Goldman Sucks

16 February 2012

Global gold demand exceeds US $200 bn for first time in 2011: WGC

NEW YORK (Commodity Online):Global demand for gold in 2011 rose to 4,067.1 tonnes (t) worth an estimated US$205.5 billion - the first time that global demand has exceeded US$200 billion and the highest tonnage level since 1997.

The main driver for this increase was the investment sector where annual demand was 1,640.7t up 5% on the previous record set in 2010 and with a value of US$82.9 billion.

The pre-eminent markets for investment demand in 2011 were India, China and Europe. Central banks continued the trend established in 2010 of being net buyers of gold.

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Rothschilds Want Iran’s Banks

By Pete Papaherakles

Could gaining control of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran (CBI) be one of the main reasons that Iran is being targeted by Western and Israeli powers? As tensions are building up for an unthinkable war with Iran, it is worth exploring Iran’s banking system compared to its U.S., British and Israeli counterparts.

Some researchers are pointing out that Iran is one of only three countries left in the world whose central bank is not under Rothschild control. Before 9-11 there were reportedly seven: Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Cuba, North Korea and Iran. By 2003, however, Afghanistan and Iraq were swallowed up by the Rothschild octopus, and by 2011 Sudan and Libya were also gone. In Libya, a Rothschild bank was established in Benghazi while the country was still at war.

Islam forbids the charging of interest, a major problem for the Rothschild banking system. Until a few hundred years ago, charging interest was also forbidden in the Christian world and was even punishable by death. It was considered exploitation and enslavement.

David Morgan at the California Resource Investment Conference: "Myths in the Silver Market"

John Embry - Is Greece’s Situation Bad for Gold?

Nigel Farage - Greece Descending into Total Chaos & Violence

15 February 2012

SilverDoctors: Gold & Silver Receiving SAFE HAVEN CURRENCY Flows

SilverDoctors: Gold & Silver Receiving SAFE HAVEN CURRENCY Flows: Posting has been a little slow today as The Doc spent the morning interviewing a rather pivotal player in the silver market. Check back as ...

Iran’s nuclear, terror offensives meet slow US-Israeli responses

DEBKAfile Special Report February 15, 2012, 5:17 PM (GMT+02:00)

Shrugging off Western sanctions and Israeli recriminations, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad played a starring role in a widely televised spectacle by inserting his country’s first domestically-made fuel rod into the Tehran Research Reactor Wednesday, Feb. 15. The scene came after the announced cutoff of Iranian oil exports to six European countries - Netherlands, Spain, Italy, France, Greece and Portugal. Two hours later, the Iranian oil ministry challenged the announcement, spoiling the show by attesting to differences in high regime ranks.

By this show, Tehran thumbed its nose at Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s call on the world Wednesday to set red lines for Iran’s nuclear program and denounce its terrorist activity. “If Iran’s aggression is not halted, it will ultimately spread to other countries,” he told the Knesset.
Tehran paused only briefly in its multi-pronged offensive to deny Israeli charges of an Iranian hand behind the bombing attacks on its diplomats in New Delhi, Bangkok and the Georgian capital of Tbilisi this week, in which an Israeli woman was injured.

Tuesday, Feb. 14, the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier crossed the Strait of Hormuz into the Sea of Oman for the second time. Unlike the first, an Iranian flotilla shadowed its passage made up of an explosive speedboat, warships with missiles poised ready for launching, a spy plane, a drone and several assault helicopters. Tehran was flexing muscle in the face of US naval might.
The incident passed without a US response.

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Chris Answers Your Questions (Part 1)

Farage: Globalist Troika Driving Greece Towards Violent Revolution

SilverDoctors: Gold, Silver, & US Dollar Surging As Eurozone Dela...

SilverDoctors: Gold, Silver, & US Dollar Surging As Eurozone Dela...: Lloyd and Jamie must be sweating this morning. Eurozone officials are apparently attempting to cheat death, and get as close to the cliff of...

Silver's Rise Will Shock Market Participants This Year

By Robert Hallberg

Eric Sprott, the founder of Sprott assets management has repeatedly said that gold was the investment of the last decade but silver will be the investment of this decade, and by looking at some of the fundamentals he might just be right.

There is currently an equal amount of investment money going into silver as there is for gold, yet the gold/silver ratio is close to 50:1, which means that investors are buying 50 ounces of silver for every ounce of gold. Not only that, but there is nowhere close to as much silver available for investment as there is for gold.

The chart below shows the gold/silver ratio for the last couple of years. This ratio is currently at 50:1 but the historical average over the past couple of hundred years have been around 16:1 which also represents the gold to silver concentration available in the ground. With a 16:1 ratio, silver would be priced over $100 in today's market, yet there are good reasons to believe that gold is going much higher. With such a strong demand for physical silver it is seems likely that we will once again see a 16:1 ratio, perhaps towards the end of this bull market.

What would happen if the Federal Reserve was shut down permanently? That is a question that CNBC asked recently, but unfortunately most Americans don't really think about the Fed much. Most Americans are content with believing that the Federal Reserve is just another stuffy government agency that sets our interest rates and that is watching out for the best interests of the American people. But that is not the case at all. The truth is that the Federal Reserve is a private banking cartel that has been designed to systematically destroy the value of our currency, drain the wealth of the American public and enslave the federal government to perpetually expanding debt. During this election year, the economy is the number one issue that voters are concerned about. But instead of endlessly blaming both political parties, the truth is that most of the blame should be placed at the feet of the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve has more power over the performance of the U.S. economy than anyone else does. The Federal Reserve controls the money supply, the Federal Reserve sets the interest rates and the Federal Reserve hands out bailouts to the big banks that absolutely dwarf anything that Congress ever did. If the American people are ever going to learn what is really going on with our economy, then it is absolutely imperative that they get educated about the Federal Reserve.
The following are 10 things that every American should know about the Federal Reserve....

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Japan begins Hyper-Printing/Greek GDP falters/European meeting cancelled tomorrow/Moody's threaten UK with downgrade

Harvey Organ's - The Daily Gold and Silver Report

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen:

Gold closed down by $6.10 to $1715.90 while silver, the object of interest to our bankers, fell by 38 cents
to $33.32. Yesterday we had the silver and gold equity shares weak together with a negative lease on silver.
These two red flags signaled to all the bankers and to the HFT traders that a raid was on and they did not disappoint. However our bankers were thrown a curve ball as late in the day, the big meeting scheduled for tomorrow was called off. We will go into this in the body of my commentary.

