So far, 2012 has been a banner year for the stock market, which recently closed the books on its best first quarter in 14 years. But Casey Research Chairman Doug Casey insists that time is running out on the ticking time bombs. Next week when Casey Research's spring summit gets underway, Casey will open the first general session addressing the question of whether the inevitable is now imminent. In another exclusive interview with The Gold Report, Casey tells us that he foresees extreme volatility "as the titanic forces of inflation and deflation fight with each other" and a forced shift to speculation to either protect or build wealth. Full Story
Lost among never-ending talk in the mainstream media about the ‘modest recovery’ being experienced in America have been some rather poignant headlines that are telling a completely different story. I’ve used up many weeks to outline the flaws regarding how our economic growth is measured and suggest more responsible alternatives. Full Story
By: Richard Daughty, a.k.a., 'The Mogambo Guru' - 20 April, 2012
I was trying to, even if it kills me, have a pleasant breakfast with the whole family, all of us grudgingly participating in a freakishly stupid "family bonding" activity, when I heard, for the seemingly thousandth time, the boy saying to me, "If you loved me like you are supposed to love a son, then you would give me the money I need." Full Story
Since mid-2010, the gold price consolidates sideways predominately within the boundaries of the blue-green triangle. In January 2012, the resistive blue triangle leg was broken successfully at approx. $1,700 giving the starting signal for the so-called “breakout“ reaching nearly $1,800 a few weeks later. Full Story
The Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday surprised investors with a bigger-than-expected half-percentage-point cut to its key lending rate, sending it to 8%, saying the state of India's economy is "a matter of growing concern." Assuming a normal monsoon season, continuing improvement in industrial production and in the global outlook, the RBI said it expects growth for the current year at 7.3%. Full Story
For the very first time in our history, all money, all currencies, are now fiat - the US dollar use to be gold backed and it was the rock all the worlds currencies were anchored to - when the US dollar became fiat, all the worlds currencies became fiat. Our 41 year experiment with paper money is almost over. This fact should be on all our radar screens. Is it on yours? Full Story
Pick any period of rising U.S. Equities Markets whether from the September, 2002 lows through the September, 2007 high, or the December, 2011 lows to the late March, 2012 highs. These Highs lulled some investors and several commentators into believing that they had Real Gains as of September, 2007 or March, 2012. Unfortunately, when properly measured, many of these Ostensible Gains actually are not. Full Story
Commodities have been sinking like stones since late February, an unusual divergence from the rallying stock markets. This relentless weakness has wreaked havoc on commodities sentiment, leading traders to abandon commodities stocks. As we all try to make sense of this surreal bloodbath, one catalyst keeps coming up. Western perceptions of the Chinese economy have been a real drag on commodities. Full Story
The Kondratieff long wave cycle (aka The K Wave) provides the only good explanation of the current state of the global economy and financial markets. It is clear that a multi-generation long wave debt cycle has driven individual, government and corporate debt to crisis levels that are now in the process of a slow motion implosion. The debt is coming due, but central banks and governments have transferred much of the debt to innocent parties and postponed the due date. These misguided monetary and fiscal policies only bought a little time. Full Story
To all those who say that deflationary collapses cannot happen in paper monetary systems, I ask you: don't the PIIGS-ies of Europe count? Because they're all falling, one right after the other, like dominoes. Today, the Spanish stock market ($SMSI) closed below its spring, 2009 lows. Full Story
Today we have a set of circumstances that are totally different to those times. All currencies are in a “dirty float” that sees exchange rates moving relatively freely, being the subject of market forces, including manipulation by their own governments. The days of revaluation and devaluation are things of the past. So no amount of systemic change will see the re-imposition of fixed exchange rates. Any new monetary system or adjustment to the present system will have to accept this reality. Full Story
