Corruption’ but it should]. During the peak of the financial crisis, Bloomberg sued the Fed to gain access to information relating to the trillions being passed out in secret and in all haste. It won! Finally, November 2011, the Fed dumped 29,000 pages of documents that revealed how many trillions its cronies had received. The audit results and the revelations from the Fed’s data dump came way late. Popular anger had subsided into a low simmer. Other priorities had edged to the top. And once again, nothing changed at the otherwise hermetically sealed fortress of the Fed. Status quo was successfully maintained. It remains a secretive banking cartel with unchecked powers. Bankers, top industrialists, and some economists get together with total impunity to engage in market manipulation and price fixing with impact across the globe, including interest rates that savers receive when they hand over their money to these banks—which is zero or just about zero (and negative after inflation). Hence the need for regular audits—assuming that the country even needs a central bank of this type, though not everyone, including Congressman Ron Paul, thinks so. This audit would be different than the bloated “financial” audits done annually by Deloitte (2011 audit). It would be a complete audit by the GAO of the Federal Reserve System, including the FMOC. Fed Chairman Bed Bernanke called it a “nightmare scenario” that would create “political influence” and have a “chilling effect.” Indeed, a nightmare for the banking cartel, with a chilling effect on the shenanigans being perpetrated. Now, the Republicans have an opportunity. Ron Paul is retiring from Congress after 24 plus years of going after the Fed [read.... Ron Paul Slugs At The Fed One More Time]. But during his primary campaign, he gained a lot of supporters, and now it appears that there might be critical mass to push a complete Fed audit into the dynamics of the Republican National Convention on August 27—and elevate it to a plank in the platform. “It’s good economics and it’s good legislation,” Paul said, “but it’s also good politics, because 80% of the American people agree with it.” But it will be an uphill battle against powerful interests: Congress. It’s dependent on the Fed. The deficit will be around $1.3 trillion this year, a vote-buying scheme without peer. In a few weeks, gross national debt will exceed $16 trillion. This ballooning debt needs to be funded and rolled over at near zero cost, and the Fed has promised to make that happens—regardless of what it may do to the real economy. So Congress can’t afford to upset the status quo. And it doesn’t want a Fed audit. Then there is the financial industry, including the TBTF banks, their stakeholders, and large corporations. Many of them were direct recipient of the Fed’s largesse. They want QE and status quo. They want to get bailed out next time. None of them want a Fed audit. Mitt Romney has been dodging the issue, but given his private equity background, he is unlikely to be gung ho about a Fed audit. Resistance is bipartisan, however, and the White House certainly doesn’t want one. But it brings together interesting bedfellows: the Tea Party, Ron Paul supporters, independents of all stripes, moderate democrats, liberal democrats, all the way out to the left wing. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who calls himself a socialist, is a vocal supporter of Fed audits. It’s a mirror of America. And so, if Republicans want to garner support where it would normally be difficult to find, a strong audit-the-Fed plank in their platform might do wonders. Here is an insanely awesome and hilarious cartoon by Ben Garrison on how Ron Paul is shedding light on the horrid creatures “underneath” the Fed. And here I am in a conversation with Max Keiser on the Keiser Report, discussing bubbles, central banks, NIRP, and “stupidity arbitrage” (video).
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| Marshall Auerback: Central Banks Will Need to Recover Their Gold Posted: 09 Aug 2012 07:30 PM PDT from Jesse's Café Américain:
There is not much doubt in my mind that the markets are being 'managed' here. By whom, for what reasons, and for how long is another question. But the trades and the tape are telling their tale. I am wondering if this is a new phase of the Fed's interference in the markets in lieu of genuine economic reform. They have used indirect means to pump equities as a means of wealth transmission before. This was a favorite ploy of Robert Rubin when he was Treasury Secretary. It would not surprise me if the gold price was being held around 1600 in order to give the banks an opportunity to redeem their leased gold IOU's to avoid embarrassment before things get 'messy' in Europe. The people in Germany, Italy, Spain, England, and Portugal will be angry enough, and to find out that their irresponsible banks had sold off their gold to their cronies in the bullion banks on the cheap might be a bit much. As for the US, that is a murky situation indeed. Read More @ Jesse's Café Américain:
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| Why dost thou whet thy knife so earnestly? Posted: 09 Aug 2012 07:00 PM PDT by Simon Black, Sovereign Man :
In the middle of the performance, I got curious about the sum. How much is 3,000 ducats in today's money? A quick check on my phone gave me the answer. A ducat's weight is roughly 3.5 grams, or .11 troy ounces of gold weight… so 3,000 ducats is roughly $530,000 at today's gold price. In the context of the play, this amount makes sense; in other words, if one were to write an updated version of the play to today's standards, substituting half a million dollars for 3,000 ducats would definitely fit the plot.