Let us head over to the comex and assess trading:

The total gold comex OI fell by 1775 contracts from 428,559 to 426,784. Gold had a somewhat good day yesterday so we saw a tiny bit of bank liquidation. The front delivery month of February saw its OI fall from 538 to 493 contracts for a loss of 45 contracts. We had 27 delivery notices yesterday so we lost 18 contracts to cash settlements. The next big delivery month is April and here the OI fell slightly from 232,524 to 231,263 contracts. The estimated volume today came in at 159,977 as the raid certainly saw an increase volume due to the copious supply of non backed paper and the influence of the HFT traders. The confirmed volume yesterday was very anemic at 113,529.

The total silver comex OI continues to play havoc to our bankers as the OI refuses to buckle. Today the OI registered a gain of 223 contracts from 105,969 to 106,192. The longs are in strong hands. The front option expiry month of February rose from 135 to 212 for a gain of 77 contracts. Generally when we see this, we get a big delivery notice filed and you will see below that we did receive such a notice. We are rapidly approaching first day notice for the March delivery contract (Feb 29.2012). The March OI fell marginally from 38,395 to 36,695 contracts. The March players moved into May. The estimated volume today registered 53,891 which is quite good. The confirmed volume yesterday was also quite good at 50,858.

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Keiser Report - Episode 249

In this episode, Max Keiser and co-host Stacy Herbert look at tear gas and deja vu for financial crimes and tombstone austerity. In the second half of the show, Max talks to James Howard Kunstler of Kunstler.com about the John Brown moment in America and the control fraud of media.

Intelligence experts: No proven links between Bangkok blasts and Indian, Georgian attacks

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report February 14, 2012, 11:21 PM (GMT+02:00)

Notwithstanding the loud and angry Israel official contentions that the three explosions in Bangkok Tuesday Feb. 13 were part of an Iranian global terror drive, senior Israeli intelligence sources told debkafile that no connection – other than circumstantial - had been uncovered as yet between that incident and the sticky-bomb attacks on Israeli official cars in New Delhi and the Georgian capital of Tbilisi 24 hours earlier.

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The Rise of Extreme Nationalism in Europe and East vs West

SilverDoctors: Massive inventory volatility returned to COMEX sil...

SilverDoctors: Massive inventory volatility returned to COMEX sil...: Massive inventory volatility returned to COMEX silver warehouses Monday after last Friday's unusually quiet trading day, with 2 separate 600...

SilverDoctors: Cost of Iraq & Afghanistan Wars: The Infographic

SilverDoctors: Cost of Iraq & Afghanistan Wars: The Infographic: Demon*Ocracy.info has developed a New Perspective on the Cost of War: the Infographic on the cost of the Iraq & Afghanistan wars to NATO, t...

Fitzwilson - The Entire Planet’s Financial System is at Stake

Barron - This is Financial Armaggedon, Lehman x 1,000

Silver Update 2/14/12 Success Versus Failure

14 February 2012

The largest national holders of gold have retained their reserves, but should they sell?

LONDON (Commodity Online): The vast array of macro insecurities has provided a fertile backdrop for gold, particularly when concerns escalated over the US debt ceiling last year and the Fed pushed out the guidance for the first interest rate hike this year. However, broad risk reduction and the need for liquidity have still been able to pressure prices lower. One underlying positive for the market has been the continued appetite for net buying from the official sector globally amid the sovereign debt issues, said Barclays Capital in a research note.

Indeed, on the demand side, the latest IMF statistics reveal a continuation of central bank net buying, with net purchases of just under 40 tonnes in December alone; and including Turkey’s new policy of accepting gold in its reserve requirements from commercial banks increases net reported inflows to 387 tonnes for the year, Barclays concluded.

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Japan Announces $130 Billion QE Program, One Percent Inflation Target; 4th Quarter GDP Unexpectedly Contracts 2.3%; Lawmakers Threaten to Take Over Monetary Policy

MISH'S
Global Economic
Trend Analysis

Japan's 4th Quarter GDP Unexpectedly Contracts at 2.3% Annualized Rate

The Financial Times reports Japan’s GDP shrinks in fourth quarter
February 13, 2012

Japan’s economy shrank for the third time in four quarters between October and December, after floods in Thailand damaged production, and a strong yen and subdued overseas demand hurt exports.

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What Lies Ahead for Gold & Silver?

What lies ahead for gold and silver? After gold pierces strong resistance at $1,750, the next stop according to technical analysis is $1,807 followed by $1,850 and then the all-time high reached last spring at $1,923. When $1,923 is left behind, gold should move into the $2,250 to $2,400 range (by the end of the year, or soon thereafter) and then it will have to deal with a correction that should send it back near $1,900 and will scare many people to the sidelines.

Silver is in a tight trading range bracketed by a tight trading range of $30.48 and $34.48. Once this range is overcome, the next stop will quickly be $36 to $38 or higher. It’s been a while since we’ve seen $38 silver. I remember it well as I sold some of my silver at $38 early last summer to fund the condo purchase in Miami.

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Jim Sinclair - CB’s Trying to Keep Gold from Rising Violently

G. Edward Griffin, "The Federal Reserve is a Private Banking Cartel"

Greece Bailout Yes or No?/the USA 2013 Budget/Possible Raid tomorrow/ Moody's downgrade

Monday, February 13, 2012

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen:

Gold rose by $1.00 to $1723.00 at comex closing time. Silver rose 10 cents to $33.70. Initially
gold and silver rose, however the bankers do not want our precious metals rising in these precarious times so they provided a brick wall with more non backed paper gold and silver selling. It seems that 34.00 dollar per oz is the barrier for silver. Anything over $1750 for gold will bring on much bank selling.

