Delays for Thai physical gold exchange

Jon

Establishment of a physical gold exchange remains up in the air after recent negotiations between the Stock Exchange of Thailand and gold dealers over management power ended in discord.
Despite a mutual agreement in principle to set up a spot gold exchange in Thailand, a tug-of-war between the SET and gold traders has made it impossible to occur this year.
MTS Gold president Kritcharat Hirunyasiri said questions of managerial power had not been settled yet.
‘The SET has proposed taking a majority stake in the new exchange and requested the power to set its direction, while gold traders are concerned they could lose control of the exchange and see their benefits reduced’ he said.
Mr Kritcharat described the process as moving at a snail’s pace but said at least the SET and gold dealers were still talking.
Funding for the physical gold exchange is not a problem, as both sides have ample cash, he said, adding that setting it up would cost more than 1 billion baht.

This post was published at TruthinGold on November 28, 2014.

As It Turns Out Deflation Is Good After All

Jon

Earlier today, in typical German fashion, the chief of the Bundesbank poured cold water on Europe’s latest round of demands that Germany carry the weight of the rebound from the triple-dip on its shoulders, as usual, when Buba President Jens Weidmann Friday rejected calls for a German stimulus plan, saying only structural reforms and more competitiveness would kick-start eurozone economies. ‘Calls for a public fiscal stimulus plan in Germany to boost the Eurozone economy are amiss,’ said Mr. Weidmann in a speech for an economic summit hosted by the German newspaper Sddeutsche Zeitung. He is, of course, right: the longer Europe’s insolvent, uncompetitive governments kick the can and force Germany to do all the hard work, the longer Europe will be unable to get out of a hole that gets deeper with every passing day. In short: Mr. Weidmann refuses to “get to work” for a bunch of corrupt, clueless politicians.

This post was published at Zero Hedge on 11/28/2014.

Indian gold imports rise ahead of more curbs

Jon

India’s gold imports could climb to around 100 tonnes for a third straight month in November as dealers buy heavily for fear of curbs on overseas purchases, especially as the wedding season picks up, traders said.
Local premiums have fallen to about $10 an ounce from $18 last week due to the speculation over curbs, they said.
Curbs on gold imports figured in a meeting of central bank and finance ministry officials this month as a way to rein in India’s trade deficit, swelled by a jump in imports in September and October, to about 100 tonnes each month.
But officials wary of overreacting have not yet made a decision.
‘The speculation around rules triggered panic buying and imports are going to be over 100 tonnes again this month,’ said a trader in Mumbai, adding that shipments could outstrip those in October.
October shipments to India, the world’s No.2 gold consumer after China, jumped to about 150 tonnes, from less than 25 tonnes a year earlier and 143 tonnes in September.

This post was published at TruthinGold on November 28, 2014.

Russia’s monetary solution

Jon

The hypothesis that follows, if carried through, is certain to have a significant effect on gold and the relationship between gold and all government-issued currencies. The successful remonetisation of gold by a major power such as Russia would draw attention to the fault-lines between fiat currencies issued by governments unable or unwilling to do the same and those that can follow in due course. It would be a schism in the world’s dollar-based monetary order.
Russia has made plain her overriding monetary objective: to do away with the US dollar for all her trade, an ambition she shares with China and their Asian partners. Furthermore, in the short-term the rouble’s weakness is undermining the Russian economy by forcing the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) to impose high interest rates to defend the currency and by increasing the burden of foreign currency debt. There is little doubt that one objective of NATO’s economic sanctions is to harm the Russian economy by undermining the currency, and this policy is working with the rouble having fallen 30% against the US dollar this year so far with the prospect of further falls to come.
Russia faces the reality that pricing the rouble in US dollars through the foreign exchanges leaves her a certain loser in a currency war against America and her NATO allies. There is a solution which was suggested in a recent paper by John Butler of Atom Capital, and that is for Russia to link the rouble to gold, or more correctly put it on a gold exchange standard*. The proposal at first sight is so left-field that it takes a lateral thinker such as Butler to think of it. Separately, Professor Steve Hanke of John Hopkins University has alternatively proposed that Russia sets up a currency board to stabilise the rouble. Professor Hanke points out that Northern Russia tied the rouble to the British pound with great success in 1918 after the Bolshevik revolution when Britain and other allied nations invaded and briefly controlled the region. What he didn’t say is that sterling would most likely have been accepted as a gold substitute in the region at that time, so running a currency board was the equivalent of putting the rouble in Russia’s occupied lands onto a gold exchange standard.

This post was published at GoldMoney on 28 November 2014.