According to a report last week in the Financial Times, the London Metals Exchange or LME is currently considering allowing members to settle their contracts in Chinese renminbi. In a survey of its members aimed at aiding the design of a new clearing house, the metals exchange reportedly asked if they would like to include the renminbi among its current roster of other currencies for the settling and clearing of trades, and if dropping the pound sterling would be problematic. Full Story
Gold prices in the short term continue to look overall bearish. Old news, which is being twisted into new headlines, is once again front and center. Spain, Italy, Iran, the US economy, quantitative easing and the old economic issues in America, Europe and China remain the dominant stories of the day. Full Story
This strange event happened this past Tuesday in the COMEX New York markets but I didn’t have time to post it until now. Not much to add here in the commentary that the pictures don’t say themselves, except that market prices of two different assets do not plunge in tandem by 1.2% within a matter of half-an-hour or so at precisely the same time and then gain everything back in the next two hours if their prices are set by free and fair markets. Full Story
The number one reason investors buy gold is to protect against the government policies that create inflation. However, the government has "rigged the game" in such a way that the higher the rate of inflation, the more of a gold investor's net worth ends up with the government instead of the investor. Full Story
China has been trying to diversify her foreign exchange reserves for some time. We are all familiar with the figures released by the likes of the World Gold Council about Chinese gold investment demand, as well as statistics showing official gold imports through Hong Kong into the Chinese mainland. Chinese reserves contain only 2% gold, compared to nearly 10% for India and Russia, and figures in the 70th percentile for developed nations such as the USA and Germany. Full Story
If running out of your own money wasn’t bad enough, policy makers are increasingly spending other peoples’ money to bail their country out. At the upcoming G-20 meeting, finance ministers from around the world will contemplate an increase to the resources of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). At stake for politicians is whether they can continue to do what they know best – to play politics. In contrast, at stake for investors may be whether currencies will retain their function as a store of value. Full Story
By: Rick Ackerman and Doug Behnfield - 19 April, 2012
Our friend Doug Behnfield, the savviest financial advisor we know, is skeptical about the dividend mania that has captivated Wall Street of late. In the essay below he explains why investors seduced by dividend-paying stocks may be overlooking more-than-offsetting risks and better opportunities. Doug works exclusively with high-net-worth individuals, many of whom are undoubtedly grateful for his prescient skew toward Treasury paper since the beginning of last year. Full Story
HOARDING stuff until your home is a health hazard and your family and neighbors hate you isn't only a TV "reality". Perhaps 1 million US citizens are prey to the hoarding compulsion on one estimate, fighting the urge to let everything just keep piling up. Full Story
By: The Gold Report and Richard Stanger - 18 April, 2012
Resource investors are always looking for the next untapped region and Richard Stanger thinks he has found it. President and founder of the Cambodian Association of Mining and Exploration Companies, Stanger has been working to get the word out about Cambodia, a growing, stable country with the right geology for some big discoveries. In this exclusive interview with The Gold Report, Stanger gives an insider's view of the secrets to investing in Cambodia and explains why he's expecting a land rush. Full Story
Eric SprottEric Sprott has earned a recognized standing not only as one of the world’s premiere gold and silver investors, but also as an expert in the precious metals industry. Eric Sprott is Chairman of Sprott Money Ltd. Additionally, he is CEO, CIO and Senior Portfolio Manager of Sprott Asset Management LP and Chairman of Sprott Inc.. Full Story
Dr. Quinton Hennigh is an economic geologist with more than 20 years of exploration experience. Dr. Hennigh has acted as advisor to Gold Canyon since 2009, where he helped refocus exploration at the Company's Springpole Gold Project in Red Lake, Ontario. Full Story
Decades of manipulation by the Federal Reserve (through its creation of paper money) and by Congress (through its taxing and spending) have pushed the US economy into a circumstance that can't be sustained but from which there is no graceful exit. Full Story
As I’ve noted in previous articles, there is a growing tension between the ECB, the central bank backstop for Europe, and Germany, the de facto sovereign EU backstop. In brief, the ECB has wanted to monetize and bailout needy EU members aggressively while the inflation-phobic Germany has wanted to impose fiscal constraints as well as austerity measures (essentially fiscal sovereignty) on needy EU members in exchange for bailout funds. Full Story
