Well our latest gold rally lasted almost ONE day....

Wednesday December 10, 10:56 pm Eastern Time

Homestake, Prime Resources drop plans to buy mine

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec 10 ( Reuters ) - Homestake Mining Co ( NYSE:HM - news ) and Prime Resources
Group Inc ( AMEX:PRU - news; Toronto:PRU.TO - news ) said on Wednesday they had dropped plans for a
$110 million acquisition of the Troilus gold mine from Inmet Mining Corp ( Toronto:IMN.TO - news ) .

Homestake and Prime Resources, a 50.6 percent-owned subsidiary of Homestake Canada, had announced Oct.
30 that they intended to buy 51 and 49 percent stakes, respectively, in the Troilus mine.

The transaction had been scheduled to close Dec. 17.

``Homestake and Prime have determined on the basis of due diligence studies that the conditions of the offer to
purchase the Troilus mine will not be satisfied and accordingly they will not proceed with the transaction as
announced,'' Homestake said in a statement.

A spokesman for Homestake was not immediately available for further comment.

Homestake said in October that acquiring the mine would have increased its proven and provable gold reserves by
about 1.4 million ounces, a seven percent increase over the 20.4 million ounces the company reported at the end
of 1996.

Yeah, 4 or 6 hour rally and the Bugs were having orgasms! I hate to think what'll happen if it ever goes Bull!

The most important "what if's" in this release have to do with $250.00 gold!

http://www.kitco.com/cgi-bin/comments/investment/display_short.cgi#start?SHOWTYPE=SHORT

This should send shivers down your spine. http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a48156.htm

Yeah,the euphoria of this morning-afternoon appears to be a tad premature ( and I thought I was impulsive ) .....grasping @ straws...eh!
Feb Gold down .80 ( low for the evening ) Guess that Asian equity money isn't going into gold~~~~~~

They lost to a 2-15 team~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~go gold!

Down 1.70~~~~~~~~~~The carnage will NOT be over till EMU is completed...

Feb. Gold down 2.10 ( and it's so quiet here ya can hear a pin drop ) --looks like todays trial balloon has been pricked ( POP )

Swing chart updated.
10 day m/a has just crossed over.
The recent uptrend of the indices do not show strength nor breadth.
The coming sell-off should exceed the previous one.
Asia's demise will merely add fuel to the fire.
http://www.kitcomm.com/pub/discussion/swillll1.gif

News server, News Server, it's just a statisical quirk. And if they're talkin' and not dead yet, they're lyin'.

Geez, glad I've been in the stock market for 13 years and believe in DIVERSIFICATION----to constantly put all your eggs in the same basket is a recipe for failure.....drip..drip..drip

LGB: I, too am very pleased with the takeoff of silver as I have been long the stuff from a long time ago ( while it was still dropping ) . My gold shorts have been paying off hansomely, as well and it is all due to the fabulous help of my broker who is at the same firm as RJ's. Not all brokers are bad people. However, I've learn ed that most are just plain incompetemt. The one I had at that firm before this one almost manged to run me into the ground ( despite 25 years of experience ) but I was saved from the maw of destruction just in the nick of time. This new one hs managed to build my metals holdings up substantially since the summer when I was nearly wiped out.
Along the same line, I've been wanting to post to you the summary of an article on the front page of the LA Times a few weeks ago while I was in computer limbo. It was about how the fund managers of the Getty Trust managed ( in their infinite wisdom ) to short the stock market in 1996 and lost more than $400 million. ( Even that ain't chicken feed to the Getty Foundation! ) My point in bringing this up is that they ( the professionals at Getty ) looked at al the same market data that is available to all of us ( perhaps even more ) and, after looking at the odds and after figuring out all the possible scenarios, decided to short the market. I suspect that they weren't influenced by any newsletter writers like Puetz or radio commentators like the guy on "Money Talk" ( whose name escapes me at the moment ) . They came up with the idea of shorting the market all by themselves by honestly studying and evaluating the data at hand. They were wrong! End of issue. So, even professionals can be massively wrong. There is plenty of data out there, even today, to suggest that they were perhaps way early in their predictions but that they still may be right. Rather than ascribing nefarious intentions to Puetz and RJ, I perfer to think that perhaps they are just off in their timing.
Having gotten that off my chest, I'm off to check the current prices of silver and gold. Tomorrow should be fun. BTW Silver is now in backwardation. The COMEX was unable to complete deliveries for December which is why it took off today. The raw data has been there for weeks to suggest this. It was only a matter of interpreting it correctly. That gold couldn't muster any more to the upside in the face of silver's explosive muve up bodes ill for the yellow.

Down 10.90~~~~~~~~~~~~~~good night all!!

Ted this old gold price doing a yo-yo hmmm
SDRer so the journalists smell a story within the IMF? The IMF & THe world bank are unused to public scrutiny, this will be interesting.
Had to explain to JM fella what backwardation means, credit to my teachers at kitco!

Thanks to all who generously post their knowledge and insights,

auranotpopinganycorksyet

ALL: Has anyone been over to check the foreign markets! My gosh! The ONLY one that is up is Pakistan!! Hang Seng down over 6%! We live in interesting times...

Welcome to Tudor's Trading Desk
This page provides links to stock
market related charts, quotes and news.
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/7028/

ALL: S & P is down 1090 on Globex.

International Socialist Marxist planning for a one world government requires the elimination of the middle class. As such, you will see gold and silver go down to the point ( whatever that is ) that will cause people ( average type ) to sell in a panic every OZ they own to stop the lost of all they have invested.
Then when the price is at the lowest the bankers will come in and buy all their is. Then they will say GOLD is king.

We double posted mate----but we are currently at opposite ends of the spectrum as I'm lapsing into a COMA and your only at dinner time...See what ya can about kick-starting gold while I sleeeeeep........Have a good evening bro!!! G'night~~~~~~~~~~

What is a good site for overnight S & P futures?

THE MISSING LINK: I don't know if it will serve your purposes but I get mine from http://www.cme.com/cgi-bin/flash.cgi Go down to the bottom and click on "Globex Flash Page". Hope it helps.

Crusty NZ not looking good, 6 for 99, chasing S Africa 175

Aurator - finally caught you ( damn time zones ) !
I read your 04:15 post. Your wire fraud conspiracy hypothetical is the sort of nice legal conundrum which hopefully will keep us all employed for the next decade or two !
I hear New Zealand is famous for its sheepdog trials - ever done one of those !?

Thanks, it seems that CNBC starts the trading day with the overnight S&P number before DOW trading begins. It usually show the beginning direction.

I wonder how the Federal Reserve likes U.S. Treasury note market overhang from Asia. I bet it feels alot like owning gold and having central banks threaten to sell all the time. The problem is that I am in the U.S. and it will hurt me too.

Thanks, it seems that CNBC starts the trading day with the overnight S&P number before DOW trading begins. It usually show the beginning direction.

I wonder how the Federal Reserve likes U.S. Treasury note market overhang from Asia. I bet it feels alot like owning gold and having central banks threaten to sell all the time. The problem is that I am in the U.S. and it will hurt me too.

what is happening to platinum

There are more things in heaven and earth, Auratio ... ( etc. )
P.S. - Just joking about the sheepdogs ( I loved "Babe" ) .
Must go to the Land of Nod ...

Does someone know who is the players in platinum mining, is it a by product? Not familiar with plat mining

Why is the country with the biggest per capita debt load considered a safe haven by your peoples?
Come on, wake up and buy some ( *more* ) gold before its to late. Keep away from those paper promises. Y'all hear?

why always focus on the Bill Clinton negatives. The man likes puppies for cryin' out loud.

Fidelity Select American Gold & Precious Metals Chart.
Ten market days ( seven hours / prices per day )
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/5969/agpm70.htm

Scaled Up this AM with big chips. Liked the bounce off
the 18 year low.. Impressed that it held it's gain in a
DOWN market

Read previous posts by John Disney,
he knows the subject very well.

refer; that's a question for John Disney. Next time you see him posts; ask.
Large platinum producers in South Africa are basically one metal operations; although the large Nickel producers in Canada and Russia produce platinum group metals as a by-product.

Its in the charts. Check out the Oct 89 S&P chart. It looks to me like stocks will end up posting only a 5% gain for 1997. We're headed back to about 780 quicker than Ruykeyser's elves will be able to say say ho-oh-oh.

Silver--making money while I sleep...what a life. Silver hit my first target tonight. wouldn't chase it if I were you. Wouldn't risk shorting it.

Could you please specify the location of International
Socialist Marxist Planning Center for the World Government?

I really dislike these guys, they are damn crooks, as appears now.
Last time
I had a serious dispute with them ( 10 years ago or so ) they claimed that their lovely Marxist Theory teaches them to shoot all these bloodsucking
bankers right on the spot and dump these bankers dirty gold into
the stinking toilet. They also stated in public that nobody needs gold
under happy Marxist management, and all, that people ( working people
of course ) should do, is just to unite.

I would be very grateful if you could comment on these new developments
in Marxist Planning for the World, which you mentioned in your post.

And please, I need to know where these sons of Marx are sitting?

"There is no credible evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of the President or the First Lady. This is a recording."

I really appreciated the ones who committed suicide by shooting themselves behind the left or right ear or in the back of the head. Some black humor on the part of the victim - just to stir up some conspiracies. I bet their suicide notes were a riot.

Dear friends and fellow kitconians. Gentle admonitions.

Cmon guys you all MUST calm down. I have witnessed an exercise

in mass hysteria among very intelligent people that I expect

better of. This silver spike has worked you into

a frenzy. The tiny burp in the gold price ( largely due

to a slightly weaker dollar ) has made you victims of

GRAND BEWITCHMENT. I could almost see little cheerleaders

in the corners of my screen ( and they were cute too ) .

Yesterday morning I told you and I quote

"Date: Wed Dec 10 1997 04:06

John Disney__A ( Technicolour dreaming on a summers day ) ID#24140:

All the leaves were GOLD ??

Golden Dreams ----

My own major up trend line for platinum looks like

a low of about 362 is in the cards. Using Disney's

universal constants of 0.74 and 0.69 for the platinum

gold ratios at which I anticipate 1st and 2nd

resistances for gold - I anticipate a bounce and

maybe a bottom at 0.74 * 362= 268 and an absolute

bottom at 0.69*362 = 250 $$$$$.

Should silver continue up to say 5.75, that could

give you a au/ag ratio of 250/5.75 or 43/44 after

breaking long term support at 57.5. I would prefer

a ratio of 38.5 which would be a third fibonacci

of that prior support - maybe accomodate by silver to

6.5?? "

OK I think I am on the right track. If you wish to

follow you're welcome. Platinum is almost to 364 from

377 yesterday - we are very close. I would like a gold

silver ratio of below 40.

Going at it from a different direction, The gold chart

in dm looks like good support at 480 dm/oz. The swiss

chart is harder but I think you can assume a down

channel bottom at 395 SF/oz ( this is new low teritory ) .

Gold in yen probably supports at 36000 yen.

So look at your charts, and remember patience in a virtue,

and things rarely go straight up.

I get a number like 480 dm/1.785= 269

or in swiss - 395/1.445 or = 273

( a bit stronger swiss also gets = 269

or in yen 36,000/129 = 279 ( !!nono )

lets weaken the yen to 134 = 269

check with platinum at 362 *.74 = 268

In other words, Im starting to like 269 better than 250 as it ties

in better with likely support in currencies. The market

is looking better, with better action in the mines,

but there will be a few fakeouts I fear along the path

to this bottom.

Puppy for crying???

Where are in the hell all these animal lovers???

Get HIM, guys!!!

"Love Potion Number Nine" was not sung by the Fifth Dimension. It was the Coasters, otherwise I have no argument.

Back to the Elvis '68 special. He's singing "Johnny B. Goode."

"Bill Clinton is having a problem Christmas shopping - store clerks are not accepting
Chinese cash." Jay Leno

Happy that Prime and Homestake dropped their plan to buy Troilius ( ? ) . IMO, their large cash positions can be put to much better use. Prime Resources pumps out about 12 million silver ounces yearly, which is reported as a gold equivalent.

Expect a large short term ( 13 month ) increase in silver production from the TVX/PDG, La Coipa Operation that will come from a satellite orebody starting sometime in 1998.

Elvis Special? Since Canadian TV bought our TV3 we have mostly had good programming, but last night it was that famous Mexican Elvis impersonator called "El vez" live at the Horseshoe ( ? ) Toronto

NZ loses to S Africa by one run, good on yer

best ways to play platinum? stock,coin,options. I like stocks but not very happy with stillwater

Does anyone have an idea how much above ground platinum exists at the
present time, and what the estimated ( proven ) underground supplies might
be worldwide? ( or where I can begin to find out ) I have been told
that Ballard Power is presently using 300-400 ounces per month just
developing their fuel cells -- will there be enough platinum around
to supply the market when these cells are perfected ?? I don't think
so. In addition a diesel fuel company has recently discovered that
adding 5 ppm platinum to diesel fuel reduces emissions by 25% - with the
emphasis on reducing "green house gases" platinum demand is sure to
increase. Any information on supply would be greatly appreciated.

For Salty from Crusty

It will be MUCH easier for RSA to bowl out the North American

Mines than the New Zealand Cricket Team. This is outstanding cricket

at its BEST.

I wonder if some guys believe the US has the world's best cricket

team.

HM putting cash to better use--Hows about like say, a "friendly takeover" of some warehouse stocks of Gold? Might help their owners ( shareholders ) in the process too. Just a thought...

Hey Oris

I LIKE what you did to that BEER CAN. What a RUSH.

The Elvis I'm watchin' ain't live no mo. Would love to see El Vez for sure. Maybe can catch on the Spanish channel here.

What's this? Baseball games in Dec.? Oh, are you in the "land down under" where the bathwater spins the wrong way?

Anyone heard from STUDIO.R today. Kinda worried after his last episode with the .357 mag. His caretaker, Cool Lurk, usually keeps us advised.

For crying out loud;Silver has just rallied from it's low at
4.35 to 6.00.A 20% appreciation has been met with a shrug here.Just
a foreshadowing of the coming move in gold to come.8% Bulls.
GO GOLD!Cheers...just a test.

If you're still short the SnP form 987.00 reverse your position here ( 961-962 ) with 957.00 stop. Tonight's pull back in gold is normal keep stops under the lows. If we are going to have a decent move in the gold the XAU will have to rally 30% or more from it's lows.

You asked, I did. My respect..
Besides all, you gave me a REASON
why I need to go to the shooting range again..
By the way, just 3 mile from my place, no big deal.
At least this time I did not just waste an ammo,
but proved to myself I can be grateful to somebody
and do something useful for somebody...

You want me to waste another beer can on your behalf?

John Disney: Please advise Oris to get a 75 or 100 round drum for the AK. A lot less time wasted.

If gold does its usual nosedive tomorrow, I may shoot myself 2 or 3 times in the back of the head.

Crusty,

it gets worse. Soccer was once ( only ) an Olympic sport, who do you think won the GOLD medal? Yup. the good ol' USA.
salty

BTW, I was looking for a good general Platinum URL for JEW and refer who asked general questions, being too tired to string sentences together myself, doesn't seem to be one on the kitco links page, wondering in anyone can help.. thanks...a FAQ file is looking better all the time.

I join elf in wishing Byron well, just have a look at his contribution to the links page and the newbies will understand why we miss him.

Byron have you tried to post within hotmail?

Tim
This spinning earth!, kitco has brought *spin* very much to mind. I find myself thinking of the time in Cape Breton, in Irving, in Canberra, and so on -- I thought i found a *nice* legal question earlier. Now if only Vronsky would offer something for that baby, international conspiracy to commit wire fraud on the net would fly further than throwing a writ at a CB.

Nick@C NZ draw with Aussie at the bottom of the Carlton Series.



auraroundfourabit

HM: "A Focus on Growth" I posted here a couple of days or a week or so ago that HM in their Annual Report & 3rd. Qtr Report.
They discussed using put and call options in the $326 - $336 range. They say they have cash "@ current low Gold prises.....evaluating a number of good growth opportunities"

The big "E" wears that Gold good doesn't he.

For Dave in CO

I think that was Oris with the .357. He is fine and performing

good works in the Beer Can department.

For Oris

YES get another one.

For whoevah it was - DI menshun Numba five is my place of abode -

no reference to any tacky rock group.

To anyboby-

I am lost on that naxos PM analysis pilot plant thingo - Is

that the gold and platinum from dirt people ?? Is Bernatz

in their technical Department?? We need an organization

chart.

A lot more time is needed to load this damn drum, and it's heavy too.
Prefer 30 rounder...

In regard to shooting yourself in the back of the head - it could be tricky, unless you got snubnouse+long reach+mirror, or you got a good
trusted friend ready to assist..

I had this kind of gold-related desire myself a couple of times, but was able to overcome. Would recommend you, my
friend, to start drinking, it helps a lot, but never, I repeat, never
mix vodka and beer together!


Best regards

You're the only one who listens to me ( i.e., the responsibility is yours ) so here goes:
The entrance to Kitco reads, "Group Therapy for Goldbugs." That's nice, that's cute, but what about those of us goldbugs who are becoming suicidal? People in Hong Kong are jumping out of windows. The guy in Maylasia who was making $400K a year is selling sandwiches, but how long until he throws himself in his cooler to die of hypothermia? Our gold investments are down about as much as Asia's markets.

IS THERE A PSYCHOLOGIST IN THE GROUP?

Gold fakes me out today and the manic side takes over. Tonight and tomorrow it goes down and the depressive side sets in.

We need an ( 800 ) number and group therapy for suicidal goldbugs.

Comments please.

Deep in the mountain cold, wet, and eager to find ...

Thank you very much for your high estimate of my modest work.

We got some snow tonight, so I have some doubts about tomorrow,
but I will certainly waste the second can until the end of the week, promise. Must go now to get some sleep.

Best regards...

it takes bone crushing hard work to find it and get it and that's if you are very lucky.

Thanks, oris. I just needed somone to talk to. And I took your advice about the vodka. Feeling much better.

But when I wake from my drunken stupor and if gold is down, I know the depression will set in again. Do you suggest vodka in the morning? After a couple of bloody Marys, I may fall in love with Sue Hererra, and that will complicate things even more.

I am not a doctor or shrink or anything but I think you should at least put a hold on suicide. Hard work on the front lines. There is no equivelence between hard work and sweat and those air kissers and their smog-free utopia.

Great idea!

Want to join you guys, if allowed.

Talk to you later, really need some sleep right now.

Being as familiar as I am with erections, take a look at the Gold chart to your left. I am not about to jump off of one like that.

If you're the Sen. Smith of "Mr. Smith goes to Washington" that's close enough. I'll give it a few more days. Just don't vote for the Kyoto clean air treaty, please.

And oris and I at least will have our ( 800 ) number group therapy while shooting the 30 round magazines through the AK47's.

Off to take my medication.

GO BIG "E" SHAKE THAT GOLD!!

Good Night All

Just hold on, buddy, I am with you, we will overcome some day.

I do have experience, I will share with you tomorrow.

I am also a doctor, but not M.D., just Ph.D., but who cares?

Have one more shot of vodka, relax and everything is donna be

just fine, trust me!

Besides all, we got John Disney on our side, and he is not gonna let

us down!

Take care..

How does vodka mix with lithium, prozac, zoloft, effexor, elavil, ativan, valium, Preparation-H, and kaopectate? No need for the .357 mag. maybe.

Aurator, picking on americans when they are all asleep? NZ cricket just doesn't have much to Crowe about these days.....

Sorry, I mean "gonna", not "donna". I have no idea what "donna" means,
unless it's a shortcut for "madonna". In this case "madonna" means
singer or may be singer is "madonna"?

Damn!.. I feel real dizzy tonignt..

...................................

O'yes! Madonna is a Singer!!! Got it!

Dave in CO

I feel like I can not leave you along right now...

You asked me a diffucult question in regard to mixing vodka
with other medicine. To tell you the truth, I do not know what
is going to happen, I got to try... Will try tomorrow, and if you
hear from me again, it means it didn't work..

By the way, I believe Dr.Kevorkian offers some treatment.., but I hate
to deal with middleman...

Well, unfortunately I need to go now, but stay cool, I trust you,
man, we will fix all our problems, now we got a .357 team, we will fight
and we will win...

Good night.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/korea_2.html

Can anyone here recommend a site
for information about coin/bullion
dealers in Europe which would
include info about system how its
done??

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/dlr_stumbles_vs_yen_1.html

what happened to platinum? help, please, anybody.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/ny_precious_metals_e_2.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/mof_says_ready_to_ac_2.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971209/canadian_dlr_could_f_1.html

Looks like a bad case of Asian Contagion goin' around, mate!

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/indonesia_nerves_new_1.html

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/971210/business/stories/morgan_1.html

http://nypostonline.com/business/1566.htm

Thanks for
http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/971210/business/stories/morgan_1.html
This is a must read!

And to John Disney-our very fine South African respresentative on Kitco- Thanks John! You do us proud. How could you ever have got the nickname 'Crusty'?? When you're really so dear??!! [:-}}

What is happening to everyone?? I'm so busy , I have little, if any time to come in-

And now? Group Therapy again? Vodka? Prozac- OH My!!!

Keep your spirits up, Clan - it's great that you have support from all corners of the earth!

Take care- and very best regards,

Colleen

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971209/russia_suspends_fund_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/ukraine_debt_1.html

Just a followup on the silver charts - astrological and price varieties -

As posted in the latest Astrological Investor earlier, and in answer to emails regarding same, I see strength for silver into next week, at the least, maybe 'til Christmas, with possible price chart resistance at $6.30. There may be some

hesitation there. A further breakout from that level might indicate we're going to around $7.35 on this move. If it gets there quickly, I'd take profits and wait to see

if the Saturn/NYSE Moon conjunction in March brings a reaction back to around

$6.25. After that is over with, the upside potential for silver could be just under $10 next year. IMVHO of course.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971207/bank_lending_to_asia_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971207/bis_mulls_why_market_1.html

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/exclusiv/971211.ex.BROWN.Ruddy.GagOrderBroadened.EntireAFIPStaff.Cogswell.Hause.html

Only market I can see not in the red is; South Africa, JSE ALL Gold
+11.3 ( +1.68% ) and S&P 500 ( -1070 ) .

http://www.theage.com.au:80/daily/971209/bus/bus10.html

Donald: Thank you , as always, for great updates on what's happening in the world!

Mike Sheller: Long time! Great call on Japan and 11 Cap !! [ My own Moon=10Cap, so tat was of particular interest to me. ??!!?? Oh My!!

ALL:

What do you think of Fred Crooks's update on his Synchronicity of Tidal Activity & Stockmarket Dynamics dd 21/11/97? Tried to send you by e-mail,Mike, but had no response from you. Did you get it? I'll quote [e & OE]:

"This is a courtesy supplement and must not be interpreted as a prediction. It is a targeting excercise complicated by the fact that two market tops developed. The Dow peaked at 8340 on 7th August and has been in a bear phase ever since. The main public speculative pressure is concentrated on secondary stocks such as the S & P 500. These exceeded their 7 August tops and peaked on 7 October. This divergence is a strong indicator that the bull market is over.