Koos Jansen: Dutch wanted their gold back more than the Bundesbank did

Jon

Bullion Star market analyst and GATA consultant Koos Jansen today analyzes how the Netherlands central bank managed to repatriate of a lot of its gold stored with the U.S. government even as the German Bundesbank has not managed to. Jansen's conclusion: The Dutch central bank actually wanted its gold returned, the Bundesbank not so much. His commentary is headlined "Dutch Gold Repatriation: Why, How, And When" and it's posted at the bullionstar.com Internet site.
In a second story, Jansen also calls attention to a Citigroup report scoffing at the Swiss Gold Initiative, a report disparaging gold as "a 6,000-year-old bubble" that yet may continue for another 6,000 years, which would make the bubble seem rather iron-clad. Jansen's commentary on the Citigroup report is headlined "Citibank Releases Anti-Gold Report Before Swiss Gold Referendum".

This post was published at GATA

El-Erian: ‘When You Have Very Sharp Moves in Currency, Something Breaks’

Jon

The greenback hit a seven-year high against the yen and a two-year peak against the euro earlier this month.
Divergent central bank policies are fuelling the currency move. While the Federal Reserve has begun pulling back its stimulus, the Bank of Japan and European Central Bank are increasing theirs to boost their flagging economies.
"Historically, when you have very sharp moves in the currency [markets], something breaks," El-Erian told Yahoo Finance.

This post was published at Money News

Ferguson Covers Up Bad Economy, Senator Schumer Trashes Obama Care, Watch Gold

Jon

The following video was published by Greg Hunter on Nov 27, 2014
There was rioting and violence across the country because a Ferguson grand jury did not charge a white officer in the shooting death of a black teen. That seems to be what was wanted. The Governor of Missouri did not deploy the National Guard and things got out of control. Was it done on purpose to allow things to go crazy? Who knows, but one thing is for sure, this is NOT about race. The Obama Administration wants it to be; otherwise, he would not have sent Al Sharpton to Ferguson. This is about a very bad economy and an economy that is going to get much worse. Ferguson and all the protests around the country are a distraction.
You want more proof the economy is headed down? Look no further than Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer. He just said the Democrats made a ‘mistake’ in voting for Obama Care. He said, ‘We blew it,’ and said Democrats should have focused on the economy. Does that sound like the economy is going to be getting better?
Finally, there is gold and news that more countries want theirs back. The Dutch just repatriated 122 tons. The leading French candidate in upcoming elections says France should get its gold back. The Swiss are voting this weekend to get their gold back inside its borders. Why all the attention to getting control of physical gold? Could it be central banks don’t trust each other’s paper?

OPEC’s Crude Bloodbath Sends 10 Year To 2.20%, Energy Companies Tumble

Jon

The biggest, and most market-moving, event overnight continues to be yesterday’s shocking OPEC announcement, which is still reverberating across the energy space as markets largely ignore European and Japanese inflation data which is once again sliding back dangerously fast, or Italian unemployment which rose more than expected, and joined France in hitting a new record high. As a result European shares remain lower, close to intraday lows, with the oil & gas and industrials sectors underperforming and telco and travel outperforming as oil continues its decline. EU inflation slowed in Nov. to 0.3%. Italian and Swedish markets are the worst-performing larger bourses, Spanish the best. The euro is weaker against the dollar. And while US equity futures are largely unchanged even as, or perhaps because, the world is screaming economic slowdown, bonds are finally getting the message with U. S. 10yr bond yields falling to only 2.20% as Japanese yields also decline.
Some more detail from RanSquawk:
European equities enter the North American crossover in negative territory albeit off their worst levels. The sole catalyst for price action thus far has been the fallout of yesterday’s decision by OPEC to refrain from altering their output ceiling. More specifically, the energy sector has naturally been substantially weighed on by the ramifications of yesterday, with the top 10 laggards in the Stoxx 600 all being from the sector, with the FTSE 100 feeling the squeeze with BP and shell notably lower, with the two Co.’s accounting for just over 12% of the index. Nonetheless, airliners have provided stocks with some modest reprieve as the lower energy prices will benefit the sector, although the implications for airliners are less substantial than those of oil producers. Elsewhere, in fixed income markets, Bunds opened at fresh contract highs, although now reside in relatively modest territory after failing to make a break above the 153.00 level. One thing to be aware of looking ahead, is that the lower energy prices are likely to filter through to global inflation prospects and thus could have further considerations on central bank policies, notably the ECB, with this also coming in the backdrop of the heightened expectations of a sovereign QE programme.

This post was published at Zero Hedge on 11/28/2014.

The Wild & Woolly Gold Stocks!

