Gold World News Flash |
- The Unadulterated Gold Standard Part III (Features)
- 22 Stats That Prove That There Is Something Seriously Wrong With Young Men In America
- Gold or mining shares?
- Commodity Technical Analysis: Gold Probes Lows before Closing Near High of Day
- Silver Update 12/17/12 Libor Lackeys
- Gold Seeker Closing Report: Gold and Silver End Slightly Higher
- Richard Russell - The Ring Of Fire, QE Forever & Gold
- CURRENCY CARTEL: Counterfeiting “Risk Free”
- 10 Countries Sitting On Enormous Piles Of Gold
- US NIC report extremely positive for gold and silver
- Neil Barofsky on UBS Criminal Charges for LIBOR and HSBC Money Laundering Wrist Slap – YouTube
- The Gold Price Rose $1.20 Today Validating Upward Support
- SEC authorizes JPMorgan to use ETF to rig copper market too
- Sudan tightens control of gold refining and exports
- Comex is rigged, so buy only metal, not paper, Turk tells King World News
- The Fiscal Cliff Is A Diversion: The Derivatives Tsunami and the Dollar Bubble
- Gold or Silver Stocks? Or Both?
- Turk - The Cartel Getting Desperate In The Gold & Silver War
- New Report: The Chinese Silver Market
- Guest Post: Hey You
- What Would You Prefer: Gold Or Paper?
- CIBC's Matt Gibson Sees Upside in Iron in 2013
- Commodities: Crude Oil Gains with Stocks on Fiscal Cliff Deal Hopes
- Volatility Hammered As Stocks And Bond Yields Close At Highs
- Indian government admits 'gold-backed' means just pretending to have gold
- Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts
- Indian government admits 'gold-backed' means just pretending to have gold
- Precious Metals Market Report – December 13
- America to Congress: Jump!
- The 12 Gold Bugs of Christmas
- QE4: An Early Christmas Present For Most Investors ? Here?s Why
- QE3 – Pay Attention If You Are in the Real Estate Market
- How To Reduce International Dollar Debt and Insular Dollar Entitlement Payments
- Silver ridiculously low because of paper market, Embry tells King World News
- A 'Very Different' Platinum Market Swings Into a 600,000 Ounce Deficit
- LGMR: Japan "Will Now Print and Spend" Following LDP Election Win, "Low Trader Participation" Leaves Gold "Weak"
| The Unadulterated Gold Standard Part III (Features) Posted: 18 Dec 2012 12:12 AM PST keith weiner |
| 22 Stats That Prove That There Is Something Seriously Wrong With Young Men In America Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:30 PM PST from The Economic Collapse Blog:
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| Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:30 PM PST Goldmoney |
| Commodity Technical Analysis: Gold Probes Lows before Closing Near High of Day Posted: 17 Dec 2012 10:35 PM PST courtesy of DailyFX.com December 17, 2012 03:08 PM Daily Bars Chart Prepared by Jamie Saettele, CMT Commodity Analysis: “Viewed in light of the 3 wave advance from 1672.50, the trend is lower.” Last week’s rally reversed just shy of Fibonacci resistance at 1727 and another run on the level can’t be dismissed following today’s rally. The line in the sane for me is the 11/23 high at 1754. Commodity Trading Strategy: Nothing. LEVELS: 1641 1673 1685 1711 1723 1727... |
| Silver Update 12/17/12 Libor Lackeys Posted: 17 Dec 2012 10:03 PM PST from BrotherJohnF: |
| Gold Seeker Closing Report: Gold and Silver End Slightly Higher Posted: 17 Dec 2012 10:00 PM PST Gold dropped $8.02 to $1686.18 in Asia, but it then rose to as high as $1699.10 in New York and ended with a gain of 0.22%. Silver climbed to as high as $32.374 and ended with a gain of 0.12%. |
| Richard Russell - The Ring Of Fire, QE Forever & Gold Posted: 17 Dec 2012 09:46 PM PST  With continued volatility in global markets, the Godfather of newsletter writers, Richard Russell, writes about the action in the Dow, the Fed's QE program, and a top fund manager in the world who had some strong comments regarding the future price of gold. Here is what Russell had to say in a note to subscribers: "In the current issue of Barron's, ten leading analysts are polled on where they think the S&P Composite will be at the end of the year 2013. All ten affirmed that the S&P, which is now 1413, would be higher by the end of the year 2013. The lowest guess was by Morgan Stanley's Adam Parker; he guessed 1434. Four of the ten analysts guessed 1600 or over."This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| CURRENCY CARTEL: Counterfeiting “Risk Free” Posted: 17 Dec 2012 09:30 PM PST by Gordon T Long, Gold Seek:
This is forcing a game of Risk Free Counterfeiting to now be played out. It will end, and end badly. However, at the present time it is considered the only politically palatable solution. Ø There is a Shrinking Need for US Dollars |
| 10 Countries Sitting On Enormous Piles Of Gold Posted: 17 Dec 2012 09:00 PM PST by Mamta Badkar, BusinessInsider:
Some have argued that euro zone members should use gold as collateral for sovereign debt issuance to keep bond The World Gold Council estimates that central banks will have purchased 500 tons of gold in 2012, up from 465 tons last year. And gold prices have also been supported by central bank gold purchases. |
| US NIC report extremely positive for gold and silver Posted: 17 Dec 2012 08:00 PM PST by Julian Phillips, MineWeb.com
As the year draws to an end it is good to look forward to what lies ahead. While hope springs eternal, we are bound by the forces we see that are shaping tomorrow. What are they? A report recently released by the U.S. National Intelligence Council gave us sobering thoughts that are extremely positive for gold and silver. |
| Neil Barofsky on UBS Criminal Charges for LIBOR and HSBC Money Laundering Wrist Slap – YouTube Posted: 17 Dec 2012 06:15 PM PST So apparently a TBTF bank is like a terrorist... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website http://goldbasics.blogspot.com for full Content ]]  |
| The Gold Price Rose $1.20 Today Validating Upward Support Posted: 17 Dec 2012 05:36 PM PST Gold Price Close Today : 1697.00 Change : 1.20 or 0.07% Silver Price Close Today : 32.206 Change : -0.017 or -0.05% Gold Silver Ratio Today : 52.692 Change : 0.065 or 0.12% Silver Gold Ratio Today : 0.01898 Change : -0.000023 or -0.12% Platinum Price Close Today : 1609.30 Change : -10.00 or -0.62% Palladium Price Close Today : 697.20 Change : -3.60 or -0.51% S&P 500 : 1,430.36 Change : 16.78 or 1.19% Dow In GOLD$ : $161.23 Change : $ 1.13 or 0.70% Dow in GOLD oz : 7.799 Change : 0.054 or 0.70% Dow in SILVER oz : 410.96 Change : 3.33 or 0.82% Dow Industrial : 13,235.39 Change : 100.38 or 0.76% US Dollar Index : 79.57 Change : -0.067 or -0.08% The silver and GOLD PRICE feel really tired. Gold gained $1.20 today to end Comex comatose at $1,697. Silver lost 1.7 cents to close 3220.6c. Once again, the GOLD PRICE validated that support running slightly upward from $1,672.50 (November's low) to $1,684.10 (December's low). Hit that line about $1,684.40 and bounced back toward $1,700. Today's high at $1,699.09 does not rank as a grounds for pride. The SILVER PRICE left little doubt about its intentions today with a lower low for the move at 3206c, third day of lower lows since it broke that support line about 3250c. But it isn't exactly collapsing on a skinny daily range of 30.5c (yes, the high came at 3236.5). Silver has just gone dead in the water. If 3200c is broken, silver will make a quick spike down. Watching. That's all I know to do when markets act like this. Just be patient until they tip their hand. Won't be long. Maybe rumors of a deal on the FC (I can no longer bring myself to use the cliché) ramped up Wall Street today, or maybe they're taking their Christmas toot early, but stocks rose mightily. Dow gained 0.76% (100.38) to 13,235.39 and the S&P500 gained a massy 1.19% (16.78) to 1,430.36. However the Dow still could not climb over 13,300 resistance. I 'spect it will, though, as a mouth-foaming, frenzy takes over here at year end and takes over the foresight-challenged minds. Y'all have to keep on resisting the bait, because buried in it lurks a hook. US dollar index fell mildly, down 6.7 basis points (0.09%), but that doesn't speak as loudly as the new low for the move at 79.50, taking out the old low at 79.57. No, no, it didn't follow through to fall further, but the act has been done, however long consummation delays. Euro barely moved today, down 0.02% to $1.3164. Remains above the downtrend line, but whenever it edged toward $1.3200, it wilted like a bashful boy at a barn dance. Probably has somewhat higher prices in it, but what loony would buy it for that, only to watch it collapse a few weeks later? Just to prove that no market ever drops so low that it can't drop further, the Japanese yen make a new low for the move today, lost 0.48%, and ended at 119.24 cents/Y100. Got to be making the Fed's NGM nervous. It's more oversold than hot dogs at Coney Island. Y'all still barely have time to order At Home in Dogwood Mudhole and get it by Christmas, but you'll have to use either priority or express mail. Coincidentally enough, both are available at our website, www.dogwoodmudhole.com Here's the latest reader response, from someone who had ordered Christmas copies: "I've received my first copy of AHIDM and it is already stained with tears of laughter, been, wine, and various un-identifiable solid products that appear to be in the ham sandwich family. When one guffaws, one tends to spew one's sandwich, if you hadn't noticed. Where are my other four copies? Santa is depending on you!" I'm going to tell y'all, it is just that good. Argentum et aurum comparenda sunt -- -- Gold and silver must be bought. - Franklin Sanders, The Moneychanger The-MoneyChanger.com 1-888-218-9226 10:00am-5:00pm CST, Monday-Friday © 2012, 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 bubble has burst, primary trend down. WARNING AND DISCLAIMER. 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 short term trading outlook. I write them for long-term investors in physical metals. Take them as entertainment, but not as a timing service for futures. NOR do I recommend investing in gold or silver Exchange Trade Funds (ETFs). Those are NOT physical metal and I fear one day one or another may go up in smoke. Unless you can breathe smoke, stay away. Call me paranoid, but the surviving rabbit is wary of traps. NOR do I recommend trading futures options or other leveraged paper gold and silver products. These are not for the inexperienced. NOR do I recommend buying gold and silver on margin or with debt. What DO I recommend? Physical gold and silver coins and bars in your own hands. One final warning: NEVER insert a 747 Jumbo Jet up your nose. No, I don't.  |