New Time Targets are:
Dow 17 December 1996--7 August 1997--+-29December 1997
SA Industrials: Likewise
S & P 500: 14 April 1997---7 October 1997---+-23 January 1998
[29 Dec 97 & 23 Jan98 are on BOLD on his letter, but cannot do bold on Kitco ?]
The BOLD dates are probably synchronous actions in the S & P and Dow.
Price targets are:
Dow +-5000
S & P +-600

Please understand that they are high probabilities indicating climax days in quick successions of price declines, followed by strong bounces and further declines down to maybe 2001/2002. New calculations will be required if these targets are not met. I take no responsibility for your actions in this regard etc.......

Whats a coupon pass, and what is the significance of the Fed doing
about $2 Billion a day several days in a row?

Thanks

ASIAN DOMINO STOCK MARKETS AT DAYS MERICIFUL END

-1.48%

+0.11%

-5.46%

-0.54%

-4.77%

-2.60%

-7.41%

-1.25%

-0.52%

-5.62%

+0.42%

-2.74%

-4.90%

You ask what figure belongs to which country? Like fallen dominos, they all look the same with their faces down in the financial gutter... it doesn't matter. One thing certain though, they will eventually and inevitably fall back on their cultural affinity to GOLD. Our Asian-Eagle shares his views:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/kutyn120497.html

Does anyone know if Echo Bay has any Russian exploration or mining interests?

Vronsky,

I don't where you are but here in Toronto, the business papers had their doom and gloom Asia article du jeur accompanied by a pix of Korean women turning in their infants' gold rings to "help the government". I doubt that the gold bashing can continue too much longer in view of the international currency/fiscal chaos.

Mo in To

Boy the Markets are a mess this morning ... everything is RED except my dear ole SILVER.... ( and it is bouncing wildly ..was up .25 last night )

Morning All!!

Hey! Brutus...Get the hell out of here...He's mine!

Okay...Okay...But I was just giving him a message, your Excellency!
( As Brutus exits, he reflects...Hmmmmm..."He who hath the gold maketh the rules"..."I'll get him"..."You just wait and see...He can't talk to me that way!"

You know, back in the mid-eighties, A.D., we lost about half of our banks around here. Also falling into the sink hole, were Continental Illinois, SeaFirst,Chase...I can go on. We deserved it.

Where was His Majesty, Candickus and the The I.M.F.?

Seems to me...let 'em eat their rotten cake...they baked it. If you don't like the rules... here's the fork...SPIN ON THAT!

Do any of you good people have Candickus's number...I'm feeling a little insolvent this morning!

DINES LATEST ON GOLD ( December 10, 1997 )

Internationally acclaimed newsletter editor, James Dines, shares his LATEST ON GOLD. Additionally, he calls attention to two of his favorite precious metals stocks: Agnico-Eagle and Stillwater Mining - both are hot-wired to their charts, just CLICK the name. It is also obvious analyst Dines cottons to silver:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials/dines120997.html

I think this is a great buy. I hope it goes lower today.

International Banking & Financial Report from BIS ( PDF download )
for those of you interested:
http://www.bis.org/press/index.htm

Jung@What's a coupon pass...
The Fed's way of adding liquidity to the system.
Doing $2bn a couple of days in a row? What will be said is probably
"Seasonal need" ( Christmas shopping ) , but there are those of us who
might choose to believe there are some liquidity problems in the
system which the Fed is attempting to address.

Is the price of Silver going up at present

because of the Christmas Season???

Just a thought:

Aeselw:

Using Minneapolis Fed CPI calculator here are the following equivalents of the 8/1979 low of 282.70 that we revisited lately:
$282.70 in 1997
1979= 127.48
1976= 99.91
1972= 73.40
1967= 58.65
1935= 24.06
1933= 22.83
1931= 26.69
1929= 30.03
In view of these inflation adjusted figures, does the bottome look pretty solid here, or is it as some have suggested, that gold never varies, it is the money that changes?

Thursday December 11, 5:08 am Eastern Time

SAfrica's JCI shares again under pressure

JOHANNESBURG, Dec 11 ( Reuters ) - JCI Ltd ( JHNL.J ) shares slipped almost five percent on Thurdsay in a weak Johannesburg market as concern over a possible takeover by Britain's Lonrho Plc ( quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: LRHO.L ) and the firm's own management structure continued to dog its price.

The shares were 1.10 rand or 4.80 percent lower at 21.80 rand on relatively light volumes of 126,000 shares.

``I think there's a lot of concern and it's two-fold. There's concern about the possible price between Lonrho and JCI and there has also been a recent questioning of the management structure,'' one trader said.

JCI on Tuesday confirmed it was in talks over a possible merger with Lonrho following the British firm's announcement on Monday that it was studying a takeover bid for South Africa's first black-owned mining house.

The company's directors also issued a statement that, on the issue of corporate governance, it would increase the number and frequency of formal board meetings.

South African newspaper reports have claimed that JCI chairman Mzi Khumalo and gold chief Brett Kebble had exercised a high degree of independence in the deals which they had done.

JCI's Tuesday comments on a merger were interpreted by analysts that it was manoeuvring for a better deal, but they still expected a full Lonrho bid.

Analysts reckon Lonrho was pitching for JCI with a 450-500 million pound offer -- around 26.00 rand a share. But Khumalo has made it clear that this was not sufficient.

``We believe our net asset value is anywhere north of 35 rand a share,'' he told reporters on Tuesday.

Dealers fear that the share price will suffer if this means that a takeover would be foiled by JCI playing too hard to get.

http://www.theage.com.au:80/daily/971209/bus/bus9.html

COLLEEN: Sorry about miscommunication. Been extremely busy. The dates you just posted confirm work being done by astrologer/CEO Chad Meek and myself. Chad has pinpointed Dec 29 as a critical day for the next slide to commence, while I am working with Jan 22 ( 23rd as well, of course! ) when Mars/Jupiter conjunction at 27 Aquarius SQUARES NYSE Sun!!!! This will likely be a panic phase, or jolting few days around this date for stocks. Am working on an Astrological Investor article to clarify this very phenomenon for the general investing public. What do they say about "Great minds," eh?

Certainly this is an impact of sorts, but the real factors driving silver pricing are simply supply and demand in a market that has been expanding while supplies have dwindled to historically low quantities.

every European market is down at this moment ... DAX -2.12 %
cac40 -2.28; FTSE is also down.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/australia_yield_spre_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/dollar_mark_testing__2.html

I expect to see quite a fight in the dollar/yen/mark and IMHO the dollar will be the eventual loser. People that keep talking about the flight to quality in the US market and dollar are in for a very rude awakening.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/mexico_loan_market_t_1.html

Coupon pass: Let me guess- this means the fed doesn't cash in its
coupons on teasury securities that it owns. Cashing them in would take money from the treasury which in the normal course of events would draw down the money supply.

Good mornin all.....Feb. Gold down 1.60 @ 2-8-7 ( What happened to that 'monster rally' of yesterday?? )

For what it's worth: Silver's Surge Helps Gold
Rise From 12 1/2-Year Low

By AARON LUCCHETTI
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Gold futures prices rose Wednesday, bouncing off near-18-year lows with
the help of a sharp spike in silver.

In trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange's Comex division, gold
for December delivery followed a rising gold price in the spot London
market, opening at $284.60 a troy ounce, nearly $2 above Tuesday's
close, the lowest in 12 1/2 years. By the end of the trading day
Wednesday, December gold rose $3.80 to $286.60 an ounce, while the
more-actively traded February 1998 gold contract marched $3.70 higher
to $288.60 an ounce.

Many traders started the day with eyes glued to gold, waiting to see if the
metal would dip to its lowest price level since the Carter administration.
But by the end of the day, attention turned to the silver-futures pit, where
traders took part in a buying frenzy. The most-actively traded March silver
contract rose 42.7 cents, or 7.8%, to $5.875 a troy ounce on the Comex.
The nearby December contract rose 43.2 cents to $5.827, the highest
closing price since February 1996.

"Clearly, this is a silver rally, not a precious metals rally," said William
O'Neill, chief futures strategist for Merrill Lynch Corp. in New York.
"Gold was up today, but it was kind of a reluctant follower."

Analysts say that the fundamentals for the two precious metals are
becoming so different that they look unrelated. Since July, silver futures
have jumped 16% higher while gold has tanked, setting 12-year-plus lows
and falling 15% in the same period. With the yellow metal, powerful
central banks hold significant influence because of their huge holdings of
that metal. Silver, on the other hand, isn't widely stored in central banks'
stockpiles and trades more like an industrial metal, analysts say.

And recently, the fundamentals for silver prices have been looking up.
Edward Kempf, an analyst with CPM Group in New York, said that
demand for the commodity has exceeded supply in every year since 1990.
Mr. Kempf is predicting another deficit next year of 172.4 million ounces.
Demand for the metal remains strong in applications from jewelry to
industry, and stockpiles have been dwindling to help fill the pipeline.

This week, silver stockpiles at Comex warehouses dipped to 124.1 million
ounces, the lowest level since 1985, an exchange spokeswoman said.
"Since the beginning of June, we've seen 80 million ounces disappear from
the Comex stockpiles," said Don Tierney, precious-metals analyst at Pell
Brothers Trading Co., a New York commodity-brokerage house. "A lot
of that silver has left the country, going to the U.K., India and the Far
East."

Despite growing demand for the commodity, however, many analysts said
they suspect the latest rally reflects a growing squeeze of the metal in
which powerful trading houses and funds hoard the metal and wait for
prices to go higher before selling at a profit.

"We're deeply suspicious" about the rally, said Dinsa Mehta, managing
director for global commodities at Chase Manhattan Bank in New York.
"We don't think the underlying fundamentals justify this move [in prices],"
he said.

To highlight the unusual nature of what is taking place in silver, analysts
point to the skyrocketing rate to lease the metal for one month, which rose
to about 7.5% of the metal's price Wednesday from less than 4%
Tuesday. Tim Porter, a commodities analyst at Refco Inc. said the
tightness of supply is particularly acute in metal that meets the exchange's
storage specifications. Also, traders noted that silver had slipped into a
condition called backwardation, where physical silver costs more than
silver for future delivery. Such a condition usually takes place when a
commodity stands in short supply and hasn't happened since the 1980s in
silver, analysts said.

Many analysts remain bullish on the metal's price prospects. Merrill
Lynch's Mr. O'Neill predicted silver futures would rise to $6 an ounce by
the end of this year. "There are a strong group of trade houses and hedge
funds that are buying up this market," he said.

Some analysts warn, however, that scaling back in Asian spending could
hurt silver demand in that key region, stopping the rally in its tracks. The
fall in the value of the Indian rupee makes silver more expensive to buy in
local-currency terms, analysts note. "India is extremely price-sensitive, and
[the decline of the Indian currency's value] will cause buying interest to
back off considerably," there, said David Rinehimer, head of futures
research for Salomon Smith Barney.

For gold Wednesday, silver's strength persuaded some speculators to get
out of their bearish "short" positions and take profits, said Pell's Mr.
Tierney. In the longer term however, the two metals will likely tell very
different stories. "You'll continue to see diverging price trends between
silver and gold as they continue to reflect their own supply and demand
fundamentals," said Mr. Rinehimer.

In other commodity markets:

ASIA:
December 11, 1997

Hang Seng Drops 5.5%;
Other Asian Markets Fall

An INTERACTIVE JOURNAL News Roundup

Dragged down by volatile currency markets and South Korea's economic
woes, stocks across the Asian-Pacific region plunged Thursday.

Hong Kong shares tumbled 5.5% Thursday, dragged down by rising
interbank rates and growing concerns about the regional currency crisis.

Other Asian-Pacific markets have been distracted by the news from South
Korea. Among other Asian markets, Taiwan fell 2.7%; Manila fell 4.9%,
Malaysia fell 7.4%, Indonesia fell 4.8%, and Thailand fell 4.9%.

In response to worries about South Korea's economic health, Seoul's
benchmark index fell 5.6% and the won plunged.

In Hong Kong, the blue chip Hang Seng Index fell 602.19 to 10420.22.

"There is too much regional turmoil that has led to fears that the external
problem will filter through to Hong Kong market," said Andrew Fernow,
research director at Vickers Ballas Hong Kong Ltd.

Mr. Fernow said the sharp fall in the South Korean won has rekindled
fears of more speculative attacks on the Hong Kong dollar and for
potential capital outflow from all Asian markets.

A rise in Hong Kong money market rates highlighted investors' concerns
about local currency stability. The benchmark three month Hong Kong
Interbank Offered rate climbed to 12% late Thursday, up from 10% late
Wednesday and 11% early Thursday.

Meanwhile, the currency volatility and worries about the fate of a proposal
to boost the economy and stabilize the finance sector sent Tokyo's Nikkei
down 2.6%. The Nikkei Stock Average of 225 issues closed at
16050.15, down 427.97 points.

"There are worries about the LDP's plan to
issue 10 trillion yen ( US$77.27 billion ) in
bonds to shore up the financial system," as it
appears that party members are not
unanimously in favor of the plan, said Sachio
Ishikawa, general manager at Chuo Securities.

After the close of trading in Tokyo, Japan's
ruling Liberal Democratic Party agreed to use
about 10 trillion yen to stabilize Japan's
financial system, senior party officials said.
However, the panel of senior party officials
still have not decided on whether to use new
issues to fund the plan.

Among Japanese investors, doubts have grown about the government's
ability to push through a proposal to issue deficit-covering bonds to shore
up the financial system.

Traders said concerns that the plan may not be approved by ruling Liberal
Democratic Party members are fueling market worries. Prime Minister
Ryutaro Hashimoto earlier this week instructed LDP officials to consider a
proposal by former chief cabinet secretary, Seiroku Kajiyama for the
issue.

As investors awaited the Bank of Japan's tankan, or quarterly survey of
business sentiment, scheduled for release Monday, they received little
incentive from Wall Street. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped
70.87 points to 7978.79, ending lower for the third straight session.

Traders said investors also were skeptical about the ruling Liberal
Democratic Party's package to stimulate the economy and stabilize the
financial system to be released next week.

Meanwhile, the drop in the won and Malaysian ringgit sent other
currencies reeling across the region.

The South Korean currency, the won, fell by its daily permissible limit, to
1,719.8 won to the U.S. dollar, only minutes after the start of trading
Thursday. The won is allowed to trade 10% from the previous day's
average rate, and this morning's fall by the limit was the fourth in as many
days. For the year, the won has depreciated 51%.

In late trading, the dollar was at 3.7300 ringgit, up from 3.6730 ringgit late
Wednesday.

The won's slide also had a contagious effect on the Indonesian rupiah,
which was traded at 4,545 rupiah to the U.S. dollar around 12:45 a.m.
EST. The currency traded at 4,425 late Wednesday.

In earlier trading, the U.S. dollar was HK$7.7475, sharply above the
HK$7.7440 level hit late Wednesday.

At the close, the U.S. dollar averaged 35.687 pesos on the Philippine
Dealing System, up 55.5 centavos from 35.132 pesos at Wednesday's
reference rate. The dollar hit a record high of 36.585 pesos during the
day, eclipsing the previous record of 35.981 pesos set Oct. 19.

The New Taiwan dollar lost 30.3 cents from its Wednesday close to
NT$32.532 against the U.S. dollar. In late trading in Tokyo, the dollar
was quoted at 129.25 yen, down from 129.40 yen late Wednesday in
New York.

Return to top of page
Copyright  1997 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

As usual WSJ didn't say a thing and covered all the bases. Presenting so many opinions it should be the official paper of the Pointless Forest.

Finding it damn hard to believe that platinum has fallen as far as it now has! 'Course, thought crude and heating oil were due for a move up yesterday also. Funny thing that crude. Saw it at my buy point yesterday and by the time I called my broker, it was south of that price so I did not go long. Never got to get stopped out. Platinum though....

Donald.....what was the recent high for ratio and what day? TYVM

Looks like it might hit its limit opening Down this morning.
Heading south fast now, at -1220.

CNBC financial celebrity and analyst par excellence, Gene Inger, provides us a dissection of last weeks action, and shares his prognosis of that to come in various markets:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/inger120897.html

Interesting behavior between the XAU and HUI indexs yesterday. Except for the early on spike in the HUI, the XAU was up much more than the HUI all day. Might be an early sign of general and continuing weakness and something that will need to be watched. The HUI should be advancing faster than the XAU.

In keeping with the various exchanges updating their systems to handle massive trading volume CNBC has announced they will soon unveil their new high-tech Full Metal Puppets. ( details to follow )

December 9th was the high. The close was 28.44. Intraday it was 28.64, also on the 9th

BARRICK GOLD PLANS ISSUER BID TO BUY BACK UP TO 10 PCT OF SHARES REUTERS

Eldo:

Perhaps the outperformance of the XAU to the HUI is just a reflection of risk appetite. With gold prices at these levels the viability of many companies comes into play. Those people wishing to take a shot at the sector are probably more concerned with survival than anything else. In our quest to load up on a few juniors we are going after those that we think will at least survive for 2 years with 280 gold. While I hope that it doesn't come to that, its best to get those long dated 'options'. As my brother once remarked, in a dog eat dog world its best to have a big dog.

http://www.hfxnews.southam.ca/story5.html As I said last night our premier ( Mac somethin ) is now in Ottawa lobbying the 'big chief' for more gov'ment HAND-OUTS to open another HIGH cost + sulpher coal mine in a very pristine oceanfront environment while out of the other side of his mouth he said there will be NO GOLD mining in CB as long as he is premier...SICK....as the Sydney "tar ponds" ( most toxic waste site in ALL of Canada ) continues to flow UNTREATED into Sydney Harbor...P.S. Sydney is Mac-somethin's ole home town....Even the environmentalists ( ??? ) are wacked-out here as there is not ONE word that hey,maybe burning + mining very HIGH sulpher coal ( that is totally UNCOMPETITIVE with world coal prices ) is not the 'thing' to do ( DUH ) ...This thing ( Devco ) is a gov'ment funded farce that loses MILLIONS of dollars EVERY year paid for by hard-workin Canadians who live in other areas....But Mac-somethin has principles and he won't let those nasty gold miners into our pristine ( ??? ) environment cause coal is the STUPID legacy of this place with its head in the sand ( hey Harlem used to be a farming community and do they dwell on the fact that they have to continue that legacy ) talk about living in the past ( DOOOOOOH ) ....Since I have lived ( ??? ) here the fed. gov'ment has spent 14 MILLION on a new gov'ment wharf in Sydney and a new Boardwalk along the Sydney waterfront--all of this to attract tour boats and tourists in general and you would think the NEXT step would be to clean up the 'Tar Ponds' and stop the PCB'S from washin up against the tour boats....eh??....A couple of weeks ago in a major Boston Newspaper ( travel section no less ) there was an article on tour boats and Sydney sayin people were AFRAID to leave the boat to enter such a POLLUTED + TOXIC environment....Is Mac-somethin or the rest of these bozoos fixating on this problem--NAAAAH...---they're too busy trying to get another high sulpher coal mine right on the oceanfront.....I always thought ( duh ) that Canada as a country was environmetally conscious as far as countries go but what other country lets UNTREATED PCB'S and god knows what else flow into a major harbor??

You have to be right about the Mark. The Bundesbank is not running the presses to bail out Wall Street bankers the way the Fed is. It makes me sick when they give this garbage about "helping our Asian friends" It is no such thing. They are helping Citicorp, Morgan, Chase and that bunch.

Hey them Wall Street Journal reporters can't help it if they ain't as smart as most Kitcoites ( grin thing ) ....ya got FOUR days for gold 400 and Dow 5,000 bro~~~~~~~~~~EB: GO GOLDen State......

I hope the big jump is'nt a mistake. Pleaseeeeeeeeeeeee.

.......and the slide in equities continues......

D.A. -- You could be right. But it wouldn't be the first time I've seen this behavior act as a leading indicator. This ultra-breakdown in the platinum also doesn't particularly bring 'relief' to the thought either. I'll now go back and watch the price behavior of the metals.

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/971210/business/stories/burgerking_2.html

Silver solder: also, someone asked why silver was going up: aside from the decades long draw-down & COMEX squeeze, I can personally relate that at the Fortune ( less ) 500 electronic firm wherein I scuttle to and fro, like a pair of ragged claws, our PCB fab lines are dumping heavy metal lead/tin solders and switching to happy, smiley-face eco-friendly silver/tin solders.

GO KYOTO GREENHOUSE EMISSIONS DOA TREATY!!! Bill Clinton on the boob-tube solemnly informing all Americans, that for the good of Planet Gae, we must pay $5/gallon greenhouse-emission tax ... while He & Congress toot around Washington DC in gas-guzzling limos. Isn't hypocrisy great?

Or, will Clinton buy a Geo Metro for the new presidential limo, in order to show he feels our pain??????

.......go bonds.........followed by gold....and gold equities..............

The IMF is an agency which works with those nations who are self refered. I know this is simplistic, but it is still true. They have a 'carrot' and wave it about to entise the desperate politicians whose screwups have finally come back to haunt them. No nation is forced to go there. If the Koreans wanted to handle it on their own they could have done so. Yes, it would have been a burnout situation, but they would have been in control of their own situation. Each nation that comes into an agreement with the IMF is making a pact with the devil, IMO. Two drunks hanging on each other, etc...

I take exception to the FT commentator's ascertian that there are no 'fundamental' macroeconomic problems in Asia. There are MAJOR systemic issues. Investors are rightly concerned when a situation begins to feed on itself either positively OR negatively. In the case of a rising market everyone was all smiles and warm fuzzies. In this meltdown the same basic action ( market ) is blamed. To me this is like blaming the air for your struggles when it gets difficult to breathe. Nice try, I don't buy it.

Down -101 at opering.

Donald:

Yes it is rather disgusting to see the IMF work to destroy a country so that the shareholders of CCI, BT, JPM etc take no hits. I'm sure in their calculus it is better to kill off a few small countries than to allow the contagion to move up the chain.

I keep wondering at what point will the countries under the boot say enough. If I was the president of Korea I might just be tempted to tell the IMF to take a hike. I'd then call my friendly neighborhood bankers and explain that all the debt owed by my corporations was not going to be serviced for a while and perhaps we could talk about a workout.

On the other hand the friendly nieghorhood bankers happen to reside in a country which has a large military presence in your bankyard to help you deal with some unfriendly folks up north. The bankers might be inclined to go to their congressmen demanding that the military exit and that the funds saved be used to compensate their losses. After all, if we can't make money on these people who really cares whether or not they are invaded and end up in a war.

No matter how this works out there are going to be lots and lots of very unhappy SE Asians. No doubt that they will be told that it was the 'bankers' that caused all their problems. I would not want to be an American bank manager working in S. Korea at the moment.

COMPANY NEWS ( sm ) provided by Dow Jones Online News


12/11/97 Barrick Gold To Buy Back Up To 31 Million Shares

TORONTO - ( Dow Jones ) - Barrick Gold Corp. ( ABX ) said it plans to repurchase up to 31 million common shares, representing about 10% of its shares floated publicly.
The company said Wednesday the buyback program is subject to regulatory approval. It said it plans to apply for such repurchases to take place on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange.
Barrick Gold is a gold-mining company.