Let us head over to the comex and assess trading today. The total gold comex OI (open interest) fell by
2517 contracts to 428,559 from 431,076 contracts. The huge raid on Friday, caused minor liquidation of some longs in the gold complex. The front delivery month of February saw its OI fall by 248 contracts to 538. We had 229 delivery notices filed on Friday so we lost 19 contracts to cash settlements as Blythe Masters offered copious fiat money to some of our longs instead of letting them stand for actual metal. The next big delivery month is April and here the OI fell by 3104 contracts from 235,628 to 232,524. The estimated volume today at the comex must surely bother our CME folk. It registered a measly 102,890 contracts. The confirmed volume on Friday, the day of the big raid saw its volume come in at 191,182 contracts. To me it looks like many have abandoned the comex to seek their physical elsewhere. They know the game is crooked and the risk of another MFGlobal must weigh on investors. This is the reason for the lowering of the margin requirements in all commodities to entice players to return, but it is a little too late.

The activity in the silver complex is something to be beholden. The total silver complex open interest, after 3 raids, shook our bankers up again today. The OI rests tonight at 105,969 rising by 603 contracts from Friday's level of 105,366. Please remember that all OI numbers are one day back, i.e. we are looking at official OI as of Friday night with Monday's figures. No wonder the bankers threw a tantrum and they decided that another mini raid was necessary today, to scare some of the new silver longs to pitch their long contracts. The front options expiry month of February mysteriously saw its OI rise from 64 to 135 contracts for a gain of 71 contracts despite zero deliveries on Friday. What is even more puzzling is the fact that we got zero delivery notices again today. Generally when we get a rise in OI during an options expiry month, the bankers raid the comex for some physical and send the metal to needy destinations. Something is happening with silver as the world tries to obtain this worthwhile but fast depleting metal. The next delivery month is March and we are a little over 2 weeks to go before first day notice. The OI fell by only 1472 contracts from 39,867 to 38,395. The OI has been staying at these lofty levels and we have not witnessed much roll- over contracts into the May delivery month. The estimated volume at the silver comex today came in at a slightly lower pace of 40,200 contracts. The confirmed volume on Friday was a very healthy 58,209 contracts. Yet we saw nobody leave as the OI remains relatively constant!

Silver Update 2/13/12 Bogus Budgets

SilverDoctors: Moody's Expected to Downgrade Citi, JPM, BOA, Well...

SilverDoctors: Moody's Expected to Downgrade Citi, JPM, BOA, Well...: Moody's is reportedly on the verge of 2-3 NOTCH DOWNGRADES of all the too-big-to-fail US banks. Bank of America, JP Morgan, Citigroup, Mor...

SilverDoctors: Moody's Downgrades Spain, Portugal, Italy, Places ...

SilverDoctors: Moody's Downgrades Spain, Portugal, Italy, Places ...: So much for waiting till Friday night after the markets close to announce big downgrades. Moody's has just dropped the hammer on the Euroz...

SilverDoctors: COMEX Warehouse Silver Inventory Update 2/13/12

SilverDoctors: COMEX Warehouse Silver Inventory Update 2/13/12: Inventory movements were subdued Friday, as we have only 2 silver inventory movements to report with today's update, one of which involved ...

Richard Russell - A Bitter Pill to Swallow, Austerity or Inflation

13 February 2012

Turk - Gold Panic Buying & Pulling Banks Back from the Brink

SilverDoctors: Guest Post: Even the Inflation Adjusted Prices of ...

SilverDoctors: Guest Post: Even the Inflation Adjusted Prices of ...: AGXIIK on his war with Fidelity and why he is closing his account and converting to Phyzz. Even the Inflation Adjusted Prices of Monkeys i...

Mesicek - We are Nearing the End of the Consolidation Phase

Analysis of the Long-term Silver Chart

SilverDoctors: Iran False Flag Becomes a Possibility as US Vice A...

SilverDoctors: Iran False Flag Becomes a Possibility as US Vice A...: The alternative media has been swirling the past few weeks with speculation that the US military is planning a False Flag attack on the soon...

Andy Hoffman - The Gold Cartel Is About To Be Overrun

Italy and its Debt to GDP/Greece debt problems/USA Debt Problems/Gold and silver raid/

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Good morning Ladies and Gentlemen:

Somebody did hack into my computer. We are trying to remove the virus.

Before proceeding, we had two bank failures last night as they entered our banking morgue.

1. SCB Bank of Shelbyvile In.
2. Charter National Bank and Trust, Hoffman Estates, IL.

On Thursday we saw gold and silver equity shares languish throughout the day followed by the whacking of the metal in the access market...a sure sign of a major offensive shorting move by the bankers. They did not disappoint, much to the glee of the regulators who stand by collecting their salaries and doing absolutely nothing stopping this collusive and criminal action by the bankers as they supplied copious amounts of non backed paper driving the price of the precious metals lower on Friday. The price of gold finished the comex session at $1722.00 down 17 dollars. The price of silver held its ground falling only 28 cents to $33.60.

Let us head over to the comex and assess the damage.

The total comex gold OI fell by 1071 contracts with the final reading for Friday registering 431,076 contracts. The front delivery month of February saw its OI fall by 32 contracts from 818 to 786. We had only 10 deliveries on Thursday so we lost 22 contracts or 2200 oz of gold standing as Blythe did some cash settlements with these longs. The next big delivery month is April and here the OI fell slightly form 236,981 to 235,628. The estimated volume on Friday was bigger than normal coming in at 191,182 as our banking heroes supplied a great number of non backed paper and drove the metal price down. The confirmed volume on Thursday was also high at 172,861 as the raid commenced on Thursday afternoon in the access market.

The total silver comex OI refused to budge. The final reading for Friday rose by 34 contracts to 105,366
as the commencement of the raid had little effect on our silver longs. The front options expiry month of February saw its OI mysteriously rise for the second straight day to 64 from 34 despite zero delivery notices again. Again this means that some entity needed silver badly and yet no physical silver could be found at the comex silver warehouses to supply these entities with the necessary metal. The next big delivery for silver is March and we are less than 3 weeks away from lst day notice. Here the OI fell slightly from 40,979 to 39,967 contracts as some of the March silver longs rolled to May. It seems that the remaining longs are resolute as they prepare to tackle our bankers as physical silver is depleting around the world. The estimated volume on the silver comex on Friday came in at 58,209 which is very high for silver lately as the bankers tried to shake some of the silver leaves from the silver tree (and probably failed). The confirmed volume on Thursday was also high at 55,297.

