By: Peter Spina, President, CEO of GoldSeek.com & SilverSeek.com - 6 February, 2015
Gold and silver prices surged in January having an even more spectacular month in foreign gold price terms. With the gold price rallying alongside the US Dollar, gold prices in currencies such as Canadian Dollars surged by 20%, rallying from C$1,375 an ounce to as high as C$1,650 at month’s end. Full Story
By: Julian D. W. Phillips, Gold/Silver Forecaster - Global Watch - 6 February, 2015
As we watched the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister of Greece travel though Europe in a failed attempt to re-negotiate the terms of the “Bailout” it received, we find ourselves thinking quite differently to the mainstream commentators. Ours is not a jaundiced view but a realistic one. Pragmatism demands we do so. The prime underlying factors that will be brought into play are the interests of each side. Full Story
These charts summarize gold's impressive performance during the tumultuous first fourteen years of the 21st century. Investors fearing some future Black Monday, a general bank or currency collapse, a 1930s-style economic depression, or a sudden and virulent inflation took precautions by purchasing gold coins and bullion as a form of portfolio insurance. Gold Chartography 101 is a record of that past. At the same time, though, it could very well be a glimpse of the future. Full Story
We've been watching gold be pressured all week in anticipation of a lower rigging on Friday if the BLSBS "exceeds expecations". The process continues today as gold is down even though every single headline I can find could be construed as gold positive. Full Story
As Koos will no doubt report at this site shortly, I found the numbers doing nothing but solidifying my belief on how gold trades. But first the numbers are worthy of review. 2014 mine supply of 3100 tonnes is misleading as roughly 25% of supply never leaves two large producers China and Russia (allegedly). Well, the Chinese just withdrew 255 tonnes in January alone from the SGE. Yet, do we see even an inkling of that in how gold trades? Of course not, because gold is all about lines on a chart and futures contracts. Full Story
In the last trading week of January on the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE) another huge quantity of gold left the vaults. According to the latest SGE data in week 4 (January 26 – 30) nearly 54 tonnes were withdrawn, down 24 % w/w. Year to date a staggering 255 tonnes has been withdrawn, up 4 % from the strongest January ever in 2014. Full Story
By: Adam Hamilton, Zeal Intelligence - 6 February, 2015
There’s no doubt the gold-mining stocks remain deeply out of favor, collateral damage from the Fed’s gross financial-market distortions of recent years. But sentiment is shifting, with stock traders starting to regain interest in this left-for-dead sector. Gold-stock trading volume is really growing as capital returns. And since higher volume is an essential precursor to major new uplegs, its growth is a very bullish portent. Full Story
Gold and gold mining shares rebounded strongly from the end of December through the first three weeks of January. Over the past several weeks the sector has digested those gains while holding above rising 50-day moving averages. The sector is nearing a bit of a decision point where either a breakout could occur or further corrective activity. Full Story
The headlined blared – “Global rate-cutting frenzy could freeze U.S. economic recovery” (Globe and Mail, Report on Business, February 4, 2015). This seemed to fly in the face of an FOMC that the US economy “has been expanding at a solid pace”. The FOMC cited an improved labour market, modestly rising household spending and lower energy prices boosting household purchasing power. The FOMC also cited that business investment was advancing. If there was a concern it was that inflation had fallen below the “Committee’s longer-run objective” and they also thought that inflation could fall further in the near term but they expected inflation to rise gradually towards its 2% objectives. Full Story
By: Steve St. Angelo, SRSrocco Report - 6 February, 2015
The U.S. Empire continues to disintegrate from within due to the worst oil productivity in the world. This collapse is due to a falling EROI – Energy Returned On Invested. While this has been a long and ongoing process, the rate of decline is speeding up as the U.S. Shale Oil Industry is in deep trouble. Full Story
Uranium spot prices have shown more life recently, says David Sadowski, mining equity research analyst at Raymond James, and he expects upward pressure to continue as utilities resume buying to meet future needs. In this interview, he tells The Energy Report the time is ripe to invest in uranium company stocks. Full Story
