Free Republic

With countless settlements documenting the rigging of every single asset class, it was only a matter of time before the regulators - some 10 years behind the curve as usual - finally cracked down on gold manipulation as well, even though as we have shown in the past, central banks in general and the Fed in particular are among the biggest gold manipulators. That said, we are confident by now nobody will be surprised that there was manipulation going on in the gold casino. In fact, ever since Germany's Bafin launched a probe into Deutsche Bank for gold and silver...

Move over, microchip. A random assembly of gold nanoparticles can perform calculations normally reserved for neatly arranged patterns of silicon. Traditional computers rely on ordered circuits that follow preprogrammed rules, but this strategy limits how efficient they can be. “The best microprocessors you can buy in a store now can do 1011 operations per second and use a few hundred watts,” says Wilfred van der Wiel of the University of Twente in the Netherlands. “The human brain can do orders of magnitude more and uses only 10 to 20 watts. That’s a huge gap.” To close that gap, researchers have...

It’s well-known that you have to make a declaration if you physically transport $10,000 or more in cash or monetary instruments in or out of the US, or almost any other country; governments collude on these things, often informally. Gold has always been in something of a twilight zone in that regard. It’s no longer officially considered money. So it’s usually regarded as just a commodity, like copper, lead, or zinc, for these purposes. The one-ounce Canadian Maple Leaf and US Eagle both say they’re worth $50 of currency. But I’ve recently had some disturbing experiences crossing borders with coins....

Over the past several years, incidents involving fake gold (usually in the form of gold-plated tungsten) have emerged every so often, usually involving Manhattan's jewerly district, some of Europe's bigger gold foundries, or the occasional billion dealer. But never was fake gold actually discovered in the form monetary gold, held by a bank as reserve capital and designed to fool bank regulators of a bank's true financial state. This changed on Friday when Russia's "Admiralty" Bank, which had its banking license revoked last week by Russia's central bank, was reportedly using gold-plated metal as part of its "gold reserves." According...

Tyler Durden 09/09/2015 Just over one month ago, when looking at the latest changes in registered gold held at the Comex ,we were stunned not only by the collapse in this series to a record low of just over 350k ounces or barely over 10 tons, but also by the surge in "gold coverage", or the amount of paper gold claims on physical gold, which exploded to a record high 124 per ounce. This is what we said on August 3: While on its own, gold open interest - which merely represents the total potential claims on gold if exercised...

A culture official in Poland said radar imagery appears to confirm a story by two men who said they know the location of a mysterious Nazi train that may contain gold or other treasures. Deputy Culture Minister Piotr Zuchowski said Friday he's "more than 99 percent sure that the train is there," but couldn't confirm what was inside the train. ...... ........ The mystery train is believed to be in an abandoned tunnel near Ksiaz Castle, in southwestern Poland. Local legend says the train contains gold, precious stones, art and weapons. The two men who brought the train to the...

The mystery surrounding a legendary Nazi gold train buried in Poland took a new twist after the suspected location of the armoured train and its cargo went up in flames. The embankment by the Wroclaw-Walbrzych main line considered to be the favourite for the train’s location in the town of Walbrzych, southern Poland, was burnt along with 219 square yards of forest and bush on it.

Two people in Poland say they have found a Nazi German train cloaked in mystery since it was rumoured to have gone missing near the end of World War Two while carrying away gems and guns ahead of advancing Soviet Red Army forces. Local authorities in Poland’s southwestern district of Walbrzych said they had been contacted by a law firm representing a Pole and a German who said they had located the train and were seeking 10 percent of the value of the findings. “Lawyers, the army, the police and the fire brigade are dealing with this,” Marika Tokarska, an...

Tyler Durden 08/27/2015 Shortly before 10amET, amid USD strength, futures prices for Copper, Crude, and Silver suddenly started spiking higher...(snip)

'Significant find' confirmed in Poland as speculation builds it could be lost Nazi train carrying gold - follow latest updates. SNIP--- 23.02 At a press conference Zygmunt Nowaczyk, deputy mayor of Walbrzych, said “the discovery was in the town’s district”. The Polish state treasure and culture ministry have been informed in case the find contained anything of value, Matthew Day reports. SNIP-- All we know for sure so far from today's developments is a press officer in the Polish town confirming a military train has been found and the Walbrzych's deputy mayor saying there was "formal information".