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Israeli Embassies Attacked In Three Countries, Netanyahu Blames Iran

Mamta Badkar | 2 hours ago |

Joji Philip Thomas

A bomb attack aimed at members of the Israeli embassy has injured four people in New Delhi, India, according to NDTV.

Israeli officials have said there was another attempt on a diplomat's car in Tbilisi, Georgia, but the device did not go off. A Georgian worker at the Israeli embassy in Tbilisi said he heard strange noises in his car and alerted the police, according to Haaretz.

Security officials found the explosive device underneath the car and prevented the attack. Israeli diplomats were also reportedly targeted in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

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The Federal Reserve, Rothschild, and Vatican Banking Cartels

Warren Buffett Trashes Gold, But What About Silver?

Eric McWhinnie

February 10, 2012 - 1:29pm

“Gold gets dug out of the ground, then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head.”-Warren Buffett
In a recent Fortune article, Warren Buffett provided a glimpse into his upcoming annual shareholder letter. Buffett used this opportunity to once again remind everyone how much he dislikes gold. He cites gold’s limited industrial demand and places the precious metal in a category of assets that “will remain lifeless forever.” However, there are two precious metals that are considered to be monetary safe-havens. Sometimes referred to as gold’s little brother, silver has also acted as a hedge against uncertainty and fiat currencies. Furthermore, its industrial use is far from being lifeless.
Buffett paints another analogy of the world’s gold stock as a useless cube that would fit within a baseball infield. At $1,750 per ounce, this pile of gold would be worth $9.6 trillion. He then visualizes another pile where as an equal amount, you could buy all U.S. cropland, 16 Exxon Mobils and still have $1 trillion left over for “walking-around money.” He wonders what investor with $9.6 trillion would select the gold pile over the latter. While Buffett’s thinking about gold is somewhat understandable, he continues to omit silver from the conversation. Maybe Buffett is still sour from his past venture into the most conductive metal known to man?
Beginning in 1997, the legendary value investor reportedly purchased a whopping 130 million ounces of silver between approximately $4.50 and $6 per ounce. According to Silver Monthly, from 1997 to 2006, Buffett’s investment fund-Berkshire Hathaway-accumulated over 37 percent of the world’s known silver supply. At Berkshire’s annual shareholder meeting, Buffett was asked about the fund’s silver investment. He said, “We had a lot of silver once, but we don’t have it now, and we didn’t make much on our prior holdings. I bought early and sold early.” Although silver trades near $30 an ounce today, Buffett sold his position near $7.50 an ounce. There is heavy speculation as to why Buffett sold his position, but the underlying reasons for holding silver have not changed. In fact, the reasons for building a position in silver continues to grow.

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Total Chaos; Riots Rage; Athens Resembles War Zone

MISH'S
Global Economic
Trend Analysis

Coverage of the chaos in Greece is now everywhere I look. Here is a sampling of stories:

The Guardian
Greek protesters fight with police as parliament agrees cuts deal

As more than 40 buildings went up in flames, including two historic cinemas and several banks, Athens city centre was left resembling a war zone with cafes and shops smashed and looted as MPs backed the austerity measures by 199 votes to 74 in the single most important ballot in modern Greek history.

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SilverDoctors: Asia Buying Gold On Dips - “Empires May Fall, Curr...

SilverDoctors: Asia Buying Gold On Dips - “Empires May Fall, Curr...: Gold opened in Asia nearly $13 higher at $1,734.90/oz (after closing at $1,719.60 on Friday) prior to giving up those gains and trading bac...

SilverDoctors: Greece Agrees to New Bailout Terms & Austerity Mea...

SilverDoctors: Greece Agrees to New Bailout Terms & Austerity Mea...: The Greek parliament tonight voted to pass the new austerity measures to receive an additional €210 billion , even while Greek citizens li...

SilverDoctors: Jim Sinclair: Dollar Hyperinflation/ Full Gold Val...

SilverDoctors: Jim Sinclair: Dollar Hyperinflation/ Full Gold Val...: Jim Sinclair has just sent the following warning to email subscribers, and for the first time, has put a timeline on hyperinflation of the U...

Silver Update 2/11/12 Socialism Fails

ECB Cuts Reserve Requirements in Half--to 1% Fractional Reserve Requirement!

Pento - Looming Debt Market Collapse to Destroy the Dollar

11 February 2012

Silver Forecast: Silver Premium Update

February 10, 2012

Silver Forecast: Is Silver Outperforming The Gold Fractal?
Below, is an extract of my Silver Premium Update for 25 January 2012:
Since my last silver articles (here and here), the silver chart has been following the patterns, I have been tracking, quite nicely. Below is an updated version of the gold vs. silver fractal:

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SilverDoctors: Short Term Silver Lease Rates Go Negative

SilverDoctors: Short Term Silver Lease Rates Go Negative: Silver's lease rates are again plunging, as the 1 month and 2 month rates have suddenly gone NEGATIVE! The 1 month silver lease rate has p...

SilverDoctors: Commercials Increase Net Silver Shorts 71 Million ...

SilverDoctors: Commercials Increase Net Silver Shorts 71 Million ...: So much for the theory that JPM was finished manipulating silver, and was attempting to rid itself from its remaining short silver position....

John Williams - The US Edges Closer to Collapse

Celente - Gold, Silver, War, Systemic Collapse & Social Unrest

10 February 2012

Rant Topic: The Precious Metals “Anti-Bubble”

As for silver, not only is production inexorably declining, but in addition to its long-standing usage as MONEY, silver is the second most utilized commodity on Earth, trailing only crude oil. Silver is indispensible to countless industrial processes due to unique properties such as strength, malleability, and ductility, and is rapidly emerging as a key component to the inelastic medical industry. Thus, unlike gold, silver is consumed.

Consequently, less than a billion ounces of above-ground silver remain on Earth, worth less than what the Federal Reserve prints every few hours. The U.S. Geologic Service (USGS) forecasts silver to be the first extinct element due to its gaping supply/demand gap, but do not account for monetary demand, which in my view will ultimately dwarf industrial demand by a factor of 1,000 or more. As for attempting to calculate silver’s “monetary value,” simply utilize the money supply metrics above and take your best guess.