| SEC authorizes JPMorgan to use ETF to rig copper market too Posted: 17 Dec 2012 05:03 PM PST SEC Approves JPMorgan Copper ETF By Emiko Terazono http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/01525174-482e-11e2-8aae-00144feab49a.html A JPMorgan-backed investment vehicle that aims to track the price of copper has won the approval of US regulators in spite of strong opposition from users of the metal and senior politicians. The Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday approved the exchange traded fund, which is backed by physical buying of copper, opening the door to easy investment in the metal. The regulator's approval comes despite opposition from Carl Levin, chairman of the powerful Senate subcommittee on investigations, on the grounds that the proposed products "would allow speculators to create a squeeze on the market." ... Dispatch continues below ... ADVERTISEMENT GoldMoney adds Singapore vaulting option In addition to its precious metals storage facilities in Hong Kong, Switzerland, Toronto, and the United Kingdom, now with GoldMoney you can store gold and silver in Singapore in a high-security vault operated by Brink's Singapore Pte Limited. To celebrate the launch of this storage option, GoldMoney is offering a discount on buy and exchange fees at this vault for any orders above US$10,000 (or the equivalent) until January 11, 2013. Tthe gold buy rate is 0.98%, while the silver rate is 1.99%. Metal exchanges into Brink's Singapore will also be discounted for this period and will be charged at 0.78% for gold and 1.75% for silver. Simply place your order online and the above rates apply automatically until January 11, 2013, 15.00 UK time. To find out more about the new vault, please visit: http://www.goldmoney.com/singapore?gmrefcode=gata GoldMoney customers can take delivery of any number of gold, silver, platinum, and palladium bars from any GoldMoney vault, as well as personally collect their bars stored in the Hong Kong, Switzerland, and U.K. vaults. It's easy to open an account, add funds, and liquidate your investment. For more information, visit: http://www.goldmoney.com/?gmrefcode=gata Senator Levin said that the SEC's approval of the ETF was "a blow to American businesses and consumers" and that it would "increase copper prices and volatility, and undermine market efforts to produce prices in response to supply and demand by copper users." The SEC said it did not see the products disrupting the supply of copper available for immediate delivery and gave the go-ahead to NYSE Arca, the exchange, to list the JPMorgan ETF. NYSE has a separate request to list a rival BlackRock iShares copper ETF, which is now likely to go ahead too. Leading US copper users have argued that the ETF would even "wreak havoc" on the global economy, given the metal's use in electrical wiring, which makes it essential to the manufacturing industry. Companies such as Southwire, Encore Wire, Luvata, and AmRod as well as trading house Red Kite said the launch of the products would result in a "substantial artificially induced rise in near-term copper prices." JPMorgan said it could not comment until the launch of the copper ETF, but in a previous submission to the SEC the bank had countered that the product would not consume metal but would merely hold it. If and when the metal is needed by real consumers, the investors can sell their shares in the ETF and the copper will be available to the market within days. Its regulatory filings suggest JPMorgan's ETF could hold 61,800 tonnes -- the equivalent to 27 per cent of the copper held in the London Metal Exchange's global network of warehouses. The regulator said it believed the physical copper ETF would "provide another way for market participants and investors to trade in copper" and could enhance competition among exchanges. The SEC added that the new copper ETFs would "provide investors another investment alternative, which could enhance a well-diversified portfolio" and "could increase competition among financial products and the efficiency of financial investment." Join GATA here: Vancouver Resource 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: |
| Sudan tightens control of gold refining and exports Posted: 17 Dec 2012 04:42 PM PST Sudan's Central Bank Places Moratorium on Gold Ore Exports From the Sudan Tribune, Paris http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article44842 KHARTOUM, Sudan -- The Central Bank of Sudan on Wednesday issued a ban on the exports of gold ore effective January 2013, state media reported. No reason was given for the decision but the report stated that the bank will focus on developing marketing channels for the gold locally through the establishment of precious-metals exchange in Sudan. Gold mining firms will be allowed to export in line with bank policies only after refining it in the newly built Khartoum refinery. The government had said that the state-run refinery, opened last September in the capital, will help reduce the ore smuggled overseas to places such as Dubai. Producers would receive more money for the higher-quality gold, reducing the incentive to smuggle, the government says. ... Dispatch continues below ... ADVERTISEMENT Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy open All Pro Gold Longtime GATA supporters Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy have brought their many years of experience in the precious metals and numismatic coins to All Pro Gold as metals brokers who specialize in the delivery of gold and silver bullion bars and coins as well as numismatic gold and silver coins. Fred and Tim follow these markets closely and are assisted by a team of consultants in monitoring market trends. All Pro Gold offers GATA supporters competitive pricing on all bullion products and welcomes inquiries. Tim can be reached at 602-299-2585 and Tim@allprogold.com, Fred at 602-799-8378 and Fred@allprogold.com. Ask about their ratio strategy and the relationship of generic $20 dollar gold pieces to 1-ounce gold bullion coins. Visit their Internet site at http://www.allprogold.com/. The bank has tried to end smuggling by buying gold from local traders, even above market prices, according to industry sources speaking to Reuters. Sudan says that gold production hit 34 tonnes this year through September compared to 10 tonnes during the same period in 2011. The East African country is looking for gold to make up for the budget deficit it incurred as a result of losing three quarters of its oil production due to the secession of South Sudan in July last year. Sudan hopes to sell 50 tonnes of gold worth up to approximately $3 billion this year, double last year's gold revenue. Join GATA here: Vancouver Resource 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 Opinion Around the World Is Changing When Deutschebank calls gold "good money" and paper "bad money". ... http://www.gata.org/node/11765 When the president of the German central bank, the Bundesbank, pays tribute to gold as "a timeless classic". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/09/24/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a leading member of the policy committee of the People's Bank of China calls the gold standard "an excellent monetary system". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/10/01/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a CNN reporter writes in The China Post that the "gold commission" plank in the 2012 Republican platform will "reverberate around the world". ... http://www.thegoldstandardnow.org/key-blogs/1563-china-post-the-gop-gold... When the Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy of the U.S. House of Representatives twice called on economist, historian, and gold standard advocate Lewis E. Lehrman to testify. ... World opinion is changing in favor of gold. How can you learn why and what it will mean to you? Read the newly updated and expanded edition of Lehrman's book, "The True Gold Standard." Financial journalist James Grant says of "The True Gold Standard": "If you have ever wondered how the world can get from here to there -- from the chaos of depreciating paper to a convertible currency worthy of our children and our grandchildren -- wonder no more. The answer, brilliantly expounded, is between these covers. America has long needed a modern Alexander Hamilton. In Lewis E. Lehrman she has finally found him." To buy a copy of "The True Gold Standard," please visit: http://www.thegoldstandardnow.com/publications/the-true-gold-standard |