Jon

If one loves to ride a roller coaster, then owning gold stocks may be for you. The above chart of the Philadelphia Gold & Silver Exchange (XAU) is enough to give anyone that sinking feeling one gets while riding a roller coaster. On a roller coaster when the drop comes, you have the feeling that your stomach is floating in your chest. As to your heart well……
Note: I am using the XAU because the XAU has the longest history. Normally I use the Gold Bugs Index (HUI) and TSX Gold Index (TGD). The XAU contains Freeport McMoran (FCX-NYSE) a company that is predominately copper rather than gold and silver. As such, I find both the HUI and the TGD more properly reflects the gold and silver stocks. The XAU is an index of 30 stocks vs. 18 stocks in the HUI and 40 stocks in the TGD. Some stocks are common to all three indices.
I am sure those who have survived through the most recent gold stock ‘drop zone’ have the same feeling as one would have being on a roller coaster. The trouble is, as everyone knows, when you are on a roller coaster you can’t exactly get off at the top. The vicarious thrill of the roller coaster is going through the drop. As to whether one gets a vicarious thrill of continuing to own gold stocks through the drop is not known. Some people even ‘hurl’ during the drop. The good news is as with a roller coaster, one eventually hits the bottom and the long ride to another top gets underway.

This post was published at Gold-Eagle on November 27, 2014.

Clarion Call, Ep. 3: Apple Computer is worth HOW much Silver?

Jon

In this week’s Clarion Call, we take a look at the market cap of Apple Computer, then compare it to the nominal GDP’s of several nations, and are left with a dizzying perspective. Lastly, for kicks, we take the monstrous number of this one company, and place it beside the tea-cup poodle known as the ‘physical silver market’.

This post was published at The Wealth Watchman on NOVEMBER 28, 2014.

Can QE Prop Up Asset Prices Forever?

Jon

Popular Myths and a Shrinking Work Force It’s not just voters who buy into popular myths. Many investors do too. Few have wider appeal than the myth that central banks can create economic growth via the printing press.
What central bankers and their supporters seem to forget is that growth comes from living, breathing human beings.
It often sounds a lot more complicated than it really is. But genuine economic growth comes from two things: the number of workers in the labor force and the productivity of those workers.

That’s a problem for the US. Because according to a recent report in The Economist, its potential labor force is set to grow at less than one-third the 0.9% rate we saw between 2003 and 2013.

This post was published at Acting-Man on November 28, 2014.

Did Bernanke Really Save The World?

Jon

Ben Bernanke and his teenaged Wall Street media groupies like to claim that he saved the world with QE. But if QE was such a cureall why has the ‘recovery’ in Japan and Europe been so weak? The ECB printed money out the wazoo for a while and the BoJ is giving Japan, the US, and everybody else an all out BoJob. Yet only the US is rising.
The Fed and friends all pump cash into the same banks all around the world…

This post was published at Wall Street Examiner on November 26, 2014.

“Panicking” Ukrainians Face Soaring Prices, Warn “Inflation Is War”

Jon

With Ukraine, according to President Poroshenko, on the verge of World War III, it appears the people of the divided nation face another all too familiar war… on their living standards. As Hyrvnia continues to collapse to record-er lows, Ukraine’s Central Bank warns of further stress and FX (think USDollar or EUR) demand because the “population is in panic.” With a 19.8% inflation rate last month and a 48% devaluation in the currency this year, Bloomberg reports the costs of imported goods from gasoline to fruit and from medicine to meat is soaring. One store-owner reflected that she “feels the hryvnia devaluation everywhere,” and another noted “I can’t imagine how people survive on a single pension. We can’t even go to the drug store. We try to use herbs instead.” The Central bank expects inflation to keep rising (having previously peaked at 10,256% in 1993 as the Soviet economy was dismantled). “Inflation is the same as the war,” warns one analyst, “it may lead to protests if people blame the authorities for failing to conduct proper policies.”

This post was published at Zero Hedge on 11/27/2014.

IRS Hunting People Who Sell Anything on EBay

Jon

The following notice was sent out by EBay warning people that the IRS is matching records now between internet companies to make sure you pay taxes on selling any old stuff. EBay wrote:
We are writing today with an urgent message in regards to PayPal account(s) associated with your eBay account.
The IRS recently notified PayPal that the legal business name and/or Taxpayer Identification Number (also known as a TIN) on one or more PayPal account(s) associated with your eBay account does not match what the IRS has on record. If this discrepancy is not corrected, in order to comply with applicable regulations, PayPal will limit the affected PayPal account(s). If these PayPal account(s) are limited, you will not be able to receive payments to these PayPal account(s).

This post was published at Armstrong Economics on November 27, 2014.