At a bare minimum, I expect gold to reach $15,000-$20,000/ounce, and the gold/silver ratio to fall to between 5:1 and 15:1 (yielding a silver price projection of $1,000-$4,000/oz), in TODAY’S (non-hyper-inflated) dollars, pounds, Euros, Yen, and Yuan, of course.

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Greece/Iran and Indian Rice/Banks get big break with a $26 billion foreclosure settlement

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen:

Gold closed higher by $9.70 to $1739.00. Silver also rebounded nicely rising by 21 cents to $33.88.
Gold jumped immediately at comex opening and remained positive until London was put to bed and that is when the crooked bankers sold their paper metals to drive the price down.

Let us head over to the comex and assess trading today.
The total gold comex OI fell by 3,914 contracts as the raid had a little effect forcing some of the weaker longs to pitch their contracts. The front delivery month of February saw its OI rise by 4 contracts despite 35 delivery notices yesterday. We thus gained 39 notices or 3900 additional gold ounces standing in this delivery month. The next big delivery month is April and it is here that some the biggest contraction from 240,326 contracts to 236,981 for a loss of 3345. The estimated volume today was quiet at 147,155. The confirmed volume yesterday, the day of the raid came in at 162,522 as the bankers supplied all of their non backed gold paper fire power.

The total silver comex OI fell slightly by 676 contracts from 106,008 to 105,332 as raids seem to have no effect on our silver leaves as they refuse to fall from the tree. The front options expiry month of February saw its OI fall by 1 contract despite 41 delivery notices yesterday. We thus gained another 40 contracts or an additional 200,000 oz of silver. We are now 20 days away from first day notice for the March contract.
Here the OI fell from 43,383 to 40,979 which is normal as we witness some rollovers into May. The estimated volume today came in at 46,867 which is becoming the new norm. The confirmed volume yesterday, the day of the raid came in at 69,549. The bankers are throwing a temper tantrum that they cannot force the liquidation of silver longs.

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Robert Prechter on how Social Mood Drives Markets, Movies and Miniskirts

China's Rebalancing Should Be Good for Gold Demand

By: Ben Traynor | Thu, Feb 9, 2012

The next stage of China's development could give gold buyers a boost...
There is an old saying: "Nobody rings a bell at the top or bottom of a market."
Having said that, anyone reading about the stampede for gold during last month's Chinese New Year celebrations might have heard a faint ringing in their ears.
Here are a few quotations from various press sources:

"Some customers just walk in and buy a bunch of 100g gold bars all at once...Companies come in too to buy gold bars for presents." -branch manager, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.
"Some companies are giving out gold instead of cash to their employees" -Jia Zhihong, jeweler, Wuhan.
"With customers crowding and rushing in, we did not even have time to eat and drink." - gold counter sales clerk.
"People seem crazy about gold, snatching it up more like a cheap cabbage than such a precious metal...You have to quickly decide whether to make a purchase, or it will be taken away by others." - Beijing shopper
"Think of it like investing in the stock market...Gold maintains its value much better than stocks." - sales clerk, China Gold store.

The classic signs of an investment mania are there. Mass participation, frenzied buying, an established narrative that something is a 'sure thing'. But though this may look like the-mania-before-the-crash, that doesn't mean it is.

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BrotherJohnF Is All About Freedom And Silver--02-09-2012

"Brother John F of BrotherJohnF.com is an amazingly popular blogger who's site regularly attracts many thousands of visitors. Through his YouTube Channel and his site, he's become a go to source of information about what's really going on in the economy. And we both agree, it ain't pretty. Declining employment rates, declining standards of living, and political instability are all indications of where the state of our nation and our economic prospects are headed.

However, John believes that you can avoid much of the economic deluge that is currently hitting our shores by the judicious purchase of silver. While the Financial Survival Network sometimes may appear to be a gigantic echo chamber, it is virtually impossible to get opposing viewpoints to go on the record. Perhaps they know something and don't want to leave a record behind. So folks like Brother John are left to spread the word and help us prepare."

ORIGINAL SOURCE

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There Will Be No End to Quantitative Easing

By Detlev Schlichter Feb 9th, 2012

The Bank of England is expected today to announce another round of debt monetization, called “quantitative easing”. A majority of economists polled by Dow Jones Newswire earlier this week expected the central bank’s policy committee to agree “to £50 billion ($79 billion) of additional bond purchases using freshly created money to underpin demand and ensure its 2% inflation target is met. Some expect it to go for £75 billion.”

Official inflation is over 4 percent in the UK, so how printing more money is going to help meet a 2 percent inflation target is a bit difficult to grasp, but let us not quibble over such details. What counts is that the Bank of England is the undisputed champ of QE. After the next round of money printing, the BoE will have created new money to the tune of 20 percent of GDP, and will fund more than a quarter of all outstanding government debt via the printing press.

£275 billion of QE so far have not solved the crisis — the economy last year grew by less than 1 percent — but have lifted inflation and thus squeezed real incomes. At the same time, this policy has kept the government’s borrowing costs low and the banks from shrinking and in certain cases from collapsing. As with any policy of monetary debasement, the direct beneficiaries are the state and the banks.

This has tradition behind it. The Bank of England was founded in 1694 for the specific purpose of financing the Crown, which at the time was in low standing with its creditors. From its inception the Bank of England enjoyed numerous legal privileges that cemented its dominant position in the nascent but growing British banking system. Among them was the privilege to issue money against obligations of the Crown — a form of early ‘debt monetization’. Of course, the gold standard was a hindrance to unlimited money creation, so whenever the state needed more funds, usually at times of war, the Bank of England was conveniently absolved of any of its contractual agreements to redeem in specie, and kindly asked to fund the state through the creation of new money.

Gentlemen, start your printing presses!

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Richard Russell - Massive Money Going Into Tangibles

Ben Davies - Fair Value on Gold Today is Over $4,000

SilverDoctors: CME Slashes Initial & Maintenance Margins for Gold...

SilverDoctors: CME Slashes Initial & Maintenance Margins for Gold...: In an obvious sign that the CME is suffering from a massive exodus of investors in the wake of the CME refusing to make MF Global clients w...