| Comex is rigged, so buy only metal, not paper, Turk tells King World News Posted: 17 Dec 2012 04:27 PM PST 6:23p ET Monday, December 17, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold (and Silver): GoldMoney founder and GATA consultant James Turk today tells King World News how the big commercial shorts in the gold and silver futures arenas always fleece participants who think there's a market. Turk says the shorts can be beaten but only by avoiding futures and purchasing real metal. "The house is rigged," Turk says. "So don't play the game. Stay out of the paper market. Stop using the Comex. Don't be feedstock for the gold cartel." An excerpt from the interview is posted at the King World News blog here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2012/12/17_T... CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Opinion Around the World Is Changing When Deutschebank calls gold "good money" and paper "bad money". ... http://www.gata.org/node/11765 When the president of the German central bank, the Bundesbank, pays tribute to gold as "a timeless classic". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/09/24/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a leading member of the policy committee of the People's Bank of China calls the gold standard "an excellent monetary system". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/10/01/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a CNN reporter writes in The China Post that the "gold commission" plank in the 2012 Republican platform will "reverberate around the world". ... http://www.thegoldstandardnow.org/key-blogs/1563-china-post-the-gop-gold... When the Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy of the U.S. House of Representatives twice called on economist, historian, and gold standard advocate Lewis E. Lehrman to testify. ... World opinion is changing in favor of gold. How can you learn why and what it will mean to you? Read the newly updated and expanded edition of Lehrman's book, "The True Gold Standard." Financial journalist James Grant says of "The True Gold Standard": "If you have ever wondered how the world can get from here to there -- from the chaos of depreciating paper to a convertible currency worthy of our children and our grandchildren -- wonder no more. The answer, brilliantly expounded, is between these covers. America has long needed a modern Alexander Hamilton. In Lewis E. Lehrman she has finally found him." To buy a copy of "The True Gold Standard," please visit: http://www.thegoldstandardnow.com/publications/the-true-gold-standard Join GATA here: Vancouver Resource 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 Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy open All Pro Gold Longtime GATA supporters Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy have brought their many years of experience in the precious metals and numismatic coins to All Pro Gold as metals brokers who specialize in the delivery of gold and silver bullion bars and coins as well as numismatic gold and silver coins. Fred and Tim follow these markets closely and are assisted by a team of consultants in monitoring market trends. All Pro Gold offers GATA supporters competitive pricing on all bullion products and welcomes inquiries. Tim can be reached at 602-299-2585 and Tim@allprogold.com, Fred at 602-799-8378 and Fred@allprogold.com. Ask about their ratio strategy and the relationship of generic $20 dollar gold pieces to 1-ounce gold bullion coins. Visit their Internet site at http://www.allprogold.com/. |
| The Fiscal Cliff Is A Diversion: The Derivatives Tsunami and the Dollar Bubble Posted: 17 Dec 2012 04:23 PM PST By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts | paulcraigroberts.org The "fiscal cliff" is another hoax designed to shift the attention of policymakers, the media, and the attentive public, if any, from huge problems to small ones. The fiscal cliff is automatic spending cuts and tax increases in order to reduce the deficit by an insignificant amount over ten years [...]  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Gold or Silver Stocks? Or Both? Posted: 17 Dec 2012 03:20 PM PST Recently, gold and silver's performance wasn't what precious metals investors had expected, even though it seems that this turbulence is just temporary - fundamentals are great with the Fed promising to print even more money ... Read More...  |
| Turk - The Cartel Getting Desperate In The Gold & Silver War Posted: 17 Dec 2012 03:12 PM PST  Today James Turk told King World News that the 'cartel' which has been manipulating the gold and silver markets is now entering a stage where the situation is becoming more desperate. This is yet another fascinating chapter in the gold and silver war. Here is what Turk had to say: "The last few days have given us a good example of how the gold cartel operates, Eric. It is a classic example of how the big players in the paper market can move the price of physical gold and silver."This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| New Report: The Chinese Silver Market Posted: 17 Dec 2012 03:12 PM PST The Silver Institute and Thomson Reuters published a report of 25 pages about the Chinese Silver Market. In it, the market structure is presented detailed by supply and demand, imports and exports, and outlook. In a nutshell, China became the world's second largest silver fabricator and is on its way to be the second largest producer. Its share in global demand stands at 17% while global supply at 14%. The executive summary contains the following two paragraphs which represent a high level overview of silver's supply and demand in China:
The expectations from the researchers are that silver demand and supply will achieve even further growth in the years ahead. One additional chart is worth showing. It represents the turnover and open interest in two commodity exchanges in which silver is trading. The Shangai Gold Exchange (SGE) launched in 2006 a physical silver contract and a futures contract. The Shangai Future Exchange (SFE) started trading only in May of this year a silver futures contract. The growth in trading volumes and open interest speak for themselves. |
| Posted: 17 Dec 2012 03:02 PM PST Submitted by Jim Quinn of The Burning Platform, Hey you, out there on the road Pink Floyd – Hey You “A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude.” – Aldous Huxley – Brave New World The world makes less sense every day. Little children are randomly slaughtered in their schoolrooms. Predator drones roam the skies over foreign countries exterminating bad guys, along with innocent women and children (collateral damage when it occurs in a foreign country). Drugged up mentally ill kids with no hope and no future live lives of secluded quiet desperation until they snap. Ignorant, government educated, welfare dependent drones with no self respect or respect for others, assault, kill and rob within their government created urban jungles. Sociopathic criminals who committed the largest financial crime in world history walk free and continue to occupy executive suites in luxury office towers in downtown NYC, collecting millions in bonuses as compensation for crushing the American middle class. Academics, whose theories have been thoroughly disproven, continue to steer our economy into an iceberg while accelerating the money printing and debt issuance that will sink our ship of state. Corrupt, bought off politicians pander to the lowest common denominator as their votes are only dependent upon who contributed the most to their election campaigns, which never end. Delusional, materialistic, egocentric, math challenged consumers (formerly known as citizens) live for today, enslave themselves in debt, vote themselves more entitlements, and care not for future generations. The alienation and isolation created by our sprawling, automobile dependent, technology obsessed, government controlled, debt financed society has spread like a cancerous tumor, slowly killing our country. Pink Floyd released The Wall 33 years ago. It was a concept rock opera album that explored the issues of ababdonment, isolation, alienation, authoritarianism, the brutality of war, a tyrannical conformist educational system, and the walls individuals and society build to protect themselves from having to confront reality and deal with the consequences of their actions. I attended the Roger Waters Wall Concert this past summer at Citizens Bank Park with my three sons. Three decades later, the message is more powerful than ever. The government oppression and never ending wars waged by the American Empire around the world have created a society built upon fear and loathing. Roger Waters’ vision is colored by Orwell’s 1984 dystopian nightmare of lies, misinformation, propaganda and brutality. The missing piece, which Waters didn’t see coming in 1979, was the ability of the oligarchs to use their control of the credit system to entrap the masses by convincing them to love their servitude and become so consumed with material possessions and the love of money that they would become nothing more than passive egotistical consumers. Since 1979, Total Credit Market Debt in the United States has risen from $4.3 trillion to $55.3 trillion, a 1,286% increase in 33 years. Over this same time frame total wages and salaries have risen from $1.3 trillion to $6.9 trillion, a 531% increase. GDP has grown from $2.6 trillion to $15.8 trillion, a 608% increase. Luckily for the oligarchs, the math challenged masses don’t understand that 375% of the increase in GDP is strictly due to Federal Reserve created inflation, as the U.S. dollar has lost 68% of its purchasing power since 1979. This GDP growth was driven by debt, with consumer expenditures rising from 61% of GDP in 1979 to 71% of GDP today. In the one hundred years since the creation of the Federal Reserve the country’s population has tripled, while our public debt and unfunded liabilites have risen from $2 billion to over $200 trillion, a ten million percent increase. The masses have been programmed and conditioned to love their debt servitude and yearn for more debt to fix an economic system that collapsed due to excessive debt. The cadre of ruling elite are obliging by creating debt at hyperspeed levels. The corporate media, Wall Street shysters and low-life captured politicians assure the sheep-like masses that this is normal and beneficial to their interests, as the sheep are sheared and led to slaughter. “There are some ideas so wrong that only a very intelligent person could believe in them.” – George Orwell