Donald: Any idea how many dollars are being printed? It is nice to know that someone is trying to control the worldwide deflation, but it is not nice to know what will happen to our dollar after the dust settles. I think D. A. is right that the US markets will avoid an outright deflationary crash, and that our next big problem will be inflation, not deflation. The deflation may come later.

What worries me about our electronic method of printing dollars is that I don't know if there is anything that prevents money expansion without limit.

In this period of economic turmoil, one has to move quickly -- or just buy physical gold, sit back and watch everyone else run around.

IF gold doesnt rally soon we are going down again today. DA do you still have your silver options bye

I AM ALL FOR AN INCREASE IN THE FOSSIL FUELS TAX.
For years the American tax payer has subsidized the consumer and corporate user of fossil fuels.

Bite the bullet and realize we can pay now or future generations will pay a huge price later.... and for what ....the greed and ignorance of two generations that have had better lives than several before them and many that will be forced to pay & pay for their debauchery long after they are dead and gone.

Grow up my fellow Americans and stop crying into your Gold cup of designer Coffee!!!!!

For me, the importance of the article is that the struggle to
'restructure' ( to use the popular buzzword ) has begun.
If they are to save the system, they must have a global,
non-hegemonic, currency of account fixed to a standard benchmark
of value ( gold ) .
That means there must be changes in 'staff'; "Pricers" must go, to
be replaced by "Valuers".

Also Allen, if you have a moment, would you look at the
currency/gold/SDR thingy? It looks as if the currencies ALREADY have
a link to gold ( via the SDR ) ...or is that wishful observing on my
part?

This just in: Mr. Camdesuss has informed us that he has changed plans to vacation in S. Korea, travel plans have made for Mexico.

Don't you think we should be seeing more of these gold mining companies statements regarding stock buybacks at these prices?

Or is it due to the fact that cash is so tight that they don't want to part with any.

U of New South Wales ( whales there? ;- ) ) has developed a battery system which uses a solution of vanadium peroxide and plastic/graphite plates to store and release tremendous amounts of electrical energy. Prototypes of first generation system set up for solar as well as vehicle applications in proof of concept. VERY IMPRESSIVE.

The power storage capacity of the system is independent of the power delivery of the system. Also the system is able to deliver adjustable voltage to current delivery of power ( DC "transformer" analog ) . Power can be withdrawn from 95% to 5% of stored power with only a 20% drop in voltage. Chargable at 2 volts, even if dischargeing is set up at 100 volts or more. Impressive weight to power ratio potential since the components are plastic and an aquias solution of vanadium plus a few pumps.

Search: Vanadium?dox&New&Wales

How this relates to gold? This enables efficient, low cost electric vehicles. VERY BIG IMPACT on weight reduction, safety and economy. Exchange your fluid at "power" station. Takes two minutes. Go for another 2 - 3 days??? Conversion of economy from petrolium to electric. This technology is the first serious step to implementing a conversion of transportation systems away from oil dependency!!!

The American policy of "It's our currency, but it is your
problem" is coming to the end of a bumpy road. When we call
the AAA for a tow, the line will be busy...

Tolerant1: I'm saving all your unique word-marriages for future
use. ( e.g. 'Pointless forest' ) . What'll be the royalty fee?

This is Admiral Spud, stand at attention, Private!

Amerika does not not a "line the Politicians pockets" gasoline tax!

America needs:

1 ) Automobiles that get +100 mpg. If we could build the atomic bomb, we can *damn* well build a comfortable, efficient +100 mpg car. Dammit, I'm an engineer and this is just a bleeding engineering problem. We could build them, if we wanted.

2 ) Viable hydrogen fuel-cell usage & nation-wide infra-structure of hydrogen delivery.

3 ) Homes built to conserve energy & use passive solar heating, cooling.

4 ) Vast hemp plantations to grow the rope we will need to lynch the bastard politicans who have led us to this impending crisis.

Unfortunately DA, the problem with Korea is the loss of confidence with local investors. Its always the locals who sell the currency when things get tough. Its the confidence of the Korean investors that has to be restored. The IMF medicine while harsh is the correct remedy, just look at Mexico.

When the currency crisis hit in Mexico, you didnt see the President of Mexico blaming everyone else, he knew where the problem was and set out to fix it with the help of the IMF. The result has been a BOOM in the Mexican economy over the past two years. If Korea and the rest of the Asian Tigers follow the path laid out by Mexico you will see the same kind of recovery in Asia as we have seen in Mexico.

xau5:

Every last one. We are not going to be sellers until at least 8 dollars or expiration. Whatever comes first. All the squeezes we have had over the last six or seven years have ended in massive capitulation with almost complete illiquidity. There has also been huge backwardation. If this game runs like the others, yesterday was only a taste. Remember back to last June when platinum and palladium were squeezed. There was a night that the markets virtually shut down and the spreads were 10% wide. I'm hoping for a replay.

That last idea about buying gold and sitting back to watch everyone else run around sounds pretty good to me!

I will ruminate on that and expostulate at a later date ;- )

No fee needed. Education on currencies and SDR alone have you in a credit position in my book.

Thanks Allen. That really is Good News...
( and a remarkable piece of fact gathering! )

Re: sdr/Gold...no hurry, it is not going to happen this week!

ALL - I have not been able to access ( read or post ) Kitco 1 from my computer for past two-three weeks. Somehow I just got in. I imagine it may be a problem at my end as I access all other sites O.K. - Hope to see you all again - more frequently - soon!
A.A.R. - Now that I'm here - and D.A. just recently posted re: Silver - I want to congratulate David A. on behalf of the group for presenting just about the best strategy, re: Silver, that has been aired here; and this was from about two months ago: BUY and HOLD!

Let's see if I can make it two in a row:

"Chance favors the prepared mind."

----Louis Pasteur

Karlito:

I am not sufficiently well versed in the finances of either Mexico then or Korea now to offer an opinion on remedies. I do know that there are important differences in that Korea's problem loans are largely private sector while Mexico's problems were in the public sector. Enforcing draconian contractionary policy measures to reign in growth does not seem to my untrained eyes as a perscription for health in an economy which is imploding due to private sector bankruptcies.

You are quite correct in pointing out that the currency pressure is largely coming from onshore and that the people have lost total confidence in the local currency. How that confidence is to be restored I have no idea. It will probably take some strong leadership and a true presentation of the choices.

It does bother me that the banks which lent the money to these areas are not yet taking a bigger hit. The job of a bank is to assess loan risk and lend money appropriately. If they screw up that job their shareholders and ultimately their depositors should pay the price, not the taxpayers. If the banks are indemnified against this kind of default then we don't need them. The Fed should just act as international bank. At least if the taxpayers are to be saddled with the losses they might as well share in the gains when better times are at hand.

The 'moral hazard' danger of which AG so often speaks seems to apply more to the banks making the loans than the people receiving them although it is never presented in this fashion.

If I were king there would be no such thing as deposit insurance or too big to fail. Instead there would be strong rules on transparency. All banks would be required to lay out their loan portfolios, derivative exposure, market positions etc. in a timely manner. If all this information was available to the investing public the ensuing scrutiny would keep things from ever reaching the state they are in today. It always galls me that the 'elite' make their decisions in the smoke filled rooms and the rest of us poor souls are stuck living with the consequences of their decisions.

Want to hear what it was like to actually go down and see GOLD
au natural! Also have some "very interesting" stuff on notational
exotic currency derivatives to share.

Tolerant1@Guardian: You're very gracious. Thank you.
re: our 'friend' Camdessus--he just might be taking a much
longer vacation than expected... ( one lives in hope )

D.A. - I was ready to call my brokedude until I saw your comment. Damn! I wish I would have never taken a peek here first. I was gonna sell my silver and prepare for going the other way to make a little cash on the profit taking ( or free fall ) . You have now planted the seed...you know the one of doubt? So...... ( and not because of you...OK maybe partially because of you ) I will hold ONE more day ( Friday...gold?uhoh ) to see what will 'shake-out'. I will still place an order to sell at a specified $$. Now....I must go back TO THE CHARTS to find the $$....ohmy.

its gonna correct............uh huh.......how far? how fast? and what will we be squeezing then ( sorry for the banalities Tolerant1 ) .

away...to put on my iron clad boxers ( undergarments )

wherethehellisCherOkee?

Beamer-

Nobody knows how much aboveground platinum exists today. The figures out of South Africa are fairly reliable, but there is no information available about Russian stockpiles. These figures are never revealed but most of the official stockpiles have been looted over the last several years, some finding its way onto the open market through Switzerland. It is widely regarded by industry watchers that Russia's stockpiles are nearly or completely depleted. Wittiness the platinum delivered to the NYMEX last year with pictures of the Czar stamped in them. 80 year old platinum sure looks like the bottom of the barrel.

So there is no telling just how much platinum is in the world - or rather on top of it - at any given time. Only 8% of all platinum produced finds its way into private investor's hands. There are no stockpiles of platinum or palladium to depend on during times of supply disruptions. ( quite apart from silver. $6.50 + will bring a lot of silver out of the woodworks. The price has been down for so long that $6 - $7 seems a kings ransom. So beware the silver tide, there is a lot of it in the world )

As for why platinum is suffering recently; The Russians shipped all their scheduled deliveries in November and are on track for December, so there is temporary liquidity in the market. This makes the metal available for the speculative shorts to sell on the TOCOM and buy on the cash market for arbitrage. Additionally, Japan's own currency woes have left some scrambling for quick cash.

The Russians don't like the prices this low, and could easily cause a $80 - $100 rally with a few well timed press releases, just like they did in the spring of this year. Export authority for further shipments in 1998 will be held hostage to the Russian general budget, which is not expected to be signed until April or May. Shipments from Russia should cease by mid January. South African platinum is not so subject to price fluctuations. SA platinum - about 80% of world production - is virtually all under long term delivery contracts to Japanese industry. Platinum and palladium purchases are based on an average spot prices over the last several months. This evens out the peaks and valleys for both the producers and consumers alike.

Platinum could well go back to the recent highs - $450 - $480 by year's end, but it is looking as if a significant rally may wait until January. I would buy platinum at these prices in a normal year. With impending supply disruptions and potential market manipulation by the Russians, - $500 - $600 platinum seems a reasonable trading range for 1998, particularly if palladium stays above $200. With palladium at more than half the cost of platinum, it now becomes cheaper to use platinum in applications such as catalytic converters. What is good for palladium is good for platinum. That they are moving in opposite directions is an anomaly, and is confounding amateurs and pros alike.

I've been buying platinum from $420 down. The downside looked to be at $398 - $300, which held 3 times followed by nice little rallies to $450+. I'm telling my clients to buy as much platinum as they can at these levels. Look at the attached platinum chart and history to see why I think these levels are so attractive.

As for silver, I got stopped out of what shorts I had today and covered all the rest in late hour trading. I'm staring down the nostrils of a vengeful and pissed off bull and I've seen this kind of feeding frenzy before, I'll no longer be in its way. Its a shame I didn't believe this one was coming; I saw the possibility, but in a beaten and battered market, I figured the down was more likely than the up. I was 100% right - but in the wrong metals. So, time to lick some wounds. I do have some clients still long silver and short gold, and they are pleased to have doubled their money in the last 6 weeks, but I've got some fancy footwork ahead to salvage some of my less fortunate trades.

All and all, it has been a spectacular year. Made a lot more than I lost. I don't think I'll be dropped off too many Christmas card lists. Its a shame I had to get slapped a bit at the end after almost a full year of hugs and kisses, but I let my roving hands go astray, hiked the skirt up a bit too high, and I'm here to testify: It was a chill wind blowing up those silver shorts.

I think a vote, if one were held ( so let's not ) , would be unanimous that I could use a little humbling. But with platinum this low, silver running, and gold ready to slingshot off a near term bottom, the next few months look to offer lots-o-fun.

#1 - You know it!
#2 - The technology is almost here - big time!
#3 - Easy - You know it!
#4 - Tell us something we don't know already - will 'ya!
#4a Alternately the excess leafy material from that plant has medical uses ( eg. controlling epilepsy and glaucoma ) and a judge in Ontario, Canada, JUST yesterday, declared the leaf legal for medical purposes for certain person's prescribed under doctor's care. Ground breaking decision.

Here it is

With the NASDAQ Dropping 20-30 Points Here & There Recently -- and ORACLE COMPUTERS LOSING 30% OF ITS VALUE IN A SINGLE DAY, the following may provide insightful and interesting reading:

Deja Vu All Over Again?! From 1929 to 1932 RCA lost 97% of its market value. Recall RCA was the #1 High-Flying Tech stock of the 1920s.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials/rca_msft.html

We can indeed build 100 mpg vehicles. But with gasoline at $1.25 per gallon, who in the USA would buy them? It seems that everyone wants a three ton, four wheel drive sport-utility vehicle, capable of cruising comfortably at quietly at 100 miles per hour.

If the price of gas increases by a dollar or so, the boys in Detroit ( historical home of the gas hogs ) will go nuts! The Japanese manufacturers will an even a larger share of the market...

What is the url for those that just want to lurk and not post?

I can't seem to find it.

Even with alot of help from their friends these pigs will get their lunch eaten by market forces.

Short em all ...and cover asap to beat the christmas rush. ...

RJ - Thanks for being generous in sharing your thoughts and view. Being 'in the trade' gives you a unique vantage which I have come to appreciate over these past few months. If you have only been slapped around recently then bravo! I'm looking forward to more of your posts. Enjoy the season.

All - Giving credit to DA/RJ/et al for their various contributions here. Recent post by pro 'hedger's was interesting and I'd like to hear more on this end. Please share more and know that we are hearing you though there are extremes here as everywhere.

I particularly am interested in hearing about why you do what you do. The things you consider. How you weight various concerns in the market. And, as always, poste mortum when a particular approach didn't work; since this is what we all call an 'education' ( with tuition of course ) .

Also, what do you guys/gals think of ANOTHER's posts? Plausible?

Forget it. NOt enough sleep. Of course, I am a goose.

It is the commonly believed myth that *any* fuel efficient car must necessarily be a cramped, uncomfortable vehicle. Nonsense.

It only takes the National will, or a smart company to produce one. For example, if Saturn Corporation ( GM ) took their currently marketed EV-1 electric vehicle and put a gasoline engine in it instead of the current electric/battries they would have a car that would get around 70 miles per gallon. A quite comfortable, stylish car I might add. GM, you out there listening?

As for all those 11 to 13 mpg Sports Utility Vehicles ... chuckle ... what a bunch of eco-green hypocrites. They drive THE most wasteful vehicles on the road, and yet claim to be "eco-sensitive". Their unholy-howls of agony when they are paying a $5/gallon "greenhouse emissions" tax on top of the current $1.39 gallon price of gasoline will be music to my ears. I expecially enjoyed the National Public Radio segment on eco-green-yuppies driving $80,000 Hum-Vees. These monsters get a wopping 9 miles per gallon. If there was ever an egregious, boastful display of wealth at the expense of the earth...

ps - my sensitive cow-workers have informed me that I mispelled "Gae" .. should be "Gaea". Isn't that right Mary?

He said that if gold stayed at about current prices for a few weeks then his interpretation was ( covert buying of physical being to affect market ) that we were in for an explosion in gold price. Well, we have had a test low at 282. We are channeled at 283-287. He was talking about a year end/new year sky-rocket. What think ye??? Are we meeting this criteria? His statements indicated three CB's buying as well as Middle Eastern oil concerns.

Silver Bull - thanks for posting comex silver data Tuesday - I was in surgery and they wouldn't let me have access to the internet, damnit. I did have an interesting discussion with a pair of docs who actually knew gold was cheap and a good buy ( isn't that a paradox ) .

JTF - I will get back to my geology lesson a little later, when I can see out of both eyes and am not myopic.

Allen - thanks for the kind words.

Roebear - Echo Bay has a nasty experience in Russia, their people told me they wasted something like $17 million that could have been better spent elsewhere. With the wholesale turnover in the company's management, I doubt if they have any further exposure there.

Re your RCA and Microsoft comparison. The comparison is apt except as I pointed out several weeks ago here, the high flyers in 29 were paying out generous dividends: 3.5 to 4.5 % at their peaks. The comparable high flyers today require all their free cash flow to "pay" their employees with stock options and also to keep moving in a frenzy of planned obsolescence. Back in the 20's, the new technology built power lines and power plants that were useful for generations. Today we have cutting edge new tech companies building "fabs" and software that has a useful life of a few short years. I only point these non comparisons out in order to suggest that a crash may be of a different magnitude and change the availability of capital for a much longer time than the 29-31 disaster.

I was wondering if in view of current crisis, Korea might default on it's gold loans. If they did, would the CB's ever acknowledge it or would they just keep the loans on their books forever?

Much easier to spell muthah, er mudder .. mom.

A nice little planet with a good location, no neighbors to mess up the view and at bargain basement prices to boot. Enquire: Galactica Real Estate ..

Hope the surgery went well and you will be back on your feet very soon. Take lots of vitamins ( especially E ) and drink lots of water. Eat well, it will help.

Fed printing. Last weeks Fed data showed an increase in the Monetary Base from 490.7 B to 493.4 B. Currency in circulation increased 3.6 B to 471.8 B which was slightly more than the increase in the monetary base. So reserve balances must have declined slightly at Fed Reserve Banks. It will be interesting to see the next report.

ALL: Just heard a fascinating news update on my local news radio station. According to a just released government report MOST of the government's computers will NOT be fixed in time for the arrival of 2000!! No details of the consequences were provided as it was one of those "we interrupt this program to bring you an important news item..." sort of reports. Hmmm... Maybe the IRS will vanish in a puff of smoke. One can only hope...

Allen, ANOTHER's idea about oil for gold exchange seems to be
interesting and even explains to a certain degree many different events we are watching now. However, we do not know for sure that his idea is indeed CORRECT, because there is no way to check it out. But it is at least realistic idea, not wild, as some of the other ideas.

Some of ANOTHER's statements are also appearing to be pretty extreme.

I guess what we will see at first is some kind of limited shortcovering
rally in gold, may be until the end of this year, with gold going up
15-20$ from the current level. Next year should be very interesting for gold, I feel...

I can not imagine gold shooting up 100$ or 200$ per day, but I may
simply have a luck of imagination.

Correction to my post: not "luck", but lack, of course. Sorry...

The German daily "Boersen-Zeitung" reported yesterday that GOLD will be included in the proposed European central bank's reserves.

ISN'T THIS A "THREAT" OF CENTRAL BANK BUYING...all we've been hearing in the media these days is central bank selling. And we know that's because, "THEY" want to buy up as much gold as possible NOW.

EB:

Don't let my musings interfere with your trading. My views tend to be much longer in scope than the next days trading, and they are just my views. I am privy to no more info than you except for some feel on who is doing the buying and selling. At this point in the silver game the selling is mostly coming from producers who as RJ has pointed out haven't seen it this good in quite some time. I don't place much value on this info other than if the current selling is absorbed without much retracement then the rally will continue.

I've said it here many times, I don't short commodities. The game is asymetric and should be played as such. The natural short sellers are producers who while losing profit potential do not get carried out when they make a mistake by over selling. This is not so with speculative shorts. Over time, shorting commodities is an extremely difficult way to may money. The likely outcome is a nasty day of reckoning when you are caught in a squeeze and squished. Since you are the only one who has stepped to the plate to make me a true gold bug I am indebted and would feel bad if your mangled carcass was hung upon the horns of a raging silver bull. Happy trails.

Away to the big city.

Ted-Many games in all markets going into xmas with low volume time to take a rest and enjoy the holiday season.Away to be flat and happy.

ARDEN: Get well soon! We all appreciate your updates and insights, especially your fascinating geological postings. Hope those surgeons didn't have to mine to deeply to fix whatever they had to fix!

TODAYS SPECIAL TURMOIL, TURMOIL,TURMOIL, PREPARED AND SERVED UP 1OO DIFFERENT WAYS...OFFERING THE WORLD FAMOUS HAVE YOUR CAKE AND EAT TOO SWEETS FOLLOWING THE MEAL.

It's been said that if all the CB's were to sell their gold, it would last only 17 years. That's ONLY 17 years! At that time Gold would become as precious as diamonds!!

for the worldwide debt bomb ignition. We are in process. Cover your credit $$$ with cash $$$. Your bank may not be able to give you paper dollars when you and a few others decide you want them. Have physical dollars as part of your portfolio just as you would hold physical gold or silver. The images of grandma's weeping before riot police asking why they can't have their money says it all.

Consider US$ 15 Tln credit pool and only US$ 500 Bln in actual cash ( total world-wide paper currency, much less paper dollars in the USA ) . That's a 30 to 1 credit dollar to cash ( paper ) dollar ratio. If only 1% of these credit dollars began to be exchanged for "real" dollars there wouldn't be enough "real" paper dollars in the USA ( proper ) to saticfy the demand and float the transactions which are part of daily life. What would this do to your reality??? Look at Korea. That is what. Forewarned is forearmed.

Hold ( at least some ) physical: "cattle", silver, gold and paper! ( Genesis 13:2 )

Karl ( vronski ) : YOUR comment, The comparison is apt except as I pointed out several weeks ago here, the high flyers in 29 were paying out generous dividends: 3.5 to 4.5 % at their peaks. Firstly, my comparison was NOT to the high flyerS in 29, but RATHER to THE high flyer of 1929, RCA. And apparently, you failed to read my comment, Also unbelievingly incredible was the fact it ( RCA ) never paid a cash dividend! - just as Microsoft has not paid a cash dividend since going public. But apart from this you seem to be ignoring the most current example of what draconian action the market can take against a high flyer, notably, ORACLE COMPUTER, DOWN ABOUT 30% IN ONE DAY.

Oh, BTW, its vronskY

Thinking of moving out of silver and into platinum. Any comments? Lost lost of gold. Got lots of gold. Would someone please post the URL for the federal debt? Thanks.

No way will all the computers be fixed for 1/1/00. There is not an issue there. There are these questions: How great will the damage be? How resilient and strong will humanity be in response to the problem? It could turn out like the San Francisco fire: A better city rising from the ashes. And, hopefully, a city built ( economy-wise ) on gold, analogous to how the heavenly one is built ( physically ) .

Neophyte: Hell, I can figure that one out. Korea will use the money from IMF to settle up for their borrowed gold via cash payments. This
in effect will turn gold on books of the lending CB's into paper assets, which is what they've been doing anyway. At least, however, it won't result in more gold being dumped on the market.

VEEEEERRRY INTEEERREEEESSTINNNG! Hope that makes the news.

When Kitco averages a post a minute for ten minutes, watch out!?!

When you look at almost ALL of the world's financial markets ... they are DOWN BIG TIME. Is this what a financial meltdown looks like??

T REX: The difference between diamonds and gold is that the diamond market is strictly controlled by the likes of DeBeers. There are enough diamonds around in their vaults that if they decided to sell them all, diamonds would be worth about as much as peanut butter. Maybe less.

CBC just said Monk is buying back ABX shares cause their toooooooo

cheap!

Please explain to me how on CNNFN they post the gold futures to have gained as much as $4.00 for march gold yet the spot price drops $2.00 an ounce today. I would assume ( perhaps thats my mistake ) hat they would follow the same path. Could someone try and explain this to me Thanks.....

Reviewed your post re: Were I would king I would force banks to disclose their loan portfolio's and exposure and if they did make bad loans and go under, let them go under with the shareholder's loosing rather than the taxpayers. I agree.