With consideration to our variant methodologies for establishing a context for the downtrend in long-term yields, we believe the move has reached the dregs of the trend. Over the past year, we've posted the following 10-year yield charts ad infinitum, with the idea that long-term yields were poised to retrace a significant portion of the move that had reached a relative performance extreme at the end of 2013. Full Story
By: Ira Epstein, The Linn Group - 5 February, 2015
Up until February 3, gold witnessed an overall strong bid. That’s now changed and has left me leaning to expect lower gold prices in the first half of 2015. Europe continues to provide gold with a bid. It’s not Chinese or India buying in my opinion. Rather its concern about the fallout of the quantitative easing program the European Union is about to embark on along with fallout from Greece’s confrontation with its lenders and falling oil prices. Full Story
Wall Street breathed a sigh of relief this week after a case of the jitters the last couple of weeks. Fears over a deflationary plunge in the euro zone had sparked an increased demand for safe haven assets, including gold and silver. The decline to multi-year lows in the crude oil market as recently as a few days ago also fed into investors’ desire for safety. In the last couple of days, however, those fears have at least momentarily abated as the oil price has rallied while Treasury prices and the U.S. dollar have declined. Consequently, gold and silver safe haven demand has declined in recent days. Full Story
Every once in a while I am still amazed at some of the truly non thinking and non logical “mush” that comes out of the mainstream. While years ago my wife could find me screaming at the television on a regular basis, I have since mellowed and this is a much more rare occasion …until this morning. Maybe being bombarded for years by illogical mainstream pabulum has numbed my senses? One thing is for sure, the public has swallowed it whole! Full Story
How is it possible for one man to burn through $400 million and wind up filing for bankruptcy, $27 million in the hole? Boxer Mike Tyson made it happen, and he’s in good company among professional athletes. Yet other professional athletes parlay their sizable earnings into nest eggs that grow and last. Full Story
The buzz has been building on this trade for weeks. Clients, friends, people on Twitter, everyone I know has been waiting for a chance to pick the bottom in oil. I’ve heard all this chatter on which triple-leveraged oil ETFs to use (I make a point of not knowing such things). They’ve been waiting for this opportunity since oil was at 80 bucks. Full Story
By: John Mauldin and George Friedman - 5 February, 2015
All eyes are focused on Europe this week as another Greek drama plays itself out. I have to admit that in my student days I was forced to sit through a number of Greek dramas, which are admittedly a fine part of our cultural heritage; but while I can appreciate their time and place in history, I really can’t say that I enjoyed them all that much. Full Story
Tonight I would like to look at the precious metals complex and see how things are moving along. Consolidating would be an understatement. The PM complex has been in a very large consolidation pattern going all the way back to the June 2012 low where the HUI, GLD and SLV all bottomed together. From that low all three have been chopping in a falling type pattern making lower lows and lower highs. The combo chart below shows the three distinct but slightly different 18 month consolidation patterns starting at the June of 2013 low. Full Story
The Sage of Omaha has spoken. On Fox News yesterday Warren Buffett dismissed the possibility of an interest rate rise in the middle of this year. To paraphrase this multi-billionaire, the global economy is too weak to allow it to happen: money would flow from Europe to the US disrupting the delicate balance of a global economic slowdown. Full Story
There is enough evidence European countries, among others, are nervous about the security of their official gold reserves stored abroad – who wouldn’t be if unprecedented amounts of physical gold were moving to Asia while Western consultancy firms are clearly underreporting this trend. Accidentally there are more and more stories popping up that might be a backwash from the tension between the big custodians (FRBNY, BOE) and the gold owners. Full Story
What Greece needs to do is default. The Troika will eventually go bankrupt if it does because others will follow (all of Europe). That is what we have at stake. However, what I wish the Greeks would do is scrap the entire debt based sovereign model. Please Greece, issue cash to pay your bills. Tie the issuance to any metric you want. Put simply, Greece could set the model for the world. I pray they do it. Full Story