There is an old German saying that goes, "whoever does not respect the penny is not worthy of the dollar." It expresses the sense that those who neglect or ignore the small things cannot be trusted with larger things, and fittingly describes the problems facing both the dollar and our nation today. For nearly a century monetary policy has been delegated to the Federal Reserve System. Full Story
As a general rule, we hate to see an announcement of a share rollback, however, there exceptions which we cover below. Investors should always be aware that if a company has, say over 150 million shares outstanding, in our opinion, it is a potential candidate for a rollback and the announcement should not come as a surprise. Full Story
In the last few days I’ve received numerous emails alerting me to the fact that Mr. Dennis Gartman has stated both gold and the junior resource stocks are basically dead. Virtually all the emailers then went on to personally add this must be the best contrarian indicator as they feel his actual track record leaves much to be desired. They also point out that his own publicly-traded fund has underperformed most benchmarks. Full Story
The graphic is self-explanatory, and indicates that the Gold/Platinum Ratio is in a position similar to where silver was at the end of January 2011. If the ratio was to continue to follow the silver pattern, then we could have gold being 1.7 times the value of platinum in this year. This is consistent with my expectation of a significantly higher “real’ gold price (relative to stocks and most commodities). Full Story
The world’s most influential central bank wants to inflate American asset prices; thus it is conceivable that the ongoing rally on Wall Street will continue for several months. Look. The Federal Reserve has made it clear that it will keep rates on hold until at least December 2014 and it is also buying US Treasuries across the entire yield curve. Put simply, Mr. Bernanke is suppressing interest rates and he is forcing investors to search for yield. Full Story
Deception continues, as we are told unemployment (U-3) is 8.3%; without a mention that (U-6) is 14.9%. That means if you eliminate the birth/death ratio you come up with an overall unemployment number of 22.4%. As we mentioned earlier we expect the administration to try to attempt to push U-3 down to 7.5% before the election. Whether they will be successful in that endeavor remains to be seen. In reality almost 1/5th of working Americans are either unemployed or underemployed. Full Story
We have argued here before that it is lies, systematic fraud and blatant duplicity by the central banks that have kept the global economy afloat in recent years. In the essay below, a regular in the Rick’s Picks forum who goes by the handle ‘Buster’ provides as succinct and elegant an explanation of this as we have seen. His thoughts were originally published in the forum, but we are reprinting them below because they deserves a wider audience. Full Story
The questions gold investors have to ask themselves is, “if the days of the dollar are numbered, how will gold be used in the monetary system that follows? Will there be a global monetary system that all nations subscribe to or will the monetary world fragment?” For one thing, we will continue to live in a global world with nations trading amongst each other. To gold investors, such an eventuality –let alone its potential reality—would cause a return to the use of gold as a foundation for any monetary system, but not as a means of exchange, ever again. Full Story
Recently, the world's economic leaders, including economists at the European Central Bank, the European Union, the International Monetary Fund, and the U.S. Federal Reserve, supported by most of the mainstream financial media, assured the world that the debt agreement worked out between Greece and its creditors would help put an end to the European-wide debt crisis. In reality, the crisis has merely been papered over. Despite the broad rally in stock and bond markets over the past few weeks, I firmly believe that Greece will likely require another bailout within a year. Full Story
Featured is the 5 year gold chart courtesy Stockcharts.com. The blue channel has defined the uptrend since 2008. Except for the credit crunch in 2008, the 300DMA (used here) has not been violated. The chances of a 2008 type of correction are slim, due to the amount of liquidity that has been added to the system. A bounce off the $1600 level and a breakout at line ‘B’ will lead to the expectation that price is likely to repeat a performance last seen when line ‘A’ was overcome. Full Story