Pavlov’s Dogs
“And always, everywhere, there would be the yelling or quietly authoritative hypnotists; and in the train of the ruling suggestion givers, always everywhere, the tribes of buffoons and hucksters, the professional liars, the purveyors of entertaining irrelevances. Conditioned from the cradle, unceasingly distracted, mesmerized systematically, their uniformed victims would go on obediently marching and countermarching, go on, always and everywhere, killing and dying with the perfect docility of trained poodles.” - Aldous Huxley Aldous Huxley and Edward Bernays realized in the 1920s that the utilization of conditioning and propaganda techniques could be used to control and manipulate the masses. Ivan Pavlov, the famous Russian physiologist, conducted the ground breaking work on conditional reflexes. Pavlov discovered that when a bell was rung in subsequent time with food being presented to a dog in consecutive sequences, the dog will initially salivate when the food is presented. The dog will later come to associate the ringing of the bell with the presentation of the food and salivate upon the ringing of the bell. To a critical thinking human being who questions authority, resists being told what they should think, and values their humanity, over what is crammed down their throat by government run schools and the corporate controlled media, the thought of being treated like a dog is revolting. But to people like Edward Bernays, who believed manipulation of the masses by an invisible contingent of intellectually superior men, conditioning the minds of the masses through propaganda was a necessity in a democratic society to keep the herd under control. Just a cursory examination of our society reveals a population of salivating consumers (dogs) who can be stimulated to buy the latest iPhone or techno-gadget with a simple Madison Avenue advertising campaign (bell). Everyone has seen the videos of the masses lining up like cattle on Black Friday, stampeding through aisles, and fighting each other like their the entertainment at Michael Vick’s house on a Saturday night. All the mega-corporate retailers and the corporate media have to do is ring a bell (SALE) and the dogs start salivating. Product placement, Hollywood star endorsements and influential people using a product immediately convince the easily manipulated dogs to salivate and purchase the products. The difference is that these dogs have credit cards issued by the Wall Street banks and funded by the Federal Reserve with dollars created out of thin air. We are inundated with millions of TV, newspaper, radio, billboard, and internet advertisements designed to make us salivate (spend). Huxley’s dystopian vision of a society whose economic values, in which individual happiness is defined as the ability to satisfy needs, and achievement as a society is equated with economic growth and prosperity, has come to full fruition. He never conceived of consumers having the ability to consume without even having the money to do so. The credit card became our form of Soma. The so called progressives point to our ever increasing “advancements” in technology as proof that our society is progressing. Huxley knew otherwise, decades before we reached this disgusting point in history: “Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards.” - Aldous Huxley In reality our “technological progress” has done nothing more than create a humorless, shallow, superficial world of alienation and egocentric desires. Just as in Huxley’s Brave New World, science and technology have not been used to seek truth and advance our culture. They have been used by the State to sensor, control, and monitor the citizens. They use technology as a means to create electronic entertainment machines that generate both harmless leisure and the high levels of consumption and production that are the basis of societal stability and state designed happiness. When those in control talk about progress, they mean greater control over our lives. When the consumption of material goods isn’t enough to fill the holes within our souls, our owners are quick to prescribe a pill to smooth over those feelings of unease and discontent. In Huxley’s novel the population voluntarily consumes Soma to dispel any anxieties or negative emotion. The saying was, “One cubic centimeter cures ten gloomy sentiments.” In America the government controlled drug industry has thousands of pills to treat every ailment or unhappy thought that might ail you. Just don’t try and treat yourself with an unapproved natural or banned substance. The threat of imprisonment always lurks in the shadows. They just want us to be interchangeable bricks in the wall. And the Worms Ate Into His Brain“The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. Many of them are normal because they are so well adjusted to our mode of existence, because their human voice has been silenced so early in their lives that they do not even struggle or suffer or develop symptoms as the neurotic does. They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness. These millions of abnormally normal people, living without fuss in a society to which, if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted.” - Aldous Huxley
Hey you, out there in the cold Pink Floyd – Hey You The tragic deaths of twenty children and six adults in Newtown, Connecticut this past week and the similar tragedies in Aurora, Columbine, Virginia Tech and Tucson are a reflection of the twisted society we’ve created. The progressive control freak do-gooders that believe the government can solve all problems and improve our lives with another law or regulation, have as usual come to the wrong solution for the wrong problem. Stricter gun control laws would not have averted this this tragedy. Connecticut has the 5th toughest gun restrictions in the country according to the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The guns were purchased legally by the mother of the killer. Mentally deranged people should not have access to guns, knives, automobiles, gasoline, or baseball bats. The real issue is not what he used to kill these innocent people, it’s what caused him to snap. Those in power want to divert the attention from this crucial question. In Huxley’s novel the characters do everything they can to avoid confronting the truth about their own lives. They try to alter reality by ingesting Soma, encouraged by the state as the ultimate form of willful self-delusion. Soma clouds the realities of the present and replaces them with happy hallucinations, and is thus a tool for promoting social stability. America has taken Huxley’s dystopian vision to an extreme. There are millions of children in this country being drugged on a daily basis to keep them under control. A majority of the mass murderers were taking psychotropic drugs, including the mentally deranged killer this week. These killings are a result of the state sponsored drugging of children, a culture that promotes narcissism, broken families and our technologically enhanced suburban sprawl isolation from human relationships, love and compassion for others. We glorify technology even though it encourages the building of brick walls, creating a self-imposed isolation from society. The traditional family unit has been discarded, with 50% of marriages ending in divorce and 43% of all children born out of wedlock. Millions of families are dysfunctional, with parents too busy with their careers and acquiring material possessions, to bother with raising their children in a loving nurturing way. One in ten American adults choose to escape their man made cells with prescription anti-depressants. Almost one in four women in their 40s and 50s are popping pills to escape their depressing lives. Huxley envisioned a Soma Nation. America is a Prozac Nation. The wealthy think medicating their kids, spoiling them with toys, gadgets and cars, and occupying their days with organized sports and activities passes for involved parenting. Poor urban children are lucky if they ever lay eyes on their father. Ignorance, violence, and dependency are a given for most of these kids. And all of these children are matriculated into the government run schools whose sole purpose is to teach kids what to think, rather than how to think. Our owners need to keep us “happy” and focused on feelings, material possessions, and an infinite number of distractions, so they can retain control and continue their pillaging of the national wealth. Our leaders have attempted to design their own Brave New World, retaining control by making America’s citizens so contented and superficially fulfilled that they no longer care about their personal freedoms, liberties and civic responsibilities. The consequences of increasing state power are a loss of dignity, morals, values, and emotions. We are losing our humanity. The society created by Bernays and his minions who occupy the executive suites in NYC and slither through the halls of Congress has been built upon destroying all human truths, such as love, friendship, community, and personal connections. Decades of media propaganda, public education mind control, and peddling of debt convinced the majority that happiness meant immediate gratification of our desires for food, sex, drugs, clothes, iGadgets, and all the other consumer crap made in corporate sponsored slave labor factories