Silver Update 2/09/12 Metals Margins

09 February 2012

Greece/S and P threatens USA with another downgrade/

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen:

As promised gold and silver languished today with gold falling by $17.10 to $1729.30
Silver fell by 50 cents to $33.67. It was quite clear that the bankers orchestrated their raid starting yesterday. The signal was sent yesterday morning as gold/silver equity shares were pummeled despite the rising price of the metal. The crooks covered many of their shorts today on the equities as the metal fell due their massive supply of non backed paper. These crooks have been performing this collusive trading for almost a decade now and it is getting monotonous. It works quite well when you have the regulators in your back pocket.

Let us head over to the comex and assess the damage today.

The total gold comex OI rose by a tiny 459 contracts despite the huge runnup in the gold price yesterday.
The new total OI rests tonight at 436,061. The front delivery month saw its OI fall from 1063 to 814 for a loss of 249 contracts. Yesterday we had 262 delivery notices filed so for the first time this month we did not have any cash settlements and we gained additional gold ounces standing. The next big delivery month is April and here the OI rose by a little over 2,000 contracts to 240,326. The estimated volume today was luke warm at 144,390. The confirmed volume yesterday was very good at 173,983.

The total silver comex OI continues to rise ever so slowly but firmly in strong hands. Today it rests at 106,008 a gain of 570 contracts from yesterday. The front options expiry month of February saw its OI fall from 53 to 35 for a loss of 18 contracts. However we had 41 delivery notices filed yesterday so we again gained 23 contracts or 115,000 additional silver oz standing. We are now less than 3 weeks away from first day notice in the March silver contract. Here the OI fell slightly down around 1400 contracts to rest tonight at 43,333. No doubt we lost some March players who rolled into the future month of May. The estimated volume at the silver comex today came in at 58,340 contracts. The confirmed volume yesterday registered 64,605 contracts.
Even though HFT players are huge in the silver comex, it looks like we have a few more players playing and quite possibly standing for delivery in the March contract.

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As US and Israel dicker over Iran strike, American airlifts strength to the Gulf

DEBKAfile Special Report February 9, 2012, 5:20 PM (GMT+02:00)

US Air Force airlift over Sinai to the Gulf

As the US and Israel carried on bickering over the right time to strike Iran's nuclear sites, their war preparations continued apace. debkafile's military sources report that flight after flight of US warplanes and transports were to be seen this week cutting eastward through the skies of Sinai on their way to Gulf destinations, presumably Saudi Arabia, at a frequency not seen in the Middle East for many years.
The three International Atomic Energy inspectors who spent the last three days of January in Tehran had asked to meet the hitherto invisible head of Iran's nuclear bomb program, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, 50, a general of the Revolutionary Guards. The Iranians pretended to be deaf. They also kept the inspectors away from any nuclear installations. A senior Obama administration official termed the visit "foot-dragging at best and a disaster at worst."
debkafile's intelligence and military sources note that without talking to Fakhrizadeh or any of the 600 nuclear engineers and scientists working under him, unless one of them defects, there is no way the West can determine what exactly is going on in Iran's nuclear program stands and which installations have been moved to underground facilities.

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Iran Using Gold, Oil to Pay for Grain

By Valerie Parent and Michael Hogan

February 9, 2012 11:30 AM EST

(REUTERS) -- Iran is seeking to close grain purchases using gold and oil as payment, and has paid in yen for a large volume of wheat in its first deal since western sanctions against Tehran started choking imports of food staples, European wheat exporters said.
Iran bought at least 200,000 tonnes of soft wheat on the world market last week for prompt delivery from private sellers - mostly of Australian origin - but some traders said the United States could possibly account for part of the volume.

New financial sanctions imposed since the beginning of this year to punish Tehran over its nuclear programme have ended up playing havoc with Iran's ability to buy imports and receive payment for key food items.

The sanctions have drastically cut its ability to obtain euro and dollar denominated financing, forcing Tehran to find alternative ways to pay for its imports.

Traders believed the Iranian government had used companies based in Switzerland capable of financing themselves in Asia, and used yen-based contracts to finance the 200,000-tonne deal.

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Ingredients for Inflation: Stirring the Pot

By Dock Treece

Before we begin, a quick note that this week’s article is largely a continuation of musings from last week, entitled Ingredients for Inflation. In that article – which was widely circulated around the internet – we wrote about the coming wave of inflation that will result when the velocity of money accelerates in the US and all the new money printed by the Federal Reserve begins to circulate.

As many are aware, and as we discussed last week, the Federal Reserve has greatly expanded its monetary base over the past several years – mostly in an effort to shore up this nation’s banking sector in response to the financial crisis sparked in 2008.

However, despite the rampant printing of growth – which usually leads to inflation – the impact has been relatively small to date because all this new money has failed to permeate our economy. New dollars haven’t been used to buy houses or TVs or gasoline; but has instead been sitting in the Fed’s digital vault, supporting banks’ weakened balance sheets.

In other words, velocity – or a lack thereof – has kept inflation from running rampant. To borrow a phrase from one of last week’s readers: “If it doesn’t circulate, it can’t inflate.”

Leeb - US Government Desperate & Scared Regarding Gold

Keiser Report - Episode 247

In this episode, Max Keiser and co-host Stacy Herbert discuss the latest discoveries of black holes in the financial universe and the populations growing permanently poorer as a result. In the second half of the show, Max talks to Dr. Yanis Varoufakis about financial horror, a currency from which you can’t escape and the Greek situation.

Jim Rickards: War with Iran and QE3 possibly by this Summer

Silver Update 2/08/12 Extend and Pretend

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Norcini - Continued Dollar Selling to Keep a Firm Bid for Gold

Hathaway - People Are Right to be Scared & Gold is a Necessity

08 February 2012

Silver Manipulation Quiz

Bix Weir

1) Which monetary metal is the MOST manipulated on a daily basis by the banking cabal?
a) Gold
b) Silver
c) Platinum
d) None of the above

2) The definition of the "US Dollar" as first defined in the Coinage Act of 1792 is equal to:
a) 1 oz of Silver based on the average weight of a worn Spanish Peso.
b) Three hundred and seventy-one grains and four sixteenth parts of a grain of pure, standard silver.
c) 1/20 oz of .999 fine $20 St. Gaudens Gold Coin
d) 23.22 grains (1.505 g) of gold

3) Why did Warren Buffett sell all of his physical silver holdings in the 1st quarter of 2006?
a) He thought silver was overvalued and wanted to lock in a profit
b) He did not think the future of silver was bright
c) He swapped it to buy gold
d) He handed it over to the banking cabal when they blackmailed him.