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| The Gold Price Rose $4.20 Still Trying to Bust $1,625 but Closing $1,617.10 Higher Prices to Come Posted: 09 Aug 2012 05:11 PM PDT Gold Price Close Today : 1617.10 Change : 4.20 or 0.26% Silver Price Close Today : 2809.70 Change : 2.0 or 0.07% Gold Silver Ratio Today : 57.554 Change : 0.109 or 0.19% Silver Gold Ratio Today : 0.01737 Change : -0.000033 or -0.19% Platinum Price Close Today : 1411.30 Change : 2.00 or 0.14% Palladium Price Close Today : 586.00 Change : 0.20 or 0.03% S&P 500 : 1,402.80 Change : 0.58 or 0.04% Dow In GOLD$ : $168.29 Change : $ (0.29) or -0.17% Dow in GOLD oz : 8.141 Change : -0.014 or -0.17% Dow in SILVER oz : 468.56 Change : 0.04 or 0.01% Dow Industrial : 13,165.19 Change : 10.45 or 0.08% US Dollar Index : 82.60 Change : 0.306 or 0.37% The GOLD PRICE rose $4.20 to $1,617.10, but as nice as this is, it doesn't really prove anything. Just leaves GOLD trying to bust through $1,625 still. It's pushing, for sure, but must break through to change anything. The SILVER PRICE rose -- get out your microscope -- two cents to 2809.7c. Chart resembles gold, but knocking at a ceiling of 2820c. 2860c is the next big barrier. Yet this is progress. The SILVER and GOLD PRICE are holding on and slugging out gains cent by cent. Higher prices to come in the fall. Today leaves me scratching my head. Course, that ain't no big trick, since I'm only a natural born fool. Twist your brain around this. US Dollar index rose today, 30.6 basis points (0.39%) to 82.603, a right pert move. Makes you think demand for dollars rose, right? But the yield on 10 year treasuries gapped UP today, meaning the 10 year treasury price FELL. But what is a 10 year treasury made of save dollars? Nothing, not even any vanilla, so dollar demand fell? Why mess with this? All that "flight into dollar" talk has some little credibility as long as that yield keeps falling and T-note rising, but the yield has now twice (2x) gapped up in the last three days. What I want to know is, what happens when the "flight OUT OF the dollar" starts? And it will look something like this, with yields rising fast. By the way, it appears that yield has bottomed and reversed. The Draghi gas has been let out of the euro's bag. Euro dropped again today, down 0.46% to $1.2305. Tomorrow will probably drop below the 20 day moving average, which it touched today at $1.2264 Sorry, sorry. Yen stumbled 0.17% to 127.27 cents (Y78.57). Rolling over earthward. STOCKS were a mite bewildered today. Dow fell 10.45 to 13,165.19 while along with other indices the S&P 500 rose 0.58 to 1,402.80. Highest the S&P500 can reach is about 1,420, Dow about 13,300. Then the torture will begin. I always thought there must be something in the world dumber than a US presidential race. I was wrong. The Republican, What's-His-Name, lambasts welfare cheats and accuses Obama and the Democrats of abetting them. Look at the numbers: this is an emotional red herring, as you can roll up all the welfare in a ball and throw in social security and it amounts to less than peanuts in the Federal Budget. Big money goes to war spending and medical care, and they won't touch war spending any closer than Superman will touch kryptonite. I saw a Reuters report today that was got everything completely so wrong that it wasn't worth the trouble to unravel. It said we are getting close to game over for gold. What makes all these otherwise intelligent people such goofs when the topic turns to gold or silver? They have no clue what drives them. None. Not a bit, and even when they cite an excrescence of the driver -- in this case, the Fed's inflationary QE1 and QE2 -- they can't fit that into the bigger picture. Dopey as it sounds, they believe the Fed's propaganda that these inflationary waves help the economy or are limited to these two incidents. In other words, they don't grasp that the Fed's job is to INFLATE, and it can do no other, and that the entire jury-rigged financial and monetary and government spending system must inflate or die, and that inflation alone drives silver and gold. Argentum et aurum comparenda sunt -- -- Gold and silver must be bought. - Franklin Sanders, The Moneychanger The-MoneyChanger.com © 2011, The Moneychanger. May not be republished in any form, including electronically, without our express permission. To avoid confusion, please remember that the comments above have a very short time horizon. Always invest with the primary trend. Gold's primary trend is up, targeting at least $3,130.00; silver's primary is up targeting 16:1 gold/silver ratio or $195.66; stocks' primary trend is down, targeting Dow under 2,900 and worth only one ounce of gold; US$ or US$-denominated assets, primary trend down; real estate in a bubble, primary trend way down. Whenever I write "Stay out of stocks" readers inevitably ask, "Do you mean precious metals mining stocks, too?" No, I don't. Be advised and warned: Do NOT use these commentaries to trade futures contracts. I don't intend them for that or write them with that outlook. I write them for long-term investors in physical metals. Take them as entertainment, but not as a timing service for futures. 
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| The “New” Migration To Gold And Silver Posted: 09 Aug 2012 05:00 PM PDT Yesterday I gave you a brief history of gold, and why I think the metal may be higher. Today let’s round out our discussion with the importance of holding physical metal! In fact, over the past few years investors have been flocking to gold and silver. What’s going on? It’s a worldwide trend. There’s a money migration going on. And I mean BIG money is migrating. It’s like those herds of zebras or wildebeests or gazelles in Africa. When they migrate, the earth shakes and the ground is just a moving kaleidoscope of hides and footprints. The dust clouds blow high into the sky. Yes, the world economy might be in a recession. People across the world are worried about their job and security for their family. But other people with big bucks are scooping up gold and silver. Those buyers are looking for investment safety, they want to protect and grow their wealth. Moneyed investors don’t trust the world’s governments or paper currencies (just look ...
