Highly recommend the article on the World Gold Council's web page:
www.gold.org. The article is by Williams de Broe and is entitled,
Can the Collapse Continue? He says that the analysts who say it
will take a year to see a meaningful reduction in output because of
the low prices are wrong. He expects very quick reductions. He states
that you don't need outright closures because the mines shift production
to their highest graded ore and stop mining the low grade stuff. This
reduces output and unit costs. However, after a few months, the high
grade reserves become exhausted and they have to cut output here as
well with a consequent increase in unit costs and then eventual shutdown.
He says we are already seeing a meaningful reduction in supply from
this process. He further states the price should rise over the next
6 months to between $360-$400 per oz. because of the shrinking supply
and growing demand. He says also that there could be a default on
some gold loans over the next few months that would cause the central
banks to reduce their gold available for loan. Central Bank outright
sales in 1998 should be no higher than the approximately 400 tons
of net sales in 1997.

A guy is walking down the street, and comes across a frog sitting in

the middle of the sidewalk.

The frog says "I am an enchanted princess. Kiss me and I will make

you very happy."

The guy smiles, picks up the frog, and puts it in his pocket as he

continues to walk down the street.

From inside the pocket, the frog's muffled voice comes - "I am an

enchanted princess - kiss me, and I will stay with you and make you

VERY happy ( wink wink, nudge nudge ) ."

The guy stops, pulls he frog out of his pocket, smiles, puts the frog

back into his pocket and continues down the street.

Again, the muffled frog voice comes - "Maybe you didn't understand - I

am AN ENCHANTED PRINCESS - kiss me and I'll make your life a veritable

heaven on earth."

The guy stops again, pulls the frog out of his pocket and smiles, then

replaces the frog in his pocket and continues on his way.

Now a very exasperated and muffled frog voice can be heard - "I don't

get it. I've told you I'm an enchanted princess and that kissing me

will make you most likely the happiest man on the planet - why won't

you kiss me?"

The guy stops one more time, pulls the frog out of his pocket, looks

at it and says "Look - I'm an engineer and I don't really have time

for a girlfriend. But a talking frog - that's really cool."

Panda -- I said yesterday that I too dis-regard the deflation scenario under the precept that tooooooo many voices were expounding it. Besides, it just doesn't add up at the grocery store, or most places, for that matter, or with the printing presses. It might happen should the big anti-dollar crisis hit, but that sure isn't in the cards at the 'moment'. Perhaps when all the lending institutions call their loans, but not yet. Even though we have credit card deals arriving in the mail almost daily expounding ever lower 'initial' rates, this is still not the deflationary times. Even though we have expanding numbers of non-credit-worthiness and bank-ruptcies and homelessness, now is not quite the time. Close, but no 'cigar', YET. Bailing out the foreign governments and banks will pre-occupy us for a few more days/weeks. When that fails, THEN we'll see some further BS come our way. Now is NOT the time to be lax in getting that foxhole dug. Seems that ANY kind of BS can happen within any given day! Expect the worst and celebrate any day it doesn't happen. The alternative is NOT nice. The alternative of NOT getting that foxhole dug is even worse.

G'day from Kalgoorlie.

Given what is going on in the World at this time, a question to all Americans -

Do you consider yourself a Global Citizen, or do you consider you own the World and the World owes you Americans a living?

What do you think Lads?

Aye, Haggis

MJPL
Superb broad brush through a history. I look forward to reading the next installment.

Producer
The book on the Klondike Gold Rush arrived today. I am agog as I am right now holding a gold nugget from Alaska, just gob-smacked.


I will reply later, old bean.

D.A.
I too am v concerned about the development of civil unrest in Indonesia. The military has a history of brutal supression of any dissent. If one was incautious enough to espouse communist principles, as was one German I met in Java, one would end up like him. He was beaten up by the police, tortured and thrown into Jail. He bribed his way out of jail and was heading for the airport when I met him.

crusty
ROTFL
salty

Think we all want absolutes and there are none. Astrology like religion & politics brings out strong emotions in people, not so much because they hate astrolgy, but rather they love their own system of dogma better.

Not all Americans are arrogant scumbags.

Tolerant, Podge

Hong Kong -4.49%
Indonesia -8.42% !!!! When have you ever seen this before?
Philippines -5.24%
Singapore -2.93%

It all dpeends who you talk to.

Our Kalgoorlie exploration and mining group are actually expanding, but I must say that we go about things in a different way. We have got new exploration-evaluation projects in Western Australia, looking at re-evaluation of old mines in Tasmania, and possible projects in Bolivia. Further more we are talking to groups in the Philippines, and we are looking at silver and vanadium projects in Australia.

All is NOT dead. The view we take is that - we aren't making as much, but we are making it. Exploration and mining requires pro-active people - not Speculators, Economists or theorists. Just doers!

Aye, Haggis

Thursday January 8 1998
Hang Seng Index close
9,110.46 ( -428.15 )
Updated at 12.55pm:
REUTERS

The Hang Seng Index tumbled 428.15 points, or 4.49 per cent, to close at midday at 9,110.46.

The fall was precipitated by a rise in local interest rates after a further deterioration in regional market confidence.

``It's just like a cinema fire, people started to flee, causing a stampede and no one is able to call them back now,'' Eugene Law, director at Lippo Securities, said.
( More details to follow )

Haggis@Query
I am first, foremost, a human being, not an island, and diminished
by what diminishes my kind. I do not ask for whom the bell tolls...

MJPL, your post 23:44 is very good.
Thank you, my thoughts are the same.
____________________________________________________

Karlito, why do you say "Karlito's response"?
It's just funny, are you member of the Roayl Family -
- We The King? Or somebody else posts for you?
Anyway, your response to Jude is very detailed, but
unfortunately it also sucks, no logic.

Could you please continue to comment on every WS article
in regard to gold? Your posts trigger responses from
smart people, and it adds to my education.

Thanks in advance.

Ask better questions and you will get better answers.

Tolerant Podge

Nice to see ya back posting, I take it you had a bad experience with a yank while you were gone!

I have seen the attitude you discribe but it is from the from a group of people on the welefare system. These people have the mind set that what is handed out to them is theirs and that it is owed to them for some unaparent reason. I know these is stereo typing a bit much and all people on assistance our not that way, it is usually the carear ones or the second generation that display this attitude.

Did you run into some these on their winter vacation?

See the movie "Rollover"

Now I remember. No, I caught bits and pieces, barely a hint of what it was about.

Hong Kong Standard, Wed Jan 7, 1998
1. Speculation on the potential for a devaluation of the renminbi added to jitters in Hong Kong and elsewhere.

But a lengthy article, CARRIED ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE PEOPLE'S DAILY, rejected such charges. It said the country was not seeking to devalue its currency and rejected criticism that its 1994 renminbi devaluation was partly responsible for the current Asian currency crisis.

http://www.hkstandard.com/clips/finance/080198/frontpg/fina001.htm

FT columnist, some weeks ago, remarked that there was a consensus ( ? ) view that the renminbi was UNDERVALUED.

Indonesia Jakarta Composite ^JKSE 12:00AM 361.061 -33.178 -8.42%
Philippines PSE Composite ^PSI 11:09PM 1655.85 -91.49 -5.24%
Hong Kong Hang Seng ^HSI 11:30PM 9110.46 -428.15 -4.49%
Singapore Straits Times ^SS1 11:31PM 1328.04 -40.02 -2.93%

Now add to that the loss caused from currency drops. Very painful.

Haggis__A ( To all Americans, a question......... ) : Save yer energy and breath for the mighty task of maintaining Americans in the style to which they have been accustomed. We like things as they are. Thank you. ...... Said tongue in cheek of course.

Haggis -- Global Citizen? Let's see now. 'Citizen'; A person who by birth or by choice is a member of a state or nation which GIVES him certain rights and which claims his loyalty.

Actually, My rights are GOD given and not 'state' given', so I guess I'm not a 'Citizen' under the states own definition.

As for global, yes, I was born on this dirt ball of a 'globe' to walk for awhile.

