Free Republic

"The transcending value seen in the Dollar has lost its foundation..." A SHORT SERIES of secret memos, published and dissected at ZeroHedge, provide the "smoking gun" of gold-market manipulation. Apparently. And given this little slew of dusty archive-digging - throwing up three documents from 1968 to 1975, each one declassified within thirty years - then "If over 40 years ago the Fed and the members of the gold 'Pool' were openly intervening in the gold market, one can only imagine what the situation is now..." Go on, just imagine. Because imagination is what you'll need if you're going to nail...

I can't think of a better way to describe the last 2 years than as times of great uncertainty. Not only did we have two near catastrophic banking failures worldwide, but we also have the ever present Iran Israel nuclear contention. The USD held reasonably well during this period, although it's weaker. In any case, gold has held up amazingly well over the period of the last two years too, in fact is at highs. What else is except US T bonds? Pimco's Bill Gross just said the longer term of the US T yield curve is flattening and that...

Sprinkled among all the official talk about efforts to end the current recession, you'll hear assurances, notably from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, that when the economy does revive, it won't be allowed to blast off into runaway inflation. The Fed, we're being promised, will prevent such a launch by reabsorbing the hundreds of billions of dollars of excess liquidity it recently created to halt the credit crisis. Delivering on those assurances won't be easy. There is no reliable, real-time guide to how much cash the economy needs, so deciding when to drain excess reserves from the banking system (by...

As an almost revered subject, the question of whether central banks across the world will be buyers or sellers of gold is one usually left until after the event. Central Banks themselves are usually very unhappy to talk about their gold policy. When they do it is a once-in-several-years-event. As a result we watch the behavior patterns of the last decade to see what lies ahead. We have been waiting so long for clarity on the policy the I.M.F. are to adopt with the sale of their 403.63 tonnes of gold. The IMF Executive Board has now approved the sale...

Probably the biggest "X-factor" in the ongoing effort at reviving the global economy is China. China is seen by many as the world's emerging industrial powerhouse and its relationship with the United States is considered to be crucial for its own development, as well as for the strength of the world economy. With the U.S. in the role as the world's premier consumer and China considered to be the major industrial player, all eyes are on the respective economies of these two great nations. There are two dominant views regarding China's economic outlook and its prospects for total recovery from...

"A mere $400bn went missing in the UK debt-savings boom of 2000-2008. Not to worry..." SEEMS WE'RE NOT the only ones trying to figure out this week where the last decade's record consumer borrowing went. "Where did all the debt go?" asked Bank of England economist Spencer Dale in a speech this Thursday in Exeter. Sadly for US and British households, however, let alone savers and investors, he had fewer answers than even we do here at BullionVault. "Household debt as a proportion of income increased from 100% to 165% in the 10 years to 2007," Dale noted of the...

As the U.S. strategic petroleum reserve (SPR) approaches capacity (721.5 million barrels filled out of a total possible 727 million, and will be filled by January 2010), the federal government will fade out of the oil-buying business. Some bearish traders believe that this factor can weigh in on prices, since most petroleum stocks in the United States are government-held rather than private. Bullish traders have also used the filling of the Chinese SPR as a reason that oil should go much higher. Planned government buying or selling of crude oil for SPRs actually have very little impact in the overall...

Bump and grind economic numbers might suggest that the Western economies, including the U.S., have seen the worst of the economic slide. Despite that appearance of an economic bottom, that the economic policies of the Obama Regime are a failure, and will continue to be a failure, is now increasingly obvious. When nations like China and India are demonstrating superior economic performance perhaps the time has come to either, one, jettison the bumbling economic policies of the Obama Regime, or, two, look elsewhere for opportunities. Western economies made two attempts at economic witchcraft, the internet/technology stock bubble and then the...

The vast over-issuance of the U.S. $ internationally, has debauched its international value. In time this will lead to hugely falling buying power and translate into very high prices for the resources of the world. Few believe the plans put forward to reduce quantitative easing will work as expected, as this will simply return the world to recession or worse still, depression. Such liquidity reductions can only take place in a climate where confidence can be maintained as money tightening kicks in. This is not just inside the States but globally. So 'confidence' in the $ and its future value...

Two charts and three measures of gold's "real" price today... GOLD'S CURRENT price-tag of $1,000 an ounce suggests big doubts over the US Dollar, its domestic economy, and its status as the world's No.1 reserve currency. Or so we guess after 10 years of watching it quadruple from two-decade lows. But gold investors (old, new and everywhere) should note that this decade's bull market in bullion is about much more than the greenback. Here are three ways of judging what you might call the "real price of gold" instead. #1. The Global Gold Index Gold has risen against all world...