Each Investor Can Become His Own Central Bank

Jon

Translation of the interview for Oroyfinanzas.com
Oroyfinanzas: These last few weeks half of the planet’s stock markets reached historical heights. Do you see this upward movement continuing going forward?
Fabrice Drouin Ristori: I would answer in two parts:
First, in nominal terms (measured in paper currencies), stock markets have effectively been growing these last years, but evaluating an asset in a devaluating currency (dollar or euro) does not lead to a clear vision of its performance. In order to get a clear idea of its performance, I think it is best to eliminate the monetary factor and compare an asset against other real assets, such as gold or oil, for example. And if we use this method over a long period, we realise that the stock markets do not really perform highly. This performance is an illusion due to the depreciation of paper currencies.
Secondly, stock markets are not the free markets they once were. We now know that central banks intervene massively in those markets, distorting their value by creating demand coming directly from liquidity injections into the system. So as long as central banks keep monetising the stock markets, we will continue to see a high performance in nominal terms, but not in real terms.
Thus, if central banks continue to intervene in the stock markets, they can continue rising in nominal terms.
Oroyfinanzas: Is this rise justified, seen through the lens of economic fundamentals and corporate results?
Fabrice Drouin Ristori: No. The price-to-earnings ratios are approaching levels of over-valuation like the ones of the last speculative bubble of the 2000’s. As I was stating above, the current valuation of the stock markets has strictly nothing to do with fundamentals, and everything to do with central banks’ interventions. Or else, for instance, how could one explain that trading volumes on stock markets have been plunging these last few years, while stock prices are rising? It doesn’t make any sense, unless one factors in central bank interventions.
Oroyfinanzas: Is there a mutual relationship between central banks and stock markets?
Oroyfinanzas: Is there a mutual relationship between central banks and stock markets?
Fabrice Drouin Ristori: The majority of investors keep an eye on the stock markets’ performance. A rising stock market may provide the illusion of economic health and comfort for the masses. And this is what governments and central bankers have been trying to sell us since 2008, while the fundamentals of the real economy keep on deteriorating.
This is the reason why central banks, certainly at the behest of governments, intervene in those markets. This is, notably, the role of the Plunge Protection Team in the United States.

This post was published at Gold Broker on Nov 27, 2014.

The Welfare Costs of Amnesty – Chump Change

Jon

It annoys me that we get stories like this. The Social Security costs of putting 4 million illegal immigrants onto the rolls of Social Security will cost taxpayers $2 trillion. This is an estimate by someone at the Heritage Foundation.
What we need is for this guy to study the size of the net unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare. Prof. Lawrence Kotlikoff has used Congressional Budget Office figures – which the CBO now suppresses – to estimate the costs: over $200 trillion.
If the Heritage Foundation wanted to tell the truth, the researcher would hold his press conference and say this…

This post was published at Tea Party Economist on November 26, 2014.

Goldman Sachs joins three other major in banks in lawsuit tied to metals manipulation

Jon

The price rigging and manipulations just keep on coming in the Western financial system as a new lawsuit filed against Goldman Sachs, HSBC, and two other major banks accusing the institutions of wide-spread price fixing in Platinum and Palladium over a sever year period has been filed in Federal court this week.
The lawsuit filed in a court in Manhattan was done by Modern Settings LLC, a Florida-based maker of jewelry and police badges, and brings a to a judge a case where losses incurred to both businesses and customers equates to millions of dollars in over-pricing tied directly to commodity broker manipulation.
Four major global firms are to appear in a New York court accused of manipulating platinum and palladium prices for eight years. The law suit is the first of its kind in US history…

This post was published at The Daily Sheeple on November 27th, 2014.

Thankful For Inflation? Turkey Day Dinner Is Up 6,000% Since 1909

Jon

While not hyperinflating, the slow and insidious diminishment of the fiat US Dollar’s purchasing power (and thus the living standards of lower- and middle-class Americans – who are not balls deep invested in the US stock ‘market’) is nowhere more evident than in the soaring costs of Thanksgiving Day dinner during the Fed’s 100 year reign…

In 1909… Thanksgiving Day Dinner cost $0.50…

This post was published at Zero Hedge on 11/27/2014.

IIMA and World Gold Council set up India Gold Policy Centre

Jon

The centre is aimed towards conducting cutting-edge research on all aspects of the Indian gold industry.
The objective of the ‘India Gold Policy Centre’ is to develop insights into how the significant stocks of gold that India owns that can be used to advance growth, employment, social inclusion and the economic wealth of the nation. It aims to conduct research that has a practical application and that the industry and all stakeholders can use, leading to the development of an effective gold ecosystem in the country.
“As part of the initiative taken by IIMA to connect more closely with practice, and in line with our vision to contribute and reach out to industry, the Gold Centre will provide innovative solutions and insights for the gold industry through cutting-edge research. The research is intended to study the growth and development of the gold industry in India and globally,” said Ashish Nanda, Director, IIMA.
Commenting on the collaboration, Somasundaram PR, Managing Director, India, World Gold Council said,”It is estimated that India holds around 22,000 tonnes of gold valued at over a trillion US dollars. This historic asset can be used to enhance the nation’s prosperity by putting it to work for the economy, creating jobs, developing skills, generating exports and revenues. To develop gold’s potential, we need to understand gold’s role in the Indian economy, through high quality data, insights and research.”

This post was published at Indian Express