...mucker! How very sad!

We all saw different things in Barts post of
FDRs Executive Order has been firmly wedged in my throat all day. ...by subjects of the United States

Random House Unabridged Dictionary; subject...
7. One who is under the dominion or rule of a sovereign.
That is not I.

8. One who owes allegiance to a government and lives under its protection.
That is the troth of fidelity of serf to liege lord.
and that is not I.

Allegiance: I have said the words the whole of my life,
and believed I understood the nature of my pledge
In recognition of, and loyalty to, the principles and the people who established the republic
to those men, to those ideas, to that republic,
I have--and do--pledge an allegiance
making no promises, and asking none
other than the vow
to put myself above no person
and allow no person to be put above me
it is a bond of spirit
a pledge of intellectual honesty, sobriety and prudence
For the bond between us
to be valid
the republic owes to me
a similar pledge
and I will settle for no less.
for I am neither subject
nor serf

Being an "American" some times is closer to a religious experience than

being a "world citizen". The yanks are wonderful at sales and promotion and the "direction" of mass thought. They realize that peoples perceptions, in fact are reality, whether it is true or not. Look

at how JFK is still loved in spite of all the negative press.

Image over substance , paper has the image , gold has the substance

gold is ignored. However when the folks in Middle America wake up

look out. Underneath all the flags and oaths they really care about their fellow man and have a sense of fairness and ethics. The mutual fund boys better watch out when middle america wakes up white collar crime could become a hangin offence.

DITTO!!!

G'Day,

I have been away looking at some gold properties. Have had a few days off, so that explains why I have been boring the arse off everyone.

I am not anti-American, but being a traveled Scot ( 10 years living and working in Africa, and a further 10 years in Australasia ) I have seen "alot".

For example, I did a technical review of a gold mining operation in the Philippines last June 97 - in 1995 the made US$100 million profit, 96 US$20 million, 97 nothing. During the 8 years life of this mine, besides minimal wages for the local workers, nothing was put back into the local infrastructure. To me, particularly in mining, that is BAD business planning. Mining is international.

Seems to me that the US requires a dose of EPSOM SALTS - clears the system out!! Thereafter, the US should stick to fruit, or even better GOLD - you cannot digest GOLD, you can paper.

Aye, Haggis

Aye, Haggis

DITTO!!!

Lets debate the price of gold instead of our patriotism.

John, I liked the frog story very much.
Reminds me of myself a little bit.

Got the third beer can ready to go,
will do it when rain stops.

Can you imagine, we got rain here in Michigan in January?!
Fed does whatever it wants, absolutely no control from nobody!

As I recall from my history books, as each nation became the leader and thus became haughty, pretentous, and arrogant, they started to crumble and fall ( England, Germany, France, Rome, Greece, Medo-Persia, and on )

Note the PM's at the top of this page.
283.25 -.5 363.00 +7.15
6.09 +.05 205.50 +6.15.
Very nice I think. It seems to me that, just maybe the Russians are continuing to have problems shipping palladium. $205.5 is a darn fine price if you look at last year at this time. Silver speaks for itself. Platinum is coming back to life ( mining in Russia is becoming a lost art ) . Gold -- I think it has bottomed.

Yes, I think all is well. Now I go to dream the golden dreams.

MJPL: A most excellent post. Feel free to continue. It's unfortunate that a few on this site are unwilling to recognize the unremitting cyclicality of human folly. Rather than place the past 20 years in the context of the human historical record; they myopically confine their investigation and conclusions to the immediate past. And with intellectual dishonesty, totally ignore the immediately preceding period - 1966-1982 - which is the paper side of their diatribe against gold. Same folly different vehicle. Ignore the cycles at your own peril.

We would all like to have the American experience of the past 20 years continue indefinitely. But some things are just not possible and that is one of them. As we are in the process of discovering.

But remember - All that glitters is not GOLD, particularly the US Dollar!

A balance is required between currencies, this can only be achieved via GOLD

As for Fund Managers ... why not make Cocain legal, just for them!!! Give them MORE credit cards.............!

Quite right.

Log on the attached web page. Go into the "Discussion Group" and scan until you see the chat room related to Asian funds. Consensus of the group seems to be that are really cheap, bargain basement......

www.fundlibrary.com

Myrmidon -- Debate it all you want, but currently it is down near 50 cents. Will it go lower or higher, I suppose is the question. I put in my 'two cents worth' earlier. What's your take on it? In the mean time, we discuss the sovereignty of gold along-side the relative sovereignty of other 'entities'. It's really the same issue in the end. 'To slave or not to slave, that IS the question!'!!!

KO -- Cheap is a relative term. CheapER is also a relative term and will soon be the 'cheap' term. Keep it all in perspective. Thanks.

Steve: I don't know your exposure to the odd behavior of gold, so I will briefly summarize the period from 1900 to the present. The problem is similar to why you can only cook a frog if you drop it into cold water. If the water is already hot -- it will jump out! In other words, the public ( and the money suppliers to some extent ) are the frog. If our money inflates quickly, the price of gold will rise, and everyone will know there is a problem. But -- if our money appears to inflate slowly, due in part to the confidence in the country that generates the money, noone notices. Then one day, it becomes apparent to the money makers that the currency has inflated. They suddenly realize that the price of gold is about to rise, so they do everything in their power to convince the public that the price of gold is not rising -- constant talk about why gold has no value, reports of sales of gold by national authorities such as central banks, real sales of gold, gold loans, all carefully timed to suppress the gold market. If inflation news can be suppressed by tinkering with the price indexes "because they do not reflect the true amount of inflation", they will be altered. If deflation news can be plausibly reported, it will. Even the dreaded "D" word if things get bad enough. Basically what I am getting at is the bankers are being slow-cooked too -- and are unwilling for a variety of reasons to address the root problem, inflation of paper currency. Eventually, all their attempts to suppress the price of gold fails, and it rises to its equilibrium value.

Perhaps another way of looking at this, is that everyone starts to believe in the US dollar as stable for all time, so it must remain stable. If the dollar is threatened by inflation, the reaction of the "powers that be" is to fight the inflation by suppressing anything that might indicate that all is not well, namely gold. They ignore the root cause, because it is easier to treat the symptoms, not the disease.

The "powers that be" have actively suppressed the value of gold for example with the London Gold pool in the sixties, when the world powers decided to sell gold because gold had risen to the unheard of price of $40US. They pushed the free market price down to about $35. This worked from 1961-1967, when in 1967 France realized what was happening, and decided to buy gold instead. In about 4 months, 20% of the US gold supply left the country, and LBJ asked the London gold pool to be closed. The gold drain continued somewhat abated until Nixon closed the gold window in 1971. After gold rose to about $200 in 1975, the US treasury decided to demonetize gold again by selling gold for about two years, pushing it down to a minimum of $165 in June of 1975. By 1977, the second attempt had failed, and gold rose to the $800 peak in 1980.

The current war on gold is similar - the consequence of many years of inflation, with an additional new deflationary complication. This does add a real short term risk of dropping gold prices in the US. However, despite all the deflationary activity in SEAsia, there has been no clear deflationary shift in the USA -- so far at least. Since the US dollar is the world's currency, all of those extra dollars lurking outside the US tend to cancel the deflationary aspect. AG also has been inflating the dollar ever since the SEAsia crises became evident.

So why is gold going down? Because the consenus of the average person right now is that the dollar is in high demand -- for a variety of reasons -- none of them relative to an price anchor such as gold. But -- eventually people will again realize that all is not well and gold will rise again. I hope this helps. I sometimes wonder why I invest in a commodity/currency that has such unpredictable behavior, and so hated by those who do not want to accept that inflation of "paper" currency seems to be part of human nature.

Farfel made an important point concerning spin doctors. Now it's our
time to spin and spin and spin. He recommended Newmont, P. Dome, TVX?
and liked Goldenstar at the exploration end ( a later bloomer he said )
Not high on Echo Bay or Royal Oak due to exploration costs. Gee I wish he liked ALTA.