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 03:59 PM PDT By Ted Butler | SilverSeek There has been an explosion of interest and commentary these past few days as a result of a front page story in Monday's edition of the influential Financial Times (of London). The story stated that the CFTC was set to drop its four year investigation into alleged silver price manipulation [...] 
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Margin Hiker-In-Chief Fires First Warning Shot As CME Raises Crude Oil Margins Posted: 09 Aug 2012 03:45 PM PDT Back in April, when gas at the pump hit all time highs for that time of the year, and when the world was still hoping the euphoria from the LTRO would last (it didn't), Obama decided to implement his own centrally-planned vision of events in yet another market: crude. Recall: "now that Obama's uber-central planning mandate has proven completely powerless to redirect the flow of zero-cost money from acquiring real, as opposed to paper-based, assets (read crude), the Teleprompter in Chief will have a sit down with the nation at 11:10 am and in the latest sermon from the White House mound, will "confront" oil speculators once and for all. His plan: why encourage margin hikes of course - the same principle that crushed the spine of the gold and silver spike in 2011." Furthermore as part of his then adopted plan, Obama would "Give the Commodity Futures Trading Commission authority to increase the amount of money that a trader must put up to back a trading position. The administration officials said such authority could help limit disruptions in energy markets." Our conclusion was that "Obama is about to become the Margin Hiker-in-Chief." 4 months later, the MaHinC has fired the first warning shot. After all, while Obama would love to have 1600 on the S&P the day before the election, the last thing he would like is to also have the $150 in WTI that would necesssarily accompany it, and guarantee his reelection failure. Sure enough: the first attempt at disconnecting the hard asset market from the S&P has arrived, as the CME just hiked various Crude margins by about 3.7%.
In brief: central planning is now coming to a commodity market near you. But first the crusade against those evil, evil, oil speculators (read central bankers but not really) is about to hit crescendo all over again. Be afraid. Be very afraid as this lunatic fancy that someone can control all asset markets is doomed to not only failure but a spectacular crash.
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| Treasury used ESF cash to insure money-market funds Posted: 09 Aug 2012 03:06 PM PDT Treasury's Secretive $2.4 Trillion Mutual Fund Guarantee By John Carney http://www.cnbc.com/id/48578949 Details about a secretive government program to bail out money-market mutual funds are finally coming to light. Acting without any explicit congressional authority, the U.S. Treasury guaranteed in excess of $2.4 trillion of money market funds after the giant Reserve Primary Fund "broke the buck" following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. The program, which ended on Sept. 18, 2009, seems to have prevented a panicked run by money-market fund investors. But until now the Treasury has kept the identities of the funds that received government backing and the amounts guaranteed secret. It was not clear how many funds obtained backing or for how much taxpayers were on the hook during the program's duration. Linus Wilson, an assistant professor of finance at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, recently obtained data about the program from the Treasury, through a Freedom of Information Act request. ... Dispatch continues below ... ADVERTISEMENT Sona Discovers Potential High-Grade Gold Mineralization From a Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- With its latest surface diamond drilling program at its 100-percent-owned, formerly producing Blackdome gold mine in southern British Columbia, Sona Resources Corp. has discovered a potentially high-grade gold-mineralized area, with one hole intersecting 13.6 grams of gold in 1.5 meters of core drilling. "We intersected a promising new mineralized zone, and we feel optimistic about the assay results," says Sona's president and CEO, John P. Thompson. "We have undertaken an aggressive exploration program that has tested a number of target zones. Our discovery of this new gold-bearing structure is significant, and it represents a positive development for the company." Sona aims to bring its permitted Blackdome mill back into production over the next year and a half, at a rate of 200 tonnes per day, with feed from the formerly producing Blackdome mine and the nearby Elizabeth gold deposit property. A positive preliminary economic assessment by Micon International Ltd., based on a gold price of $950 per ounce over eight years, has estimated a cash cost of $208 per tonne milled, or $686 per gold ounce recovered. For the company's complete press release, please visit: http://www.sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR18_2011-opt.pdf The data from the Treasury show that taxpayers were backing in excess of $2.4 trillion through the mutual fund program. Hundreds of funds participated in the program, amounting to almost 99 percent of the total money-market mutual fund assets. Mutual fund companies such as BlackRock, BNY Mellon, T. Rowe Price, Dreyfus, and Legg Mason took advantage of federal assistance. Banks that provide money market funds to customers -- including JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo -- also participated. Despite the enormous size of the guarantees, the Treasury collected only $1.2 billion in fees from the participating funds. By Wilson's calculation, most participating funds paid just 0.04 percent, or 4 basis points, for a year's worth of insurance. Treasury used $50 billion from an account set aside for exchange rate stabilization to fund the program. Those funds can be spent at the Treasury secretary's discretion -- even when it takes a pretty creative logical leap to connect the expenditures to exchange rates. "Clearly, the tie between exchange rates and money-market mutual funds is very weak," Wilson points out. "Moreover, it is not clear that $50 billion was enough to guarantee over $2 trillion in assets." Guaranteeing the money-market funds was not without risk. Although money-market funds have rarely seen their values drop below a dollar, guaranteeing the funds, it could be argued, encouraged moral hazard as investors lost the incentive to police the quality of fund management. Join GATA here: Toronto Resource Investment Conference New Orleans Investment Conference * * * Support GATA by purchasing DVDs of our London conference in August 2011 or our Dawson City conference in August 2006: http://www.goldrush21.com/order.html Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt: Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal 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: ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Platinum Announces Wellgreen Preliminary Economic Assessment: Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada -- Prophecy Platinum Corp. (TSX-V: NKL, OTC-QX: PNIKF, Frankfurt: P94P) reports the results of an independent NI 43-101-compliant preliminary economic assessment for its fully owned Wellgreen nickel-copper-platinum group metals project in the Yukon Territory. The independent assessment, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case of an open-pit mine (with a mining rate of 111,500 tonnes per day), an on-site concentrator (with a milling rate of 32,000 tonnes per day), and an initial capital cost of $863 million. The project is expected to produce (in concentrate) 1.959 billion pounds of nickel, 2.058 billion pounds of copper, and 7.119 million ounces of platinum, palladium, and gold during a mine life of 37 years with an average strip ratio of 2.57. The financial highlights of the preliminary economic assessment, shown in U.S. dollars, are as follows: Payback period: 3.55 years Prophecy Chairman John Lee says: "We are pleased with the preliminary economic assessment results. The numbers indicate that Wellgreen is one of most exciting mineral projects in the Yukon. The company is drilling to upgrade and expand the resource base. The infrastructure is excellent as the project is only 1,400 meters in altitude and 14 kilometers from the paved Alaska Highway, which leads to the Haines deep seaport. Discussions are under way with support from local stakeholders regarding permitting and logistics." For the complete press release, please visit: http://prophecyplat.com/news_2012_june18_prophecy_platinum_announces_res...