Treasure hunters have searched for it since the end of World War II, but it may have never existed in the first placeTw wo treasure hunters are claiming they have discovered a train full of Nazi gold and jewels hidden under a mountain in Poland. As much as it sounds like a movie plot, the lost train is a bit of a local legend around the city of Wroclaw. The story goes that towards the end of World War II, as the Soviet army marched on eastern Germany, a Nazi train loaded with gold, valuable art and jewels disappeared into...

Asian equities tumbled, the U.S. dollar retreated and industrial commodities from copper to oil slid to their weakest since 2009. "Gold is rising on market fears," said Howie Lee, analyst at Phillip Futures in Singapore. Lee said gold looks on track to rally to $1,200 an ounce, a level last seen in June. Gold rose to as much as $1,168.40 on Friday, its highest since July 7. It gained more than 4 percent last week, the most since mid-January. Fears of a China-led global economic slowdown drove Wall Street to its steepest one-day drop in nearly four years on Friday,...

MIAMI: Treasure hunters off Florida have found $4.5 million in gold coins from a Spanish ship that sunk during a hurricane in the 18th century , the sal vage company said on Wednesday. The ship 'Ten Galleons' traveling from Havana to Spain... "Over 350 gold coins, including 9 Royals were recovered on July 30 & 31 on the actual 300th anniversary of the wreck,"

A massive explosion at a warehouse in the northern Chinese port city of Tianjin killed seven people and sent a fireball ripping through the sky, state media reported Thursday. The blast, which could be felt kilometres (miles) away, was triggered when a shipment of explosives detonated in the container where it was being stored, according to the official Xinhua news agency.

Did you see what just happened? The devaluation of the yuan by China triggered the largest one day drop for that currency in the modern era. This caused other global currencies to crash relative to the U.S. dollar, the price of oil hit a six year low, and stock markets all over the world were rattled. The Dow fell 212 points on Tuesday, and Apple stock plummeted another 5 percent. As we hurtle toward the absolutely critical months of September and October, the unraveling of the global financial system is beginning to accelerate. At this point, it is not...

One month ago, when everyone suspected that the PBOC's dramatic, 57% jump in gold holdings after a 6 year silence, to a "record" 1658 tons would be a "one-and-done" event, meant to facilitate China's admission into the SDR, we disagreed. This is what we said: ... now that the seal has been finally broken after so many years, and since today's update indicates that Chinese gold numbers are clearly goal-seeked with a specific policy purpose - to boost confidence - we await for the PBOC to start leaking incremental gold holding data every month (and especially in months when...

Members of Sierra Vista’s Choson Martial Arts took part in the recent 4th Biennial Worldwide Tang Soo Do Family World Championships in Las Vegas. The event brought Tang Soo Do practitioners from 12 different countries: Aruba, Belgium, Chile, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Malaysia, Netherlands, Poland, Republic of South Africa, Scotland and the USA. More than 600 competitors and masters participated in the world-class tournament. Team Choson, representing the US team, and brought home one gold medal, one silver and one bronze. This was their first ever competition at the international level, and medals were awarded in the forms and sparring...

Akin Oyedele August 10, 2015The pain is far from over for commodity prices. Gold, crude oil, copper, and aluminum have all had ugly plunges this year, especially in July. And as far as analysts at Macquarie see it, it's only going to get worse.In a note to clients on Monday, the firm writes that the plunge in prices is not just a story of oversupply in commodities but also an undersupply of the dollar. And so as dollars become more scarce, the dollar gets more expensive, meaning that on a gross basis, fewer dollars buy more commodities, making it hard...

Dominic Frisby, MoneyWeek August 7, 2015 How much gold does China have? The question won’t go away, because the answer is vital. The answer could define, in no uncertain terms, how important or irrelevant gold is in the modern world. Is gold obsolete, or does it still have a significant role to play?Today we consider that question, and look once again at China’s gold... Gold – useless shiny pet rock or the very essence of money? Some people argue that gold is just an inert, useless metal, good for little more than jewellery. Its role in finance is as obsolete...

Opinion: Why China probably has a lot more gold than it admits By David Marsh Published: July 20, 2015 11:48 a.m. ET Transparency on holdings linked to review by the IMF on joining the special drawing right China has lifted a veil over its gold holdings and confirmed its interest in providing more up-to-date reserves data by announcing a near 60% jump in its official bullion assets since 2009. /snip The PBoC said its gold reserves were 1,658 tons against 1,054 tons in April 2009, which was the last time China declared its gold holdings. In 2009 the reserves total...