I sense a lot of tension tonight and this can be attributed

to the frustrating performance of our investments. I feel bad of my

virtual gold investments. Those damn certificates look like the WON.

If gold was up $8 we would feel different.

In response to your query whether or not an American

considers himself to be a citizen of the world or whether

that world owes him a living:

First, I don't think those are the only choices. Secondly,

you'll certainly find the respondents of this group aren't

even slightly representative of the American public. Third,

I suspect you're just in a foul mood, and it is silly to

even respond to you tonight. What the hell ...

I'm afraid that I only began to consider myself a citizen

of the world when I lived outside the US borders for a few

years in Europe. That was an eye-opener. Now I strongly

recommend it to all Americans I meet, for themselves, or

if that is impossible, for their children. We are the

most amazingly insulated people. Our media and our political

system is so tightly controlled, that we are virtually a

one-party system with a controlled media, a la USSR in the

old days.

Living abroad, seeing the multi-party system in action, and

being exposed to multiple viewpoints in the media was just

stunning to me. When I came back, I felt like Plato's man

who has exited the cave and come back in to tell others to

find the light. This, too, has passed. Hopefully, the

internet offer Americans freedom of association & expression,

for at least some people. I suspect it will be a media

for the young. That's ok. I'm a patient sort of person.

No, I don't feel that the world owes me a living. Nobody

owes me a living. It's just something I'll continue to

scrape out for myself.

What's more interesting is why you asked those particular

questions. Well?

Gold is up against Asian currencies and holding its own against apile of depreciating assets including:

copper, oil, natural gas, nickel ....

The only asset class which hasn't dumped big time is real estate because of historically low mortgage rates. When the Asian depression starts to really effect Europe and North America plus Australia and peoples jobs are effected foreclosures will start and real estate will crash.

Gold and silver are doing just fine. The only bad gold and silver assets are mining companies with high production costs and high debts.

Does Alan G. really hate global deflation or is he a trilateralist
who wants the new world order to start from the bottom? The other
view he is a closet traditionalist and will inflate to save the
West. Inflate and the bugs win? Deflate and the bugs lose or win?
LGB don't feed me harsh criticism please.

Seagate To Disappoint Yet Again
By Gabrielle Jonas, TechInvestor
Seagate said after market close Wednesday that it will post"a substantial loss" in the second quarter because of weak demand and price competition.
Analysts' latest predictions called for the company to post earnings of 3 cents a share.
In a statement, the beleaguered disk-drive company also said revenue will be about $1.65 billion, "significantly less" than expected.
Seagate is the latest storage company to issue a profit warning. Read-Rite said Monday its profits would be lower than expected, and the outlook for the rest of the sector looks bleak http://www.techweb.com/investor/story/INV19980107S0009.
Seagate, based in Scotts Valley, Calif., will report its second quarter financials on Jan. 20. Seagate's loss will be compounded by numerous charges related to restructuring, inventory write-downs and other one-time expenses.
The company said it is planning to align worldwide operations with current market conditions.
At market close, and before news! of the shortfall, Seagate [SEG] was down 1 1/4 to 20 5/8 in heavy volume.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
There's Lots To Worry About In The New Year
By Wayne Rash, InternetWeek
For some people and some companies, 1998 is going to be a really bad year. For others, it's going to be an absolutely awful year. For a few, it might be the last year ever.
Bill Gates, for example, is going to have a tough time this year once the Justice Department gets rolling on its antitrust case. When Justice hired New York attorney David Boies last month, it put Microsoft on notice that the government has two specific goals: to take this case to trial, and to win.
Boies, it seems, is one of the best litigators in the United States-perhaps the best, depending on whom you ask. Hiring him, instead of using a staff attorney, is akin to telling Iraq that the next time Saddam gets out of line, you plan to use nuclear weapons. What's worse is that Microsoft is largely responsible for its own problems. And it'll continue to get worse in 1998.
There are no indications that Gates is likely to make any effort to improve his image in Washington, o! r that his lobbying staff will grow larger than its current four people, or that Microsoft will stop shooting itself in the foot through actions such as producing a nonfunctional version of Windows 95 in response to a court order to unbundle Internet Explorer.
If Microsoft were the only company due for problems, this wouldn't be a generally bad year. The problem is, it's not. For the reason, look at Asia. The Asian currency and financial implosion, and subsequent governmental failures, will continue to play out until things hit a point low enough that the governments and companies involved will finally pay for their past extravagance. Although this is positive over the long run, at least if you believe in a market economy, in the short run it's going to be really hard on the high-tech industry in the United States.
The reason it'll be tough is that the communications industry was counting on the rapidly growing markets in Asia for significant revenue in '98. The markets have largely disappeared. Adding to the problems, Asian products, thanks to the devaluation of Asian currencies, will get less expensive. Makers of U.S. products, especially those with lots of Asian competition, will have to compete in a very unfavorable market.
Meanwhile, there will be plenty of homegrown things to worry about. For example, how likely is it that Apple Computer will continue to exist in its current form by this time next year-especially with Steve Jobs running things?
I could go on, but you get the drift. Although there will be lots of cool products to test and interesting trends to spot, it'll be at least as interesting to see who gets a massive headache this year and what the corporate version of aspirin turns out to be.

Lets all retire on put options. Please share your brain.

"Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the capitalistic system was to debauch the currency. Lenin was
certainly right. There is no subtler, so surer means of overturning the existing basis of society. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million can diagnose." John Maynard Keynes

G'night

Asia burnt today - ouch.
While Japan held it's head above water.
But then late in the day Japan decided to join the rest of Asia,
And slipped into the red.

Change of heart?

Is this next year the climax before the last act in the market before
Y2K? Do we make money now, sell, and wait to repurchase.

One must not forget that many of us watch gold on a minute by minute basis hoping to be on the spot when gold finally turns and begins a bullish run. Give it time, we all KNOW that sooner rather than later this
ponzi game will end and many gold shorts will wonder what hit them. As the mutual fund mania unwinds and all of the paper has been passed to the weak hands by the strong hands real panic will set in. The last three days the dow has traded in excess of 600,000,000 shares per day and where did the dow go? Distribution from the wealthy to the poor has begun and will continue until the point that the rich have exchanged their worthless paper for greenbacks. Then and not until then will you see panic enter into the gold market.

Folks, it is interesting to watch variety of posts on this forum because I think it represents very well a sentiment in different countries. Now lets look at the US. We see posts:

government and politicians are just a bunch of hoodlums  business is screwing us up . bankers and financial community will destroy this country through their policy . most of the people investing their retirement money knows nothing about whats going on and gullibly supports this trend . our foreign policy stinks . East Coast stinks . Silicon Valley stinks  paper bulls stink . my neighbor stinks . but we are all patriots .

followed by statements:

how could Korean turn in their gold?  are they going to get paid?  crazy fools how could they do that ..

well it makes me wonder. If this great country runs into trouble, who will help? Because everybody is on its own, its always "them against us" however, if we dont pull together we will be gone sooner then we think.

And somebody else will be asking:

how come they did not pull together to get through it?  even without pay  crazy fools how could they do it?  and than some will say "good riddance"  well, at least they had some money left to get out of that place.

I dont know, it does not give me too much confidence. My fellow Americans, we better start fixing things before this country hits some real trouble because than itll be too late no matter how much money we make.

KO: I was explaining to Steve why gold has been going down for the last 1 1/2 years -- since I think he is new to this site. I do agree with you that we are very near a turning point -- in fact if you read my post carefully you will see that what I am saying is that gold should be going up steadily over the last few years -- not down. I left out the additional complexities of why the US dollar is going up due to the EURO crisis, which would also make gold go down -- short term.

You are right that every day more currencies are going down in value, and gold in these currencies is going up. When the people in these countries can afford to buy gold again -- they will in a big way, and then the dollar price of gold will rise.

Right now my investments are based on the premise that gold is still in a long term bear, but can have short term rallies. Just made about 5% before the bottom fell out again. Also -- if there is a major market correction, and you are invested in gold -- you may be in for a big loss! The time for gold to shine will be after the markets collapse, or after inflation returns to our shores.