It is interesting how the game was played out during the early 80's recession in the U.S. Scores of banks were allowed to go under. Of course the government reimbursed any losses to depositors up to a limit, but the shareholders did see their investment erode to nothing EXCEPT for Continental Illinois. The government apparently thought it was too big to go under and managed to save it. Then, in order to reestablish what bank remained and restore them to profitability, the government lent them money for 2% which they borrowed back for 5% or so ( I think I have it right ) which was in effect subsidizing them at taxpayer expense. It seems there is a double standard.

If people do not have faith in the banking system, governments will not be successful in utilizing the banks to spread the paper it prints. Governments have to protect the banks. Whether this is good or bad is subject to debate. Certainly we would have nvever had the S & Loan debacle if you were king. Yet, we may have had chos. No one wants to see virtually all the banks shut down as they did following the 1929 crash. It sems a little slight of hand may be in the best interests of a country. Proping up the Asian countries seems to me to be slight of hand on a collosal scale. The deception is painfully obvious, and for that reason, I do not thinbg it will work to resolve the problem, only postponeit. The camel has its nose under the tent and the day of reconing will come.

I grow old

I buy gold

I shall wear the bottom of my trousers rolled

In the room

The Women come and go

Talking of Gold

- When debt is packaged or repackaged as a security ( stock ) . ALL IPO's which do not pay a dividend are debt without interest AND with very high risk factors. The speculative stock may reward the buyer with appreciation of share price. MAY. One might wish to think of ANY stock which doesn't pay dividends as investment in an unsecured debt pool. This would certainly stiffen up the old spine! As it is ORACLE has deflated based on what? On a drop in earnings ( which affects the speculative value of the shares ) .

Stocks which pay little or no dividend are a mirage in a falling earnings environment ( especially if their P/E's have been driven through the roof already ) . That's what happened to RCA in 1929-30. Then, after the fall, they decided to start paying a dividend to provide a real return, which would be a gauge of the company's performance and value in relationship to its shares price.

Consider what would happen if ALL High Technology, non-dividend paying companies deflated in share price until their respective boards decided to relearn the RCA lesson. WIPE-OUT!

Strad: I think all the recent proposals by the Clinton administration and congress to go to a flat tax or national sales tax are related to the y2000 bug. They know that they will be unable to collect taxes and need to change the law before 2000. By the way, are you still short gold?

Arden, hope you are well. Keep talking those Doc into gold/silver:- ) ) Here is a post ( from elsewhere ) and the reason why I asked about Echo Bay:
I work the dock in a Port in Washington State.

I see some equipment of ECO coming back from Russia, and other shipments of
equipment going over. The stuff coming back is some kind of catapillar driven drill unit.
Stuff going over is general mining equipment.

Does anybody on this thread know how involved ECO is in Russian Far East gold
mining.

This equipment is coming from and going to the Magadon area.

This is from today, does it make any sense with losing 17 mill?

Sorry about the spelling of your name. I guess I took it for granted that you were making a comparison with implications beyond the future of Microsoft's price action, i.e, the market as a whole. My only point is that when one owned stocks in the new technology of the 20's, it was an INVESTMENT in infrastructure and in many cases, these companies were INVESTING in assets that were going to be productive for your lifetime and paying you a return as well. This is not generally the case now. And the implications of a crash for a holder of today's paper is different than then, namely his SPECULATION in PAPER will have gone bad and he will have absolutely no reason to provide capital to these enterprises for a long long time.

Strad Master; The IRS will not vanish in a puff of smoke. They will instead dun you for 99 years of fees and interest on your overdue taxes.

Heard an excerpt from one of your Hungarian dance recordings on our local public radio station a few weeks ago. The announcer massacred your first name, but the last name was recognizably right. Nice clear, bright tone from your violin, and a good lively interpretation. Bravo.

Radial Keratectomy. I think Arden had an operation to correct Myopia....if my read is correct. This is outpatient surgery and is not life threatening. My regards to a quick and healhty recovery of your eye ( s ) . Did they do both? Or must you go back next week? Was it laser or the knife? Or am I nearsighted in my understanding?? Now.......get back TO THE CHARTS!! ;- )

away...to the grind

makinglasses

IDT...You can write that down in your little book...The IRS tax code will be changed ( simplified ) before Y2K ... not to benefit "the middle class", but to be able to collect taxes ...

The world's markets are all red, except for Sri Lanka andf Slovakia ( ??? ) .
I am begining to feel their pain.

IT is The Hara KIRI time. No knives please.

Mark Mobius stated on CNBC that the average asian investor would be sporting a look very much like his after the "Haircuts" have been given. He is expecting continued BIG BIG problems in Korea and Japan 5-6% down per day for several sessions. Perhaps another 25% down before things settle down. Even that kind of a correction may not help if the Korean government and people do not allow foriegn takeover and investment of trouble concerns.

Spud Master: I see that you are now in agreement with me.
This is a worldwide problem. The moron yuppies in the SUV's are the same old NOT IN MY BACK YARD crowd.We produce more emmisions in California alone than nearly all of India, or China. That will not be the case once the US , Japan, and former Korea sell them all fossil fuel burning vehicle.

I make alot of money off of exporting US made autos.

If gas went to even $10 a gallon the boys in Motor city would be pumping out fuel eff. autos and the resst of the world would follow.

Now what was it Puetz said to do during a meltdown??

This is the begining of the end for the banks my friends.

They have not even begun to set aside assets for the Y2K
problem, and it is do or die time.Not to mention derivatives.

The Bank baby setters will not be able to help them with
that problem. IMHO

I think I helped DaveinCo a little bit with his crisis.
We decided to form a special team and support each other
in the future. We need the PRESIDENT for our new PARTY..
I think that both of us are looking at you as a very
appropriate candidate. What do you think?

Sometimes even goldbugs are in need to have FUN...

I just made a forecast in my post to Allen ( USA ) that gold may
be able to move higher until the end of this year, 15-20$ short
covering rally. I already regret I made this forecast, now it
is not going to happen, but still, do you think it is possible
from your point of view?

http://nypostonline.com/business/1566.htm

Historically, what has been the credit to cash
ratio? Can you give us more information to go on?
The 30 to 1 ratio does look highly leveraged,
but please compare it to something.

BillD: You got it. They ( U.S. politicians ) will sell it to the public though as a crusade to rid us of the pestulence called the IRS. I looked at those hearings congress had recently on the abuses of the IRS and listened to the politicians pumping themselves up in preparation. Those boys can really gag a maggot.

^DJI
12:08PM
7838.05
-140.74
-1.76%
N/A
Chart
^IXIC
12:09PM
1554.59
-42.02
-2.63%
N/A
Chart
^SPX
12:09PM
953.99
-15.80
-1.63%
N/A
Chart

Hope you are well on the way to a healthy mend.

No, the surgeon was fixing a shattered cheek the result of being mugged. My myopia is the result of the pain pills which I detest. I got mugged the same time gold did. Lets hope that gold recovers as fast as I will!

I had better get my 'vision' checked. I am sorry to hear such distressful news. I send my best for a fast and speedy recovery.....and I hope they catch the bandits.

Apologies.....

away

onehead

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm

The Public Debt To the Penny URL ( why not cents? )

Latest: 12/10/1997 - $5,474,482,104,049.82

Low on: 12/09/1997 - $5,472,670,670,026.80

Peaked on: 12/01/1997 - $5,489,774,551,535.81

ELF: Hungarian Dance Recordings? It's no wonder they massacred my name - that wasn't me. My records are all classical music. Curious to know who it was, though. BTW, you're right about the IRS dunning us all for 99 years of back taxes. .

WE NEED STEVE PUETZ INSIGHT AND DIRECTION NOW!!!!!
TOO MANY THINGS HAVE CHANGED IN THE LAST FEW DAYS TO DETERMINE GAME PLAN.
HELP THIS FELLOW HOOSIER!

Sunshine seems to be lagging compared to the other silver stocks mentioned at this site. Hopefully its just that it takes alittle more momentum to get the larger market cap stocks to get going.

Has anybody been watching the most excellent action here?? http://www.cme.com/cgi-bin/flash.cgi I have been seeing a great deal of red lately. And I am finally seeing some black on the Mark. Perhaps it will now resume it's upward movement and my buy the dip strategy will be back on track. I hope so.

Profit taking ( massive ) on the US$ or a new flight to quality?? What is the Tequila drinker saying here ;- ) . Short term playing is the way to go from here, no? I don't know which will be the loser....I just like to buy low and sell high....oh my! You go Tol1!!

Date: Thu Dec 11 1997 08:32

tolerant1 ( DonaldA ) ID#31868:

I expect to see quite a fight in the dollar/yen/mark and IMHO the dollar will be the

eventual loser. People that keep talking about the flight to quality in the US market

and dollar are in for a very rude awakening.

When will the true flight to quality take place.........hmmmmmmmmm.....or will it? I assume that it will.....eventually...uh huh.

away...to work to make a buck to pay for shoes and gas and things oh my....and to remove 'obstacles' from peoples 'vision' ;- )



"The Public Debt To the Penny URL ( why not cents? ) "
Why not cents, CJS? Because there is no cents to our Federal debt.

Who was it that was all over Puetz for not retracting his advice to bet against the market in December? Today is vindication day for our hero of the Kitco, ho, ho, ho. Dow sinking badly, S&P crushed, Nas, decimated 3rd day running. Asian markets poised to start the cycle anew tonight. Puetz, Captain My Captain!

DOW ready to plummet...look out below.

Just get LGB and do the opposite!!

Gold SDR
11-Dec-97

Country,Gold/Ounce ( NY ) ,SDR,Gold SDR

Italy,0.00000199,0.000423,0.00004

Venezuela,0.00000703,0.001476,0.00014

Japan,0.000026663,0.0056827,0.0005

Belgium 0.0000944,0.02012,0.002

China ( Renmimbi ) ,0.00042,0.08952,0.008

Mexico,0.0004496,0.09155,0.009

Hong Kong,0.0004562,0.09577,0.009

France,0.0005815,0.1239,0.01

Saudi Arabia,0.0009412,0.1976,0.019

Netherlands,0.001727,0.3682,0.03

Germany,0.001947,0.415, 0.04

New Zealand,0.002083,0.4439,0.041

Australia,0.002335,0.4976,0.04

Switzerland,0.002396,0.5107,0.05

Canada,0.0024462,0.52135,0.05

Brazil,0.0031294,0.66696,0.06

USA,0.0034782,0.74131,0.07

Argentina,0.0034807,0.74183,0.07

This seems uncanny to me ( but what do I know ) . The ounce/gold
conversion ( NY, 12/8/97 ) multiplied by 20 is a fractional value
of the SDR as they say it is now computed. Country after country, the
alignment holds. What have I done wrong ( gently please )

and it's not up.

kiwi: We just send a memo to LGB and everything will be fine.

DINES LATEST ON GOLD ( December 10, 1997 )

Internationally acclaimed newsletter editor, James Dines, shares his LATEST ON GOLD. Additionally, he calls attention to two of his favorite precious metals stocks: Agnico-Eagle and Stillwater Mining - both are hot-wired to their charts, just CLICK the name. It is also obvious analyst Dines cottons to silver:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials/dines120997.html

is cooool~~~~~~~~~~go GOLDen State!!

Kitco is way to slow to post today.....

Lurking until later.

sure glad I sold the last of my transports a couple of weeks agos and took profits...the wife was complaining that they continue up even after I sold at all time highs...I tried to explain to her that "bulls make money, bears make money, and it looks like the pigs are getting slaughtered today" Go down DOW & TRANSPORTS!

Glad to be in bonds today!

I don't understand, what are you calculating?
I saw this yesterday and couldn't figure it out then either.

Oh....show me the way to the next wiskey bar......

In the midst of 'massive global equity meltdown' gold-XAU is once again acting as a very 'safe-Haven'......EB: That's THREE straight~~~~~~~~~

Arden: Sorry to hear that you had a misadventure. Hope you are mostly on your way to recovery. Allen ( USA ) is right about the Vit E, -- just add VitC and organically bound Selenium to the list. Vit A, for all of its hype with visual problems, etc has no solid scientific antioxidant or healing support in the literature.

Speaking about health and gold bugs -- I'm wondering if what is called a bipolar personality disorder is the best diagnosis - oscillations between severe depression and total euphoria! I know, because one of the VIP's at work that drives me nuts is on the medication of choice -- Lithium.

Perhaps we should prescribe lithium for gold bugs. The problem with my senior colleague is that when he feels good, he forgets to take his meds. Then I am really in trouble! I wonder -- would our depressed gold bugs forget to take their meds during a gold rally?

I'm looking forward to your geological opinions when things quiet down.

From: http://www.FreeRepublic.com - Latest WW News
December 11, 1997

RUDDY SHOWS THE PHOTOS ON TV!

Morning View, NET Broadcasting ( soon to be American Voice )

Morning View, on NET this morning, was the first TV broadcast
to display Chris Ruddy's photographic images of Ron Brown's
x-ray, the wrecked plane, and a full-color photo of Brown's hole
was shown as well ( not for the weak stomach ) . I, and tens of
thousands of other viewers, now have that on video tape. The
photographic imagery appears to back up everything Ruddy had
claimed. It sure looks like a bullet hole to me, with brains and
all. Not only was there a round hole in the skull, but a smaller,
round hole in the brain, just like what one would expect to see.

I was also impressed with the fact that Brown's teeth were
visible as well. It would be most difficult to claim this
is a fake if the dental work matches.

I apologise for not giving you a flash about Ruddy's visit this
morning. I should have known better. Every day he decides to
go out, Ruddy has a surprise. ( Odds are, he will be making the
rounds, today. You might get to see him on Direct Line, tonight.
I'm not sure yet. In fact, he might even show the photos again
on Alan Keyes, since it is half-TV. Once again, I am unsure. )

Another little-known fact Ruddy mentioned is that the rescuers
found an empty nine-milimeter clip near the wreck. ( Probably
mentioned earlier-I just didn't catch it before. )

A viewer asked Ruddy about the mysterious black box. Ruddy
mentioned that he has photographs of the black box being
broken out of the back of the plane.


{OH, HO HO! So there WAS a black box?
First there was, then there wasn't, now there is again?!}

Ruddy had ANOTHER surpirse ( posted in earlier strings already ) :
the government has made a sweeping gag order on all the military
personnel involved, and has essentially, as one officer said,
put them under house arrest. None of them can leave their desk
or office. ( I will try to have a more updated reference guide
soon ) .

Geneveive said that she bet they would love to be a gag order
on Ruddy, himself. Ruddy replied, "They have tried."

Ruddy said that Cogswell believed that the crash should not
have been 100% lethal. The G-force was so low that some of the
wine bottles were left standing upright! Where the passengers
were seated, there was very little crumpling. Passengers were
not crushed, as one might expect in a high-G-force crash.

Hearing Ruddy talk about Cogswell, I am more respectful of the
man's courage than ever. Cogswell would show those slides to
trainees day-after-day. The trainees would walk out angrilly.
But, no one approached Ruddy about it for a long period of time.
That level of courage is admirable. It is what I call patriotism.

When Geneveive Wood asked Ruddy who tipped him off about
Cogswell, Ruddy said, "I will tell you this much, it was NOT
a member of the FBI." I am left with the impression that FBI
agents are jaded with political "correctness".

Ted
get thee to a whisky bar?

whisky from uisge beatha --usquebaugh ( pr ooskebar ) the water of life
so you are off to an ooske bar bar?

too early for me

auraontherocks

A little rock-N-roll is in order~~~~~~~~~~~~~go alternative energy!!

To All

As any who dare read these posts will recall, The

grand prophesy required platinum to fall to 362 from

where it was yesterday morning december 10 ( i.e. 377 ) .

Gee whiz prest-o change-o - it has fallen BUT the

prophet has confused himself - The January future

has fallen PAST the Target to 360 from 375 and

spot only to 366 !!!! Signs of backwardation or

retardation of the part of your poor prophet?

Another facet of this strange wonderful and confused

prophesy is falling into place - gold will fall to and

be supported at 480 dm/oz - yesterday 513 now 501. In

Swiss its 405 now versus 417 yesterday morning with a

target of 395?? ( WhudIsay ?? I forget - your prophet's

mind is clouded ) . But The support point comes closer.

The springboards from which gold may soar are

falling into place inshallah.

Allah o akbar - gold is great - Hoop -La

precious metal?

( 1 ) My data show Feb AU futures down $2.60 - no discrepancy with spot

( 2 ) George S. Cole's call of an 8300 Dow top has held for a long time

( 3 ) I have been to international UN-type meetings and felt the profound uncertainty and enormous sense of ego that pervades international relations. International peace and cooperation are extremely fragile when seen from close up. I have sympathy with those who argue for the preservation of the absolute autonomy of individual nations, as opposed to the one-world government agenda. Yet we should appreciate just how fragile international cooperation is. I am not a greenie, and I do not know enough about the global-warming agreement to have a position. Yet I am respectful of the global-warming conference as an example of how far along this international tower of Babel of worldwide economic and geo-political joint endeavors has come. To bring nations together around ideas, without the focus of a fully dominating political power to dictate the agenda, and without the human appeal of a charismatic figure, is no mean feat, IMHO. I am all for world peace.

But here is my point. This is a fragile collection of disparate interests that operates the UN, the IMF, etc. When the dedicated men and women that keep this show alive find themselves overwhelmed with one economic, military, or political crisis too many, the coalition and the ( arguably ) attendant international stability could be annihilated quickly. Were there a single dictator or a single all-powerful nation at the helm, there would be more flexibility in response.

Of course I am not arguing for such a centralized governmental system.

Here is my point: The patterns of international cooperation that do preserve the systems of economics and politics are ephemeral, the system could crash, and not be easily repaired. If and when that crash happens ( and certainly we should pray that it does not happen ) , the precious metals could become quite precious indeed.

And that is the relevance of the global warming conference to our investment concerns.

A possible explanation for the recent sharp drop in the price of
Platinum maybe due IMHO in part to the fact that SE Asians preferred
Platinum over Gold for jewelry and coins, and what we may be witnessing
is a sell off of their Platinum Jewelry and coins to pay off debts or possibly
lowered demand at the very high prices of Platinum vs the Yen.

The EMU and the EURO$ intergration, I believe that early 1998 ( April? )
is the date set for the creation of the Euro Central Bank, which will require
counries CB'S participating to contribute 25% of their holdings. Although
no mention of GOLD was made it was implied that the new Euro CB will
hold Gold. An interesting possibility is that the individual countries CB'S
DO NOT want to part with their GOLD and are in fact buying low in the markets for the New Euro CB after ( as T. Rex pointed out ) depressing the market with the threats of CB Golds Sales?
My guess is that whatever they are going to do they are doing NOW!
because frankly THEIR M.O. has been to announce sales or this case
purchases after the fact, and the New Euro CB will have to be set up
by early 1998. Surely they are not going announce the very day the New
EURO CB is set up either sales or buys knowing the explosive effect on the Gold Market either way.

CLOSE CURR CHG %CHG
7978.79 7836.56 -143.98 1.80%
67.63 65.88 -1.60 2.37%

Hey Ted

Oh show us the way to ze next whiskey bar oh don ask vy oh don ask vy.

is NOT NOT NOT by the doors for chrissake.

It was by Kurt Weill from the Rise and Fall of the City Mahogonny

and sometimes sung by his wife Lotte Lenya.- both long dead now. He also

gave us Mack the Knife from threepenny opera.

The doors were good but not THAT good.

CLOSE CURR CHG %CHG
7978.79 7836.56 -142.23 1.78%
67.63 65.88 -1.75 2.59%

DUH...

away...back to the chalkboard

ackhandingtedsmackughdropklunk

go gold~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~...?

It does look like in the very thin air of the upper stratospheric layer of banking we have a use for gold, eh? I'd like to see a few of these currencies over time in comparison to gold price, US$ price and gold SDR. It is possibly a tight, albeit not an air tight fit.

I remember that gold is priced in US$ and then currencies are converted to obtain gold price in those currencies. Same for oil. Possibly what we are seeing in your numbers is a back door to gold. Again, it is only a mechanism ( ? ) to assure stability for the top most level of interbank exchanges ( ? ) . What this would indicate, though, is gold is the universal currency. This would be necessary for the huge international merchant banks in order to circumvent the geo-political vacillations in currencies ( ? ) .

I wonder at what rate the gold SDR rate changes for currencies. Is it set on a hourly, daily, weekly, monthly basis??? What about currencies which are experiencing a significant alteration in the markets? Are there two or more 'tiers' of currencies ( USD, DM,Yen as first tier ) which are revaluated on different bases or is it possible that some currencies must "go through" other currencies in order to be related to the gold SDR?

Many questions. As per the article this AM, IMF ( also BIS, et al ) are very closed doors. Maybe good, maybe bad, maybe.

What are you saying, in simple terms? Someone in fact is using the
gold as a standard? Can you describe the arithmetic with an example?
Thanks.

I 'capped' my silver...uh huh.

away...to have comfort in the knowledge $$Ca-hing!

eavis&uttheadohmy...duh...he he...

John, the biblical definition of a "False prophet" is one who "If he predicts it and it does not come to pass, his prohecy is not from God". Per that deifnition, Puetz has to win the prize as the FALSEST of all false prophets of all time!

The fact that Peutz is so revered here, is indicitave NOT of Puetz's analytical/propehtic ability, but instead of the poor grasp of reality that extremist GoldBugs hold. They'd rather have a prophet tellin em what they want to hear, than giving them facts. Puetz's warnings about debt, bubble markets, etc etc are all sound, no problem there, but his market calls are nothing short of disastrous, and have been so as long as he's been posting/writing his newsletters ( compared to any REAL analysts anyway ) .

AS to my OWN prophetic ability, or lack thereof, I can only state that the record is pretty clear for anyone wnating to go back and compare me calls to Puetz's...there simply IS no comparison. Course I'm not a "Certified" ANALyst, not a newseltter seller, not a professional economist or financial manager..juts a layman who loves to play the markets and attempts to analyze it as broadly and accurately as possible. Unlike Puetz, I have no ax to grind. I could care less whether Gold or paper prevail in the long run, whether any equity or metal is in a Bull or a Bear trend. All I care about is being on the right side of the trend and making money, ( which I have been extremely successfull in doing so far..even in these "perilous" times )

Can't get yer 7 more words-----were they words of praise for mois??? rock it 'Boss'-- 'sittin here waiting fer yer life ta begin'.... 'these are better days my friend'......'I feel like I'm commin home'......go GoLd!

I didn't win the 32 mill ( USCONfederate$ ) in Cal's state lottery. Some group in Santa Barbara is getting 2 mill each/yr apiece. I will have to postpone my retirement a little longer. Meanwhile I'll keep buying the gold at these magnificently CHEAP levels...or maybe I'll buy a little Oracle. What do ya say;- ) ? ...go gold...and go ( up ) silver...

away

nottherightnumbers

Interesting that the number was this high, considering it was right on the heels of the Oct. 27th debacle...

hursday December 11, 1:26 pm Eastern Time

Nov net flow to U.S. stock funds $13.5 bln--ICI

WASHINGTON, Dec 11 ( Reuters ) - Estimated net new flows to U.S. stock mutual funds were $13.5 billion in November, down sharply from
October actual inflows of $18.2 billion, a mutual fund industry trade group said on Thursday.