across Asia. These delusional hallucinations of happiness are the prison walls we’ve built brick by brick. “This concern with the basic condition of freedom — the absence of physical constraint — is unquestionably necessary, but is not all that is necessary. It is perfectly possible for a man to be out of prison and yet not free — to be under no physical constraint and yet to be a psychological captive, compelled to think, feel and act as the representatives of the national State, or of some private interest within the nation, want him to think, feel and act.” - Aldous Huxley It took the intellectuals and progressives that wield power across the land only moments to hijack the feelings of sorrow and pain sweeping the nation, to misdirect attention from the mental illnesses caused by the society they’ve created, towards the false storyline that gun violence is sweeping the land. In reality, violent crime has been falling for over a decade as gun sales have soared. The homicide rate in this country is the lowest since 1964, with the vast majority of homicides occurring in the urban kill zones created by the five decade long progressive war on poverty. The truth is of no interest to those brandishing power. After decades of conditioning, the masses are psychologically captive to the messages designed to make them salivate. They will be compelled to think, feel and act as instructed by the Alphas. There will be calls for more police, despite the fact that police rarely stop a crime. With all of their armaments, technology, high powered weaponry, and political clout, they can be counted on to arrive five minutes after the tragedy is over. But they are brilliant in luring clueless Muslim teenagers into terrorist plots, picking the target, providing the fake bombs, and taking credit for foiling the plots they created. More union police officers will increase our safety as much as more union teachers have made our kids smarter. This tragedy will be used by the propagandists to impose further restrictions upon those who choose personal responsibility and self-reliance over dependency and trust in the efficiency and fairness of our benevolent government overlords. As the father of three sons I can’t imagine the pain, sorrow and emptiness the parents of these beautiful children must be experiencing. The grief is overwhelming. I mourn for the children and adults slaughtered by a mentally deranged young man created by our truly perverted culture of alienation. I mourn for the children being raised in a society run by evil psychopathic liars that use the power of propaganda and the tools of debt to control and manipulate its citizens. I mourn for unborn generations that will be forced to confront the dreadful depraved chaos created by our culture of egocentric greed and narcissism. The things we value in this culture – accumulating wealth, outward beauty, acquisition of material possessions, instant gratification, access to debt, government control, and curing our ills with drugs – are driving us insane. Who is really abnormal in a profoundly abnormal society? Believing that possessions, more laws or another medication will truly make us happy is insane. Popping a pill, buying a new iPhone, or passing another law will not cure the disease that permeates this nation. We need to recapture the humanity, civic pride and self-responsibility that built this country. Only an awakened populace can change our course. Huxley feared that our desires would ruin us. Orwell was afraid that what we fear would ruin us. The oligarchs have pushed the Huxley vision to its sustainable limit. The avarice and greed of these invisible power brokers has devoured the vast resources of the nation. These psychopaths weren’t satisfied with siphoning off most of the wealth of the country. They wanted it all and wrecked the global economy in their odious pursuit of mammon. We are now in the death throes of the most decadent, delusional, debt engendered era in the long history of mankind. Those in power realize it is slipping away. Their “solutions” reflect an air of desperation. Their propaganda efforts have been redoubled. As more middle class workers lose their jobs, more young people graduate from college with tens of thousands in student loan debt and a future of dramatically reduced expectations, and more people are driven beyond their breaking point, this materialistic shroud of happiness will be torn asunder. Anger is building like a lava dome within a volcano. A critical thinking minority are questioning the motives of those in power. The unsustainability of our economic paradigm is certain. The seeds of revolution are being sown. Our society is only fantasy. The wall is too high. It will be up to an irate tireless minority of freedom minded citizens to tear down the wall. The alternative is to allow the worms to eat into our brains. Each of us must answer a simple question. Are you just another brick in the wall? But it was only fantasy. Pink Floyd – Hey You The oligarchs will not give up without a fight. Their realization that the Brave New World method of controlling the masses has run its course has convinced them to shift their methods towards Orwell’s 1984 tactics. In part two of this series – Mother Should I Trust the Government? - I’ll address how the use of fear, war, pain, and surveillance are becoming the new controlling method of the oligarchs. |
| What Would You Prefer: Gold Or Paper? Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:47 PM PST In this article, the author makes a simple yet powerful comparison between a gold investment and paper based investments. What was the yield of typical paper based investments in the past decade vs gold or silver (which are mostly criticized as they don't pay interests or dividends)? Which are the inherent risks and what to expect in the coming years? Obviously there will be a time when gold and silver will be overvalued, as it goes with each wealth cycle. However based on the current evolution we are still far away from that point.
Further reading on the expectations of the silver price? Please read Silver outlook for 2013. The author recently published an eBook "Survival Investing With Gold & Silver." It's available on this website, from Smashwords, and from Amazon Kindle eBooks. |
| CIBC's Matt Gibson Sees Upside in Iron in 2013 Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:40 PM PST The Gold Report: Matt, you cover four companies in the iron space with market caps that range from Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. (CLF:NYSE) at $4.2 billion and Labrador Iron Mines Holdings Ltd. (LIM:TSX) to Alderon Iron Ore Corp. (ADV:TSX; AXX:NYSE.MKT) and New Millennium Iron Corp. (NML:TSX) with market caps around $200 million. In Q1/12, all of them were worth double what they are trading at today. Why should investors be interested in these companies? Matt Gibson: We have started to see positive trends in the iron ore space. Chinese port inventories have started to tick down, while capacity utilization globally and in the U.S. has started to tick up for steel companies. Iron ore prices have rebounded from lows of $86/metric ton (Mt) to the $118–120 Mt level. TGR: Are larger companies like Cliffs being punished for their acquisitions or is the across-the-board share price decline all about low steel prices and global economic fears? MG: I think most of it has to do with iro... |
| Commodities: Crude Oil Gains with Stocks on Fiscal Cliff Deal Hopes Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:30 PM PST courtesy of DailyFX.com December 17, 2012 07:46 AM Crude oil prices are on the upswing amid a broad-based advance in risk appetite triggered by hopes for a US “fiscal cliff” deal. Gold prices are treading water. Crude oil prices are on the upswing amid a broad-based advance in risk appetite triggered by hopes for a US “fiscal cliff” deal. Gold prices are treading water. Talking Points [LIST] [*] Crude Oil Follows Stocks Higher on “Fiscal Cliff” Deal Optimism [*] Gold, Silver Tread Water as US Dollar Stages Shallow Recovery [/LIST] Crude oil prices are on the upswing amid a broad-based recovery in risk appetite as markets look toward a resolution to the “fiscal cliff” fiasco playing out in Washington, DC. The newswires suggest optimism follows an apparent concession from House of Representatives Republican leader John Boehner to accept a tax increase on millionaires as part of the arrangement. Gold and silver are t... |
| Volatility Hammered As Stocks And Bond Yields Close At Highs Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:16 PM PST For anyone watching the last hour or two of today's market, there was plenty to entertain. VXX (the implied vol ETF) collapsed in a haze of glory dragging stocks to the highs of the day with financials seeing their best day in three months. Treasury yields, Gold, and Stocks have all recoupled from the election and perhaps that is what this bond weakness is related to (as for example LQD fell to 3 month lows today, while HYG remains close to record highs). Stocks closed at Thursday's highs amid heavy and large size trades - the vertical rampathon (or inverse Baumgartnering) suggests a quiet market desparate to auction to stops. The USD ended unch, as did Gold while 30Y added 8bps as testicular fortitude appeared under pressure today. Perhaps Citi should downgrade AAPL every day? Today's #Teppergasm (h/t @gubbmintcheese) saw the NASDAQ back to unchanged for December and Citi up a measly 13.3%. The S&P 500 futures were relatively entertaining today - kissing VWAP twice before accelerating 10 points in the afternoon to close at the highs... and what that rampalicious liftathon looked like up close and personal - two words - Linear Awesomeness...
which leaves S&P futures at a key crossroads...