From the sig line of a regular to the comp.software.year-2000 newsgroup:

Democracy: three wolves and a sheep voting on dinner.

Republic: the sheep get to vote for which wolves vote on dinner.

Constitutional Republic: voting on dinner is strictly forbidden, and the sheep are armed. q;o ) =

Sorry friend but gold and silver are not doing fine! You just see some noise on the chart and like many others on this board, you are getting all excited!

Calm down and wait, wait, and keep on waiting. Someday it will do fine. Meanwhile, tension prevails because gold and silver are not doing fine. We all know it, but don't want to admit it.

http://quote.yahoo.com.intlmarkets

Anyone care to comment on the significance of this?

During the late 70's gold took an upward grind, this grind took it to a spike peak; a spike that the likes of LGB loves to rub in. Its useless to argue with a guy that presents extremes ( be they the price of gold, real estate or whatever ) in an analysis.
Logic says that with the large amounts of paper and debt created since 1982 a very large gold price increase is probable and when occuring, should remain intact. Not at all like the rolling gold prices of the past and caused by those controlling the world economies.

Don't forget -- if the markets tank, so may the gold stocks and gold. I don't think the PPT will leave gold alone quite yet, as it is an indicator of trouble in the markets. My guess is that the reason the market rceovered in the last twenty minutes on Jan 7 was due to the PPT, so they still have reserves left.

So far, gold has not responded well to the silver rally, indicating that the gold shorts still have some control.

Good luck all, and keep some powder dry!

YES,YES,YES...When this bug turns ( and it will ) the weasels will
try to creep back to this site with spin of their own. They will rue
the past 6 to 9 months they put this site through. Thanks for your post.

In many posts I have read "PPT". Would you mind enlightening
me ( and countless lurkers} whom do you mean?

I am calm but slightly depressed. I was hoping that we might avert a 1973-74 recession ( which I did go through ) or worse. The Asian markets could take a lot of people down. I have owned precious metals for over 17 years and am slowly balancing my portfolio to hedge all bets. I am not concerned whether precious metals go up or down relative to dollars and timing the market. It still intrigues me how many people love to gamble with options whether in stock or precious metals ahead of what could be a killing bear market in stocks.

The Hatt, what is your definition of strong and weak hand. I know that it sounds really good in rhetoric but strong hand definition is not clear to me. Do you define the strong hand somebody with $500K, $500mill? a few billions? Is a smart investor with $50K weak comparing to $1mill dumb investor? Who is rich and who is poor? That line "rich are passing" stocks to poor" don't apply much these days Most people around me sit on $500K + in mutual funds and while move money around between mutual funds they don't cash. Are they poor? strong? weak?

Anyone have any recent data on real estate values in your
area? Just curious. We are seeing a falling US bond market
( today ) , falling SEAsian markets, etc. Seems that asset
values are falling all around us. But it's very hard to get
current data on Real Estate. It would be interesting.

Especially with commodities falling all over the place. IS
THIS THE BIG "D"?

Currently at 8935, down 603pts ( 6.33% ) .

In my area ( Phoenix, AZ USA ) prices have gone up by 10% at least in the last year.

@ tolerant1 - are you around??

KO -- Comment on it? OK. Talkin' over the fence; 'Tis a shame about that
Singapore currency, isn't it Martha. Who EVER would'a thought just a few months ago! Did you all lose anything on your growth fund investments?'
KO -- What do you mean; 'comments'?

Promethius: The PPT is the Plunge Protection Team, a team of individuals who respond to members of the treasury, to support the markets. Although others on this site now more about the inner workings of the PPT than I, the gist of it is that they have access to funds from a variety of sources, much of it private. For example Robert Rubin used to be a trader, and I think worked for Goldman Sachs. So it would be right up his alley to devise a support system for the market to get through weak moments. Their funds are not infinite, of course -- and if the market starts to act like Niagara falls, it will go wherever it wants.

The idea of a PPT supporting the US markets goes back nearly 100 years, but I doubt that one has always been active. This is not something that one can easily read about in the papers. Good night!

Just about the same in Washington DC area. +5 to 10 percent

In Canada real estate is steady or up a few %. The U.S. has had record housing starts due to historically low mortgage rates. This market will only crash when unemployment rises. The last stocks to crash will probably be things like "insulation contractors". Yes I do own stock in an "insulation contractor" to hedge my bets along with global bonds and cash. I am saving up to buy a car mid-summer when the auto market crashes due to cheap Hyundais, Hondas and Toyotas flooding the North American market. Same goes for a new computer with an Asian high resolution monitor.

http://www.stocksite.com/features/contrarian/
http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~netking/finan.htm#tquotns
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What's going on? - My take on the Dow.
The wave structure that we are currently in, is a repetition of the wave experienced in late October.
The wave nature is of a larger scale with a potential for a greater fall.
We are currently in the last wave down.
Asia's woes are accelerating the down trend same as last time.
If last night's down trend was left in the negative, the rest of the world would have reacted and followed suite.
They had to resurrect the fall otherwise a large down move would have followed.
This speaks of desperation.
They don't want they party to end and will use all their resources to stop this happening.
This is not the action of the PPT rather the MF's and floor traders controling the direction.
This market has stopped being a freely traded market and is more a led market. Not running under it's own momentum but where it is led.
It is at one of it's most pivotal points.
For to fall here will only lead to greater selling.
They must above all costs hold the markets head above water over the next few days.
At least till the momentum of fear and selling subsides.
To lose it here will lead to a testing of Oct lows and I believe to a penetration of them, due to the wave structure.
The coming moves will be volatile to the extreme.
A perfect time to straddle.

The chart shows my interpretation of the waves.
http://www.kitcomm.com/pub/discussion/Image.195.gif

http://www.kitcomm.com/pub/discussion/Image195.gif

here it comes ...

Thank you, JTF and those who are responding re: Real Estate.
It looks like Hawaii and Vancouver are the first, perhaps
only areas to slump over this Asian crisis outside SEAsia.
Wait and see. We really have no choice.

Indonesia down 14.7%

Indonesia - 13.5%, HK -5.5%. I've put some money in a few months back thinking they can't go any deeper. Fortunatelly pulled it all out before loosing any money.

sharefin: Why would the money funds and the floor traders want to prop the market up? They should know better than the average individual what is happening? Are they all short-term traders, looking for profits on the ups and downs? Does AVID suggest anything about when these fellows will stand back and let things happen?

How are IMF going to bail out 150 million people with this mess ...

Anybody! Wish to make investment in Aussie gold stocks preferably with exposure o'seas as well as Oz, with the intention of being geared up when the yellow metal turns around. Would greatly appreciate any suggestions.

Time to say goodnight, hate to leave this conflagration.
Hope it looks better in the morning.

sharefin: Your graph indicates you expect the second ping in a few days -- right? If so the funds and floor traders may be standing back very soon. Perhaps they didn't have all the derivatives they wanted to go short. If you know when you are not propping up the market, that is an unfair advantage for the insider shorts-- agreed?

unbelievable ...

G'nite all!

I need to finish some work :- ( Indonesia -15.5%, Japan turned red too. Hmm, South Korea +3.5%. Looks like donating gold did some good to them?

I would love to see a chart of the Indonesian market, or a fund invested in Indonesian stocks. I feel sorry for the people and all mankind experiencing such economic dislocations. Mankind easily forgets..

Good job demolishing his WSJ piece. To think that he probably got paid good money for that nonsense! Just another semi-articulate incompetent.

...

Do you think there is any order right now or is everyone trying to cash out at once? Does this mean bankruptcies or is this just a market thing?

Indonesia
Jakarta Composite
^JKSE2:01AM
327.581
-66.658
-16.91%

Make that 18%

...

COMPLETE LOSS OF CONFIDENCE!

KO -- The sh_t is just going to get deeper until enough shovels have been handed out to deal with it. That or there will not be enough shovels; Kind of like the mid-west floods where the sand-bagging couldn't keep up or the sand-bag dikes would break. This scenario really is not much different. The question is whether or not the shovels and sand-bags are enough and 'fast' enough, and tough enough. I personally doubt it. Like gold has been, cheap currencies get 'cheaper'and the dearth of debt homage gets deeper. The countries need to start learning 'better ways'!