4) What is the real Silver to Gold ratio in above ground supplies?
a) 50-1 (50x more silver than gold)
b) 20-1 (20x more silver than gold)
c) 1-1 (same amount of silver as gold)
d) 1-5 (5x more gold than silver)

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It's 1980 Again

Mises Daily: Tuesday, February 07, 2012 by Doug French

Floyd Norris writes for the New York Times that it's 1980 all over again.
Discussion of gold has gone from nonexistent a decade ago to the question of whether its price is in bubble territory, and now a policy question in the Republican primary. Ron Paul has been stumping for a return to the gold standard for decades, and the populace has finally caught up.
The issue resonates with young people who worry about a dire future with a dollar crash and nationwide poverty. The gold issue is hot enough that Newt Gingrich has promised to appoint a gold commission, with The Case for Gold coauthor Lewis Lehrman and Jim Grant as cochairman.
When Ronald Reagan went through the gold commission charade in 1981 to satisfy a campaign promise of studying the gold standard question, Lehrman cast one of two dissenting votes on the commission that voted in favor of maintaining the fiat money status quo. The other "no" vote came from Ron Paul himself. As Murray Rothbard explained,

The gold standard was the easiest pledge to dispose of. President Reagan appointed an allegedly impartial gold commission to study the problem — a commission overwhelmingly packed with lifelong opponents of gold. The commission presented its predictable report, and gold was quickly interred.

The Fed's Quasi-Fiscal Policies

Mises Daily: Wednesday, February 08, 2012 by David Howden

The policies that the Fed embarked on in late 2007 are a sharp departure from the old way of performing monetary policy. In fact, it is difficult to state that the Fed is any longer in the business of traditional monetary policy — understood in the United States as aiming for low inflation and smoothed output volatility. A new breed of monetary policies better referred to as "quasi-fiscal" policies has become the norm.
The Fed's policies have a fiscal flair to them for two reasons.
First, no longer are output and inflation the primary concerns. The Fed has framed any reference to inflation over the past four years in the context of either:

the low levels of price inflation erasing inflationary fears from pursuing unorthodox monetary policies, or
the threat of deflation, thus creating the "need" for monetary expansion to ward off its ill effects.

Inflation has not been a direct concern in the sense that the Fed's role is to control it. Instead, it has been viewed as a constraint on Fed policies to pursue other ends.

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Why Is Global Shipping Slowing Down So Dramatically?

If the global economy is not heading for a recession, then why is global shipping slowing down so dramatically? Many economists believe that measures of global shipping such as the Baltic Dry Index are leading economic indicators. In other words, they change before the overall economic picture changes. For example, back in early 2008 the Baltic Dry Index began falling dramatically. There were those that warned that such a rapid decline in the Baltic Dry Index meant that a significant recession was coming, and it turned out that they were right. Well, the Baltic Dry Index is falling very rapidly once again. In fact, on February 3rd the Baltic Dry Index reached a low that had not been seen since August 1986. Some economists say that there are unique reasons for this (there are too many ships, etc.), but when you add this to all of the other indicators that Europe is heading into a recession, a very frightening picture emerges. We appear to be staring a global economic slowdown right in the face, and we all need to start getting prepared for that.
If you don't read about economics much, you might not know what the Baltic Dry Index actually is.
Investopedia defines the Baltic Dry Index this way....

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Buying Gold in Uncertain Times

Bill Bonner

Dow down slightly yesterday. Oil falling further below $100. And gold still going up.

What is most interesting is the movement in the price of gold. It seems to be heading up again – almost no matter what else is happening.

So, let’s look at what might be going on…

If investors sensed a recovery…they would expect banks to lend more freely…people to shop more freely…and prices to rise.

This would raise consumer prices; the price of gold should go up.

But if the market sees growth and inflation ahead, why is oil slipping? And why is the Baltic Dry Index – which measures shipping prices – at a 25-year low? And how come last month’s employment figures were disappointing? And why aren’t stock market prices going up?

Most important, if the economy is really recovering, why is the 10-year note yielding only 1.82%? And what about the long bond? Shouldn’t it be trading at a yield higher than 3%?

And how come house prices fell over the last year…and the last month?

And how come incomes are falling?

Or, to look at it from the opposite point of view, how is it possible for a real recovery to take root in the hard, barren soil of falling house prices and slipping consumer earnings?

But if the economy is not improving…then there should be no increase in inflation…and no pressure on the price of gold, right?

Maybe investors don’t anticipate a recovery at all. Maybe they’re buying gold because they see the economy getting worse, not better. We associate a rise in the price of gold with inflation. But gold is much more versatile than we think. It protects your wealth when paper money loses its value. It also protects your wealth when paper money gains in value. It protects you when you are right…and when you are wrong.

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France/Greek rescue Attempts/Bernanke speaks:Gold and Silver rises/Manufacturing Leaving Japan

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen:

The bankers decided in the wee hours of the morning that it was necessary to raid silver and gold However as soon as Bernanke spoke this morning, the metals skyrocketed when the world realized that we are going to have zero interest rates to infinity. Gold finished the comex session up 23.60 dollars to $1746.40 and silver rose by 45 cents to $34.17. Gold and silver equity shares languished with despair today as they refused to join into the fun. This is the bankers signal that another raid is imminent. Our crooks are at it again.

Let us head over to the comex and assess trading and amounts of precious metals standing.
The total gold open interest at the comex rose by 631 contracts despite a mini raid yesterday. Again this accomplished nothing as the bankers were hoping to shake some gold leaves from the tree. They will try again tomorrow as long as Bernanke will not open his mouth. The front delivery month of February saw its OI fall 20 contracts from 1083 to 1063. We had 3 delivery notices yesterday so we thus lost 17 contracts to cash settlements. If players have plucked 100% of the contract price it would be unheard of for them to roll. They would have done it 2 weeks earlier or so. For many years, almost 100% of the front month deliveries were done in the first 2 days. Now we are witnessing it takes the entire month to settle upon our longs. This is why I know that Blythe is in there offering cash settlements to roll to a future month instead of the longs taking physical from the comex. The next big delivery month is April and here the OI remained relatively constant at 238,227 dropping by about 600 contracts. The estimated volume at the gold comex came in at 160,390 contracts, which is quite low compared to last year. The confirmed volume yesterday was 144,803 which is also quite low.