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| There's a massive Asian buyer in the gold market, Davies tells King World News Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:50 PM PDT 4:46p ET Thursday, August 9, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold: Writing at King World News, Hinde Capital CEO Ben Davies reports that there is a strong Asian buyer in the gold market and that "the strong hands are buying from the weak hands." Davies' commentary is headlined "There Is a Massive Buyer in the Gold Market" and it's posted at the King World News blog here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2012/8/9_Ben... CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Platinum Announces Wellgreen Preliminary Economic Assessment: Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada -- Prophecy Platinum Corp. (TSX-V: NKL, OTC-QX: PNIKF, Frankfurt: P94P) reports the results of an independent NI 43-101-compliant preliminary economic assessment for its fully owned Wellgreen nickel-copper-platinum group metals project in the Yukon Territory. The independent assessment, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case of an open-pit mine (with a mining rate of 111,500 tonnes per day), an on-site concentrator (with a milling rate of 32,000 tonnes per day), and an initial capital cost of $863 million. The project is expected to produce (in concentrate) 1.959 billion pounds of nickel, 2.058 billion pounds of copper, and 7.119 million ounces of platinum, palladium, and gold during a mine life of 37 years with an average strip ratio of 2.57. The financial highlights of the preliminary economic assessment, shown in U.S. dollars, are as follows: Payback period: 3.55 years Prophecy Chairman John Lee says: "We are pleased with the preliminary economic assessment results. The numbers indicate that Wellgreen is one of most exciting mineral projects in the Yukon. The company is drilling to upgrade and expand the resource base. The infrastructure is excellent as the project is only 1,400 meters in altitude and 14 kilometers from the paved Alaska Highway, which leads to the Haines deep seaport. Discussions are under way with support from local stakeholders regarding permitting and logistics." For the complete press release, please visit: http://prophecyplat.com/news_2012_june18_prophecy_platinum_announces_res... Join GATA here: Toronto Resource Investment Conference New Orleans Investment Conference * * * Support GATA by purchasing DVDs of our London conference in August 2011 or our Dawson City conference in August 2006: http://www.goldrush21.com/order.html Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt: Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal 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: ADVERTISEMENT Sona Discovers Potential High-Grade Gold Mineralization From a Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- With its latest surface diamond drilling program at its 100-percent-owned, formerly producing Blackdome gold mine in southern British Columbia, Sona Resources Corp. has discovered a potentially high-grade gold-mineralized area, with one hole intersecting 13.6 grams of gold in 1.5 meters of core drilling. "We intersected a promising new mineralized zone, and we feel optimistic about the assay results," says Sona's president and CEO, John P. Thompson. "We have undertaken an aggressive exploration program that has tested a number of target zones. Our discovery of this new gold-bearing structure is significant, and it represents a positive development for the company." Sona aims to bring its permitted Blackdome mill back into production over the next year and a half, at a rate of 200 tonnes per day, with feed from the formerly producing Blackdome mine and the nearby Elizabeth gold deposit property. A positive preliminary economic assessment by Micon International Ltd., based on a gold price of $950 per ounce over eight years, has estimated a cash cost of $208 per tonne milled, or $686 per gold ounce recovered. For the company's complete press release, please visit: http://www.sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR18_2011-opt.pdf
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| Dimitri Speck: A high-frequency attack on gold Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:39 PM PDT 4:33p ET Thurday, August 9, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold: Market analyst and GATA consultant Dimitri Speck today publishes at Safe Haven a study of what he concludes was a high-frequency trading attack on the gold futures market on June 7 that drove the price down $20 in two minutes. Speck concludes: "Although in the past central banks repeatedly intervened in the gold market, it is unlikely that this action was done by a central bank. In the field of high-frequency trading, the technical complexity and the necessary level of experience and specialization are probably too high. Therefore, a private financial institution must have done the high-frequency price manipulation to achieve a trading profit. This was a well-defined incident in thin trading, limited to a short time period and to a single market. These conditions make it ideal for a successful investigation by the regulatory authorities." Maybe the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission will look into the incident when it finishes with its investigation of the silver market -- or when Hell freezes over. Speck's analysis is headlined "A High-Frequency Attack on Gold" and it's posted at Safe Haven here: http://www.safehaven.com/article/26474/a-high-frequency-attack-on-gold CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Sona Discovers Potential High-Grade Gold Mineralization From a Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- With its latest surface diamond drilling program at its 100-percent-owned, formerly producing Blackdome gold mine in southern British Columbia, Sona Resources Corp. has