The Investment Company Institute also said the estimated flow to all long-term stock, bond and income mutual funds was $21.5 billion last
month, compared with actual flows of $21.9 billion in October.

ICI said the November decline in flows to stock mutual funds reflects a ``normal tendency of investors to postpone stock fund purchases ahead
of November's and December's capital gains distributions.''

ICI also said ``investor uncertainty'' regarding the outlook of many developing economies led to weaker foreign-related funds.

Bond and income funds had an estimated inflow of $8.0 billion, compared with an inflow of $3.7 billion in October.

The monthly estimates are derived from unpublished weekly estimates based on a survey of long-term funds that account for about 97 percent
of long-term mutual fund assets, ICI said.

Did you work with the Bingo, Bango Bongo author who unfortunately passed away a few years back. The writing and logic is similar. I loved those reports. I didnt get more specific because I did not want to divulge your name on the net. bye

Stop bein soooo rational-----that's a NO-NO!! ....." meet me tonight in Atlantic City".....go team gold~~~~~~~~

SOMETHING IS AFOOT! THURSDAYs trading saw 42 of the worlds 45 largest Stock Exchanges are awash in RED... and those few that are up, barely eked out small gains. Some exchanges plummeted 5-7%. We are talking down markets in ALL the Americas, Europe, Asian & Pacific countries, Africa and the Middle-East... vivid testament to the worsening Domino Effect gripping the entire globe.

Just by extending massive loans to Asian Banks, the IMF IS NOT ADDRESSING THE ESSENCE OF THE PROBLEM: Which is simply that the borrowers cannot repay their debts! UNFORTUNATELY, ASIAN Debtors bit off more than they can chew financially.

It doesn't take a double Ph.D. in Mathematics AND Finance to understand the ludicrous folly of the Asian Banking Debacle looming on the horizon of the Land of the SETTING Sun... and the horrific ramifications which inevitably will ensue.

THIS is the LATEST analysis of the Asian Banking Domino Effect by John Kutyn -
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/kutyn120497.html

' we got debts no man can pay'.......Buy some FRO and ya can't lose~~~~~

Reversed and went long the Dec S&P stopped out at 957.00, made 25 S&P points on the short, lost 5 on the long, net profit 20 points. Currently long the Mar. S&P at 966.00 with stops under today's lows looking for a rally into the mid 980's. Added to my Gold position today, stops under the lows.

Considering last night Asian market activity, and last 2 weeks extraordinary run-up in the DOW, I'm surprised it isn't off a lot more than it is today. A lot of underlying strength still there in my view. I noticed the new highs to new lows ratio reached 10 to 1 a couple days ago, way off today no doubt...

I really have to laugh at folks here calling today's activity a "meltdown". Particularly when we compare the DOW to where it was when it began the year. The "Meltdown" is in Gold...but I still maintain, $280 +/$5.00 is a good support point according to most metals analysts absed on production costs, most CB selloff already occuring, etc. and I tend to agree.

Sure was great to have RJ's comments today, it's nice to see commentary from someone who actually KNOWS something about the metals markets and what moves them, posting here for a change, in liue of the usual Y2K and conspiracy nonsense.

I am NOT a goldbug!!!!! I am a 'land' and money BUG~~~~~~~~~~and could not afford ta have two houses in Vermont,one on this screwed-up Island and a soon to be oceanfront property on Swan's Island Maine if I wasn't a stockbug for the past 13 years....Can ya live in gold? Can it heat ya??....Can ya kayak from it?? I continue ta wonder how many of YOU are prepared for the kind of society that you are hoping ( or think will happen ) for ( collapsed economies,worthless money, etc etc ) ----how many of YOU are praciced in the 'art of self-sufficiency'????

@'"???????

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/korea_ratings_1.html

Kiwi asked: What are you calculating?
to which I reply, Beats me.

In the course of my work, I had a list of currencies with their spot closes. On impulse, I converted the spot price ( close NY ) into gold ( XAU gold ounce NY ) , both of these conversions 12/8/97. I whipped up an Access dB, and sorted them all from least to most in gold ( thinking I could perhaps find indicators about what currency might APPRECIATE ) ; and since I had the dB there, I input the SDR value of each currency; the SDR value and the gold value tracked perfectly. Then I noticed that the gold value was a fractional function of the SDR value. So I upped a bit ( *20 ) and got 1/100 ( think it was 1/100--dont remember ) of gold value for SDR.

EUREKA...here is a bona fide gold SDR...

there is No official Gold SDR---the Gold SDR is the creation of this board and what Ive learned here; but it appears to me there is an UNOFFICIAL Gold SDR

As to how the IMF/World Bank computes the value of the SDR: although the
basket of five is only configured every five years, the weighting ( a deep dark secret, about which one REALLY SPECULATES NOW! ) can be jiggled anytime the IMF has a mind to jiggle it. For example, they jiggled the dollar upward about ten days ago, a fact that Carl brought to my attention. ( Thanks Carl! )

So yes, this will have to be carefully tracked to see if the pattern holds; and maybe one of the Very Clever people on this board will provide new insights into intriguing mystery. As things now stand, I think I can see currencies that will be revalued, and two major currencies that will be devalued.
BBL

They're all callin for you Puetz. They're lookin at their S&P Put options ( was it $500 December you recommended?? ) and they NEED yo to come back and reassure them, that they're going to make money because a huge crash is imminent.

Come on Puetz, Full Moon this week, Winter solstice comin up, han't had a crash prediction from you in a couple weeks now and it's starting to affect my ability to sleep at night! If you persist in no new crash predictions, I may have to short the S & P myself Puetz......

Come on ..PUETZ, tell us what to do?? Tell us that a global Armageddon is it hand..tell us that paper money will soon be used only to start campfires....PLEEEASE?? ( The diehard GoldBugs chimed in chorus )

Are you insinuating that some 'here' don't know what they are talkin about??

LGB -- Kindly refrain from being a horses ASS!

Let's see now. You have said so far ( that I can recall ) that:

1 ) Y2K is completely over-hyped
2 ) Y2K and conspiracies are nonsense
3 ) Goldbugs are morons

Anything to add to this? BTW, what does the GB in LGB mean?

APH: Thanks for your running tally - - you are already long on the SP500, and most of Kitco is still astir about the AM downturn. I watch and learn with interest. Our Kitco early warning system is great, but we must not get carried away with our own rhetoric, and move prematurely, out of sync with the markets.

What interests me is how little the SP-500 has gone down, given the meltdown in S Korea. Also, gold did not really budge either way.

It is reasonable to expect the US markets to head back up, at least for now, despite the panic about the computer stocks. All those buying baby boomers, who know almost nothing about SE Asia.

My educated guess is that the real threat now to the US markets is dollar inflation, not a SE Asia crisis-induced crash.

All: Having fun with LGB at lunch...

Sure was great to have APH's comments today, it's nice to see commentary from someone who actually KNOWS something about the metals markets and what moves them, posting here for a change, in liue of the usual gold-sucks and debt-forever nonsense.

fundaMETAList

Why don't you do what APH does -- just give us a tally on what you are doing, and what percent you made on each trade?

You will save yourself ( and others ) alot of bandwidth. Did you notice that APH makes money on sp-500 puts? Did you notice that some of the pros are wondering about a silver reversal soon? Something to think about. No harm done in learning about making money on any time scale from minutes, days, weeks, months, to years. The point is to share knowledge and learn -- not argue.

Many here are bemoaning the fact that Gold and Platinum have been taking such a beating lately, ( that is when these same folks are not scizophrenically orgasming over a 4 or 6 hour rally that fizzles and fails ) .

However, believe it or not, there IS a Gold and Platinum investment that has been profitable lately. I know, because I sold some of each yesterday, and made a good profit on both. How you say? Anyone who has been reading my posts for any length of time already knows....

My Gold investment consisted solely of Gold St. Gaudens $20 pieces. I sold a few yesterday and made $ 22 dollars on each. When I bought them in early September, Gold was a lot higher and "Saints" were worth about $25 LESS than they are now. I wouldn't be selling them if it weren't for the fact that I want to move the money to Silver....

So what about Platinum? OK, as I mentined here back in August and several times since, my only Platinum purchases have been the new American Eagle PROOF sets. I purchased several from the U.S. mint, at $1350 each when the were issued back in June. At the time I made my posts, I was strongly derided by many in the group for making a "Numismatic" type purchase and paying such a large "premium" for what essentially is just "a little less than 2 ounces of Platinum.

Well guess what? I sold several of the sets off yesterday for $1,750 each. That's a $400 profit ( 30% profit ) in less than 6 months on a Platinum coin set, taking place as Platinum has PLUNGED In value. Again, I sold these only to move more money to Silver ( and possibly I'll buy a few "bullion" Platinum AE's now that they're so low, to diversify the metals portfolio a bit )

The above are the reasons that Numismatic considerations can be very rewarding and important in limiting your "downside" risk, and maximizing your "upside" potential in coins, without using high risk derivitive, stock, or paper plays. When the U.S. mint began this "Proof" program, and published their ultra low mintages for these Proof sets in advance, it was obvious to many that they could go nowhere but up, regardless of PLatinums price.

There are other Numismatic values today that fall into this category, I don't have the time to spell out all the reasons here, BUT I state this all only to recommend, if you don't know anything about Numismatics, it CAN be lucrative to add this to your knowledge portfolio when it comes to metals investing.

Those many here who derided me for making my Platinum purchases, strictly in the PROOF coins, and Gold coin purchases, strictly in the "Saints" were as wrong as wrong can be.... ( IMNHO )

El Dorado, re your 14:44, now you're asking the IMPOSSIBLE!!

I have done that a few times JTF, maybe I should do the old "Basket of investments" breakdown and give a running tally..juts not into giving total amounts, perhaps I could do it in percentages...

Quietly, without fanfare, and on the back page of the WSJ, it was
reported that the 3rd quarter current account deficit rose to $42
billion from $37 billion in last year's 3rd quarter. The article
stated that the likely full year deficit would be about $160 billion
and that next year's deficit would likely be around $200 billion.

James Grant stated on CNBC that the swelling current account deficit
would eventually lead to dollar being viewed as a currency in supply
surplus. When asked what one should do, he stated the dollar is
universally loved and gold universally despised. The contrarian play
is to buy gold.

You asked what it means, Quite shockingly it means "Gold Bug" ( because at heart I have a fondness for the damned yellow stuff, but more as a Numismatist than any kind of hard moeny advocate ) ,

Course you'll get several OTHER suggestions as to what the letters mean no doubt!!

Now as to Y2K, conspiracies, et al, sure they're fun topics and all that but overdone by a 900% or so margin as to their potential impact on metals prices don't you think? I mean people are always telling me I'm redundant, yet the endless parade of Y2K posts continues unabated. I mean the point has been MADE already about it's possibly impact on institutions don't you think? Does it take hundreds more posts to elaborate? Is it really that relevant to Gold?

Can anyone explain why the media is so silent on the Korean Bank closures? I would have thought they couldn't resist the image of Grandmothers crying outside banks guarded by riot police.

Dear Midas, I don't think they want to spoil the consumer's attitude during this important spending season. Keep seeing mental images of those New Year's parties in New York, 1/1/30

Now you I like! A Gooldbug with a sense of humor! reading Eldorado, Kiwi, et al, I thought Goldbug humor futures had crashed along with Gold's price the past few months!

OK, lunch time fun is over, I better get back to work and leave the forum to the Gloom and Doomers, LGB bashers, Rothschild conspiracy nuts, Y2K obsessors, Puetz cult devoted worshippers, U.S. market and economy bashers, 20th century advacnement naysayers, and TWA Flight 800 loonies!

( Pssst, I hear George Soros is cornering Silver so his APEX shares will rise.....pssst pssst )

Thanks Prometheus. I'm sure the media prefer the anguish caused by serial killers, etc, to that caused by our ( or their ) trusted leaders.

Still, not a word on the National seems almost like censorship.

Disneyland calling LGB

Puetz has the touch. Puetz has grace under pressure. Puetz has

humanity. Puetz has humility. Puetz is a mystic. All true goldbugs

have these qualities and more. You will nevah unduhstand.

You left out one, Puetz has his followers in bankruptcy by now, but he's a helluva nice guy!

All - does anyone have a link to the hepsters last call ( with a date & numbers ) ?

Just heard on Paul Harvey that the consumer confidence is the highest in 12 years, golds turn will not happen until that changes.

Might be until the numbers of the first quarter corperate earnings of 98 and when it comes to surface all the $$$$ fund mangers lost in asia.

Then people will realize the "asian thing" is for real.

Since you say goldbugs are morons, do you mean you are a latent moron? Sorry, couldn't resist.

If we counted your many posts here vs. those on Y2K and conspiracies, the count would be close. And because your rhetoric can be heard over and over and over again on any of the so-called mainstream news programs, especially CNBC, your redundancy is beyond compare.

How much coverage has there been by mainstream news about Y2K?

MARKET UPDATE ( 12/11/97 ) AM-----Gold was down on the open despite deepening
currency problem in Asia -- particularly Korea where the yuan dropped another 10%
overnight and its stock market 6%. Stock market reports after the close yesterday in the
US confirmed growing concerns among stock analysts that the Asian crisis will affect
US corporate earning afterall. The Dow is down almost 100 in early trading. Europe and
Asia also had bad days in their equities markets. CPM Group reports this morning that
private investment demand for gold bars and coins has more than doubled in 1997 as
investors worldwide scramble to protect themselves against the gathering crisis in
world currency and equity markets. "Investors in the Middle East, North America,
Western Europe and China began accelerating their purchases of gold bars and coins
in late October, as equity markets around the world, and currency markets in Asia,
came under pressure," said CPM's Jeffrey Christian. "And as gold prices continued to
move lower throughout November and early December, investors increased the pace of
their bullion purchases," he added in a Reuters' report this morning. He went on to say
that this may signal a reversal. Supplies for gold continue to tighten. In other news,
Italy reported a revaluation of 540 tons of their gold reserves to meet Masstricht
requirements. The gold was revalued by 7 trillion lira. Reports emphasize that this does
not mean that Italy will be selling any in gold. To the contrary it virutally puts a lock on
that portion of Italian reserves. That's it for today. Mor later if warranted.

LGB ( @ Inflows to stock funds ) : What is equally interesting is that money is apparently escaping the general equities faster than it is coming in. As I recall the news report, something like a billion a day is coming in to the funds and is still not enought to move the market up. ...... Sounds like you will have to commit 50% of your 401k funds in order to move the thing.

Just read your 14:28. Congratulations on your success; your investment philosophy seems spot-on to me, as does your outlook on life after a financial melt-down. And you claim to be a "simple-minded hick". I think not.

Dave, Dave, will you stop Dave ( open the Pod Bay dorrs Hal! ) OK, now look, I admit to prolifigacy. But as to puppeting the usual media talking head line I must strongly take issue.

How many in the media advocated dumping all their mutual fund retirement investments back in August, or putting most of their discretionary investment pile into Silver in July/August as I did? I've made some market plays since then but that's been my most basic stance as anyone who ever read my posts knows.

As to redundancy, I post a lot pf responses to "redundant" issues that are consistently posted here by others. "DOW crashing tomorrow" for example. ANd of course I've been a consistent cheerleader for 20th century progress becauseso many here are so GROSSLY ignorant of what they have, and why they have it. Those redundant posts come from deeply held convictions and beliefs.

The rest of my annoyingly redundant posts, ribbing Puetz and such, is driven partly by a warped sense of humor, and partly because I constantly see such ludicrously silly adulation here in Gold Bug country, of an analyst that has been consistently and extremely wrong on virtually all his market calls! Even a "stopped clock" has done better!

I don't disagree with Puetze's fundamental principles that excess debt is bad, or that cycles and bubble markets occur, or that crashes are possible in equities. . Any dweeb is well aware of those facts, even the talking heads. Where I depart is in the extent of the effects, and the inability by many here to see the FULL spectrum of what a debt driven economy has done for them and their lifestyle. The BIG picture over the long run. The actual effects that a tight credit, Gold linked monetary policy would have created in our century, etc.

Go ask an Asian next year whether he's better off with his bubble/burst economic, too easily obtained credit driven economy, or the "Good old days" of no credit, hard money, farming a rice paddy barefoot and making $2.00 a year in income. yes the Asians went too far in easy money creation, thus they pay a price now as we will if we go too far. But an alternative of very tight monetary policy linked to a Gold standard, would have left us all in the great depression for most of the remainder of the 20th century, not to mention, postponing all the technology and breakthroughs in all economic endeavors and...

ahhh but I become redundant in my preaching once again!!!

refer ( Consumer Confidence ) : Consumers will never be the salvation of anything. Especially the gold market. They have consumed themselves into the next millenium and have no resources to save even themselves. They can only continue to ride the good ship lollipop until it hits the reef of bankruptcy.

LGB, All:

Below are the Y2K subjects listed at http://www.garynorth.com/y2k/latest_.cfm for just *2* days. LGB, read over this list, visit the links if you like, and then tell us that Y2K couldn't possibly have any link to Gold. When the general public becomes aware of what *COULD* ( I'm NOT saying there will be a meltdown, only that you should be ready for what does come! ) happen they will flock to Gold and Silver. My feeling is that there are many lurkers out there that have the same Y2K frame of mind as you with new ones stopping by all the time. We wish to alert these people to both the seriousness of Y2K and the implications they have for PM's. Unless Bart himself decides that Y2K is not a Gold related subject I hope that all Y2K'ers will continue to post their concerns. Let's just not LGB the subject to death, eh!

11-Dec Interdependency Makes It an All-or-Nothing Problem
11-Dec FDIC: Only 95% to Go!
11-Dec No Program Yet, Aay 45% of British Managers
11-Dec London Sunday TIMES: Warning on Share Prices
11-Dec Summary in Chicago DAILY HERALD: Word is Slowly Trickling Out
11-Dec Why Asia Won't Make the Deadline
11-Dec California Considers Cap on Y2K Damages
10-Dec Embedded Chips Shut Down Plant for 13 Days
10-Dec Examples of Vulnerable Systems: Steel Plant, Pipeline, Refinery,
10-Dec A Programmer's Response on Embedded Chips: "Show Me!"
10-Dec Web Site of 2000-Compliant Companies, Dreamers, and Liars

And now, back to slaying the dragons.

fundaMETAList

Congrats. and your post is "best of day" in my book. Overall lifestyle is the bottom line, and fortunately for you, you have hard assets as a result of good equity investing. Good that ytou weren't listening to the Gloon and Doom Puetz types who were around 17 years ago, even before our current 400 to 1,000% runup in the market. ( depending on where you got in, DOW bottomed at an amazingly low 777!!! someone's lucky number who bought that day eh?? )

Here's a URL that lists just about everything that has been entered in the electronic print media about Y2K.

http://www.year2000.com/y2karticles.html

Sources include Reuters, the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, UPI, etc. I consider those mainstream sources.

LGB: did you ever answer my question couple days ago about whether Y2K is or is not a problem? I inferred from one of today's posts that it might be a problem, but we talk about it too much here at Kitco. Please clarify.

I'm not entirely clear on what you did in your calculations, but I think you just proved that relative currency values are relative. The SRD for each currency is adjusted all the time, for example see yesterday: http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/u_s_sdr_rate_moved_t_1.html
It has to be, otherwise a country could just print up a bunch of currency and raid all the SDRs. Since gold price, say in dollars is also relative to other currencies, it's going to have to be relative to SRDs.
Perhaps ( probably ) I've missed the point of what you did. Help me out.
Keep up the good work!!!

Everybody loves Ted!!!! Even LGB.Away to catch the Titanic,

China, SriLanka, Slovakia and Egypt were UP TODAY.

EVERYBODY Else was down...This may not be a meltdown ( a la Puetz ) , but if we were going to have a meltdown ... this would be the way it would develop ... huh, LGB...

http://personal.fidelity.com/82DEV/the_hub/html/indexes.html

Remember the end of '79? We were setting up a computerized inventory system for a gold coin dealer. On one of those antique PC's that measured their memory in Kilobytes. The "little guys" were standing in line to unload their silver at $50/oz. Melting down their tablewear. Glad to read that personal investment in gold is more than double year over year. The little guy ain't so dumb, after all. If gold doesn't hold at 280/oz we'll have alot more to worry about than our personal portfolios.

CHINA was up 11% Too....lucky them...

make that .11%

Dow/Gold Ratio = 27.63

Ted-True Confessions.Oh My! Oh My!Away to see Soros Poor Fellow dying in vomit swallow.

That's Point eleven percent. .11% on the China Shanghai Composite Index today.

XAU/Spot Ratio = .232

Once confidence is gone the debt leveraging system collaspses. e.i. Joe consumer see bad times ahead, he stops purchasing all items except essenstials and decides maybe he better rat hole alittle. This causes market slow down and the wheels of industry slow down. This has a snowball effect since if industries slow people get laid off. Laid off people can't meet their monthy payments because they live pay check to pay check. So creditors witness an increase of bankruptcies. At this point the already shakey finacial house of cards begins to tumble.

At this point state and fed governments will see an influx of unemployment and welfare claims which will cause more financial problems from increases in the tax structure to compenstate for the higher number of claims


I think I remember reading a news release stating that one of the problems of Japan or Korea, can't remember which one, was one becoming of liquidity, people were compounding a bad situation by withdrawing their money.

This sinero times time to unfold ( how many years did it take us to get to this point ) and will not happen overnight, or in a trading sesson. The events have started and will take time to gain speed.

The picture is ugly and hope it will not happen, but it appears to be unavoidable at this point.

Comex warehouse gold stocks FELL 1280 oz to 675,279 oz. Eligible gold stocks fell 975 oz to 165,730 oz today.

Comex warehouse silver stocks SOARED 991 oz. to 124,228,869 oz.

I may now be the only member of this group with a bona fide excuse for being a gold bug. At least I can blame it on being hit on the head! Thank you all for the kind words and emails.

Ted-Love on the Internet!!!! LGB Finally Try's For A Friend .Away to George in the Jungle.

Forgot to end my earlier pst with "IMH Novice O"

Poorboys: Not ta say that I haven't made money off the PM's in the past and currently have some money in em but there is a time and place for everything and ta be perpetually in the same investment-trade no matter what the circumstances are is IMHO a recipe for disaster....In that vein,no I am NOT a gold bug!!...Tim: Thankx from this ignorant hick---you too LGB....Now back ta the bridge of the TITANIC~~~~~~~~go maine...

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/u_s_sdr_rate_moved_t_1.html

LGB does tend to push the mainstream/bubblemania/cloneology paperboy's

theme here quite consistantly.Although balance is good for discussion and

essential for debate,I tend to agree with many that his attitude is poor

towards those who he wishes to stereotype as Goldbugs.I notice the same

tribe whom he emulates love to use this term disparagingly as well.Seems

anyone who doesn't fall in line and suck up the mainstream BS,or wishes

balance and objectivity is today labled a Goldbug.Gawd forbid we ever

lose our right to question those in the driver seat as we head toward the

cliff after just bouncing off a moving train.Were it not for the balance

presented here and elsewhere on the net,I fear we would all be awash with

useless paper of one sort or another.Get a grip LGB...or better yet..get

a better attitude toward your fellow man.Didn't you listen to what the

man said dude?