Sometimes, but not always. Facts need to be filtered and interpreted through the screen of market beliefs. In 2010, the market believed that Quantitative Easing (translated commonly as money printing) would generate economic growth and consumer price inflation, so money printing was good for gold as well as stocks. More recently, the market has concluded that QE does not create price inflation. Therefore, QE is still regarded as good for stocks but not good for gold. We think this perception could change in the next few months, much to the advantage of gold. Full Story
Technically, gold should be under $1,140 per ounce, but instead it is rising with the strong dollar. In this interview with The Gold Report, Pamela and Mary Anne Aden, authors of The Aden Forecast, see value in gold and silver and share their strategy for gaining exposure to the upside in natural resources that is coming on the heels of a volatile currency upset. Full Story
Last year Switzerland has globally exported gold worth 65 billion Swiss Francs. India was the biggest buyer, Germany was ranked 5th. Russia delivered 55 tons more than it withdrew. The Swiss customs administration released numbers on Tuesday this week regarding Swiss foreign trade in 2014. It contains detailed information about the country’s gold imports and gold exports. Full Story
The Miles Franklin Blog’s unwavering aimis to speak economic TRUTH, no matter how painful it is. And whilst part of said truth relates to reality versus lies in economic reporting, equally important – and perhaps, more so – is demonstrating how rigged financial markets – coupled with Wall Street, Washington, and MSM propaganda – are utilized to whitewash truth’s perception. To wit, since the age of “financial engineering” commenced at the turn of the century, London and New York bankers have led “TPTB’s” effort to commandeer markets with technology, in partnership with the politicians bought and paid for with illicitly gained profits. Full Story
The Greek minister of finance Yanis Varoufakis is the catalyst that serves to unite the European nations against the EU regime. The current EU regime is increasingly being exposed as serving the interests of Washington rather than its members. Citizens of Europe have correctly identified Brussels as being their enemy, which is evident from the increasing popularity of nationalist “anti-EU” parties in elections all around Europe. Local governments are scared as they have nationalist parties breathing down their neck and know it is only a matter of time before they loose popular support unless they get out from under the oppressive EU regime. Full Story
Owning foreign real estate moves your savings and wealth offshore and therefore outside of the immediate reach of your home government. Unlike an intangible financial account, it is highly unlikely for your foreign real estate to be seized at the drop of a hat by your home country, without a literal act of war. Full Story
Since the bull market for gold began in 2003, the world’s major gold mining companies have produced tens of millions of ounces of gold and have raised (and written-off) many billions of dollars for capital expenditures and acquisitions. Despite a gold price that appreciated from $344 to $1260 an ounce from 2003 to the present (a gain of 266%), the largest gold mining companies have not rewarded shareholders with a significant appreciation in share price and/or return of capital via dividends. In fact, as a group they have not been profitable over this entire 11-year time period. Full Story
TCR family, Gene Arensberg, a friend and fellow newsletter writer, left us a day ago from a Houston hospital, where he had been battling multiple surgeries and complications from a lung transplant. Full Story
By: Chris Powell, Secretary/Treasurer, GATA - 4 February, 2015
Our dear friend Gene Arensberg, publisher of the Got Gold Report died yesterday at Houston Methodist Hospital as a result of complications from lung transplant surgery undertaken in September. For years Arensberg was a major contributor to the cause of free and transparent markets in the monetary metals, an incisive observer, and, most important, a kind, helpful, and gentle soul whom one was always glad to see, and who will be terribly missed. Full Story
Last weekend, I noted how bears in metals were quite scarce of late. Rather, everyone was quite certain that the bottom in metals has been struck and the bull market was back. Well, almost everyone! Now, it seems at least some are beginning to question whether we have truly hit bottom. Full Story
While we invest to protect our nest egg against inflation, by owning gold and silver, we are aware that when the commercial gold and silver dealers are heavily ‘net short’ in the futures market, they will spend hundreds of millions of dollars MORE, in the form of futures contracts, in an effort to drive the price down so that the previous short positions can be covered. Full Story