One-thousand Federal Reserve Notes per troy ounce! This past week gold edged over $1000 to close at its highest levels ever witnessed. This much-maligned investment has nearly quadrupled since its secular bull's humble beginnings in April 2001, a fantastic 297% gain compared to the S&P 500's pathetic 7% loss over this 8+ year span. With gold being the best-performing major asset of this decade, and now surpassing the once-unthinkable $1000 mark, many investors are growing wary of its future prospects. Is gold too high today? Are $1000+ levels unsustainable? Is gold's secular bull nearing its end after this metal's epic...

Tim Geithner, the Goldman Sachs Secretary of the Treasury, has gone on record as saying that the government will withdraw its $3 trillion backstop guarantee from the money market fund industry, on schedule, today, September 18th. While I am for any reduction in the government's role in the economy, this decision is pretty interesting. Why would they do it now, when even a cursory examination of the real economy shows that things are shaky and rocking the boat on investor confidence seems a bit of a gamble? I will try to answer that question, but only after stepping back to...

"Whether through exuberant hedgies or anxious private investors, gold just keeps pushing higher..." SO SPECULATIVE BETTING on gold going higher now equals a record-busting 752-tonne position in Comex futures and options, yet this is not a bubble according to Michael Pento of Deltaga. Let's say otherwise. Let's say that gold prices, surging by almost $100-per-ounce in barely a month, are very much in a bubble...blown up by near-zero interest rates worldwide and a sharply negative cost of borrowing after inflation. Were that the case, the question before potential and existing investors would be simple: Is this "irrational exuberance" or a...

The latest story to hit the headlines in this regard is the matter of U.B.S. I’m sure all of you have read the details there, so I won’t describe the entire story. The pertinent point is that the U.S. Taxman asked for confirmation of the names of 52,000 account holders and has received 4,500 only. Why? The Swiss government relies on its banking services for a considerable percentage of the nation’s income. For three hundred years they have provided a home for foreign owned assets and monies. The have, still firmly in place, Bank Secrecy Laws that ensure that nobody...

As of a few moments ago Bloomberg broke a story suggesting that the US government would be selling off its stake in Citigroup stock. As much as I'm for the US Government and Taxpayer getting away from any of our illegitimate TARP children, Bloomberg's story is just off. here is no such thing as a profit on the sale of this stock when, as a nation, we are into Citi Bank for much more than what was placed into Citi Stock. Specifically, from Bloomberg's article and confirmed via Pro Publica there will be at least $25 billion in warrants left...

Last week when gold started flirting with $1000, the gold stocks caught a serious bid. On an impressive 3.8% 2-day gold rally, the flagship HUI unhedged gold-stock index rocketed 15.7% higher! And the volume in this index's elite gold stocks was staggering those 2 days, 2.8x the 3-month average. This blisteringly-fast surge easily drove the HUI up to new 2009 highs, eclipsing the 398 witnessed in early June. To see any stock index blast nearly 16% higher in a couple days is exceedingly rare, so naturally all this excitement captivated traders. But it also led to growing fears that this...

Talk is now circulating in financial quarters of a new "mini-bubble" in the making. Apparently the unbounded rise in the stock market is reviving fears of another collapse like the one suffered last year. Another reason that the "hated rally" has sparked fears is that we're about a year removed from the final "hard down" phase of last year's 6-year cycle collapse. September 2008 witnessed the financial markets crater and the intensity of last year's fear was unmatched in our lifetime. Not even the 1972-74 bear market, which was the worst since the Great Depression, witnessed a comparable level of...

And then...Presto! Just like magic through stimulus and some fancy footwork the economy begins to look like it is improving, but is it really? Knowing that stimulus money must eventually run out, that the number of American's out of work continues to grow, that Europe's unemployment is at 10 year highs, and that some Asian countries are starting to falter how can we believe this? We shouldn't and through our knowledge of that we should be looking for opportunities to capitalize on the bear market rally's turn around. In particular we should be looking to banking stocks, auto manufacturing stocks,...

As gold tries to break and hold $1000 it brings up the larger question of how long the USD has to last. At the very least, after the markets digest the debate over deflation which is USD bullish, the question becomes: how long can the USD hold together before it falls in value drastically. Big drumbeat out there I am sure that you know about China vigorously complaining about the abuse of the USD, most loudly complaining about the Fed's quantitative easing (buying any and all bad assets from banks and putting them on their balance sheet - called monetization,...

As gold tries to break and hold $1000 it brings up the larger question of how long the USD has to last. At the very least, after the markets digest the debate over deflation which is USD bullish, the question becomes: how long can the USD hold together before it falls in value drastically. Big drumbeat out there I am sure that you know about China vigorously complaining about the abuse of the USD, most loudly complaining about the Fed's quantitative easing (buying any and all bad assets from banks and putting them on their balance sheet - called monetization,...