Poorboys: The internet makes fer 'strange bed-fellows'.....eh....Enuf of this crap the 'chef' has work ta do and spicy ( freakin HOT ) Mexican stew is on the menu~~~~~~~~~~

When I said mainstream news, I meant where most people get their information; i.e., T.V. news: ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN. My daughter ( UCLA grad, non-tech job, no internet access, cursory reader of newspapers ) who is much more well-informed than most, hadn't even heard of Y2K. Is there an effort to keep this information away from most people? If most people knew about Y2K and its possible consequences, would they remove their money from the banks before 2000 ( like 20%+ of IT people said they would in a poll ) ? What about the stock market? Is it a conspiracy to omit or minimize information in the TV news where most people get their information?

LGB: I saw Puetz quoted twice recently by a well known market analyst and newsletter writer. I'm still looking for someone ( other than yourself over and over and over again ) to quote you.

What you doin using that name. I knew the John "Hep", John "Hep" was a friend of mine. I'll tell you what dude, you ain't no John "Hep"

Lloyd Benson

http://biz.yahoo.com/upi/97/12/11/general_state_and_regional_news/nyclinton_2.html

Too bad they don't have any rules at the White House so we could throw the whole family out.

Ohh I see, Puetz was QUOTED so now he's authoritative and "right" compared to a successful layman. Even if all his market calls are incorrect. Therefore I should NEVER have the audacity to point out that my market calls have been accurate and Puetz's have been an unmitigated disastor.

UmmHmm, gee I see quotes in the media all the time from Louis Farrakhan, Saddam Hussein, Yassar Arafat, et al so I guess their views are a lot more credible than my own in the area of world politics also. Yep, they're leaders and men of respect and QUOTED in the media so I guess we better give them their rightful measure of respectful deference.

Now HepDude, as to my comportmant and such, sure I may be a little abrasive, but it's the only way to survive in this "Dog eat Dog" site of extremist Goldbugism. When I first came here as a gentleman, it was I who was immeditely derided as a "Lemming", "Sheep" "Moron" etc etc.

The condescending attitude in my commentary springs not from a sense of righteousness, but from an absolute wondrous amazement, that so many folks, concentrated in one spot, can indulge in so many delusional fantasies about the actual state of Gold investments / advice vs, Equities over the past 2 decades. Oh YES, the tide will turn, meanwhile it is not I who is being monolithically closed minded in my views....

Question: If mutual fund inflows are running at US$1 Bln per day and the market is not going any where, THEN we have a transfer of shares TO THOSE who use mutual funds ( joe/jane average ) FROM WHOM???

Answer: people and organizations who know better and are selling into this demand to GET OUT OF THE MARKET.

Mr. Buffet, I'd like to introduce Joe Smith. He'd like to buy some stocks from you, OK. Thanks for your time, sir.

Mr. Buffet ( thought bubble - Wow! This must be the greater fool I've always heard about ) .

Ted, your post reminded me of the very old expression, "be careful what you ask for, you just might get it" !!

First time poster and novice. Can someone please explain this for me.

I have seen it explained before but cannot recall what it is. Thanks in

advance.

LGB Review these two URL's and then tell me that "everything is sweet!!"

http://quote.yahoo.com/intlmarkets

http://personal.fidelity.com/82DEV/the_hub/html/indexes.html

Does this not look scary to you??

I was thinking this may be the first time in the Clintons' adult lives that anyone enforced a rule. Maybe it will start a trend.

Avalon:

It's an index comprised of various gold stocks ( all North American? )

I don't know exactly how it's computed but here it is:

http://cbs.marketwatch.com/data/dbcfiles/phlxgoldt.htx?source=htx/http2_mw

http://www.phlx.com/products/xau.html

Let's face it LGB, the market failing to make new highs here is disappointing to the bulls. CNNfn was nothing but a parade of interviews of small fry investors today who weren't being spooked by the week's action so far. What's the point of such infantile coverage? Earnings will suffer next year. There will be more cracks to come in the market.

arden - Had a poker buddy who was mugged in a Las Vegas motel. Took a bullet in the shoulder. He was really peeved, because the trip to the hospital kept him away from the poker table for 2 hours.

Best wishes for a recovery as speedy as this.

http://www.hkstandard.com/online/finance/001/frontpg/frontpg.htm

Thanks tolerant1, my bookmark page runneth over.

Ted-If I was A carpenter of Gold And A soothsayer of begotten times and then again a poster of Depressive Ideas let me praise all at Kitco for Being genuine ONCE sometime.Away to see Hollywood sublime.

I am impressed with the people on this forum with different views from the mainstream. I too made money on stocks in this bull market, but I don't claim to be an expert because of it. The monkey with a magic-marker made money too.

I'm not impressed with someone like you who has so little originality that he has to repeat the same tired old crap especially when you repeat it with a condescending tone.

Palm Beach coin dealers telling the public that gold is incredibly cheap. Buy now before the price goes back up.

Welcome. The XAU is an index made up of gold mining company stock prices just as the DOW is made up of 30 "industrial" stock prices. It is heavily weighted by Barrick and tends to be a proxy for ABX's price.

I remember back in 92 I swore if gold coins ever got to under $300.00 I would sell the house and buy gold. Well I got a second on the house and started buying today. I bought 100 - 1 oz. Philharmonic ( .9999 ) gold bullion coins today for $299.30 ea. delivered. I also bought 1 June 99 270 put for $630.00 for insurance. For what is worth, the Philharmonic have a 2000 Austrian Schilling guarantee ( $160.00 ) . I will buy coins and puts every $10.00 decline. I will go all in if we break below $250.00 or when we rally to $320.00. It doesn't get any better than this!!!!

"Expert"?? hardly. Never claimed to be one and quite the opposite. I point out my succeses, NOT to give them a veneer of expertise, but to point out the absurdity of adoration for those with an "analyst" title who perform so poorly compared to a layman. Not as an attack on the analyst himself, but the underlying philosophies from which his stream of predictions springs....

just a realist callin em as I see's em, and as to redundancy, usefullness of my posts etc. I'll compare my record of layman analysis and advice giving here to yours any day of the week pal. I too like a diversity of views, and am here to learn, else I wouldn't be coming back here all the time. ( Well, that plus it's hard to ignore a bad car wreck when you're driving past it )

Thursday December 11, 4:24 pm Eastern Time

US Treasuries near session highs on late day rally

*U.S. Treasuries add to gains after futures market close. *Market encouraged as retail sales data show little inflation. *Asian turmoil continues
to entice flight-to-quality buying. *Stocks recoup some earlier losses, still end 129 points off. *Dollar weakens against some European
currencies.

I think you're really onto something here...I'm accustomed to seeing correlations in science matters but this is too uncanny to be true.

Either the SDR is being kept in line with a "gold standard" ( by our friends at the IMF ) ...
OR gold is keeping these various currencies in line in a defacto nature...that is it's ability to act as a politically neutral currency ensures it is the nexus about which the paper revolves.

Try this...take 200 and divide it by the price of 1 oz of gold in the country you're interested in....voila you get close to the SDR rate.

Cool...now how do we make money out of this?

As gold reflects the trusted value of a currency we can see which way the SDR will be adjusted towards....hmmm is there a tradeable market for SDR's ( read gold global currency )

As I said, I compare my analysis more to the monkey with the magic-marker. I made money in spite of myself in this bull market. But I did sell SSC at 1 3/8.

Your expertise is very well known to yourself and few others. I see your analysis as a balding CNBC retread.

I REPEAT ...
LGB Review these two URL's and then tell me that "everything is sweet!!"

http://quote.yahoo.com/intlmarkets

http://personal.fidelity.com/82DEV/the_hub/html/indexes.html

Does this not look scary to you??

Scary enough to change your lollypop view??

December 11, 1997
Managers blamed for business bankruptcies

OTTAWA ( CP ) - Poor management causes most bankruptcies, says a new study by Statistics Canada. Contrary to what some experts say, companies go down the drain not so much because of external factors or bad financial planning, but because managers don't know how to run their business, the report says.

"The main reason for failure is inexperienced management," study author
John Baldwin, director of the micro-economic analysis division at Statistics Canada, said Thursday.


But Brien Gray, vice-president of the Canadian Federation of Independent
Business, says the report takes a rather simplistic approach and doesn't
take into account how banks deal with small businesses. "My difficulty with this is that it seems to reinforce a common stereotype that many bankers have about small business owners," he said.
http://canoe2.canoe.ca/NationalTicker/CANOE-wire.Bankruptcy-Managers.html

In my readings on history of markets, never found a solution to deflation instituted by governments or central banks that worked, including low interest rates or flooding the markets with money. Have I missed something here? War has ended previous deflations, of course. Any reference to source materials will be appreciated. Need to read.

I have been crankin away on SDRer's numbers for
a while. Incredible, they always come out.
Take a look at the 16:05 by Carl.

Apparently your reading ability matches your analytical skills. Why persist in using words like "analysis" and "Expertise" re my commentary when I refuse to apply ssame to myself and in fact do the excat opposite?

Go ahead and revere whomever you like Dave, I could care less if you worship the technical analysis of soon to be extinct Frogs. Ultimately, it's events that determine who's take on the markets is deemed accurate, their own areas of expertise notwithstanding. I'll take consistently accurate "Retread balding CNBC" ANY day, over delusional fringe analysts who are consistently wrong in every market call.

To give respectful deference to fringe, whacko, sensationalist, National Enquirer type, "professionals" in the technical analysis game, is something I'll leave to you. Glad you're here to perform that important function.

Well stated, Dave. We should be thankful to have LGB here to remind us just how many monkeys and how many magic markers there are out there. After all, in markets the majority rules, for a while...

Based on the numbers, I cannot identify the
currencies that you may be referring to.
Don't tell me - that would spoil the fun.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/ldc_debt_slumps_on_a_1.html

Thanks to all for such quick response re my question.

Ted from a friend -Intellectual analysis of the Gold Markets-Away to see Mr. Bean.

I have watched Donald's D/G ratio for a little while and understand the
significance of the "high" it made yesterday. My question is how far back
has it been tracked and what has the ratio been historically ?
And, can it be graphed ?

Forget everything else ( for a moment ) there is just us, and say, Hong Kong dollars. Convert Hong Kong dollars to gold. Multiple by 209.945. Compare the results of that calculation with the Hong Kong dollar converted into SDR.

What have you got Carl?
Youve got a global gold currency, me thinks???!!!

There is a world key currency, NOW, and it is gold!
It is difficult to find any other explanation for the tight tracking of the currencies/SDR/and gold.

Convert the currency into XAU ounce of gold.
Convert the currency into SDR.
Multiple the currencys Xau ounce of gold by 209.945
What you get--what I get anyway--is the SDR
( as of December 8, 1997 anyway )

The only consistent tie the world currencies appear to have that is linear is to gold.

The link is soooo consistent,
I can't BELIEVE this!!!!!

Donald_A: ( last URL )

Did anybody else catch that - Yeltsin at the "santatorium" ( so that's where old Santa's go... )

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971210/u_s_sdr_rate_moved_t_1.html

Who's the Monkey? The guy who catches the wave and get's off before it crushes him in the curl, or the guy that never catches it at all?

A successful investor must look at mass investor sentiment and act accordingly, with fairly astute timing if he is to maximize his gains. I'm personally OFF the mutual fund bandwagon at the moment, and will get back on only when I believe the risk/reward ratio warrants it.

Meanwhile, riding the Silver wave is nice. What DaveinCo thinks ( or anyone else here ) doesn't affect my lifestyle. What decisions I make re my investments do. I respect success, not delusional rhetoric. My own market successes are no doubt partially luck based. nevertheless, glad I didn't listen to the tired old Gloom and Doom refrain back in 1978-1997. Talk about redundant!! The pitches were all the same then as they are now. The G & D crowd is just lazy, they recycle the smae old tired scare tactics year after year, waiting, hoping, desperately wishing for that inevitable U.S. market crash that will finally vindicate their snake oil sensationalist pitch.

Meanwhile, the little guy remains "gullible, naive, sheeplike" enough to continue making enough money to be WAY ahaed of the hard money advocates in real terms, even AFTER the inevitable crash comes some day.

I have in on a chart back to 1903. I can send you a copy by regular mail. Just e.mail me your postal address. donald@uconect.net

FELLOW KITCOITES! I BELIEVE LGB DESERVES A ROUND OF APPLAUASE FOR ADMITTING THAT THE UNDERLYING INTENT, PURPOSE OF HIS POSTS IS TO PRESENT A DIVERGENT, CONTRASTING, TOTALLY INCORRECT VIEW OF THE CURRENT ECONOMIC STATE IN ORDER TO LEARN MORE AND BRING OUT THE BEST OF ALL OTHERS CONTRIBUTING VALUABLE INFORMATION TO THE SITE.
HIS ONLY MORTAL SIN HAS BEEN TO RUN MR. PUETZ OFF!
THE 85% OF THE REST OF THE WORLD WHO ARE IGNORANT OF THE CURRENT STATE OF AFFAIRS ( I WILL INCLUDE MYSELF ) NEED REPRESENTATION AND LGB FUFILLS THAT NEED!
CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP1 CLAP!
NOW LGB GET YOUR --- TO CHURCH AND GET IN THAT CONFESSIONAL AND CONFESS YOUR SIN TO FATHER JOHN!

ugh

Glad to hear that even you don't consider your opinions to be "analysis" or "expertise" because they obviously aren't. As I said, a monkey could have done as well in this bull market.

BTW, many of those crazy right-wing experts that I "worship" made the silver call a long time before you jumped on the wagon.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/asia_economies_2.html

SILVER HAS RISEN MORE THAN A BUCK IN RECENT WEEKS

Internationally acclaimed newsletter editor, James Dines, shares his LATEST ON GOLD. Additionally, he calls attention to two of his favorite precious metals stocks: Agnico-Eagle and Stillwater Mining - both are hot-wired to their charts, just CLICK the name. It is also obvious analyst Dines cottons to silver:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials/dines120997.html

Well, it was a hard decision, but I'm not sure its quite the time to get in any deeper into equities like NEM or ABX, except in the course of rolling over funds for tax losses. So I'm not going to commit any new money yet.

I have ZERO real knowledge about the matter but my hunch is that the beady eyed gambler over in the corner who never says anything is going to try to force ABX down below 15. How far below 15 we don't know yet. So I'm going to just stand pat on the cards I've already drawn...at least for tonight.

In my very first post here at Kitco on Dec. 01,/97 @23.39, my very first
words were"The US$ ( implying necessarily also most major currncies ) is being backed by gold ever since AG was appointed by Reagan, and that this was in part responsible for the one of the largest sustained growths minus inflation to date,and remarkable CONFIDENCE in US$ equities
and Bonds.As I stated a few times now the GAME now is at who is
going to print massively to bail out SE Asia? The FED will not do so
unless and until it is forced down their throats i.e. US Equity Market
CRASH for a day or two, before they inflate a la 1987, and stabilize
the situation. Some here would like to continue their wonderful dreams
uninterrupted, but the fact is using CNBC lingo" We live in a Global
Ecomony "and sooner or later they are going to bail ouit SE Asia,
thus far they have managed ( PPT ) the situation, but for how long?
That will be when Gold will take off, since it will no longer equitibly back the US$ as before. But don't believe that the Market will go straight down
in an arrow, history shows us that THEY have numerous"methods" of
orchetrating an orderly market decline. A Fact that I have not seen posted here is that when Gold was at it's peak in 1980 or so the DOW was about 900 points no that isn't a typo. I am not suggesting that it will go down that far but certainly in a couple of years 3000 DOW is not out of the question IMHO.But look for THEM to FIGHT Gold all the way!

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/rubin_says_has_not_s_1.html

I hope the people of Korea tell the IMF and all the other dirtbags to drop dead.The problems in Asia will drop the financial world to its knees and then some.

And our President called it a glitch. What a jerk.

Barrick Gold - Buyback -2: On Toronto Exch, NYSE

TORONTO ( Dow Jones ) --Barrick Gold Corp. ( ABX ) said it plans to repurchase up to 31 million common shares, representing about 10% of its public float.

In a press release, the company said the buyback program is subject to regulatory approval. It said it plans to apply for such repurchases to take place on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange.

Barrick Gold is a gold-mining company.

"Dow Jones News Service"

"Copyright ( c ) 1997, Dow Jones & Company, Inc."

LGB-You Surprise me!! The God of all markets AMEN!!! In the bush and lost my way ,Save Me OH MY! OH MY!.Away to catch the catcher in the rye.

Who you calling a diety PB? Don't you have me confused with Steve Puetz? Dave's icon of Omnipotence?

Thursday December 11, 5:32 pm Eastern Time

AFTER THE BELL - Stocks in line after market drop

NEW YORK, Dec 11 ( Reuters ) - Stocks remained in line with their closing values in after-hours trading Thursday after a punishing day on
Wall Street brought down the Dow Jones industrial average by 129 points, or 1.6 percent.

``I don't have anything trading out of line,'' a dealer said during after-hours trade.

Further currency turmoil in Asia was blamed for the regular- hours market decline, which left the Dow at an unofficial level of 7848. The
Nasdaq Composite Index, meanwhile, fell by 2.38 percent.

http://www.kitco.com/silver.graph.html Warning: IMHO silver is going to need to do better than this before I sell the farm to buy more. I have no professional experiance here, just a hunch based on several years of making and losing money in SSC. I suspect that unless silver has a run up over $6.40, SSC won't top 1+7/8 this year. ( You will really get a laugh out of how I usually decide to sell. I wait until SSC runs across the ticker 4 or 5 times in a half hour on the CNN noon news show, using high sales volumn and volatility as a sell indicator. Within the context of my general guy and hold strategy of course. )

Thursday December 11, 5:09 pm Eastern Time

U.S. stock index futures close sharply lower

CHICAGO, Dec 11 ( Reuters ) - U.S. stock index futures closed sharply lower on mutual fund selling and jitters heading into the opening of Asian markets, traders and analysts said.

One U.S. dealer in particular was a heavy seller, selling between 500 and 1,000 March Standard & Poor's 500 futures at the 966.50 to 967.00 area, floor traders said.

They said the dealer selling hammered March S&Ps towards the lower end of their daily range. Earlier March filled a chart gap at the 965.00 to 964.00 area and fell to 962.00, its lowest level since November 25.

At one point, the contract mustered a recovery to the 971.00 area, below the day's high of 975.00. A rally in U.S. T-bonds and a continued selloff in technology stocks kept stock index futures on the defensive.

The resiliency of the T-bond market's gains also led to market speculation of asset allocation out of U.S. stocks and into U.S. T-bonds.

Turbulence in Asian markets has continued to spark flight-to-quality buying of U.S. Treasury securities and has fueled liquidation of some U.S. stocks, they said.

Traders are concerned that weak Asian markets and economies may reduce demand for U.S. exports and lower earnings for U.S. companies.

Fair value for March S&Ps was at 11.60 points over cash, with arbitrage buy programs at a premium of 12.35 points and arbitrage sell programs at a premium of 10.75 points.

Traders are awaiting the U.S. November producer price index on Friday at 0830 EST/1330 GMT. The overall and core PPI are seen rising 0.1 percent against a 0.1 percent rise in October's overall PPI. The core rate was unchanged in October.

At the end of pit trade, March S&Ps were off 15.90 points at 965.30, Dow futures were off 129.0 at 7,928.0, Nikkeis were off 375.0 at 16,110, Midcap 400s were off 5.50 at 326.40, Nasdaq 100s were 30.75 lower at 1,016.50 and Russell 2000s were off 11.00 at 428.50.

Considering Silver's drop today, SSRIF is lookin mighty strong at 5.7% rise. As to Silver wave, a multi year high yesterday, with a lot higher to go! Gold is the chart that's scary

Reagon did appoint a commission to study the feasibiity of
backing the dollar with gold, but the debt was TOO HIGH and it
came to nought ( I can provide you with documentation of this, if
you like ) . I, like you, am sorry that it is not so, but it is NOT
so...

Kiwi@Thinking.all.the.while
"How can we make money?"
Well, we know what 'currency' we want to be in, yes?
And, as it appears to be a world currency, perhaps we should
all chip in and buy a mine ( going at fire sale prices nowadays ) and
mint the global currency by weight? So it can be used anywhere?
Jingle in your pockets?
More seriously...
There may be 'corrections': for instance, the algorithm of the
currency converters may be adjusted to gold, and so shade the
outcome. But then, one is forced to ask, "why would it be weighted
towards gold?".

This is another penicillin ( sp, probably ) caper; we started out
with mold, and came out with something that might be quite useful
to us all!?!?

Yeah I saw that article too. However, that heavy selling of S & P options, was due to the market rumor spreading that Puetz hasn't made any crash predictions recently on Kitco, meaning of course that a huge downturn in the market could finally be in the offing!

Are you saying that SSc will not top 7/8 - 1 or are you saying 17/8

SDRer: I saw Kiwi's 17:21 post to you. So, if I got this correctly, the SDR conversion rate of each currency on your list is proportional to the price of gold in that currency. A specific formula too! Fascinating!

I have several questions:

First, all paper currencies all over the world have been inflating relative to gold, even the swiss frank. If each currency is weighted in terms of their value in gold, will this inflationary trend be prevented?

What assurances do the users have that the SDR itself will not be inflated?

Secondly, the dollar has changed dramatically relative to the price of gold in the last 1 1/2 years. Was this reflected in the SDR/dollar rate, or is the dollar given a different value? What I am getting at is that it is even more interesting if different currencies are given more or less weight in the "public" exchange format, relative to the SDR format. In other words, could the dollar be given a different, "secret" rate for special costumers, like the two-tier system for the dollar before 1972, I think it was?

Thirdly, if the SDR is to be used as a "backup" currency, where are the gold reserves, or other reserves to make sure it is stable? I remember Donald posting some time ago that the SDR had inflated over the years. Have "the powers that be" done something to convince everyone that the SDR is now a stable, currency with fixed value? If it is only a "basket" currency, then I guess each currency in the basket should have reserves based on some formula to ensure stability. I presume the reserves would be in gold. I wonder -- even a "basket" currency could be debased if the "rules of the road" are not carefully spelled out.

Fourthly, is there a way we could identify the SDR as a currency of last resort? If we could assay for exchange volumes of the SDR vs the dollar, we might be able to come up with an SDR/Dollar index, whose behavior at critical times might tell us something? If the dollar melts down, will the SDR still work? Independent exchanges, networks, etc.?

I just had a crazy idea -- If someone were to introduce a new "gold-backed" currency, how would it fluctuate wrt to other currencies? Its value should be fixed relative to gold in the ideal situation, but other currencies would vary depending on their exchange rate. If someone were to introduce a secret gold-backed currency, based on that Univ of Warwick Economic Symposium in 1990, what better way to disguise it while you are getting the bugs out, by calling it something old, like the SDR? If that is so, its behavior relative to other currencies should eventually give it away.

I wonder- have you plotted the value of the SDR relative to gold -- is it constant?

I hope these ideas help -- I find this kind of stuff confusing.

Will Barrick take profits on forward sales which are reportedly around
800 million $?