Make that 18.4%

$150 Billion in foreign debt? 30% to Europe and 10% to the United States? I hope the solvency of the creditor banks is not hanging on these payments.

Expect the following:

The Indonesian government will do the same as the Korean, suggesting that people help the economy by turning in their gold. Another 400 tonnes from there will hit in a few months the market. And who is next? India, Pakistan, Eurpe, US...

Has any market ever crashed this hard in one day?

themissinglink -- The door IS only so big in the theatre. Just yell 'fire' and see the then presumed value of continuing to watch the movie! Kind of like what has/is happening over there.

Day's Range
321.078 - 393.914
52-week Range
382.933 - 415.324

This one day has been twice as volatile as the previous 52 weeks. Strange? Wasn't there an announcement that the government planned to curb short trading? I guess the shorts picked up and left.

Somebody screwed up 52 weeks range. It is a range only from the begining of the year. Last year high was something like 750-800.

Hong Kong -5.95%
Philippines -5.24%
Singapore -5.71%

the remaining 60% of Indonesian debt must be to Japan and Korea. How come those markets are holding in view of all this?

Day's Range
8928.86 - 9579.55

52-week Range
9515.81 - 10822.67

Is this right or did Yahoo reset the 52 week range for the new year?

All that fresh IMF money paid off the foreign debt and that left extra money to play the markets. Wheeeee..........

In light of the velocity of the downward trend 15% seems pretty reasonable.

9009.55
-529.06

Up 3.5% just thought we might want to get the WHOLE picture eh?

Globex currently shows the 7 major currencies DOWN against the 'almighty' buck. Yen down 118 at this time; others down equally 'well'. Also that the S&P is currently down about 300 basis. The news out of this is that gold is currently even and silver is up about 5 cents from their previous close. Tidings?

The people will make Soeharo kiss their sh!t. 250,000,000 able bodies
crammed into Indonesia are getting primed for one almighty clash. Looks
like run President run. Leaches like you Mr. President should be
made to account for the nepatism.

Hong Kong -5.09%
Indonesia -14.64%
Malaysia -2.29%
Philippines -5.24%
Singapore -6.59%

Good night all. I hope that you and yours survive the coming mess. Good luck!

The people will make Soeharto kiss their sh!t. 250,000,000 able bodies
crammed into Indonesia are getting primed for one almighty clash. Looks
like run President run. Leaches like you Mr. President should be
made to account for the nepatism.

The US will have to compete for bond buyers.

FROM:
International NEWS
Thursday January 8, 2:18 am Eastern Time

HK's Hang Seng dives below 9,000 in afternoon

HONG KONG, Jan 8 ( Reuters ) - Hong Kong stocks extended their losses on Thursday afternoon with the Hang Seng
Index dropping below 9,000, knocked back by continuing worries about the region's economic stability and rising local
interest rates.

The Hang Seng Index was down 5.79 percent at 8,986, the first time it has dropped below 9,000 since October 28 1997.

``It's some kind of technical selling by the overseas funds because there's a rumour saying that the peg will be unpegged,
which is highly unlikely,'' Peter Lai, associate director at OCBC Securities, said.

"Eight thousand should be a strong support."

Turnover reached HK$8.30 billion.

Asian markets remained volatile amid shaken confidence in the region's economies. The Indonesian rupiah was under
heavy pressure, hitting a new record low.

``But the most important thing is there is a fear of a local interest rate rise,'' said Patrick Chia, research director at China
Everbright Research.

``If the interbank rates maintain at the current high level there is a good chance that banks will raise the prime rate.''

He expected any rise of the prime rate would be more than 50 basis points.

The three-month HIBOR surged to 13.25000 percent at 0330 GMT against 11.04464 percent at the same time on
Wednesday. The overnight rate rose to 5.00-6.00 percent against 4.25-5.00 percent on Wednesday.

China plays suffered the largest setbacks as investors feared a slowdown of the Chinese economy and a devaluation of
the yuan, brokers said. The China-Affiliated Corporation Index nose-dived 10.81 percent while the H-shares index
shaved off 10.14 percent. China Resources ( 0291.HK ) slipped HK$1.90 to HK$12.00 and Shanghai Industrials ( 0363.HK )
sank HK$2.75 to HK$21.70.

Index heavyweight HSBC Holdings ( 0005.HK ) was the biggest loser, shedding HK$9.00 to HK$170.00.

LGB -- And JUST to keep things in MORE proper perspective, NZ is also up .99%. Between the two, the ONLY black ink showing. Perhaps you'll buy in over there and make more black ink show on the charts.

Gee DEJ, you and I couldn't agree more on how investments should be analyzed. That's why I take such strong issue with the nonsensical comparisons I see each day with the DOW top, how stocks did from the top in 1929, what a "crash" we had in 1987, etc. etc.

Yet we never see the big picture presented here. Starting with Gold's post stabilization price ( say a year from when it became legal to own in the U.S. again ) how have we done in THIS life with stocks vs. Gold, and how can we use this information, factor in economic changes, and look forward? That's what I find useful.

Why is it we can constantly drone on about 1929 and 1987 crashes and such, yet we hear nary a peep about the TRUE crash in the price of Gold since 1980? Or the worst mutual fund performance of 1997? a SIXTY TWO percent drop in the Midas fund! Now THERE is a story....if only Gold Bugs would start looking at the world through realistic eyes...I think their overall world view, might evolve to serve them better when it comes to investments.

The bottom line is, our bank accounts and store of goods for the future, could care less about our fantasies and delusions. Reality speaks louder than words...... Yes, I'm glad I wasn't around to buy at the 1929 peak and sell in the 50's. Not sure I know anyone who did so. I know PLENTY of people who got burned on Gold and Gold shares in my lifetime though! And I see plenty more here who have been!

Ah LGB2, that 3.5% gives you the big picture?
The whole region has crashed, are we immuned?

Not me man, I buy on dips in the U.S. market! Not some fly by night, bubble bank economy, Hundai sellin foreign country! Don't get me wrong, the guy's with balls who buy over there right now, will probably clean up. But that ole risk/reward ratio just doesn't cut it for me. They can do anything to their currency and financial system at any time.

Say what you will re the U.S. dollar, it's a powerhouse and the strongest currency in the world. I'll save my powder for the 6300-6700 DOW, and meanwhile play Silver & other lively stuff!

I think Karlito does make a variety of compelling points in his earlier post, "Jude the Obscure." ( one of my favorite Hardy novels, by the way ) .
He is a compelling, well-read intellect and he spins well. He is a classic example of why New Paradigm analysis is winning the great American Economic Spin Wars.

Let us look at the issue from square one: first, you have the Wanniski piece in the WSJ today. ( Why is there never any analogous pro-gold piece in a mainstream investment paper like the WSJ? )

Secondly, by virtue of this piece appearing in the WSJ, the great spin
attack is instigated by a New Paradigm disciple, thereby compelling pro-gold idealogues to respond ( Again, let me reiterate...why are gold-bugs always reactive instead of pro-active? Reaction is always a disadvantageous position to pro-action. )

The response on the Kitco Forum is another classic example of why pro-gold ideology is losing these wars. Again, it is primarily reactive instead of pro-active. It seeks to critique instead of instigate.

Yes, certainly, there is a lot to critique. At times, Karlito's analysis is simplistic...or misrepresentational...or else, it provides analysis that "can't see the forest for the trees," etc. However, ultimately,
it is a damn fine piece of propaganda.

For one thing, Karlito is absolutely right in asserting that a return to a gold standard will not provide a state of Nirvana for economic affairs. Historically, it never did and it would be Pollyannish to imagine otherwise. Although there are certainly many advantages to a gold standard, there are also a variety of problems inherent in such a standard and Karlita does a good job of summarizing the more salient examples.