discovered a potentially high-grade gold-mineralized area, with one hole intersecting 13.6 grams of gold in 1.5 meters of core drilling. "We intersected a promising new mineralized zone, and we feel optimistic about the assay results," says Sona's president and CEO, John P. Thompson. "We have undertaken an aggressive exploration program that has tested a number of target zones. Our discovery of this new gold-bearing structure is significant, and it represents a positive development for the company." Sona aims to bring its permitted Blackdome mill back into production over the next year and a half, at a rate of 200 tonnes per day, with feed from the formerly producing Blackdome mine and the nearby Elizabeth gold deposit property. A positive preliminary economic assessment by Micon International Ltd., based on a gold price of $950 per ounce over eight years, has estimated a cash cost of $208 per tonne milled, or $686 per gold ounce recovered. For the company's complete press release, please visit: http://www.sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR18_2011-opt.pdf Join GATA here: Toronto Resource Investment Conference New Orleans Investment Conference * * * Support GATA by purchasing DVDs of our London conference in August 2011 or our Dawson City conference in August 2006: http://www.goldrush21.com/order.html Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt: Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009: http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal 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: ADVERTISEMENT Prophecy Platinum Announces Wellgreen Preliminary Economic Assessment: Company Press Release VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada -- Prophecy Platinum Corp. (TSX-V: NKL, OTC-QX: PNIKF, Frankfurt: P94P) reports the results of an independent NI 43-101-compliant preliminary economic assessment for its fully owned Wellgreen nickel-copper-platinum group metals project in the Yukon Territory. The independent assessment, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case of an open-pit mine (with a mining rate of 111,500 tonnes per day), an on-site concentrator (with a milling rate of 32,000 tonnes per day), and an initial capital cost of $863 million. The project is expected to produce (in concentrate) 1.959 billion pounds of nickel, 2.058 billion pounds of copper, and 7.119 million ounces of platinum, palladium, and gold during a mine life of 37 years with an average strip ratio of 2.57. The financial highlights of the preliminary economic assessment, shown in U.S. dollars, are as follows: Payback period: 3.55 years Prophecy Chairman John Lee says: "We are pleased with the preliminary economic assessment results. The numbers indicate that Wellgreen is one of most exciting mineral projects in the Yukon. The company is drilling to upgrade and expand the resource base. The infrastructure is excellent as the project is only 1,400 meters in altitude and 14 kilometers from the paved Alaska Highway, which leads to the Haines deep seaport. Discussions are under way with support from local stakeholders regarding permitting and logistics." For the complete press release, please visit: http://prophecyplat.com/news_2012_june18_prophecy_platinum_announces_res...
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| Target Date for a Bubble Bursting Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:32 PM PDT August 9, 2012
The file is already fairly bulging, the metal supports on the hanging folder about to buckle…
We perked up at the sight of this, seeing how the higher-education bubble has been on our radar for more than a year. Without any further ado, here goes: "I don't think it's a financial stability issue to the same extent that, say, mortgage debt was in the last crisis because most of it is held not by financial institutions, but by the federal government." We can perhaps credit Ron Paul for this new gem; it came during a "town hall" meeting with teachers. Were it not for the good doctor's tireless audit-the-Fed efforts, such an event — part of the Fed's faux efforts at "transparency" — might have never happened. (Real transparency would entail C-SPAN cameras carrying the Federal Open Market Committee meetings live, no?) Further, Mr. Bernanke's latest declaration stands in a league of its own. After all, it was no less than Alan Greenspan who said it is "very difficult to definitively identify a bubble until after the fact — that is, when its bursting confirmed its existence." Here's Greenspan's successor, denying the existence of a bubble in the first place. Will wonders never cease…
The Journal picked apart data from the very institution Mr. Bernanke oversees and found that higher-ed debt is swamping upper-middle income families, classified as making $94,535-205,335. The percentage of families carrying student loan debt grew faster among this income group than any other from 2007-2010. "The surge is leading many such families to look closer at cost and value when choosing colleges," says the once photo-free rag. "If the new frugality continues, experts say, it could make it difficult for all but the most-selective schools to keep pushing through large tuition increases." What? No more exponential growth? Say it ain't so! The paper profiles a parent from Albany, N.Y., whose son was accepted to Notre Dame: "She says she feels trapped in financial purgatory, between 'people with lower incomes who have a lot of subsidy, and the truly affluent, for whom this isn't a problem.'" A financial aid person from Notre Dame said people at the $125,000-250,000 income level are a big challenge for private institutions like hers because "the contributions expected from them are probably higher than what the family is prepared to do." In the past, these families were cash cows for colleges and universities: There aren't enough super-rich paying out of pocket, while lower-income families soak up grant money.