As mentioned in my previous piece, the last hour of trading on Friday was ominous and leads me to believe we will see “gap” openings in all directions very soon. Since then, the markets have bounced back but unconfirmed on extremely low volume. Zerohedge had a neat chart depicting the dichotomy of the markets versus the real economy, ignore this at your own risk! Full Story
By: Peter Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Capital - 3 February, 2015
When the Swiss National Bank decided to abruptly reverse course on its euro peg, the world should have been treated to a fresh lesson at the finite nature of creditor patience. While this message may have been lost on most observers, sooner or later this reality will sink in. When it does, the shirts will be tucked, the ties will be fastened, and knees just may start bending. Full Story
Gold is off to a great start this year. Please click here now. That’s the daily gold chart, and it looks superb. The strongly bullish technical action reflects the positive fundamentals of the gargantuan Chinese and Indian jewellery markets. Those two nations are the main price drivers of the “gold bull era”. Gold is also attempting to stage an early morning breakout from a small drifting rectangle pattern, which is good news. The “Queen of Metals” tends to have strong rallies following the release of the monthly US Employment Situation report. The next one is scheduled for Friday morning, at about 8:30AM. Full Story
Copper is off to a rough start in 2015 and while other base metals have also shown price weakness, zinc could finish 2015 strong, says Stefan Ioannou, mining analyst with Haywood Securities. He estimates that over the previous two years about 12% of global zinc production ceased and more will end soon, ultimately leading to a run in the zinc price in late 2015 and into 2016. In this interview with The Mining Report, Ioannou tells us how to follow zinc's path to big portfolio gains. Full Story
That massive disconnect between reality and the Wall Street dream world is going to translate into some very tough times for stock market investors. If you haven’t added some defense to your portfolio… you may need lots and lots of a popular Procter & Gamble product: Pepto Bismol. Full Story
Whether or not Armand was a Soviet spy, a Socialist pawn laundering money, or a brilliant rogue mastermind worthy of a role as a James Bond villain, he was surely not the simple man of commerce often portrayed in the press. However, there is no denying his business acumen and his ability to build relationships and networks. He said it best when asked to describe his career: “I am first and foremost a catalyst; I bring people and situations together.” Full Story
As you are doubtless aware we are living in a new paradigm – the age of global QE has arrived. Amongst the major power blocs it started with the US, spread to Japan, which adopted it with a particular gusto, after suffering from deflation for decades, and just has been taken up by Europe in a big way, after waiting for half its young people in many constituent countries to become unemployed due to the ravages of deflation. Smaller countries will have to join in or their currencies will soar and they will become uncompetitive. Full Story
In 1913 the US national debt was less than $3 Billion, gold was real money, and a cup of coffee cost a nickel. By 2015 the US national debt had increased to over $18,000,000,000,000 ($18 Trillion), the gold standard was called a “barbarous relic,” most currencies had devolved into fiat paper and digital symbols backed by insolvent governments, and a Grande soy cinnamon latte, double pump, triple shot, extra hot, with sprinkles cost about five bucks. Full Story
Back to today’s article, I normally start out by discussing the day’s “horrible headlines,” and particularly the “topic of the day”; which inevitably, leads to discussions of Precious Metals. However, today I’m going to start with the startling combination of surging demand and plunging supply that with each passing day, dramatically reduces the odds that the “New York Gold Pool” can maintain control of gold and silver prices – and monetary perception – for much longer. Full Story
In the last Market Overview we wrote about falling commodity prices and problems of emerging markets resulting from the strong U.S. dollar. In this edition we would like to focus on the Russian economy, which suffers from both problems. Declines in oil prices erase a great deal of government revenue, while at the same time the rise in the U.S. dollar to ruble exchange rate threatens the solvency of indebted banks and companies. Full Story
By: Steve St. Angelo, SRSrocco Report - 3 February, 2015