Half the time the URL is only partially there. Kinda makes it hard to find the information referred to. Thanks!

Tolerant, what would you like to happen in Korea. The IMF path for Korea is the same one laid out for Mexico. By taking th IMF cure, the Mexican economy returned quickly to health and the economy there is now BOOMING.

No one likes austerity, but you sound like a spoiled child who doesnt want to take his medicine.

This is just not my view or theory this was stated by conservative
L.Kudlow who is in the know, the US$ is not fiully backed by GOLD
but rather is tied to GOLD thru an international monetary arrangement.
Believe it or Not. Time will tell.

I know they'll use IMF money to pay off the gold loans. I was just thinking that the IMF money probably won't cover all their debts and maybe the CB's will be at the end of the line. Just wishful thinking on my part. Then again, maybe the Koreans will defy the IMF and ... the rest is history.

I dont care what ya think them Clinton people is fine folk. Them Knick and Giant aint so good I think.

Horrible looking close for the SnP, sold my position near the close at breakeven. Could see 945.00 ( March ) by Monday, may spike to mid 970's first. Going to pull my stop orders on gold for the opening tomorrow. It's possible gold could make a new low by .50 - 1.00.

SDRer: Your 17:52 -- I suspect you did not intend to refer to XAU, as that is the gold/silver stock index. Didn't you mean spot gold, or something to that effect?

You could not be more wrong. I am taking the side of the soverign nation of Korea and the people that live there. I am not taking the BS, paper printing, lying IMF, World Bank crap. They live on the backs and sweat of hard working people in every country they infect with their lies and manipulation. I want the the death of the IMF, the World Bank and the FED.

I want them to take their medicine and die like the parasitic cancer that they are.

Is this plain enough for you? I can expand on these thoughts if you like.

The moutain of energy, analyst Gene Inger, is beginning to become interested in GOLDs prospects. ...no doubt the yellow metal is somewhere near at least an interim low point. We view it as a value buy, but not very good as a hedge. As far as gold goes, we prefer stocks to bullion. His complete intra-week report at:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/inger121197.html

42 hours ta go dude~~~~~~~The Clintons SUK! ditto Redskins + unions...

Karlito99: "By taking th IMF cure, the Mexican economy returned quickly to health and the economy there is now BOOMING. "

Fine, fine - the common Mexican citizen had their savings raped to hell by Salinas/PRI machinations, ruining the currency. American Wall Street firms scream murder and get their inept, anything but brilliant investment capital wasted - IMF steps in and GIVES American taxpayer dollars thus bailing out Wall Street and Salinas & cronies just smile and set things up for the next round. All the elite pats themselves on the back and tell each other what brilliant world leaders they are. I assert that if they were - Mexico would never have gotten into the mess. Call them what they are: crimials in nice suits.

And while we are at it, lets play spanky-hands with Barney-the-IMF-Dinosaur and pretend that Mexico's corrupt government & rich controlling families will never screw-up again and need to be bailed out by the American taxpayer. It's a damn good life, isn't it Karlito?

btw, have you been to Monterrey, or Mexico City or Vera Cruz to see just what is *really* going on, or do you get your informed prole-feed off the front cover of Barons?

LGB -How do all survive in a market of contrived innuendoes? or broker insane madness?Away to check out the American Fish.

I was wondering what you thought of that drop at the end of the day in the SP-500. I kept my sp-500 puts, and bought some XAU puts to cover my irrepressibly gold buggish longs.

By the way, do you have any idea whether the plunge protection team might still trash gold bullion if the market tanks? Can't have that "flight to safety" indicator take off, can we?

My take is that it is a real possibility.

Appreciate the predictions. Will let you know who the winner is on the day.

APH - March SnP's down to 963 and falling fast! I see support at the 950 level...after that Katy-bar-the door. Would like your thoughts on where you think gold may be headed in the next few weekws.

Have been doing some reading about the Gold Standard in recent days. Many myths believed by people in this chat line have been exploded years ago.

Even when the US was on a Gold standard up to 1971 you couldn't actually redeem your money for gold. Also the minute there is any financial trouble, governments take their currency of the standard rather than see their Au hoards destroyed. A quote for your troubles.

"No future gold standard will offer any security for redemption in gold or even for the maintanience of a fixed gold parity. Under such circumstances it is hardly possible to argue that the gold standard has an inherent quality commanding general confidence, or is the only monetary system that possesses this distinction." ( G.Cassell 1936 'The Downfall of the Gold Standard' )

Also "It is sobering to recall that the last attempt at restoring a gold standard broke down in 1931 precisely because nations, when it came to the crunch, were not willing to make the surrenders of sovereignty necessary to keep it going. The flexibilities in a credit system, which so alarm the monetary conservatives today, may in fact be the essential condition for any workable international monetary order." ( F. Cassell 1965 'Gold or Credit?' )

So there is my two cents worth. Can't see a return to any form of gold standard. If you really feel insecure about todays finacial system, well go out and buy gold. Its legal and it is, for US citizens, really cheap.

Live Long and Prosper.

Karlito - one of the problems in Mexico was runaway inflation. The problem in Korea is deflation. Two very different problems. The Mexican solution won't work in Korea.

CBS CEO Michael Jordan recently began telling
workers that the network will no longer match dollars put into
employee 401K benefit plans.

"The abandonment of the gold standard made it possible for the welfare statists ( government bureaucrats ) to use the banking system as an unlimited expansion of credit. In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation... Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the "hidden" confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process."

Alan Greenspan

http://www.gold-eagle.com

"I'm afraid our nation is going bankrupt..."

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/kh1212/m1212b01.html


"Exports have all but stopped..."

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/kh1212/m1212b02.html

Refer: Sorry, I meant $1.88US ( Or 1.88x10^-9 trillion dollars in Federal parlance ; ) )

http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4915/index.html

LGB: According to Kaplan traders committments are bearish for silver this month. I have noticed that SSC usually has to have a few days of good silver prices before it goes up well, then people buy it feverishly and overshoot the value. I just don't think that the silver market has enough staying power to drive it up this month. IMHO --disclaimer. I'm an amateur.

Silver headed back up again in after-hours..up to 5.84.
New Zealand and Australia both opened down.

We are on the gold standard now. We have full exchangeability. As you say, we can, and do exchange dollars for gold.

Goodnight. It's been a long day.

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/kh1212/m1212b01.html

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/kh1212/m1212b02.html

Spock - You need to read A Greenspan's speech to the Cato Institute, somewhere near Oct. 1997. There is no problem with the gold standard per se, even an electronic currency that is infinitely divisable. The problem is with the "powers that be" who find it easier to inflate their currencies instead of balancing the books. The innocent public does not notice if the drop in the standard of living is subtle enough. The Swiss are as close to any to being on the gold standard, and they have done quite well, given that they have the highest standard of living in the world last I checked. Their gold backing is enviable, as they could weather a much worse depression than any other country. I think the US faded out at least 10-15 years ago.

In your post you tell us to go out and buy Gold if we wish, well then
we can exchange our US$ for Gold, there is a link or standartd albeit
in the marketplace, at this point in time a set value for Gold today at about US$285 or so. My suggestion was that there also appears to be a connection or tie or standard take your pick,between Gold and most major currencies albeit unofficial. I suppose this Gold mechanism would be helpful in attempting to control the natural print print print tendencies of CB's. Current Asia crisis IMHO will readjust this mechanism upwards.

February gold headed for 285.8.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/markets_millennium_2.html

Donald: I like your response to Spock! Yes we are on a gold standard, because we can buy and sell gold in the US. But -- it is a fully floating gold standard -- determined by the supply and demand of gold and dollars! Our government does not need to buy or sell gold to keep the value of the dollar constant.

The only thing about that we have that is fixed in value is the intrinsic value of that bullion coin after we buy it!

flux-update asatssmbo.............

20 days or less and counting..................

paper is sicker than the liberal democrats ( rnc too ) ...........

detachment does wonders for planting seeds............................

their growth is astonishing...................................

chaos and flux has begun to run amux ( nst ) the non-believers...

seeing "now", will awaken many a gumby--nomer for ski-slope-sleepwalker


-bbl--cherokee!; ) --warming-the-phalanges-for-an-assault-on-the-envelope-

February gold slipping in overnight...285 looks like support level.

http://afcomm.com/afc/report.html

If the bottom was "in", it looks like it's about to fall "out" again.

so naughty! ( But witty as... "we convert our dollars
every day to gold" )

Thanks ( once again, always & ever ) for the change update. It occurs
to me that this has been, is, and will be, a constant of which--I, for
one--was totally unaware. How else to manage the delicate
balance between the currencies ( ALL of them ) .

They are sooo good at directing our attention where they would
have it focused. ( A small, albeit resentful, tip of the hat to the
spin-miesters--my german has deserted me, I'm really tired ) ...

For all that I believe were heading for difficult times, this board,
and the INCREDIBLE people on it--generous, thoughtful, intelligent,
contrary and just plain wunderbar, make me believe we'll come out
on the other side with something even better.

so naughty! ( But witty as... "we convert our dollars
every day to gold" )

Thanks ( once again, always & ever ) for the change update. It occurs
to me that this has been, is, and will be, a constant of which--I, for
one--was totally unaware. How else to manage the delicate
balance between the currencies ( ALL of them ) .

They are sooo good at directing our attention where they would
have it focused. ( A small, albeit resentful, tip of the hat to the
spin-miesters--my german has deserted me, I'm really tired ) ...

For all that I believe were heading for difficult times, this board,
and the INCREDIBLE people on it--generous, thoughtful, intelligent,
contrary and just plain wunderbar, make me believe we'll come out
on the other side with something even better.

You need to re-orient your thinking. The price of gold is not floating. It is paper that moves up and down to a fixed measure of gold. I find myself doing the same thing, thinking in terms of a "price".

Each citizen of the world sees gold in terms of his own currency. Some are saying gold is up today, yet just across the border someone else says gold is down today. Gold did neither. It was only the value of their paper that gained or lost confidence. Now that we see that all paper things are starting to experience a loss of confidence we must quickly exchange paper for gold while we still have time.

Now what would these Fed people know about Y2K? You can rest easy. Take it from LGB, this problem is over-hyped conspiratorial nonsense.

On this one we certainly are in tune, however boy are ever fast!!!!!!

DEJ - Thats a good question. I just checked and they have
$474M current assets - $198M current liabilities = $276M.
Ten million shares X $23 = $230M.
They can afford it but they won't have much cash left after.
It should be noted they also have $500M long term debt.
I think if the Gold price trades lower, ABX has more room to move lower.
They took a massive $350M writedown in the latest quarter.
Here are some other interesting facts:

The Company realized an average price of $420 an ounce for its gold in the nine months, an $80 premium over the average spot gold price of $340 for the same period and $95 an ounce more than the current price. The Company's balance sheet strength is unparalleled in the industry  $327 million in cash, shareholders' equity of $3.3 billion and a debt-to-capitalization ratio of 0.13 to l. Barrick is the only gold mining company with an "A" credit rating, which was reaffirmed by Standard & Poor's and Moody's subsequent to the Company's third quarter provision.

Search: Vanadium?dox&New&Wales

Light weight in comparison to Lead/Acid Yet with similar power/volumn ratios.

The battery components are made from graphite impregnated Polyethylene and copper foil. Vanadium Peroxide is circulated in two subsystems; one absorbing a negative charge, the other positive.

The battery itself, its physical construction, et al determine the maximum power delivery rate of the unit. The amount of Vanadium Peroxide determines the total deliverable power ( storage ) . Want longer power? just add to the fluid capacity, not the battery portion.

Charging potential can be as low as 2 volts. There is no attribute which would inhibit superfast charging or discharging. Voltage drop from 95% to 5% charge is about 20%. Can be run into total exhaustion without harm.

Applications in load leveling, solar power, transportation, etc.

No respite for Asia, Korea already sinking 6.5%.

The S&P looks like it's going down to 944.00, a wild guess would say by mid day Monday. The question is will it run up to 975 + or - first. If it closes under 944 we could go down to the October lows. Feb gold needs to close above 295. If it does we could see 320 by mid January. Tomorrow should be the gold bottom in this time frame no matter if the price is a new low or a test of the Monday lows.

Prometheus @17:33: At the risk of belaboring the obvious; deflation cannot be ameliorated by infusions of more money ( credit ) . It was easy credit that created the original problem.

Asia has made a valiant attempt to advance it's collective economic position in world on the back of easy credit. It probably would have worked pretty well ..... if the rest of the world was capable of absorbing all of that new productive capacity. ..... Without measurably affecting prices and margins for goods produced. Alas, it was not to be.

For some time to come, the US ( western ) consumer will enjoy the benefit of such an arrangement. Right up to the day that his employer can no longer compete with the flood of imported goods. Then, I suppose, the consumer will find that he is no longer able to avail himself of all those luscious imported bargains from deflated economies in other lands. And, I suppose, deflation will then find it's way onto our pristine shores.

It will take some time for the whole world to adjust to the new reality. In the meantime, throwing more money at the excess capacity will not likely change things for the better. D.A. is correct; they will do it anyway. They are doing it now. ....... But, what the hell; we are not the folks running for public office or who have a cushy CB sinecure to protect.

Prometheus @17:33: At the risk of belaboring the obvious; deflation cannot be ameliorated by infusions of more money ( credit ) . It was easy credit that created the original problem.

Asia has made a valiant attempt to advance it's collective economic position in world on the back of easy credit. It probably would have worked pretty well ..... if the rest of the world was capable of absorbing all of that new productive capacity. ..... Without measurably affecting prices and margins for goods produced. Alas, it was not to be.

For some time to come, the US ( western ) consumer will enjoy the benefit of such an arrangement. Right up to the day that his employer can no longer compete with the flood of imported goods. Then, I suppose, the consumer will find that he is no longer able to avail himself of all those luscious imported bargains from deflated economies in other lands. And, I suppose, deflation will then find it's way onto our pristine shores.

It will take some time for the whole world to adjust to the new reality. In the meantime, throwing more money at the excess capacity will not likely change things for the better. D.A. is correct; they will do it anyway. They are doing it now. ....... But, what the hell; we are not the folks running for public office or who have a cushy CB sinecure to protect.

Lawrence Lyndsey , former Fed Board Member, call for a meltdown of US equities Market due to Asia contagen:

"Why would anyone pay .... when they could now purchase roughly equal assets in the Asian arena a a substantial discount...Our market is highly over valued considering recent events in Asia. "

He also stated that it could take up to 18 months to clean things up if they got on the ball straight away...or it could take many years as in the Japanese situation.... we are currently looking at over eight years of denial in Japan and the problems have still not been faced up to ...although the Japanese Central Bank is currently printing an additional amount of paper each day equal to 1% of the current money supply. Gee I wonder what the value of they yen shall be by March.

JTF: The functioning of your mind gives me much pleasure. I fell over this last night in the very early hours, and worked through because it seemed so unreal....that is, that there was money tied to gold?

All the questions you pose are, as always, excellent, and must MUST be addressed. For the moment, with a deadline exploding in my face, Ill rely on YOU to discover some of the answers. ( Knowing you can do a better job of it anyway! ) Ill take solace in the fact that there are more than ten of us who believe in the discipline of a benchmark of value!

February gold looks like it's bounced off the 285 level..inching up to 285.5.

The latest Money Supply data released after the market close indicate the continued high rate of MS expansion. So far the December #s are looking a lot worse due to the FRB's accelerated debt monetazation. This week alone, daily debt monetazation is runnining in excess of $2.5 billion a day!! The presses have been definately been running overtime. M3 is expanding in excess of 10%. I believe , once Dec data is in we will see an acceleration in the trend, due to the Asian need for liquidity.

Date M11 M22 M33 L4 DBT -------------------------------------------------
Seasonally adjusted
------------------------------------------------------------------------
1997-Jan. 1079.7 3834.7 4940.1 6083.9 14523.9
Feb. 1080.7 3850.0 4977.3 6131.6 14581.7
Mar. 1075.4 3865.5 5008.7 6175.9 14643.4
Apr. 1065.3 3883.3 5047.8 6231.1 14713.8
May 1062.8 3880.9 5054.2 6249.2 14759.0
June 1063.1 3894.4 5073.7 6271.6 14787.2
July 1062.1 3905.3 5117.4 6307.4 14838.9
Aug. 1069.6 3940.5 5168.9 6378.2 14891.1
Sep. 1060.8 3960.0 5209.9 6428.4 p 14944.8
Oct. 1057.4 3975.8 5244.9 15007.8 p
Nov. p 1064.2 3998.3 5291.8


M3=5,291,800,000,000 ( Nov'97 )
---

Kitco showing platinum down -8.35 at 357. !
Since the Japanese are the biggest buyers, it looks like reality is setting in. This market takes no prisoners!

I agree with your statement completely....The politicians and most Americans " don't get it"....what do people think they will be buying when they don't have a pay check...or should I say one at min. wage...soon US exports shall dry up completely...off shore consumers could barely afford US made products before the devaluation of their local script ... now it will be next to impossible to buy American...this in turn will translate to fewer Jobs and fewer dollars chasing even more low cost goods ...and ofcourse you cannot expect US merchants and consumers to buy & sell AMERICAN when they can a save a couple of bucks...exports will dry up... trade problem will follow....then even MORE PRICE DEFLATION.

FWIW,XAU starting to show a nice head
and shoulder configuration.The opening price
either has to be the same or higher.
To get on board above 67 and to get off when it
goes below 65.BGO shows strong basing and could
appreciate very quickly in the 3.50 US area.
The cycle is in upturn however short.Greatest
profits are being made in the first phase.
Happy trading : )

THE USE OF PLATINUM AS A CATALYST COULD INCREASE MASSIVELY IF GLOBAL AGREEMENT IS REACHED ON EMMISSIONS!

February gold back to 286...can it hold?

USA-TODAY
For the latest 13 weeks, M2 averaged $3,974.7 billion, a 6.7% seasonally adjusted annual rate of gain from the previous 13 weeks. M3 averaged $5,243.5 billion, up 10.3%. Both measures of money supply will give impetus to rising inflation.

The Hong Kong Oracle, Milhouse, has always maintained there is a positive correlation between the trends of money supply ( M3 ) and the price of gold. In light of M3s accelerating growth rate in recent months - the highest increase in over a decade, and nearly DOUBLE the Feds upper range guideline - it is well worth a re-study of Milhouses analysis, US MONEY SUPPLY AND THE DEMAND FOR GOLD:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/milhouse831f.html

Dave, nice to read you again.

I did try a couple of mixtures you suggested yesterday,

but I am still here. Preparation H, despite being "doctor

recommended", proved to be the worst case. Never do it.

Any ideas on future of our new organization? I did offer

post of President to J.D., but he did not respond yet.

What is your idea on the direction of gold in December?

Why do we want to find a solution for deflation? That is like trying to find an antidote for penicillin. Deflation punishes the reckless borrowers and lenders. It removes unproductive and inefficient business activity from the marketplace. It does all the things that politicians are loath to do. It re-focuses capital to assets that produce useful things and away from speculation between holders of paper. It lets business people spend their time on the production of goods rather than requiring them to expend their time on a useless paper chase. It restores the currency to stability so that long term planning is possible. Deflation focuses the mind on the real value of things, not on their illusionary value. Deflation is the cure for inflation. Inflation is an avoidable disease. If it were studiously avoided we would not need to take the cure.

Fertilization-Oh!!! Gold.Away to see pollination and the leeward's and the nugatory oogamy of parity.Away to catch Parrot Fish.

All open Asian markets are red. SK-6.6%, Japan -1.4%. Globex futures dropping as well. SP500 -300, Nasdq100 -450

Are we on a gold standard? Sure. About as much as we are on the corn standard, coffee standard, S&P standard or vanadium standard! Actually, we on the confidence standard; I.E. How much confidence can all the growing credit debt continue to breed.

I lost all my files and email addresses last week. I posted once b 4 asking you to please email me again. I would like to discuss some happenings in Co with you, but not on these fora.
Have you ever heard of the Minute Men from Co?
They were from around 20 or more years ago. May all be deceased by now?

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/bank_of_canada_conti_1.html

He said LGB is the hardest worker he knows. He said, "why that LGB worked all the way through lunch on his computer ( from 14:05 to 15:20, 7posts ) . And then after lunch was over he got right back on his computer to put his nose to the grind stone". "He must be getting soooooo much work done". "GAWD I love that boy"! "He worked for the next three hours without lifting his head ONCE from that computer" ( 15:20 to 18:27, 13 posts ) . " I'm gonna give him a promotion"!! "Four and a half straight hours on that computer working on a special project for me". "He said he was working on a project to save the lowly hard working men and women of the world from themselves". "He told me he must do this so they don't make wrong market moves...or make a HORSES ASS out of themselves...or something like that". "And he didn't even stop to pee". "I think he has a milk carton under his desk or something". "GAWD"! "I love his work ethic". " He gives me a chubby"....."ramble...ramble...ramble.......for........4 hours and TWENTY posts..........while............................working......"

......................duh......lighten up Dude...

go gold..............down...........ugh....... ;- )



http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/economy_prices_sched_1.html

One of these days they'll have to have a Bretton Woods type of conference that doesn't deal with gold, but with the 'confidence' standard and remove it as a 'standard' that doesn't work. In the interim though, I imagine they'll first 'confiscate' this 'confidence', then increase the price of it, much like FDR did with the gold. In this sense though, I imagine rates to purchase this 'confidence' will sky-rocket. Such a 'confidence' game it is!

Kitcoites..S&P futures failing sharply...Tomorrow looks like a big down day
Grey Friday leading to a Black Monday??? Has the tide turned...looks to me like a distinct sea change in the market!

Saw your msg on 12/8 and sent mail. Is your mail addr the same? Just tried again. Thanks.

It is startng to get out of control and the non reported recession Depression since 1989 for the majority of people is, God bless, starting to show its face across the globe. When the Depression and implosion come Justice will finally prevail.

A decline in the S&P is a victory for truth and freedom.

You make a very valid point on the issue of confidence in currencies
we can all imagine what in fact would happen if all printed paper worlwide
decided to buy Gold next week.... However my point was that an understanding of some type was reached by AG and all CB'S to adhear
to a fixed monetary ( paper ) supply aggregates tied in part to GOLD while at the same time demonizing Gold thru PR and threats of CB dumping in order to boost public confidence paper currency and prevent said Gold
Rush.

DEFLATION when taken in proper dosage and early on is the best medicine for the credit bacteria that infects the world economic body....

Unfortunately, treatment is most often postponed , and delayed , again and again, until the cure may be as deadly ( depression ) as the desease...

Amazingly the entire treatment program could have been over by now....but like any antibiotics if the full course of treatment is not completed the infection returns as a more resistant strain .

In the case of Korea ....amputation may be needed to save the body from the infected limbs...

The government seems unwilling to make the correct moves instead opting to nationalize the bad banks rather than forcing bankruptcy. This could kill the patient.

Thanks to you and Mr. Smith I was able to survive. The Russian medication ( vodka ) was a big help. But if the gold co.'s start going under, I'm concerned that the ( 800 ) crisis # will be necessary for some of us. What is your PhD. in? If it's not p.e. or recreation you should be able to handle it. My daughter has a degree in psychology, but I don't want her to know how crazy her old dad is.