The total silver comex OI rose by 898 contracts to 105,438 from 104,540. It is starting to break out of its narrow band width of OI trading. This, no doubt will be a concern to our bankers. They do not want to see enthusiasm building up in either of our two precious metals. The front options expiry month of February saw its OI fall from 81 to 53 for a loss of 28 contracts. We had 67 delivery notices so we thus gained 39 contracts of additional silver standing and thus lost nothing to cash settlements. I knew early this morning, that the bankers needed silver elsewhere as only 14 contracts were standing last night. They took whatever silver they had and sent it off to places that needed it like London England, the physical capital of the world.
Demand for both metals were huge over there. The demand is also huge here if you look at the sales by the mints in both Canada and the USA. In 3 weeks we will be coming up to first day notice for the March silver contract. With today's reading, the OI dropped only 249 contracts from 45,083 to 44,834 so we did not experience any rollovers today. Thus the volume is increasing in the silver comex and it may not be just the HFT traders. Someone may want to get a greater piece of the physical silver offered at any comex location possible.
The estimated volume today at the silver comex continues to rise coming in at 62,071. The confirmed volume yesterday was a touch lower at 49,044 contracts.

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First foreign troops in Syria back Homs rebels. Damascus and Moscow at odds

Syrian tank on fire in Homs

British and Qatari special operations units are operating with rebel forces under cover in the Syrian city of Homs just 162 kilometers from Damascus, according to debkafile’s exclusive military and intelligence sources. The foreign troops are not engaged in direct combat with the Syrian forces bombarding different parts of Syria's third largest city of 1.2 million. They are tactical advisers, manage rebel communications lines and relay their requests for arms, ammo, fighters and logistical aid to outside suppliers, mostly in Turkey.
This site is the first to report the presence of foreign military forces in any of the Syrian uprising's embattled areas.
Our sources report the two foreign contingencies have set up four centers of operation - in the northern Homs district of Khaldiya, Bab Amro in the east, and Bab Derib and Rastan in the north. Each district is home to about a quarter of a million people.

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Massive rise in China gold imports in 2011 - policy controlling the price?

Author: Lawrence Williams
Posted: Wednesday , 08 Feb 2012

China continues to see rising gold consumption with a virtual tripling of gold imports through Hong Kong in 2011, but demand in December appears to have stuttered ahead of the Lunar New Year.

CAPE TOWN -

Official statistics showed a huge rise in Chinese gold imports through Hong Kong in 2011, reaching just under 428 tonnes, an increase of around 260%, but the effects on the gold price were probably tempered by figures which showed that December imports by this route, ahead of the Chinese New Year, were substantially lower than a year earlier at 38.6 tonnes, a fall of over 60% year on year, despite the relatively weak gold price during that month.

The increase led to the usual speculation that perhaps the rise was in part due to off-the-record purchases for official reserves with the continuing theory that China government entities are buying on dips to exert a degree of control over the price as well as raise its reserves surreptitiously. This is done by putting the purchases into a 'holding pot' which means it does not actually appear in the country's official Central Bank's gold holding figures until it is deemed politically expedient to make such an announcement and transfer the gold to its official reserves.

With China's official gold output, the world's largest, announced at around 361 tonnes, but here again believed to be perhaps rather higher than this as reported figures are reckoned to only show a part of the overall picture (although a major sector of it) - see China's gold output and demand could be far greater than ‘official' data suggest.

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Iran, The Dollar And Financial Warfare

In March, 2009, I joined a group of sixty officials from the armed forces, intelligence community, U.S. Treasury, think tanks and Wall Street at a top-secret weapons laboratory near Washington, DC to conduct the first ever war game in which the weapons were not missiles and bombs, but stocks, bonds and currencies. The Pentagon wanted to understand how adversaries could inflict harm on the United States and expand their own power using financial weapons.
My mission was to play for the China team, although I had recruited allies on the Russian and Swiss teams also. Over two days of moves and counter-moves, the Chinese and Russians played a gambit in which a new gold-backed currency created by them would replace the dollar as the medium of exchange for Russian natural resources and Chinese manufactured goods. Many of the established academic economists in the war room were appalled at the audacity of the move to gold, and some ridiculed it openly. That was then.
As a global-macro analyst, I am frequently asked if war with Iran will come and, if so, when. My answer is that the war has already begun. It's not a shooting war - yet. What the U.S. and Israel are now waging with Iran is what experts call unrestricted warfare. This is warfare that consists of sabotage, assassination, special operations, psychological operations, attacks on critical infrastructure, cyber warfare and - the most recent addition to the arsenal - financial warfare.

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In The Bullring With Gold

After prices fell 10 percent in December, many investors wondered if the bull market in gold was running out of steam. That was before Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke swooped in with a "red cape" and fired the bulls back up. Since the Fed reassured the world that interest rates will remain at "exceptionally low levels" for another two years, gold has jumped more than three percent.
UBS described the situation simply, "if investors needed a (further) reason why they should be long gold now, they got it yesterday … a more accommodative policy is a very good foundation for gold to build on the next move higher."
To gold bugs, two more years of near-zero, short-term interest rates means negative real interest rates are here to stay, and this has historically been a strong driver for higher gold prices.
Bernanke and the Fed aren't the only central bankers in the fiscal and monetary bullring. Brazil has cut its benchmark interest rate a few times and China lowered its reserve rate for banks in December. According to ISI Group, 78 "easing moves" have been announced around the world in just the past five months as countries look to stimulate economic activity.
One of the main weapons central bankers have employed is money supply, which has created a ton of liquidity in the global system. Global money supply rose 8 percent year-over-year in December, or about $4 trillion, according to ISI. I mentioned a few weeks ago how China experienced a record increase in the three-month change in M-2 money supply following China's reserve rate cut.

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