By the same token, there are a great deal of problems in the floating currency exchange system we have today. The central flaw with floating currencies is exactly the same as I described many years ago in one of my more precocious college papers. It has been debated ad nauseum by a
variety of notable economists. The majority have come to acknowledge ( privately if not publicly ) that the floating exchange rate system is a time bomb ready to explode. The problem is synchronicity. What happens when certain economic conditions affect all major first world economies AT THE SAME TIME? Unfortunately, the floating currency system is completely incapable of handling this phenomenon. A floating currency system requires asynchronicity, i.e., one economy strong...another economy weak. Economy A pulls Economy B out of its malaise. But what happens when the same malaise strikes all major economies simultaneously? We are about to witness this interesting phenomenon
as the American economy proves itself incapable of acting as the sole lifeboat for a world of sinking economies. ( In a way, the synchronicity problem has been to economists what the Year 2000 problem has been to computer programmers...the great systemic flaw everybody knew about but hoped would never happen in his/her lifetime ) .

My own feeling is that there should be some new hybrid encompassing the best features of the gold standard with the best features of the floating exchange rate system. Ideally, we would strike a middle ground somewhere. In doing so, gold would retain and/or enhance its value.

Is that goal not sufficient? I hope to believe that Kitco is primarily composed of gold investors who wish to protect and/or maximize their wealth against the downside of paper inflation, New Paradigm Ponzi schemes, and other assorted financial manipulations ( e.g., paper pyramids, etc. ) . I hope that Kitcoites are primarily people that want to make their government and major financial institutions responsible and accountable for their actions. Hopefully, it is not composed of people who wish simply to destroy the status quo, gloat at the financial misfortunes of others, and gleefully ride aboard a gold lifeboat while applauding the global economic Titanic as it sinks into an ocean of poverty, war, and ruin.

Anyway, to summarize once again, the main point in my post I wish to hammer home is this: why are gold investors always trying to defend the shortcomings of their ideology instead of launching much needed attacks upon the manifold flaws in New Paradigm religion? Why are they always reactive instead of proactive?

Take the fight to the New Paradigm purveyors of snake oil, convince the world of the virtues of your arguments, then assist the Establishment in
recreating a viable economic system that will work to the benefit of all.

Remember that South Korea is one of the biggest economies in the world, far more meaningful than Indonesia's. Hmmm, look how weel they're doing now that they all banded together and sold their gold! Maybe we could learn something here and.........

AhhhrrGggHHhhhhhhHHhh, ( he screams as he's lynched, burned at the stake, and set before a firing squad... )

If it dropped 62% how much more will it, I'll say this year it'll out do MSFT

Farfel -- You extend tooooo many words about the Karlito message. It can be more aptly put by simply saying, 'put yourself anywhere in S.E. Asia.'. 'Nuff said!

"Anyway, to summarize once again, the main point in my post I wish to hammer home is this: why are gold
investors always trying to defend the shortcomings of their ideology instead of launching much needed
attacks upon the manifold flaws in New Paradigm religion? Why are they always reactive instead of
proactive? "


Simple farfel, Gold standard economics resulted in horrific cycles of poverty, depression, misery, starvation, and economic ruin for the common man. "New Paradigm" economics has worked, and brought about the longest and greatest period of broad based prosperity in mankind's history.

Of COURSE this means that the bankrupt and failed ideology of Goldbugism can only be weakly discussed from a defensive stance. It's like trying to defend the merits of socilaist economics. Sounds good, fails miserably in reality, causes misery among the common man, prevents efficient economic growth and prosperity through reasonable monetary lending.

one need only look at results to see why GoldBugs will always have to be on teh defensive...and it's all academic anyway because this nation will NEVER return to a Gold standard under any scenario..so why wasted the energy yearning for it?

Last night we talked about the "perception", so I decided to do something about it.

I wrote to the CEOs of the following Gold Mining companies, these being :

ABX, AU, BMG, ECO, GLG, HL, HM, MDG, PDG, RYO, TVX

outlining a proposal and the formation of a Marketing Consortium of Mining Companies. I know that there are others which I haven't contacted.

LGB -- And ONCE AGAIN you have not listened to ANYONES postings on the whole subject of debt, have you. What a moronic attitude/thought process you seem to have. Sure, we can print and print and spend and spend and continue to borrow and borrow. No big deal, as long as we keep having children who are able and WILLING to continue to pay for it! No problem what-so-ever! HAR! And WHO made anybody THEIR taskmasters? For that matter, who made anybody mine or yours for the purpose of debt payment? I'm sure that I'm not cognizant of the particular form and signature that signed my life over to the devil!!! Get real....

I take it that you ARE an American. .........

"..... Gold standard economics resulted in horrific cycles of

poverty, depression, misery, starvation, and economic ruin for the

common man. "New Paradigm" economics has worked, and brought about the

longest and greatest period of broad based prosperity in mankind's

history".

MATE WHAT A STATEMENT. Now, I take it that you are talking about issues relative to the borders of the US. I take it that you do not believe that "the rest" matter? Ever been outside the States?

Let me again post an earlier response to Karlito99....................

Date: Wed Jan 07 1998 23:29

Haggis__A ( Karlito99...............you should have learned something! )

The Dollar, the Dollar, the Dollar............

The Crash of 1987 confronted YOUR US Government ( US is short for

Useless ) with the question:

Gentleman...I apologize for a major error in my previous piece...apparently, Wanniski wrote a PRO-gold piece and Karlito responded to it. I am guilty of misinterpretation owing to an ambiguous internet communication about the article provided me by a friend from Toronto.

Therefore, in fact, we are seeing a small break in the anti-gold media bias and that is encouraging.

However, I still stand by the central thesis of my previous post. The mainstream media has done a miserable job promoting pro-gold ideology.

I take it that you ARE an American. ........."Gold standard economics resulted in horrific cycles of poverty, depression, misery, starvation, and economic ruin for the common man. "New Paradigm" economics has worked, and brought about the longest and greatest period of broad based prosperity in mankind's history".

MATE WHAT A STATEMENT. Now, I take it that you are talking about issues relative to the borders of the US. I take it that you do not believe that "the rest" matter? Ever been outside the States? Let me again post an earlier response to Karlito99.

The Dollar, the Dollar, the Dollar............
The Crash of 1987 confronted YOUR US Government ( US is short for
Useless ) with the question: Which do we consider more important -
averting a recession OR preserving the value of the Dollar?
When it came to the CRUNCH, the ACTUAL response by YOUR US Government
was unequivocal. By the middle of the second week after Black Monday,
the Dollar was cut loose from its moorings, and by the end of the week
the news was official - the Dollar moved obediently lower, and a second
selling climax in the stock market did not take place. The mistake of
1929 had been avoided.
Now YOU can have a strong Dollar, but as things progress YOU will have a
problem. International trade, by definition, is international. It takes
two to tango..............or can't you dance!! An over-strong Dollar
will cause YOU problems, or can't you see beyond today and the end of
your nose?
GOLD is required within international trade to achieve a balance, and to
keep the bastards honest! The Dollar cannot do this.

LGB2 and Karlito99 - PLEASE a response..............

Aye Haggis

Although I am not a major exponent of gold standard global economics ( see my previous post again ) , I do beg to differ with your simplistic analysis of the historical problems that occurred during gold standard regimes.

Your analysis is far too narrow...many of the problems faced by nations holding to a gold standard were based on political, sociological, and religious factors...above and beyond mere economics.

In fact, the focus on economics in today's world is a relatively new development. In economies of yesteryear, many "economic" decisions were made primarily because of political and religious considerations.

Laddies a wee bit of advice.........

Don't save your best clothes for special occasions. Wear them every day for effect. It might be fun to wear high heels to a farm, or a silk suit to a GOLD mine site inpsection.

As I have said before.......darkness is very soothing until you break your shins on the furniture or stand on something unidentifiable and squishy.

Act young, wild and free - stand on the Freeway!

Aye, it makes you wonder.

LGB
Your discourse I feel is garnered through rose coloured glasses.

To utilize the measuring stick of yesteryear is no better than hindsight.
With which I could tell you what to buy or sell, and be 100% correct.