Mid-2013 will mark four years after the volume of government-funded student loans surged. "Like the infamous option ARMs (adjustable-rate mortgages) during the housing bubble, these loans have precisely timed fuses: Four years after the loans are made, borrowers must start making payments."
"After a lending binge started in 2009, it now holds a massive $452 billion portfolio of student loan receivables, according to Federal Reserve data. This so-called 'asset' will become a liability by next year. Thanks to the punk job market, a huge percentage of these loans will go bad or have to be restructured." Dan estimates these bad loans will blow a minimum $100 billion hole in the federal budget. "Right now, even professional investors aren't talking about the ticking time bomb of off-balance sheet student loan defaults. This, along with other unreformed entitlement programs, will swell the deficit far beyond even the biggest projections."
"This scenario argues in favor of a portfolio anchored by conservative cash and near-cash instruments, but with a key advantage over most other portfolios: a healthy allocation to tangible stores of value, including precious metals and stocks of companies with pricing power. "You must be picky in this sideways, grinding bear market, but not go all to cash, in which you'll lose purchasing power over time. The younger you are, the higher your allocation to noncash investments should be." With that guidance, you can steer clear of the higher-ed bubble bursting. But you still need to protect yourself against an even bigger bubble — one that Agora Inc. founder Bill Bonner warns about in this rare video appearance.
"So far this week," wrote Options Hotline editor Steve Sarnoff last night, "money has moved out of the perceived safety of Treasury bonds, back to the risk of stocks and commodities. "As the euro rebounded and the U.S. dollar dropped, stocks moved up for a run to resistance. How the week closes may provide an important clue as to which side (buyers or sellers) has the advantage." [Ed. Note: Year to date, Steve has delivered 10 plays that could double readers' money... or better. "My first trade," writes a satisfied reader named Robert, "made me $6,540 profits! You are the first newsletter that I have tried out of hundreds that actually delivers what it promises." Robert's story could be yours... Learn how you could win on your first trade at this link.]
Driven in large part by the U.S. drought, the FAO's food price index leaped from 201 to 213 last month. Assuming the move isn't a one-off and is the start of something big, "there is potential for a situation to develop like we had back in 2007/08," the FAO's senior economist and grain analyst Abdolreza Abbassian tells Reuters.
Corn goes for $8.245 a bushel this morning on the Chicago Board of Trade. According to research from Deutsche Bank, corn is the best-performing asset among a group of nearly 40 over the last five years — up nearly 140%. Gold and silver are the only others to come close.
Inflation in July registered 1.8% year over year, down from 2.2% the month before. Meanwhile retail sales grew 14.2%. Both numbers were in a muddled middle — too weak to indicate a "healthy" economy (by recent standards), too strong to guarantee another interest rate cut by the People's Bank of China. "All these economic data did," writes EverBank's Chuck Butler, "were put the rate cut on the back burner, in my opinion. I still believe that at least one if not more rate cut(s) are coming in China. And that won't help the global growth picture, according to the markets."
As we mentioned on Tuesday, Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson have pulled the plug on a joint effort to develop an Alzheimer's drug. Now attention turns toward Eli Lilly, with a drug described in a Bloomberg story today as the "last hope for treatment" of the 5.4 million Americans diagnosed with Alzheimer's. "Still," says Bloomberg, "company executives have warned that a successful outcome for the drug, solanezumab, is a long shot." Indeed: The Lilly drug, like the failures that came before it, targets "amyloid plaque"… the stuff that scientists theorize scrambles the brain in the same way plaque can block your arteries. Lilly will likely release its findings by the end of September. The other possibility is Gammagard, a Baxter Intl. product already on the market for treating diseases caused by immune disorders. It's expensive and scarce, because it's derived from donated blood plasma. The most recent research results were mixed at best: "The participants did not show improvement in most of the symptoms of Alzheimer's they already had," USA Today reported last month, "but nor did they show any further decline on measures of cognition, memory, daily functioning or mood over the three years." More definitive results are due by mid-2013. Long before then, however… we'll know the results of a study on a dietary supplement already on the market. It might well confirm a wealth of anecdotal evidence — people with Alzheimer's disease who've experienced benefits from taking this supplement. The study is under way at one of the most-prestigious Alzheimer's research centers in the world… and it could prove a powerful catalyst beneath the stock of the company that makes the product. Patrick Cox has followed the story avidly for the last 18 months. You can follow the newest chapter here.
"Maybe the gov't needs to outlaw them too, or make the manufacturer put another claim on the Tic Tac box to put no more than five pieces in your mouth at the same time. "Please, U.S. gov't, stay the hell out of my soup!!!!!!!!!!! "Love The 5. Keep up the great work." The 5: Too late, Mr. Soup Lover… at least in California and Oregon, where effective this year, shark fins are now banned and shark-fin soup is no longer possible. But on the subject of products that supposedly pose hazards to children… we see a do-gooder dad in England swept into action at a youth sports tournament when the school gave out medals made of… metal… with a point at one end.