For the month of December, today's ripfest dragged the NASDAQ back to unch as Trannies lead...
Stocks, Bonds, and Gold all recoupled post-election...
Today was crazy in the afternoon - after being well correlated early, volatility was crushed and managed to drag stocks (and High Yield) higher into the close...
Financials had their best day in three months - in celebration of Dick Bove's resignation we assume...
Charts: Bloomberg
Bonus Chart: Financials In December... Citi +13.3%... awesome...
Bonus Bonus Chart: HYG vs Fair-Value divergence - seen that before last week, didn't end well... |
| Indian government admits 'gold-backed' means just pretending to have gold Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:11 PM PST Thanks to the government of India for acknowledging today that the great advantage of "gold-backed financial instruments" is not to their purchasers but rather to the government itself in its campaign to talk Indians out of their gold to reduce the country's current account deficit. |
| Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts Posted: 17 Dec 2012 02:08 PM PST  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Indian government admits 'gold-backed' means just pretending to have gold Posted: 17 Dec 2012 01:48 PM PST 3:59p ET Monday, December 17, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold: Thanks to the government of India for acknowledging today that the great advantage of "gold-backed financial instruments" is not to their purchasers but rather to the government itself in its campaign to talk Indians out of their gold to reduce the country's current account deficit. That is, as the Press Trust of India reports in the story appended from The Hindu, replacing the investment of the Indian people in gold with "gold-backed financial instruments" can reduce gold purchases only insofar as those "gold-backed financial instruments" don't actually have all the gold that has been sold in their name. But no thanks to the Indian government for thinking its people to be so stupid. "In its mid-year economic analysis tabled in Parliament on Monday," the PTI story says, "the government said gold-backed products would help investors enjoy the benefits of investment in the metal without investing in the physical commodity." ADVERTISEMENT GoldMoney adds Singapore vaulting option In addition to its precious metals storage facilities in Hong Kong, Switzerland, Toronto, and the United Kingdom, now with GoldMoney you can store gold and silver in Singapore in a high-security vault operated by Brink's Singapore Pte Limited. To celebrate the launch of this storage option, GoldMoney is offering a discount on buy and exchange fees at this vault for any orders above US$10,000 (or the equivalent) until January 11, 2013. Tthe gold buy rate is 0.98%, while the silver rate is 1.99%. Metal exchanges into Brink's Singapore will also be discounted for this period and will be charged at 0.78% for gold and 1.75% for silver. Simply place your order online and the above rates apply automatically until January 11, 2013, 15.00 UK time. To find out more about the new vault, please visit: http://www.goldmoney.com/singapore?gmrefcode=gata GoldMoney customers can take delivery of any number of gold, silver, platinum, and palladium bars from any GoldMoney vault, as well as personally collect their bars stored in the Hong Kong, Switzerland, and U.K. vaults. It's easy to open an account, add funds, and liquidate your investment. For more information, visit: http://www.goldmoney.com/?gmrefcode=gata But of course investing in a merely "gold-backed" product is actually a mechanism for forfeiting the benefits, by nullifying the price support that otherwise would be given by one's own investment. Besides, the Indian government's concern about its trade deficit seems a bit misplaced. Yes, Indians pay rupees for gold and as India has little domestic gold mining, the rupee is exported for imports and becomes weaker and the gold price becomes stronger. But it's not as if India is poorer by the transaction. To the contrary, India is richer since the Indian people still have the gold. Those who are poorer are those who traded gold for rupees. The real objection of the Indian government here seems to be that the Indian people have control of the better wealth-preservation mechanism, the metal, and the government is stuck with the inferior wealth-preservation mechanism, the rupee. The solution would seem to be to give the Indian people what their behavior suggests they want: a gold currency. That would facilitate what the Indian government claims to want: mobilization of the vast wealth stored by the Indian people in metal. But of course that would also risk smashing India's enduring colonial masters in the Western banking system, who can keep controlling the world only as long as they control currency creation. Like South Africa, another country with a lot of gold, India only thinks that it's free. CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer * * * Government Mulls Gold-Backed Schemes to Curb Imports By the Press Trust of India http://www.thehindu.com/business/markets/centre-mulls-goldbacked-schemes... Attributing the surge in gold imports to the high current account deficit, the government on Monday said it was considering schemes such as gold deposits, accumulation plans, gold-linked accounts, and pension products to curb demand for the precious metal. In its mid-year economic analysis tabled in Parliament on Monday, the government said gold-backed products would help investors enjoy benefits of investment in the metal without investing in the physical commodity. "Now gold-backed financial instruments in the form of modified gold deposits and gold accumulation plans, besides gold-linked accounts and pension products linked with the precious metal, are some measures being considered to reduce the attraction of a direct investment in bullion and jewellery in the domestic market and check a substantial rise in imports," the review said. However, gold-linked investments would have to be monitored to see whether the overall demand for the metal actually falls, it added. The Finance Ministry's chief economic adviser, Raghuram Rajan, told reporters: "We are worried about gold imports. It is an unproductive instrument. The way to curb holding of gold is to create more attractive financial instruments. Some gold-linked instruments have been talked about by the RBI but potentially there could be other financial instruments to attract investment." The current account deficit has been rising on the back of record trade deficits, which in October jumped to a 12-year high of $21 billion on the back of rising oil and gold imports. "We are worried about the deficit. We want to take steps to monitor it," Dr. Rajan said. The Reserve Bank of India has unveiled a slew of curbs on gold purchases and financing as imports touched a record high last year, pushing up the current account deficit to a historic high of 4.2 per cent in the year. In 2011-12 India's gold imports stood at $60 billion and the quantum of import was 1,067 tonnes. A Finance Ministry official said the imports had shown signs of moderation and that gave the government hope that the deficit would be lower this fiscal. In the April-June quarter of the current fiscal, however, gold imports had contracted by 18.4 per cent year-on-year to Rs.71,912 crore ($13 billion). Gold imports into the country had risen considerably in the last 3-4 years. Join GATA here: Vancouver Resource 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: |
| Precious Metals Market Report – December 13 Posted: 17 Dec 2012 01:02 PM PST |
| Posted: 17 Dec 2012 12:35 PM PST December 17, 2012
A recent poll taken by the Pew Research Center asking Americans about a variety of methods Congress and the White House could employ to cut the federal budget deficit: "The only deficit reduction proposals that garner more support than opposition — among 12 items tested — are those that affect higher-income Americans," reads a summary. Naturally.
While "eating the rich" got a similar response in the Politico poll, across-the-board spending cuts — i.e., the fiscal cliff — got 3 out of 4 "yea" votes. Only 14 days left until the federal government takes the big leap. Congress was meant to adjourn last Friday. Last year, it took until Dec. 23 to pass a two-month payroll tax cut extension. Only two lawmakers were in attendance for the voice vote. The drama.
Exhibit A: "With tax rates set to jump in 2013," our managing editor Chris Mayer warned readers over the weekend, "it makes more sense to not pay the dividend at the new confiscatory rates." One of Chris Mayer's "Special Situation" plays announced a special dividend last week. "When a company chooses to pay a dividend," the company's press release put it clearly, "it pays those dividends after it has paid about 35% in income taxes on its taxable income; individuals pay an additional 15% on any dividends received, for a total effective tax rate of 45% on this stream of income." Double taxation? You bet. "If there is no solution to the 'fiscal cliff' by the end of this year," the statement goes on, "the dividend tax rate will climb as high as 43.4% after factoring in the new tax due to the recently passed Affordable Care Act. "In simple terms, dividend income is first taxed at 35% and then again at 43.4%, for a total of approximately 63% effective tax on that stream of income." [Ed. note. Your taxes are going up. Unfortunately, the devil is in the details. What happens for you next depends on how closely you read the fine print. Tomorrow... to address specific problems you'll be facing on other side of the fiscal cliff... we're releasing a beta version of a new 5 Min. Forecast we're calling The 5 Min. Forecast Pro. The new Pro version of The 5 will give you specific actions to take on the nuggets you read each day... for more details on the beta test and how you'll be able to give The 5 Min. Forecast Pro a test-drive, look for the Special Announcement below....]