To use the yardstick of today is also incorrect as tomorrow bears little resemblance to today.
You only have to look at asia's tigers to realize that what is today will not neccessarily resemble tomorrow.

To forward view the potential for tomorrow is what most here choose to do.
They choose to take todays position and forward project for tomorrow.
Not to view what happened yesterday and claim hindsight.
But to try to be prescient and position for the future.

You obviously never read that Url I suggested.
http://www.kitcomm.com/pub/discussion/100Facts.html
As you still choose to claim that we as humanity are progressing forward.
To view humanity based on observations from yesteryear,
Is not viewing society as it evolves today.
It is true that we live in amazing comforts today.
But at what price?
The price that will be placed on our future children.

Take off your fancy glasses and forget the comparisons of yesteryear.
Instead look to what we are creating for tomorrow.
For my children and the children of the world.
It is not what we have become but what we are transcending into, tomorrow.

It's a waste of time berating goldbugs for the last 10 years of direction.
Rather join them in prognisticating the direction for tomorrow.
For there lies the future of our race.

Be it good or bad for that is where we are going.

100 Harshest Facts About Our Future

1. Children born in 1994 will face lifetime tax rates of more than 80
percent. ( Clinton administration 1994 budget )

2. A teenager in 1990 was less likely to die of an accident, a
cardiovascular disease, or pneumonia than his or her peer in 1960, but
more than twice as likely to die by homicide or suicide. ( Public Health
Service of the United States )

3. Since the first members of our generation were born ( 1961 ) , America
has experienced a 560 percent increase in violent crime, a 400 percent
increase in births to unwed mothers, a tripling in teenage suicide, and
a drop of almost 80 points in SAT scores. ( Index of Leading Cultural
Indicators, William Bennett )

4. Real wages peaked in 1973 and have been declining ever since, yet we
work an average of one month more per year than we did two decades ago.
( The Great U-Turn )

5. Air pollution costs the US as much as $40 billion annually in health
care and lost economic productivity. ( Worldwatch State of the World
Report )

6. Each year U.S. factories spew 3 million tons of toxic chemicals into
the air, land, and water. That compounds the over one-half billion tons
of solid hazardous wastes - we're not talking about your garbage here -
that get dumped across the nation for our generation to one day clean
up. ( The Gale Environmental Scorecard )

7. Black teenagers are three times more likely to be killed by gun
violence than by natural causes. ( Children's Defense Fund Adolescent
Fact Book )

8. During the last 30 years the number of children living in poverty has
increased by nearly 30 percent - with the greatest increase among white
kids. ( Vanishing Dreams )

9. A monthly investment of $50 for 20 years will only provide for one
year of tuition at a public college or university. ( USA Today )

10. The total cost to clean up our toxic waste mess is almost
three-quarters of a trillion dollars - half the entire U.S. budget for a
year. ( Worldwatch State of the World Report )

11. Fifteen percent of all infants born in 1994 will be exposed to
illegal drugs while in the womb, and over 100,000 babies are born with
crack addiction. ( Forham University and the Office of National Drug
Control )

12. Since the mid-1970s, poverty among young adults ( 18 to 34 ) has gone
up by 50 percent - while the median income of under-30 parents fell by a
third. ( Vanishing Dreams )

13. The median wage for an 18- to 24-year-old man dropped nearly 20
percent during the 1980s - and it continues to decline. ( Vanishing
Dreams )

14. Half of the nation's uninsured population is under the age of 25.
( National Health Survey, 1984 )

15. In 1987, the U.S. released 1.2 million tons of toxic chemicals into
our atmosphere, 670,000 tons into our soil, and 250,000 tons into our
water. ( International Wildlife magazine )

16. In 1970, the Japanese had none of the world market share in dynamic
random access memories, a semiconductor device; by 1988, that share had
risen to 80 percent. ( Selling Our Security )

17. In 1993, AIDS was the top killer of young adults in 64 cities and
five states. In addition, the number of people with AIDS worldwide is
expected to go from 14 million to 30 million by 2000. ( USA Today )

18. 25 percent of all African-American men in their 20s are either in
prison, on probation, or on parole. And in the nation's capital, 70
percent of all black men will be arrested at least once before reaching
the age of 35. ( Two Nations )

19. Each year, 24,000 Americans - on average, 65 each day - are killed
with handguns, and we spend over $1 billion annually to treat firearm
injuries. ( Handgun Control, Inc )

20. Almost half of all Americans between the ages of 21 and 25 lack
basic literary skills, and are unable to balance a checkbook or read a
map. ( Children's Defense Fund - State of America's Children, 1992 )

21. One in five Philadelphia teenagers misses school every day. ( Monitor
Radio )

22. American teenagers ranked number one in the world in saying they
were good at math - and last in a simultaneously administered
international math proficiency test. ( Educational Testing Service )

23. A young black man in Harlem, New York, is less likely to live until
age 40 than a young man in Bangladesh. ( New England Journal of Medicine )


24. Nearly half of all the new full-time jobs created in the 1980s paid
less than $250 a week, or $13,000 a year, below the poverty line for a
family of four. ( Fortune magazine )

25. According to "moderate projections," between 1995 and 2005 there
will be almost half a million more new college graduates a year entering
the job market than there will be new jobs. ( Bureau of Labor Statistics )


26. Every day, over 2500 American children witness the divorce or
separation of their parents. Every day, 90 kids are taken from their
parents' custody and committed to foster homes. Every day, 13 Americans
aged 15 to 24 commit suicide, and another 16 are murdered. ( Thirteenth
Generation )

27. In the last ten years, the number of functionally illiterate
17-year-olds has more than doubled. Today, 7 million teenagers are
functionally illiterate. ( Children's Defense Fund )

28. In 1974, the U.S. government declared a health care crisis because
we spent 7.5 percent of our gross national product on medical costs.
Today we spend twice that much. ( State of the Union 1994 )

29. U.S. health care spending has risen from $121 billion in 1961 to a
projected $1.3 trillion by 2000. ( Congressional Budget Office )

30. In 1991 the U.S. trailed most industrialized countries in spending
on social programs and led in defense spending. ( The World Bank )

31. In the early 1990s report, the government's own accountants found
that if current trends continue, federal expenditures will grow from 23
percent of the GNP to 42 percent by 2020, pushing up taxes. ( U.S.
General Accounting Office )

32. The elderly ( age 65 and up ) population will grow 153 percent between
now and 2040. ( Social Security Administration )

33. American firms pay twice as much to borrow money and make new
investments as do their foreign counterparts. ( U.S. News and World
Report )

34. The collapse of America's savings and loans will cost taxpayers at
least $180 billion. ( Congressional Budget Office )

35. Ninety-five percent of our solid waste is disposed of in
almost-filled landfills - and one out of every two of those landfills
desperately needs repair so it won't leak. ( National Urban League )

36. Almost two-thirds of the nation's roads need repair. More than 41
percent of our bridges are structurally unsound. ( National Urban League )


37. According to Vice President Al Gore, we are losing species of
animals and plants 1000 times faster than at any time in the past 65
million years. ( Earth in the Balance )

38. "Federal judges have ordered jails closed and new ones built because
the conditions violated the rights of the prisoner. Some of our schools
wouldn't pass such scrutiny." ( Rep. Dale Kildee, member of the House
Education Committee )

39. America has the largest number of functional illiterates in the
industrial world. ( Richard Lamm, Uncompetitive Society )

40. The average murderer serves less than seven years because of prison
crowding. ( U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics )

41. Since 1970, arrests for violent crimes by youths have jumped 91
percent. ( Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency )

42. The number of guns in America increased from 54 million in 1950 to
201 million in 1990. ( Bureau of Justice Statistics )

43. The Fortune 500 industrial companies employed 3.7 million fewer
workers in 1991 than in 1981 - a loss of about one job in four. That
trend will only worsen in the next century. ( Fortune )

44. Today's average, married senior citizen paid $83,852 in Social
Security and Medicare taxes in his/her lifetime. The average senior will
get back $308,328. ( Ways and Means Committee )