There are two charts every precious metals investor needs to see. The U.S. Mint is celebrating its 30 year anniversary producing Gold and Silver Eagles and if we look at the sales data of these two Official precious metal legal tender coins going back to 1986, there are some interesting trends worth looking at. Full Story
With all the negative news out of Europe, how do you find a positive story? Is there a way to structure a portfolio that gives you permission to be more aggressive when there are danger signs all around? Everyone is worried about being blindsided by a significant downdraft in the markets when maybe we should be thinking about making sure we don’t miss a bull market somewhere. These and several dozen other topics were on the table when the Mauldin Economics writing team gathered here in Dallas for 3˝ days of intensive talk, interviews, and planning. Today we’ll go over a few of the highlights of this last week, and I’ll share a few reasons to be optimistic about 2015. Full Story
The Chinese Year of the Ram will kick off at the end of this month, but for now it looks as if 2015 will be the Year of the Central Banks. I spend a lot of time talking about gold, oil and emerging markets, and it’s important to recognize what drives these asset classes’ performance. Government and fiscal policy often have much to do with it. But in the past three months, we’ve seen central banks take center stage to engage in a new currency war: a race to the bottom of the exchange rate in an attempt to weaken their own currencies and undercut competitor nations. Full Story
Gold-price volatility so far this year has been a reflection of short-term speculative activity by a relatively small group of hedge-funds and other institutional traders taking relatively large positions in “paper” markets. Full Story
Let’s say you run a Central Bank. What’s your agenda? You need to keep your financial system liquid and inflating. Why? Well, your economy has way too much debt and you don’t want a debt collapse, especially in your Treasury market (which of course you cannot talk about). You need to finance your government’s deficits. And you need to keep your banking system afloat, which requires a lot of cheap money to be profitable because the banks keep making stupid mistakes. So, your job is to create inflation. But you can’t say that because you can’t say why. Full Story
By: Rick Ackerman, Rick's Picks - 3 February, 2015
The bounce from yesterday’s lows stalled at the 1280.20 midpoint pivot shown, but the rally target at 1293.80 remains intact. Now, a fall below 1266.50, the point ‘C’ low of the rally pattern, would negate the target, but if the initial move on Tuesday pushes the futures above the red line for a second time, it would raise the odds of a follow-through to 1293.80 to 50-50. Full Story
This past week was filled with geopolitics 24/7 until Friday, when they finally spilled all over the markets. The market action was extremely ominous in my opinion and especially the last hour into the close. Very shortly I believe we will be faced with huge market “gaps” which will be the topic for tomorrow, today let’s discuss how the current geopolitical situation will detonate the leverage. Full Story
Collateral damage from the currency wars in Europe, Japan and Russia could topple political leaders, put banks out of business and homeowners on the street. It can also play havoc with a portfolio. That is why The Gold Report called Mauldin Economics founder John Mauldin to ask how can readers protect themselves and perhaps even prosper. Full Story
Within the physical world, vibrations are generally not a good thing, often warning of an impending event, with earthquakes perhaps the best comparative example for our purposes. With earthquakes, before the big one arrives, most often they are preceded by many smaller vibrations, many of which are in fact undetectable to those experiencing them. Of course with earthquakes, as with other such phenomena, smaller vibrations can occur without a larger event being triggered as well, or at least it may seem that way because said larger event may not arrive for some time. Full Story
In the January issue of BIG GOLD, I interviewed 17 analysts, economists, and authors on what they expect for gold in 2015. Some of those included what we affectionately call our Casey Brain Trust—Doug Casey, Olivier Garret, Bud Conrad, David Galland, Marin Katusa, Louis James, and Terry Coxon. The issue was so popular that we decided to reprint this portion. Full Story
It suddenly seems as though the good times in equities might be ending. Though my perspective is based only on “gut feel”, there seems to be an underlying level of fear that has crept into the markets. If so, it’s a real problem for equities. Any market trading at all-time highs and with a valuation far above historical averages requires a continued level of irrational excitement and speculative ignorance to remain sustainable. And fear is not consistent with irrational, speculative ignorance. Full Story