Thank God for this guy! How many lives must he have saved in one day? Lawrence Connolly snatched the medals from the 10-year-old son of a friend before he could (hypothetically) hurt himself: "It does make you wonder how in these health-and-safety days, these slipped through the net… I can't believe someone's allowed these to be given out." "Let's hope," writes Lenore Skenazy of the website Free-Range Kids, "no one ever hands any kids he knows a cross or a Star of David! The horror!" Cheers, Dave Gonigam P.S. Depending on your existing subscriptions with us, you may be entitled to a "loyalty reward" worth a minimum of $1,044. We're reopening our loyalty reward program for the next 12 days. To learn how much you can save, look here.
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| Gold Seeker Closing Report: Gold and Silver Gain With Dollar Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:26 PM PDT Gold climbed $4.61 to $1617.41 in Asia before it fell back to $1609.70 in London, but it then rallied back higher in New York and ended near its early afternoon high of $1618.09 with a gain of 0.3%. Silver slipped back to $27.864 by a little after 8AM EST, but it then bounced back higher in New York and ended with a gain of 0.39%.
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| Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Coil and Cap Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:16 PM PDT |
| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 02:02 PM PDT Gold Resource Corporation (NYSE MKT: GORO) today announced results for its second quarter ending June 30, 2012. Gold Resource Corporation is a low-cost gold producer with operations in the southern state of Oaxaca, Mexico.
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| From the Field: Kiyuk Lake Summer Program Update Posted: 09 Aug 2012 01:47 PM PDT The Prosperity Goldfields team has been hard at work on our 2012 Summer Program at Kiyuk Lake, Nunavut. In this update, CEO Adrian Fleming discusses the scope of work currently taking place and highlights the top results from the 2012 Spring Drill Program. Also Nunavut: Canada's Last Mining FrontierUnprecedented demand for precious metals from rapidly growing economies such as China and India have sent thousands of Canadian mineral exploration companies scrambling to the far reaches of the earth hoping for the next multi-million ounce discovery. However, one of the last great frontiers in mining could be closer to home than originally thought. Nunavut has become Canada's hotbed for exploration and mining of resources as the region's rich geological structure hosts a wide rage of mineral targets including gold, silver, zinc, diamonds and uranium. The territory was formed in 1999 as a result of North America's largest Aboriginal land claim agreement, the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement (NLCA). Since then, exploration and mining companies alike have been targeting the region. Exploration spending is increasing by leaps and bounds year after year. As recently as 2006 exploration spending topped out at $210.6 million, but has since exploded to nearly $400 million in 2011. A recent survey has predicted that exploration spending in Nunavut to reach a record $568 million in 2012. Why Nunavut Now? Nunavut has vast landmass ripe with mineral potential, which has seen substantially less exploration than other jurisdictions with similar geology. When asked why Nunavut is such an important target for his company, Dr. Quinton Hennigh of Prosperity Goldfields stated, "The Kiyuk Lake region is host to known geochemical anomalies identified through lake sediment sampling in the 1970s that is consistent with other great gold belts. While many other parts of Nunavut with known deposits are very isolated, this property is located further south and is in closer proximity to existing infrastructure across the border in Manitoba." Favorable government policy has given way to many junior exploration projects and mining companies operating in Nunavut. In a recent address to the Nunavut Mining Symposium (April 2012) premier Eva Aariak stated, "We have been very clear. Nunavut is open for business. Nunavut wants and supports responsible development of our natural resources. The Government of Nunavut is committed to working constructively with resource companies to give you the certainty and consistency you need to manage risk and make informed decisions." Although most of Nunavut is isolated in terms of infrastructure, the mineral potential that this province has is attracting infrastructure development through development partnership agreements. There are plans under consideration to improve infrastructure, including projects to build a port and road at Bathurst Inlet and a road to connect Manitoba with Nunavut's Kivalliq region along the Hudson Bay coast. The remoteness of many deposits have not deterred mining companies however. Agnico-Eagle Mines' (AEM) Meadowbank project opened it's doors in 2010. With a proven resource of 2.2 million ounces of gold and a five year expected life span, the project has already proven to be a boon for the local economy. Through jobs and contracts with local companies AEM spends more than $200 million per year in Nunavut, with over $19 million towards payroll alone. In addition to stimulating the economy, the company has implemented several community programs focused on increasing the number of local workers in skilled positions at the mine and educating students on the opportunities for high paying jobs in the mining industry. AEM's advanced-exploration gold play, Meliadine lays 290 southeast of Meadowbank is already starting to make it's mark, pumping $30 million into locally based companies in only eight months of activity in 2011. This project is currently undergoing a second feasibility study with an increased production rate after successful exploration results in 2010. Further north is North Country Gold's advanced-exploration project Three Bluffs. The company has several targets along the Committee Bay Greenstone belt, with a potential deposit of 2.5 million ounces of gold. This is just the beginning for Canada's next gold frontier. While the full-scale resource potential of Nunavut is still unknown, the rush is on as more and more Canadian exploration companies turn north in search of their next big hit. Nunavut Part II: Government Policy Encourages Mineral ExplorationNunavut was created as a result of the largest land claims agreement in Canadian history. It includes most of the 500 million year old Canadian Shield, with considerable mineral potential for gold, silver, iron, diamonds, uranium and base metals. Mineral development is being encouraged by both national and local governments, with the majority indigenous population (Inuit) adopting progressive mining policies. Land tenure for minerals is administered by the federal government on public lands, and by the NTI (Nunavut Tunngavik Inc.) on Inuit owned lands. The Nunavut Land Claims Agreement essentially