Heh. "As much as we would like to ignore all this talk about the cliff," comments market forecaster Greg "Gunner" Guenthner, "it's possible that it completely takes over the headlines this week. That's fine — as long as you strive to keep it all in perspective. Any fiscal cliff decision (or nondecision) could move the market. However, any reaction — positive or negative — will likely be short-lived." Spot gold sits where it did when the market closed Friday afternoon — $1,697.
Nearly every internal of the survey was bad — number of employees, average workweek, prices paid (still rising), and prices received (flat).
"The company earlier vowed to hold the line on such promotions to protect profits through the end of the year," Bloomberg reports, "even as competitors flood showrooms with traditional year-end deals." "There is a price for that pricing discipline," adds the Detroit Free Press. "By the end of November, GM dealers were holding 139 days' supply of full-size pickups, far more than the 80 to 90 that is considered ideal." Ford ended the month with a 90-day stockpile. There's precedent for giving away a backlog of GM cars: Remember the backlog of cheese the government started handing out in the early 1980s? "When cutting into a block of government cheese, you never really knew what type of cheese you were eating," writes food blogger Harrison Jones. "The taste and smell can only be described as a cross between very low-grade American cheese, a generic Velveeta knockoff and a somewhat rancid cheddar."
"On first impression, the only difference seems to be cosmetic differences in the grille and lights. Here is stock photo of the 2013 Chevy Silverado: "And here is a photo of the 2014 Chevy Silverado: "Perhaps the 'Dilbert' government bureaucrat mindset is seeping into GM management?" muses Mr. Amoss. "No flair for risk-taking anymore?" After all the inventory is given away, maybe Congress could take a further page from their own farm subsidy bill… and pay GM to not make trucks at all.
"Ford's move to new technology has helped it grab the lead," writes Jeff Bennett of the Dow Jones Newswire. "It offers the F-150 with a V-6 EcoBoost engine that includes turbocharging and other technologies to cut fuel consumption yet give it the power of a larger V-8 engine. "Through November, more than 40% of the 576,529 F-series pickups Ford sold were EcoBoost models."
Inspired by the John Cusack disaster film 2012, "Noah's Ark" is one of several yard-high fiberglass and steel spheres Mr. Qiyuan has spent 300,000 yuan ($45,675) to complete in preparations for the apocalypse. "The pod won't have any problems," Mr. Qiyuan explains, "even if there are 1,000-yard-high waves… it's like a pingpong ball, its skin may be thin, but it can withstand a lot of pressure." Each pod is equipped with enough seat belts, oxygen tanks, food and water supplies to supply up to 30 people for at least two months. And due to a meticulous insulation job, "a person could live for four months in the pod at the north or south pole without freezing, or even feeling slightly cold." "If there really is some kind of apocalypse," Mr. Qiyuan declares, "then you could say I've made a contribution to the survival of humanity." As the Mayan calendar careens to a halt in just four days, we're assuming it's a little too late to put in our orders.
"My small custom landscape company, with six employees, was accosted by a tactical team consisting of a representative from the Contractors State Licensing Board, the Employment Development Department (EDD, the payroll tax people) and (of most concern) Cal/OSHA (the 'safety inspection guys' — the heroes that protect us from 'sweatshops'). "We play by the rules as well as anyone can, but one of my employees was ambushed. The team started in with a barrage of questions about who he was and ended rapidly with a demand to see the job site. The job site is someone's backyard behind gates and walls and not visible at all from the street. "When I arrived, they were cheerful enough, explaining over and over that they had been given permission to enter the property. This later turned out to be a shrug from my overwhelmed employee and the words, 'I guess, if you have to.'"
"The person from EDD wanted everyone's IDs, home addresses and phone numbers, tax numbers, etc., and from me also wanted the name of my bank. I assume the bank info was meant to expedite any needed transfers in the quiet of the night in case any paperwork was found to be out of order in the future. "In between the several mentions of permission to enter my client's backyard, I was informed that they had been following likely trucks from the Home Depot and ambushing the unsuspecting drivers when they reached their job sites. "Apparently, before that, they had just been sitting around the office doing nothing and were finally given funding to embark on this new adventure. I'm not sure what this new funding was for, since I am sure they all got paid the same to just do nothing. In retrospect, I am happy that my tax dollars paid them to do nothing, and would have preferred to keep it that way. "The part you'll appreciate most: One of my employees asked the EDD representative for a welfare form if she had any with her. Once he heard the dollar amounts in question, he assumed we'd go out of business and he would be out of a job. The EDD rep looked shocked and replied that wasn't what they were there for at all." The 5: Of course, not.
"I do think that it is appropriate to ask if there are any effects of what the Congress is giving borrowed money to do. Does it have any real effect on additional job creation? NASA created the space industry, which has more positive ancillary effects than most government programs. From miniaturization of health monitoring equipment to better weather forecasts through private satellites, I don't think we can begin to cover the long-term positive effects of that program. "Spending money on food stamps does not have that effect. In fact, even Twinkies were not saved by pouring money down that rathole. "While there are undoubtedly some benefits from military research spending — night vision developments, for example — most military developments remain hidden from public view. But money spent in foreign lands to house U.S. service people and blow things up does not create new jobs nor long-term development here in the U.S. "Stand fast. Never let your readers forget that every dollar, no matter how little it is worth, cannot exist without taking it from a productive person or be created with the depression of a computer key. In either case, every one of us is made worth less." Enjoy your Monday,
P.S. "Focusing on the world's markets is not as daunting as it may first appear," writes Robert Weinstein at The Street. "I recently read World Right Side Up… by Christopher Mayer. The book is a must-read for investors wanting to explore investing opportunities worldwide. "Mayer does outstanding work in explaining the pitfalls and possibilities in markets around the world. Moving from region to region, Mayer puts the power back into the investors' hands with the knowledge that anywhere at all is a potential winner (and loser)." SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: Starting tomorrow, Agora Financial Reserve members will begin beta testing The 5 Min. Forecast Pro. The new Pro edition will give you specific actions to take on the back side of the observations you read in The 5. (If you're not already a Reserve member but would like to take part in the beta test, call John Wilkinson at 866-361-7662. John can help identify credits that may already be sitting in your Agora Financial account. The Agora Financial Reserve is by far the most economical way to take advantage of the ideas and advice you read here in The 5 every day.)        |
| Posted: 17 Dec 2012 12:34 PM PST Synopsis: Why banks, governments, and prominent investors are loading up on gold. Dear Reader, Due to the way our publication schedule and the holidays work out, this holiday edition of Metals & Mining Monday will be our last Casey Daily Dispatch column until after the New Year. We hope you've found value in our articles this year, both for entertainment and for profit, and look forward to delivering more of the same to you next year. Whatever your beliefs may be, we wish you a very happy holiday season and peace and prosperity going forward. The peace might be hard to come by in these turbulent times, but we'll do our best to help you with the prosperity part. Sincerely, Louis James Senior Metals Investment Strategist Casey Research Rock & Stock Stats[RIGHT]Last One Month Ago One Year Ago[/RIGHT] Gold1,696.831,726.341,573.67Silver32.5232.6628.88Copper3.643.463.27Oil85.8986.3294.95Gold Producers (GDX)46.4847.2252.38Gol... |
| QE4: An Early Christmas Present For Most Investors ? Here?s Why Posted: 17 Dec 2012 12:34 PM PST One*couldn’t imagine any better Christmas gift for hard assets and stocks than*Ben Bernanke’s surprise*introduction of* QE4 right on the heels of QE3. Call the duo QE7. “QE7″ promises to expand the monetary base far faster than the markets had been discounting [which is great for gold] and also raises the floor under stocks. I suspect we’ll close 2012 with a run at the highs, and possibly climb just short of 1,600 on the S&P 500 sometime in Q1. As for Treasury bonds, well, could this spell the end of the bond market? [Let's look at the ramifications of QE4 more closely.] Words: 516 So writes John Thomas ([url]www.madhedgefundtrader.com/[/url]) in edited excerpts from the original article* entitled The Fed Christmas Present for Gold Bulls. [INDENT]Lorimer Wilson, editor of [COLOR=#0000ff][COLOR=#ff0000]www.FinancialArticleSummariesToday.com[/COLOR] (A site for sore eyes and inquisitive minds) and [COLOR=#ff0000]www.munKNEE.com [/COLOR](Your Key to Making ... |