It’s all about confidence, right? Right. In 2011, when the commodity and ‘inflation’ trades blew out, the Federal Reserve was completely discredited, with gold bugs out front poking them in the eye with taunts of “Helicopter Ben”. Markets rebelled against the Fed by sending silver to $50 and commodities in general to an all-time high. Full Story
For 30+ years, Western countries have been papering over the decline in living standards by issuing debt. In its simplest rendering, sovereign nations spent more than they could collect in taxes, so they issued debt (borrowed money) to fund their various welfare schemes. Full Story
I recently finished Tony Robbins’ latest book, “Money, Master the Game,” and I highly recommend it. Many of his suggestions in the book are really simple ideas that everyone knows about, but few execute well. Robbins shines as a personal coach and motivator; he has a good way of taking these ideas and turning them into powerful, effective action steps. Full Story
As of Thursday, assets in exchange-traded gold products rose for a tenth session, reaching the highest level since October. Investors added 65.6 metric tonnes so far this month, the most since September 2012. Gold equities, as measured by the NYSE Arca Gold Miners Index, are up 20 percent for January while the S&P 500 Index finished down 3 percent. Full Story
Despite the uncertainties ahead of the Greek general election, the European Central Bank (ECB) went ahead and announced quantitative easing (QE) of €60bn per month from March to at least September 2016. Full Story
It’s the start of a new year. The question on everyone’s mind is whither the prices of gold and silver? This Brief presents our answer (and the full Monetary Metals Outlook 2015 report gives our reasoning). One approach to the question of price is to draw a line, extrapolating the past trend into the future. Here is the graph for gold. Full Story
By: Rick Ackerman, Rick's Picks - 2 February, 2015
The Fed has done it again, purporting to manage our expectations with yet more, excruciatingly public dithering over the timing of a rate hike. The central bank is now saying there will be no policy change before June at the earliest. This latest little piece of kabuki can only add to the credibility of our own forecast, which is that that the Fed will never raise rates. Okay, we were being facetious when we first made that prediction a couple of years ago; never is indeed a long time. Full Story
Steve Forbes encapsulates the necessity for a sound, stable US dollar. The only viable alternative is gold backed money. The current monetary system is a sham, fiat money has no value, merely a means to facilitate wealth accumulation. Jim Rogers wrote of the Swiss currency swoon 2 years in advance The financial legend warns that central bankers are ill prepared to manage the highly complex markets Full Story
By: Steve St. Angelo, SRSrocco Report - 1 February, 2015
Americans are in big trouble and they don’t even know it. The financial system in which they are totally invested, is heading towards an epic collapse. Printing money and increasing debt (exponentially) are not sustainable business practices. These artificial techniques to prop up a Zombie Economy have a certain lifespan… one that will end much sooner than later. Full Story
Mention is often made that one should wait for confirmation of a particular move in futures before making a commitment, either way. Last week, it appeared evidence was mounting that November could be a possible low for the correction since late 2011. Then, we run across this graph from goldchartsrus.com which shows an inordinate build-up of short positions in silver by what we would call “smart money,” “insiders.” Full Story
In a previous post I noted I didn’t agree with GFMS on Chinese gold demand 2014, disclosed by them at 866 tonnes while supply in China was 1,833 tonnes (import 1,200 + mine 451 + scrap 182), resulting in a gap of 967 tonnes. But I would like to save the demand discussion for another post to expand upon. Full Story
From January to December 2014 the Federal Reserve Bank Of New York (FRBNY) has been drained from 176.81 tonnes of physical gold out of the foreign deposit accounts. A drop from 6,195.60 tonnes to 6,018.79 tonnes over 12 months, FRBNY data published on Friday showed. The FRBNY doesn’t disclose how much is withdrawn by which central bank. Full Story
As markets go, they always change and they changed again this past week. Two weeks ago, stocks began to finally act properly and gave us a great week, but then this past week they reverted back to a market of false breakouts and chop. So, we’re back to day-trading mostly once again. Full Story
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