provides the Inuit with a combination of surface and subsurface rights, income, and the right to participate in the management and regulation of surface rights, both land and water. All major project developers have to negotiate agreements known as Impact and Benefit Agreements (IIBAs) with the Inuit - these concern training, employment and business aspects. Both the government and the Inuit share responsibility for management of resources, and the sanction of exploration, regulatory approvals, relevant permits and licenses for exploration and mining. Nunavut benefits from Canada's Mineral Exploration Tax Credit which is intended to give a tax incentive to investors. The Government of Nunavut in turn provides a tax incentive to mining and exploration companies to offset high energy costs, and allows mining companies to recover most of their initial capital costs should a mine be developed. These, and other similar measures, have created an economic climate where 4.7% of Nunavut's land area is covered by prospecting claims, mineral claims or mineral leases, making it 4th in Canada in terms of overall investment. There are at least 100 active exploration projects underway in Nunavut right now. There are of course challenges to mineral development: Regulations are often complex, operation costs tend to be high, infrastructure is underdeveloped, and work forces are often in need of specialized training. One example of regulations that can complicate exploration operations are those concerning archeological sites where precious artifacts may be at risk. An artifact is defined as "any tangible evidence of human activity that is more than 50 years old and for which there is a broken chain of possession." In fact the extremely cold, dry Arctic climate allows archeologists to find signs of human habitation visible right on the surface. these include well-preserved tools made of antler, ivory and bone dating back as far as 4,000 years ago. Since the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada turned into Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada (AANDC) in 2011, the emphasis has been on environmental issues and land use planning. Before a mine can be developed these days, the mining company has to have a well-planned exit strategy in place. The aim is to modernize mining regulations through ongoing consultation among all the interested parties. Work is also underway to clarify water regulations. A number of geoscience surveys are being conducted, including one to study the permafrost and terrain conditions in the capital city of Iqaluit. The once continuous permafrost is now warming and thawing in places, with serious implications for strategic infrastructure, including the airport. The 2012 Nunavut Mining Symposium held in the capital Iqualit in April included in its program entire sessions on regulatory developments and community engagement – these aspects of mineral exploration are clearly major preoccupations at all levels of government in Nunavut. With progressive attitudes towards mineral exploration and mine development from both community and government stakeholders, it is clear that Nunavut is open for business to the world's mining community. Source: Prosperity Goldfields http://www.prosperitygoldfields.com/investor/video/ Disclosure: Prosperity Goldfields is a Vulture Bargain Candidate of Interest (VBCI). Members of the GGR team may hold long positions in PPG.V .
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 01:24 PM PDT The bumper sticker on the beat-up pickup truck read: “Friends don’t let friends vote Democrat.” The driver was obviously not affluent. Yet, despite all the news about mega-trillion dollar bankster bailouts, mega-million dollar bonuses for financial crooks, and unimaginable compensation packages for corporate CEOs who have moved middle class jobs out of America, something made the down-and-out pickup truck driver associate with the political party of the super-rich.
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 01:00 PM PDT 09-Aug (ZeroHedge) — Five years ago today BNP Paribas stopped withdrawals from three of their investment funds – because they couldn't value their holdings following the subprime fallout – and arguably marked the start of the Great Financial Crisis as money markets seized up and the ECB did its first emergency liquidity pump. In the five years hence, as Deutsche's Jim Reid notes, its been a pretty good run for commodities and most fixed income assets. Given all that's gone on over this period it's fair to say that returns have been pretty good if you've been in the right areas.
[source] PG View: Most investors should probably stay focused on the assets ranked #2 and #3, unless they have the means to store large quantities of corn or crude…
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| Posted: 09 Aug 2012 12:22 PM PDT Ah, the long, lazy, hazy days of summer: Here in Colorado, it's been a particularly hot and dry one, leading to one of the worst wildfire seasons in recent memory. As for 'lazy', that's a pretty apt description of the gold market, which has been confined to a range of just $66.36 since the summer solstice. Now, summer doldrums are actually quite common in the gold market. And as we like to remind our clients each year; historically speaking, the doldrums more often than not are an ideal time to buy gold, with about 2/3rds of average annual gains in the market over the past ten-years coming after the month of July. Perhaps these doldrums just seem more...well, dull...because the market has been locked in a broader nearly $400 range going back to September of last year, when you may recall the market established its all-time high at $1920.50 and then promptly fell to a corrective low at $1534.06. The latter was modestly exceeded ahead...
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John Hathaway, senior managing director of Tocqueville Asset Management, does not particularly trust banks to keep stores of physical gold safe and segregated. Indeed, he considers his black lab Jake a better watchdog than the SEC. That is why he favors the SmartMetals program from Hard Assets Alliance, a new service launched in July. Hard Assets Alliance has partnered with Gold Bullion International (GBI) to offer precious metal purchasing and storage solutions to retail investors. With more investors realizing that safety of capital is the real reason to own gold, safe storage is more important than ever. Read more in this exclusive 
As you can figure out, especially if you're a longtime reader, you had better have your stash of physical gold and silver. Furthermore, if you haven't noticed lately gold is on sale. The shiny stuff trades at a 17% discount to last year's highs.
Although I have heard this line of reasoning before, it was interesting to see it coming from the economist Marshall Auerback.
We have a new entry to stick into the file labeled, "Famous Predictions of Ben Bernanke."
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