I recently wrote an article that addresses the subject of sociopaths and how they insinuate themselves into society. Although the subject doesn't speak directly to what stock you should buy or sell to increase your wealth, I think it's critical to success in the markets. It goes a long way towards explaining what goes on in the heads of people like Bernie Madoff and therefore how you can avoid being hurt by them. Full Story
The Hindu festival of Akshaya Tritivai is coming up this month and this is of interest for gold investors. The holiday, which falls on April 24th, is a day when Indians go on a major gold buying binge. It is one of the most auspicious occasions to buy gold, the ultimate symbol of wealth and prosperity. Full Story
What economic phenomenon is most worrisome to Dr. Ben Bernanke? To view a picture of the answer, please click here now. A higher oil price is Dr. Bernanke’s biggest fear, and I believe a new move higher is beginning right now. David “SuperDave” Greenlaw is Morgan Stanley’s chief U.S. fixed income strategist. A number of Morgan Stanley’s top economists, including SuperDave, have issued substantial warnings that the American economy faces what they term a “fiscal cliff” in 2013. Full Story
Recently I was asked by a high school teacher if I had any ideas about why students today seem so apathetic when it comes to engaging with the world around them. I waggishly responded, "Probably because they're smart." In my opinion, we're asking our young adults to step into a story that doesn't make any sense. Full Story
Why do people choose to own gold? As I see it, there are two reasons for owning gold: one out of love, the other out of fear. When looking at gold investment we see similar parallels drawn between past and present, East and West. The difference is, in the words of James Turk, ‘What money is and what money has become.’ Full Story
To say the junior resource market has been “acting like a pig” is an understatement. To say simply I’ve been wrong about them being undervalued only irritates those already wishing they hadn’t purchased… (just ask my wife—I would, but she stopped speaking to me after looking at our last brokerage statement). Full Story
Considering how popular the term "Quantitative Easing", or "QE" for short, has become, it's remarkable that many commentators on the financial markets appear not to understand what QE is. It is, by definition, an increase in the money supply brought about by the central bank in an effort to reduce the cost of credit. Since the money supply can be increased by commercial banks as well as the central bank, QE can more specifically be defined as an increase in the Monetary Base (bank reserves plus currency in circulation) implemented to reduce the cost of credit. This is because the Monetary Base is the monetary aggregate that the central bank (the Fed in the US) directly controls in its efforts to manipulate the economy. Full Story
The 30 year / 2 year Treasury yield curve has been on a steady march higher since 2007. This makes sense since that was the year things started falling apart in inflated, debt saturated developed global economies, led by the nation that showed 'em how it's done when it comes to economic management by inflation; the US. Full Story
Milton Friedman was a proponent of so-called “floating” exchange rates between the various irredeemable paper currencies that he promoted as the proper monetary system. Many have noted that the currencies do not “float”; they sink at differing rates, sometimes one is sinking faster and then another. This article focuses on something else. Full Story
In the face of a correction or poor price action, we’ll often hear analysts proclaim the bullish fundamentals of precious metals. While this is true on a structural and secular basis, it doesn’t mean the market always advances every year or two. We’ve written about the wall of worry phase and how progress in the second third of a bull market is limited. The HUI hasn’t made any net progress in the past four and a half years. Full Story
Gold bulls have plenty of room to graze in the stockyard these days as the investing herd migrated to other assets during the market’s steep climb in 2012. For the fourth time in the past year, gold bears outnumbered the bulls in Bloomberg’s weekly Gold Bull/Bear Sentiment Survey. In fact, the bears had the bulls outnumbered by almost 2-to-1. Full Story
By: The Gold Report and Vishal Gupta - 16 April, 2012
Precious and base metal companies both have to obey the basic laws of physics and economics to be profitable. In this exclusive interview with The Gold Report, geologist turned analyst Vishal Gupta of Fraser Mackenzie discusses how small-cap companies can successfully take advantage of the marketplace to produce profits. Full Story