Donald: Your 19:30 -- of course you are correct -- my mistake! The dollar is floating, not the price of gold. By the way, SDRer's response to your comments to Spock was better than mine! What dry ( black? ) humor you have! Perhaps you have been in the banking industry too long and you actually know value when you see it!

Whenever I think of the US being on the gold standard, I think of Fort Knox, and all that gold that just sits there. It wasn't so long ago that the US actually sold gold to keep the dollar stable. Now they ( the government ) can keep the gold, and let the dollar go up or down -- whatever direction it goes. I still keep wondering -- is there really any gold in Fort Knox, anyway?

By the way -- thanks for the tip on the Canadian dollar -- we are now calling our relatives in Canada. Last I heard they have no gold at all - above ground where it counts.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/mexico_cetes_rates_c_1.html

Trying to look for logical causes for metals price movements lately. Noticed gold got taken down last night when India should be coming on line. The Rupee is down about 7% vs. the dollar since the beginning of November. India normally buys 20-25% of the world's gold. High prices ( in Rupees ) would lower demand and maybe generate some selling. This could be a big part of the reason gold is having a hard time getting it up.

It looks like Japan took platinum down tonight. Japan is the biggest buyer of PL. The Yen is down 7.5% vs. the dollar since Nov. 1. Platinum is down about 13%. The Yen is part of it, especially wrt. jewelry demand. Psychological factors re: the financial fiasco can easily do the rest. If the demand in the rest of the world doesn't pull PL back up, my guess is we will see the decline continue in the near term. ( Much to my dismay! ) BTW. PL broke through the channel bottom decisively today. ( And more so tonight ) .

Palladium has hardly been touched, though the uptrend came to a screeching halt. Palladium demand is mainly industrial. Long term contracts, currency hedging, etc. This is probably why it hasn't been under pressure. Can this continue? Seems like it probably can.

Does anyone know a site that gives historical data on foreign currency versus the dollar.

TZADEAK -- You can print a bill and mine an ounce. You can print a thousand bills and mine an ounce. You can even lie about how many bills were printed for that ounce. You can rationalize any damn thing you want to about those bills. Until that bill can some how be ABSOLUTELY guaranteed of its true and fixed value, you wind up with exactly what we have now; LGBs heaven!

John, I recall our first contact and me jumping on you when
you said that Russian stockpile of platinum is nearly gone.
Then I posted a whole bunch of silly jokes on this subject,
but I did find soon that you are an EXPERT+person with good
sense of humor. I promise I'll cut my production of silly stuff
at least 50% in the nearest future. Sorry if I went a little
bit to far, like CB's went with gold loans.

Anyway, I know Russia very well, lived there for quite a bit of time.

It is possible indeed that some of Russian "unaccounted"
platinum was recently sold by private parties to the private users outside Russia. It might be the reason that prices dropped a little bit
more than specialists would expect.

Russian black market activity could ( or can ) affect normal market conditions in the short-term, some kind of "unexpected interventation" took place.I may be wrong, I am not an expert on the particular subject of platinum at all,

but

it is a reality of Russia that some of its valuable resourses
can earsily flow abroad without designated official control or
accounting ( my "2 sets of books" joke ) .


If you think that those unauthorised sales could indeed influence platinum price at this time, I will share with you my very short speculation on "unaccounted" platinum from Russia.

Once again, I do not know this market, but I know what may happen when
Russia ( wonderful but strange country ) is a major player in any market.

I've been buying 20D Saints in MS-62 for 518 ( US ) and that includes shipping. The Gray ( and subsequent Blue sheet ) prices are musch lower; about 485 or 90 on the ask side however try finding one for that. These coins are slabed PCGS ( which I don't recommend in this particular instance ) ,or NGC graded coins. I bought them from Blanchard in Orleans and they take Visa and Mst. cd.

Hi PI. Sounds like you are feeling better.

Historical currency data....charts?

http://www.inven.com:7000/dataDict/root.FINEX.Individual_Contracts.html

away


However I must confess that I have been using LGB as my contrarian
indicator of the CB'S success at the CON Game, and by the way today , it almost hit a new high today ,and it goes like this. The more Posts
we see from LGB telling us there is NO problem, in a given day, the more loss of confidence in the CB'S CON Game. As I say this index looks to me to be topping out, and soon ready for a collapse.

Lurker777 - I haven't been able to find one that has actual data. If you find one, please post it. If graphical data will work for you try:

http://www.djtelerate.com.hk/htmls/fixed/charts/FXChart_reg.html

http://www.djtelerate.com.hk/htmls/fixed/charts/FXChart_int.html

You said earlier S&P was falling as you spoke. Can you provide website you are getting that info from, or better yet, at what sites can current night market quotes be located?

Texasgoldpost -- click on this:
http://www.cme.com/cgi-bin/gflash.cgi

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/adr_report_emerging_1.html

I thought ABX was a good buy too if you're looking for a stock to buy. However, according to your financial info at assests of 3.3 b it amounts to around S10 pwe share. At that rate the stock is way over valued especially if you factor in possible future wriedowns. Any comments???

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/971211/kajiyama_bond_plan_o_1.html

I have just gone through more than 60 charts for various stock, bond, and other "paper" index charts and the word I will use to describe the message I got was "ominous" some indexes are on the verge of dipping below where they were during the last minicrash. To a chart, they were almost all "rolling over" as indicatied by the associated indicators and studies. No index goes straight down of course, but what I see IMHO is an across-the-board increase in volatility and "exhaustion" of momentum. The London gold PM fix index and the XAU seem to be "itching" for a real rally as they are in oversold territory and have been for a few weeks now. The MA crossover indicator tells me that gold could finally be putting in a base in the $280. area with the spring winding up tighter and tighter. I believe that the magnitude of the dysfunction in the world financial system will counterbalance the transaction speed of modern telecommunications to make it appear to us like an automobile accident seen in slow-motion. Or, perhaps, like watching a tidal wave coming in off the ocean. It seems to take forever to get to you, but when it does, you've had the radish!

http://www.latimes.com:80/CNS_DAYS/971211/t000112116.html

EB & DJ thank you for the sites but I was looking for Austrian Schillings / Dollar historical graphs. I just found this site and it has everything. Check it out.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/

So much for all the 'cheap' imports we've been able to buy over the years. Looks like WE'll have to pay for them anyway through the bailouts with our bucks!

And another thought: Why have private banks if the government and people are the lender of last resort anyway? Cut out the 'middle man'!

The mountain of energy, analyst Gene Inger, is beginning to become interested in GOLDs prospects. ...no doubt the yellow metal is somewhere near at least an interim low point. We view it as a value buy, but not very good as a hedge. As far as gold goes, we prefer stocks to bullion. His complete intra-week report at:

http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/inger121197.html

Re chart action. Any chance of you posting the chart on London gold with 20 day Bollinger Bands.

Sorry about the spelling goofs...too excited tonight! ( Goofy grin thing )

The mountain of energy, analyst Gene Inger, is beginning to become interested in GOLDs prospects. ...no doubt the yellow metal is somewhere near at least an interim low point. We view it as a value buy, but not very good as a hedge. As far as gold goes, we prefer stocks to bullion. His complete intra-week report at:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest/inger121197.html

Re chart action. Any chance of you posting the chart on London gold with 20 day Bollinger Bands and MACD?

Re chart action. Any chance of you posting the chart on London gold with 20 day Bollinger Bands?

Re your earlier post on Mexico. The peso is at 8.56 tonight. Mexico catching the financial flu?

Next year, in the middle of the beginning of the depression, I hope our most eminent and honorable pols consider a tax cut! Wanna bet with falling revenues they increase it instead?

Can somebody please help me figure this out: According to an earlier post
Barick has shareholder equity of 3.3B. They have at least 372m shares not including the options etc. That amounts to no more than 8.75 per share. How is this stock worth $23 per share. What am I missing? Wopuld anybody on Kitco buy a company for approx 3x the asset value??

I wonder how long this correlation that SDRer has shown has been like this? Is it just that they are now being brought into line...some sort of a convergence like the Euro?

JTF, the way i see for a gold standard it is not necessary for a currency to have a stockpile gathering dust in some bankers vault, only that the bank in charge of the money supply only increases money at the same rate gold is introduced into the system...in fact some guru said a perfect economy has no gold in the bank but the "price" of the currency is directly linked to the price of gold. So now the scenario is if there is ever a reckless banker, or politician, who violates the rules and prints more money than gold has been added ( or there is a natural catastrophe of biblical proportions ) then faith in the fiat paper will be lost...as we see happening. Now, however, the populace will have the gold so they don't have to rely on the bank of last resort for liquidity in such times.
So I say let the CB's sell the gold...but they should be warning their respective populations of the implications of not holding some gold ( per person ) as they have revoked their responsibility and it is now up to the individual to exercise prudence and get a little insurance for the rainy day when the ink runs off the paper.

Donald: Do you recall that you posted some time ago that the South Koreans have 100 billion of so of Brazian debt, and ( I think ) , Brazilians have significant Russian debt? The South Koreans will want their money back. The rise in Mexican interest rates is suspicious -- so far they have been unscathed. Looks like South America is about to fall. And we have a run on the Canadian dollar which the Bank of England must support.

Getting closer to home, isn't it?

Mechanical Engineering. Specifically - technology, machines and tools
for high speed boring and precision drilling/reaming.

My stocks are also down, and not a little, but too much...

By the way, do you own RYO?

Also by the way, are you a proud gunowner, and if yes, what you got?

Lets call our organization "GOLDBUG CONTROL, INC." I'll pick up
a post of Vice-President/Head of "SILLY JOKES, VODKA and AMMO" deparment.

Salary should be paid in gold coins only, when cash flow is sufficient.

I have a whole bunch of other great ideas, will share with you if you ready to participate.

Take care...

Fidelity Select American Gold & Precious Metals Chart.
Ten market days ( seven hours / prices per day )
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/5969/agpm70.htm

Got a lot of Cold water dumped on my Warm feeling
about a possible rally. It seems like it would take a
Miracle to turn Gold around. But this is the season for
Miracles!

http://quote.yahoo.com/m2?u Japan stopped trading at 9:02pm and South Korea stopped at 9:32. What is up, a holiday?

A real tax cut could help alleviate illequidity, but if the government cuts taxes and maintains spending they will have to borrow more to finance the growing debt deficit. This growing debt will only complicate the economic deterioration.

JAMES DINES LATEST ON GOLD ( December 10, 1997 )

Internationally acclaimed newsletter editor, James Dines, shares his LATEST ON GOLD. Additionally, he calls attention to two of his favorite precious metals stocks: Agnico-Eagle and Stillwater Mining - both are hot-wired to their charts, just CLICK the name. It is also obvious analyst Dines cottons to silver:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials/dines120997.html

I am sorry, but I have I.E. 4.01 and I can't upload the stinkin' file I made. If someone can help, please tell me if I am missing something. I will hang on to the file just in case.

Sorry. My provider for the web site w/ properties is the one w/ the other email address. I can't check it for several days now as server messed up. I'll try to get him on the stick, as I enjoy trading info w/ you.
I note there was more than 174K of messages on Kitco today. WOW!!

Lawrence Lindsey, Former Federal Reserve Board of Governors was on CNBC today. He said that the IMF was a "FACELESS INTERNATIONAL BEUROCRICY ACCOUNTABLE TO NO ONE". He also said that the So.Koreans should work the refinancing out with the creditors themselves, Why should the U.S. Taxpayer pay for it. Let the Goldman Sachs take their losses and let their stockholders suffer instead of the tax payer. He also said that Japan was increasing its money supply at a rate of one percent per day for the last 3 weeks.

Japan always closes for lunch

Digdeep: 1%/day for 3 weeks? That's 21%! Where is all that money going? Into the markets? If so, that's part of what caused the 1990 Nikkei crash! I don't think our own AG has turned on the flood gates that much yet.

223: I would'nt try to evaluate the silver market by looking at SSC chart. SSC is no longer what it was. Its silver leverage is now much smaller due to poor financials and huge number of shares out. It is overvalued when compared to most other silver plays. Still it will have its day if they can bring their South American property to production.
Look at PAASF instead, if you wnat a good measurment.

My face is red 'cause I forgot to address my last post directed to you. I'll check the other email and see if he's got it fixed. G'Nite all.

All: In the "good old days" one actually had to print money to inflate it. Now it is just a matter of changing an algorithm in a computer. Just how fast can we or Japan print money -- how does one keep the lid on?

Kiwi -- You got it! It has been said here numerous times before that THE non-debt based currency SHOULD be held by the people, and in their hands! Not some damnable Fed note ( which by definition is a debt ) ! And should ALL the governments and banks unload the yellow stuff unto the market, I would personally welcome the fact! Get the stuff out here in the real world and stop having 'currency' crisis's everywhere. Hell, everyone knows what gold is! Everyone knows, or can know, what other stuff can be valued against it. But the key IS to make it MONEY in everbodys everyday life. If someone or some company wants to make a note against their particular holding of it, fine. That's their own personal business! But for a government to spend one ounce more than the tax receipts say is on hand, shoot the SOBs! WE THE PEOPLE will have to fill the gap if WE deem the action of appropriate neccessity to do so! Else, NOT! The government is US! No more intrigues, no more BS, no more expenditures that DO NOT fit EXACTLY within the context of the Constitution! No more bogus bucks!

Have the Koreans gone fishin' or what? No updates from that bourse since 9:32 EST. Must be a bank holiday.

http://nypostonline.com/business/1566.htm

D.A. @ 11:23

I always appreciate your comments but I am a bit puzzled on your view of commodity shorts. Historically, any market you look at is going to be sideways or down almost 80% of the time. Since I deal in leveraged metals, I must keep an eye on the carry costs inherent in any such investment on the long side. My clients earn interest on shorts, though. So even when the market is sideways, they are making money.

As for being caught in a short squeeze, I was on the right side of one in palladium in June and was on the wrong side of the squeeze this week in silver, so I can give a pretty detailed accounting of how it feels from both sides of the fence. Absent a runaway bull market, a short trade is no riskier than a long trade. The concept of making money on a falling market in abhorrent to many American investors who have been schooled in "buy low, sell high." Since they were little tikes in diapers. These investors don't realize that a short sell is a buy low, sell high transaction; simply sell it at today's price and buy it back later at a ( hopefully ) lower price. This is still buy low sell high.

LGB wondered today if there was any investment in gold or platinum that has made money in the last couple months. He made $22 per on his St. Gaudens ( how is that spelled? ) which I derided so thoroughly a few months ago because of the premium. I congratulate him on his return ( about 4.5% in a couple months ) but I would like to offer into evidence the best gold investment this year.. Short gold!!!!!!!!!!! Some of my clients made $50 - $60 per ounce profit each trade, and we traded the same range more than once and were pulling profits from each trade.

There is also the question of a hedge. I trade the 3 main precious metals long and short; up or down, I could care less. I am many times long in one metal while short in another. This will sometimes limit gain but, for the most part, offers excellent protection against sudden unexpected market moves. This strategy works well in most markets, but occasionally you get the price of the long going down while the price of the short is rising. It is here that a metals trader comes face to face with his worst nightmare. Both positions going the wrong way can suck the equity out of a position in a heartbeat. This is the first time I have every been caught in this vortex. My long platinum went $30 lower than it should have, while silver shot up more than 70 cents. Days like that are part of the job, but it still feels like a ton of bricks.

I'm not even sure yet how much or little damage was done. My company allows a client to reestablish a position within a short period of time. Several of my clients are taking my recommendation on getting the platinum back, but I'm recommending they stay away from the silver until a decisive top is in and I get word of some huge fund selling. I will re-short silver, but not here and not now. I may be stuck with the silver losses, but the Platinum play should still put the same clients in the black. I like playing with house money, it gets a bit trickier when the client has lost a bit. Just like poker; you can't beat a guy who won't fold; if he is also lucky. They get up a few bucks and now start chasing the cards. You or I would never draw to the inside strait, but our exuberant friend not only draws it on the last card, but fills it and beats the pants off the rest of us. I have some clients who play the metals the same way, they are convinced that the metal will move in their favor - if they wait long enough. The funny thing is, these are usually the people who make and keep the big bucks..

Anyway, short selling is not the boogie guy it has been made out to be. Over the years, I may have made more profits on shorts than the longs, besides, its fun to be making money on a commodity when all else are loosing theirs. So don't forget the shorts, DA, it is very liberating to have a play regardless of where the market goes.

PS
Lurker 777 -

$299+ delivered? For the VP? I could have beat that price by $4 per ounce. Keep some cash in reserve, you'll have an opportunity to buy gold cheaper.

That would explain why my charts for non-governmental debt indexes are popping while fed paper is dropping. How long can they keep this up I wonder?

I'm surprised nobody has made any comments about my question of Barrick being overvalued. I just can't figure it out. Barrick was around 35-40 when gold was 380 and now its 23 which makes it look relatively cheap but is it? That's the big question. If the the book value is 1/3 of the present value then you can count on the last couiple of days as being a suckers rally and we'll see alot lower prices yet. Anybody think 10??

Some comments from: http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/4915/index.html

Barrick Gold of Canada, often a trend-setter in the gold mining industry, announced today that they will buy back ten percent of their outstanding common stock in the open market. CEO Peter Munk stated, "The shares are

trading in a price range that does not reflect the value of the company's mining and financial assets and future business prospects. We have the financial strength to undertake this program."

RJ -- Couldn't agree with you more on the shorting. I will state that I do chicken out sometimes on shorting an already low commodity price ( as I see it ) . Good, bad or missed opportunities regardless. But what you say is absolutely correct. The general rule is to buy at support and sell at resistance. By far the largest percent of the time it works well and if one is on their feet, the rest of the time can be turned into a reversal with limited loses. But damn, those reversals orders have to happen near instantaneously! Many times can not be done that quickly so one has to be in-tuned to the pattern and nuances ( and draw their trend lines correctly and completely with all their nuances ) to catch the move properly. Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't. Sometimes it happens overnight! SWELL! I know where you are coming from. At least I don't have customers. Hope all goes well for you. Best regards....

Golden Boy -- I think you are reffering to 'price to book value'. In this regard, have looked the tech stocks lately? I don't think they've heard of this yardstick,...., yet.

Good night all! S+P futures down .40~~~~~~~~~~~~

RJ -- One more thing: It could be that supply fundamentals ARE finally catching up with silver. I know there is some chance of a warehouse full of the stuff showing up ( I can be paranoid too ) , but you have to play with the consensus that is before you. Especially if you are a longer term player vs. day-trader type. Else, play the rules I posted in the previous post.

If the Phili semiconductor index keeps this up, it will rival the XAU for percentage losses soon. :- ) )

Who said gold was the worst investment... Maybe it's only the second worst???

Because One of the reasons they can claim to be Omnipotent enough
to print paper currencies is that the major CB'S can if need be back
those currencies at some % level when the FIGHT begins as to whose currency is more or less valuable , and more importantly which CB decides who can print how much paper, before it effects that currency's
nomimal and trade value. The point you raise IMHO in relation to some
present currencies not backed by enough Gold, In my post I suggested
that in today's perceived valuation of said currency, it was arranged for
said currency to be "TIED" say to the US$ ( that has lots of AU ) thereby maintaining a more or less fixed rate of exchange vis a vis the US$. The real crunch I feel may indeed come as if and when the Hong Kong $ will have to be devalued Against the US$ ( It has presently a rather fixed exchange range ) in order to be"competitive" against other SE Asian currencies which have been greatly devalued against the US$.

Eldorado- there will never be enough Gold to go around for every person
in the world, and even if there were what you are suggesting is a total
redistribution of wealth on an equality basis, which IMHO ain't happening.
The rich will never give up power, at least not without major wars civil
and otherwise ....Do we really want that? Let's see if and how THEY are
going to get out of this ONE!

BTW the two major CB'S Can and OZ that did sell Gold I believe did so
with someomes hands firmly on neck. But these two countries can very
quickly produce Gold once the price moved above say $425 US and
replenish their Gold supply within a couple of years.

It is good to see your posts again. Thanks for you concern about my reserves and I am pleased to tell you I am in a cash position. I have just started futures trading and have a few June 99 370 & 340 call options left. I admit to having a gold coin fetish and enjoy stacking and playing with the coins.

I would like to start investing in Platinum and would like to hear your short term views. I do plan on buying more gold coins in the future so please give me your e-mail.

Thanks for responding. You're right Iwas referring to "price to book" but I transformed it to book to price. My understanding tech stocks have always had a high price to "earning potential" kind of ratio. But mining stocks is another story. Why would anybody pay 3x book value for a mining company in the present uncertain state of gold? An exploration company who are proving up reserves would be valued differently. All I'm saying is if I had enough money to buy the whole comapny I sure wouldn't for the present price. In fact I wonder if Munk, Bush, Molroney, etc are all net sellers and not buyers. Maybe they are taking their money out of Barrick and buying office towers.

Thursday December 11 10:02 AM EST

U.S. Retail Sales Lackluster

By Glenn Somerville

WASHINGTON ( Reuters ) - Sales at U.S. retail stores rose modestly in November in a lackluster prelude to the vital holiday shopping season leading up to Christmas, a Commerce Department report Thursday showed.

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/971211/news/stories/sales_1.html

My comment - things are not as rosy in the US retail sector as I thought

Where is the best place to go to get the current asia market updates?

Today there was a news release about ABX buying back shares. If I was a shareholder I wouldn't be happy with that idea if they pay $23 for $8 worth of assets. IMO shareholders better wake up to what these companies are doing with their money.

By Andrew Quinn

SAN FRANCISCO ( Reuters ) - The El Nino weather pattern is still growing in the eastern Pacific, outpacing the last major event in 1982-83 and threatening serious storms along the coasts of North and South America, scientists said Thursday. "This is already an extremely strong, mature El Nino," Gerry Bell of the National Weather Service told a news conference at the American Geophysical Union meeting here.

"There is absolutely no sign whatsoever in any way, shape or form of weakening." Bell and a panel of other climate scientists agreed that the present El Nino, a freak flow of unusually warm water into the eastern Pacific, was more pronounced than the last major event 15 years ago -- the largest ever recorded.

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/971211/news/stories/elnino_1.html

Check out Larouche, EIR weekly radio interview at www.larouchepub.com

A few days ago, I bookmarked a fine website with many Pacific Rim news articles selected by a financial analyst. Lost the site. Can you point me to it again? Thanks. By the way, just discovered that a couple of murderers, who killed a young local woman a few days ago, were stalking local schoolkids before picking her. Just about 3 miles from my home. Sort of puts it all back into perspective, says this parent of 3 schoolkids. Still in shock.

TDADEAK -- Perhaps not just gold, but consider other metals also. In-so-far as the rich not giving any of it up, consider that if they want to produce and sell anything, the consumer just might require something of value in exchange, so it might behoove them to make sure that such is in the mainstream of usage. Metals, by their nature have a pretty unique place in the whelm of things. The pseudo precious ones because they are abundant enough, yet valuable for the expense in their extraction. They can be used in industry, but just as well, or better, as a common, non-debt-based, value-full exchange medium. Where better to keep it than in the hands of the people rather than in some dusty old vault.

Try this: http://quote.yahoo.com/m2?u

Thanks for that site you posted. Is this a regularly updated site??