| QE3 – Pay Attention If You Are in the Real Estate Market Posted: 17 Dec 2012 12:30 PM PST With QE3, we are essentially being bought out with our own money…and unemployment is being used to facilitate this process in a very clever manner. Monetary inflation is currently being offset by labor deflation. The way you avoid collapse is by printing money and stealing assets. The way you avoid inflation is with labor deflation. |
| How To Reduce International Dollar Debt and Insular Dollar Entitlement Payments Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:59 AM PST Jim Sinclair's Mineset My Dear Extended Family, Hi Jim, In his last report, John Williams expects hyperinflation by the end of 2014. He has advised (in an interview separate from his most recent report) that when this happens, the purchasing power of the US Dollar will collapse and in about six months a new currency will be issued. All of this leads to a lower US dollar in an intact trend channel that goes to and below .5600 on the meaningless USDX index. You've talked about a new, two-tiered currency regime (if I understand correctly) that will consist of a basket-type currency traded among central banks and national or multinational-basket currencies used by the rest of us. My question is, after the new currency regime is created, what will happen to transfer-payment programs like SS, unemployment comp and the like? Will these payments resume in whatever currency the US uses next? How about public-sector employees? They, effectively, receive tran... |
| Silver ridiculously low because of paper market, Embry tells King World News Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:28 AM PST 1:24p ET Monday, December 17, 2012 Dear Friend of GATA and Gold (and Silver): Sprott Asset Management's chief investment strategist, John Embry, today tells King World News that with China's silver demand rising sharply and money printing to infinity being Western central bank policy, silver's price remains ridiculously low on account of paper market games. An excerpt from the interview is posted at the King World News blog here: http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2012/12/17_J... CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer ADVERTISEMENT Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy open All Pro Gold Longtime GATA supporters Fred Goldstein and Tim Murphy have brought their many years of experience in the precious metals and numismatic coins to All Pro Gold as metals brokers who specialize in the delivery of gold and silver bullion bars and coins as well as numismatic gold and silver coins. Fred and Tim follow these markets closely and are assisted by a team of consultants in monitoring market trends. All Pro Gold offers GATA supporters competitive pricing on all bullion products and welcomes inquiries. Tim can be reached at 602-299-2585 and Tim@allprogold.com, Fred at 602-799-8378 and Fred@allprogold.com. Ask about their ratio strategy and the relationship of generic $20 dollar gold pieces to 1-ounce gold bullion coins. Visit their Internet site at http://www.allprogold.com/. Join GATA here: Vancouver Resource 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 Opinion Around the World Is Changing When Deutschebank calls gold "good money" and paper "bad money". ... http://www.gata.org/node/11765 When the president of the German central bank, the Bundesbank, pays tribute to gold as "a timeless classic". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/09/24/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a leading member of the policy committee of the People's Bank of China calls the gold standard "an excellent monetary system". ... http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2012/10/01/signs-of-the-gold-stan... When a CNN reporter writes in The China Post that the "gold commission" plank in the 2012 Republican platform will "reverberate around the world". ... http://www.thegoldstandardnow.org/key-blogs/1563-china-post-the-gop-gold... When the Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy of the U.S. House of Representatives twice called on economist, historian, and gold standard advocate Lewis E. Lehrman to testify. ... World opinion is changing in favor of gold. How can you learn why and what it will mean to you? Read the newly updated and expanded edition of Lehrman's book, "The True Gold Standard." Financial journalist James Grant says of "The True Gold Standard": "If you have ever wondered how the world can get from here to there -- from the chaos of depreciating paper to a convertible currency worthy of our children and our grandchildren -- wonder no more. The answer, brilliantly expounded, is between these covers. America has long needed a modern Alexander Hamilton. In Lewis E. Lehrman she has finally found him." To buy a copy of "The True Gold Standard," please visit: http://www.thegoldstandardnow.com/publications/the-true-gold-standard |
| A 'Very Different' Platinum Market Swings Into a 600,000 Ounce Deficit Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:19 AM PST "I'm ever conscious of the beating JPMorgan et al laid on the precious metals between Christmas and New Years in 2011" [COLOR=#7f4028] Yesterday in Gold and Silver 'Dead' would be a good word to describe the gold market everywhere on Planet Earth yesterday. Gold closed at $1,696.20 spot...down $1.10 from Thursday. Volume was microscopic at around 85,000 contracts. The silver price chart was very similar right up until 10:00 a.m. in New York. From there it got sold off into the 1:30 p.m. Comex close...and then didn't do a lot after that. Silver finished the Friday trading day at $32.31 spot...down 23 cents from Thursday. Volume was only around 27,500 contracts. The dollar index opened at the 79.93 mark...and stayed mostly at that level until shortly before 8:00 a.m. in New York. From that point, the index rolled over...and by 12:15 a.m. Eastern time, it was down to its low of the day...around 79.51...down about 45 basis points from its early mor... |
| Posted: 17 Dec 2012 11:18 AM PST London Gold Market Report from Ben Traynor BullionVault Monday 17 December 2012, 07:30 EST THE WHOLESALE gold bullion price rose to $1693 per ounce during Monday morning's London trading, but remained slightly below where it ended last week following falls in Asia, where the Yen opened sharply lower against the Dollar before recovering some ground following the result of Japan's general election. "Gold is continuing to trade below the psychologically important threshold of $1700," says a note from Commerzbank. "There are signs that the current price weakness is not sustainable, however, and we envisage prices climbing significantly again in the medium term." Silver meantime hovered around $32.20 an ounce this morning, a few cents off Friday's close, while stocks and commodities were little changed on the day. "Participation is really low right now," one Hong Kong trader told newswire Reuters this morning. "It hasn't been a very exciting year for most people and I don'... |
When are we finally going to admit that we have a very serious problem with this generation of young men in America? We have failed them so dramatically that it is hard to put it into words. We have raised an entire generation of young males that don't know how to be men, and many of them feel completely lost. Sometimes they feel so lost that they "snap" in very destructive ways. Adam Lanza and James Holmes are two names that come to mind. Why is it that mass murderers are almost always young men? Why don't young women behave the same way? Sadly, Adam Lanza and James Holmes are just the tip of the iceberg of a much larger problem in our society. Our young women vastly outperform our young men in almost every important statistical category. Young men are much more likely to perform poorly in school, they are much more likely to have disciplinary problems and they are much more likely to commit suicide. In the old days, our young men would gather in the streets or in the parks to play with one another after school, but today most of them are content to spend countless hours feeding their addictions to video games, movies and other forms of entertainment. When our young men grow up, many of them are extremely averse to taking on responsibility. They want to have lots of sex, but they aren't interested in marriage. They enjoy the comforts of living at home, but they don't want to go out and pursue career goals so that they can provide those things for themselves. Our young men are supposed to be "the leaders of tomorrow", but instead many of them are a major burden on society. When are we finally going to admit that something has gone horribly wrong?
Since Bretton Woods and the creation of post WWII Monetary structure, US obligations were considered risk free and its debt instruments rated as AAA. Global risk and spreads have traditionally been priced off this foundation. A crippled dollar and US debt worries has the potential to trigger a global credit melt down. The 2008 financial crisis with Bear Stearns and Lehman gave us just an inkling of the magnitude of the problem.
In an uncertain global economic environment, central banks have been purchasing gold. 
"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want," wrote the sage of Baltimore, H.L. Mencken, "and deserve to get it good and hard."
Seats 14 comfortably, up to 30 in a pinch…
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