Louis: Doug, we've threatened to talk about the Constitution many times. Since there's increasing interest in the country's economic and political future, maybe now is a good time to put that into a fuller historical context.. Doug: Good idea. I confess I suspected this was coming up, so I just now read the Constitution again. This is actually something I recommend to everyone. Unfortunately, the Constitution is now a dead letter, but reading it is instructive in a number of ways, and it only takes about ten minutes. One should know the law of the land, even if it no longer applies. Full Story
WHY BOTHER investing? Five years into the financial crisis – and more than a decade after the US market hit its big top in real terms – you might well ask. Especially now that cash, bonds, Treasuries and stocks pay between zero and sweet nothing in yield, just like gold bullion. Full Story
ZeroHedge today catches the Bank for International Settlements admitting and then trying to cover up its services to member central banks in surreptitiously manipulating the gold market, work the BIS was positively advertising a few years ago in a promotional brochure for prospective central bank members that GATA brought to your attention in February... Full Story
On the positive side, the Wonderful And Immortal Lesson (WAIL) from all of this, distilled as it is from millennia of governments, is to buy gold and silver, as much as you can, for as long as you can. And with the modern addition of oil, the lifeblood of modern economies, buying gold, silver and oil to prosper in the coming cataclysm is so easy, and so seemingly certain, that it makes you giggle "Whee! This investing stuff is easy!" Full Story
Europe’s bankers will need to think really big the next time they try to construct a proper “mother of all firewalls.” A nearly trillion-euro package that was on the table a few weeks ago would combine €440 billion of uncommitted funds from an existing credit “facility” with €500 billion pledged toward a new one. Those may sound like big numbers, but they evidently were not big enough to prevent market forces from roiling Europe’s stage-managed bond markets last week. The result was a surge in yields on Spanish debt that spooked U.S. stocks, among others, into their worst weekly decline of 2012. Full Story
By: John Mauldin, Millennium Wave Advisors - 15 April, 2012
I fully intended to ignore Spain this week. Really, truly I did. I had my letter all planned, but then a few notes drew my attention, and the more I reflected on them, the more I realized that the inflection point that I thought the ECB had pushed down the road for at least a year with their recent €1 trillion LTRO is now rushing toward us much faster than ECB President Draghi had in mind when he launched his massive funding operation. Full Story
My most recent trip to Calgary gave me a welcome chance to catch up with friends and colleagues in Cow Town's oil and gas sector. I found out about new projects, investigated companies of interest, and came away with an improved feel for the current state of affairs – what's hot, what's not, and why. Full Story
By: Bob Chapman, The International Forecaster - 15 April, 2012
“War is a racket. It always has been.” These words are as true now as they were when Major General Smedley Butler first delivered them in a series of speeches in the 1930s. And he should have known. As one of the most decorated and celebrated marines in the history of the Corps, Butler drew on his own experiences around the globe to rail against the business interests that use the U.S. military as muscle men to protect their racket from perceived threats. Full Story
Starting back in August, I began suggesting that we were approaching a Systemic Crisis/ Crash scenario in the markets. The technical and fundamentals both supported this forecast, but I completely underestimated the degree to which the Central Banks and EU would attempt to prop up the market. Full Story
I have been saying this for some time that gold's fairest price or current value in terms of auction market analysis is $1,650. I am aware of the "fundamentals" for precious metals such as "increasing currency supply", "paper assets", "debt", "default" etc, but the fundamentals are for "investing" NOT "trading". If I trade by listening to any other voice other than the market, I know I am finished in this business. Full Story
The resurgence of concerns over the long term solvency of debt laden Eurozone countries like Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Ireland has led to refreshed selling of the Euro against the other major currencies since early April. Full Story
US markets are looking to be in a bit of trouble here for the first time in 2012 now a the European debt crisis is going to come back in full force this week. European markets, specifically the DAX, is breaking down on strong volume and the US markets look ready to follow. Full Story
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