45. Only 2.8 percent of German children live in poverty. Over 20 percent
of all American kids do. ( Pete Peterson, Facing Up )

46. In the last twenty years, income for parents under the age of 30
dropped 28.6 percent, while it rose 28.4 percent for seniors. ( 1992
census survey )

47. In the next 35 years, health care spending is expected to eat up
twice as much of our economy as it does today. ( U.S. Health Care
Financing Administration )

48. The U.S. infant mortality rate is higher than 18 other major
industrialized countries. ( State of the World's Children, UNICEF )

49. We're behind every major country except Hong Kong in average science
test scores for 14-year-olds. ( International Association for the
Evolution of Educational Achievement, 1988 )

50. The U.S. ranks 17th in the world in public spending on education
( Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development )

51. "Vital parts of the military equipment that helped win the Gulf War
were made in Germany, Japan, and other foreign countries," write Martin
and Susan Tolchin. "The need to beg foreign embassies for essential
parts was chilling." ( Selling Our Security )

52. There are 3 million homeless people in America - the same number as
in all of Europe. ( Coalition for the Homeless, 1992 )

53. The current average skill level of 21- to 25-year-olds is 40 percent
lower than the skill level that will be required of new workers in the
year 2000 - only a handful of years away. ( Hudson Institute )

54. The median home price, adjusted for inflation, has jumped 78 percent
since the early 1960s, making ownership out of reach of many young
families. ( Forbes )

55. In 1975, the U.S. planned on having a high-level nuclear waste
disposal site operating by 1985. It will not be ready until 2010 at
best. ( Vital Statistics, Worldwatch Institute )

56. Nearly one in three college graduates between 1990 and 2005 is
expected to take a job that doesn't require a college degree - up from 1
in 10 in the 1960s. ( Wall Street Journal )

57. "It's hard to see why someone age 68 should automatically pay lower
taxes than someone age 28 with the same income. Yet, that happens."
( Robert Samuelson, Newsweek )

58. A 30-year-old man in the early 1970s earned 15 percent more than his
father did at that age. Today's 30-year-old can expect to bring in 25
percent less than his dad did. ( Forbes )

59. By 2002, Uncle Sam will have stolen over $1 trillion from the Social
Security trust fund. ( OASDHI 1993 )

60. Poverty affected 11.1 percent of Americans in 1973 and 14 percent by
the early 1990s. ( 1992 Census )

61. "The Great American Job Machine... is shifting gears - downward.
Solid middle-class jobs... have been disappearing in record numbers and
are being replaced more often than not by lower wage jobs." ( Fortune )

62. Since the early 1970s, the poverty rate among under-30 households
has doubled. ( The Economic Policy Institute )

63. From 1929 to 1933 ( the years of the Great Depression ) , real income
fell by 25 percent. For couples with kids in our generation, it's
dropped 30 percent. ( Thirteenth Generation )

64. Estimated costs of cleaning up the 24,000 contaminated federal
nuclear facilities range from $100 billion to $400 billion. ( The
Environmental Protection Agency )

65. In 1948, a family of four earning the median income would have paid
no income tax and a mere 1 percent to Social Security. By 1955, income
tax and Social Security would require 9 percent, and by 1990 the
combined tax burden was 25 to 28 percent. And that does not even
consider sales tax. ( Boiling Point )

66. Baby boomers are saving only about one-third as much as they need.
This means their kids will have to finance their retirements. ( Merrill
Lynch )

67. From 1981 to 1989, the number of American home-owners between the
ages of 25 and 29 declined by 11 percent, while the number of renters in
that same age group rose by 16 percent. ( "Housing in America", U.S. Dept
of Commerce, 1992 )

68. Today's 63-year-old will get back roughly $200 for every $100 he or
she pays into Social Security. Today's 25-year-old will lose over $100
for every $450 paid into Social Security. ( The Wyatt Company )

69. As a share of workers' payroll, the total cost of Social Security
and Medicare could climb from 17 percent today to over 50 percent by
2040. ( OASDHI, 1992 )

70. Twenty-five percent of full-time workers do not earn enough to rise
out of poverty. ( U.S. Census Bureau )

71. The U.S. spends 6 percent of the GNP on the military; Japan spends
less than 1 percent. Seventy percent of all U.S. research and
development testing and evaluation goes to the military. ( Uncompetitive
Society Report )

72. From 1971 to 1988, only 50 percent of all eligible voters turned out
on election day - the worst record of any major democracy. ( World Values
Survey, January 1987 )

73. America spends more money on health care than any other country -
but American males rank 15th in world life expectancy, and females are
eighth. ( Uncompetitive Society Report )

74. "There are two kinds of U.S. electronics companies," explains the
chairman of the American Electronics Association, "those that are
screaming in pain from the Japanese and those that will be screaming in
pain."

75. When the national debt hits $6.5 trillion, interest on the debt will
gobble up 85 percent of all personal taxes. ( Bankruptcy 1995 )

76. The average cost in 1990 dollars of attending a private four-year
college more than doubled from 1965 to 1990. ( U.S. Dept of Education )

77. From the mid-1970s to the late 1980s, the average tuition at a
private college as a part of an average family income rose in ratio
almost 50 percent. ( USA Today )

78. The U.S. spends nearly $1 trillion annually on health care, yet
nearly 75 million Americans are underinsured or completely uninsured.
Both Canada and Germany spend 30 to 40 percent less on health care per
capita, and both provide universal health care. ( The Washington Monthly )


79. Every day, the typical 14-year-old watched three hours of TV and
does one hour of homework. Every day, over 2,200 kids drop out of
school. Every day, 3,610 teenagers are assaulted, 630 are robbed, and 80
are raped. Every day, 500 adolescents begin using illegal drugs and
1,000 begin drinking alcohol. Every day, 1,000 unwed teenage girls
become mothers. ( Thirteenth Generation )

80. The president of American Express, Louis Gerstner, Jr., stated,
"Forty percent of high school seniors can't name three South American
countries... one-third of today's ninth graders can't write a brief
summary of a newspaper story. Will [these people] be able to take phone
messages from important clients?"

81. Only 66 percent of eighth graders and 77 percent of twelfth graders
correctly totaled the cost of soup, burger, fries, and cola on a
restaurant menu. ( USA Today )



82. Contrast the very different television experiences of a typical
boomer born in the late 1940s with a typical 13er born two decades
later. By age five, the boomer had seen little or no television; the
13er had seen 5,000 hours' worth, thanks to a parent who probably used
TV as a baby-sitter. ( Thirteenth Generation )

83. Since 1969, in inflation-adjusted dollars, the average Social
Security benefit for a retired worker has risen by 80 percent.
Meanwhile, the inflation-adjusted average AFDC benefit for a child in
poverty has declined by over 10 percent. ( Social Security
Administration )

84. Some 3 million attempted or completed street crimes ( assault, rape,
robbery, theft ) take place on school property annually. One in 20
teachers is assaulted each year. One in five of today's high school
students has at one time carried a gun or other weapon to school. That
amounts to 32 percent of all boys, 8 percent of all girls. ( U.S. Public
Health Service )

85. In his book Powernomics: Economics and Strategy After the Cold War,
former U.S. trade negotiator Clyde Prestowitz stated, "On a national
basis, about 25 percent of our students drop out of high school,
consigned to a social and economic scrap heap before they even begin
their adult lives. The U.S. is the only major nation of the world that
tolerates such human waste."

86. Each year through the 1980s, 5,000 youths between the ages of 15 and
25 killed themselves. Surveys show that 10 percent of adolescent boys
and 18 percent of adolescent girls are willing to admit that they have
attempted suicide. "What can one say about a generation 1,000,000 of
whom have tried ( or will try ) to kill themselves before age 30 - and
100,000 of whom have succeeded ( or will succeed ) in their final effort?"
( Thirteenth Generation )

87. In 1992, the U.S. spent $24.9 billion to jail 1.3 million prisoners
- a per prisoner cost of $20,072 - while we spent $4,000 per public
school student. ( Washington Monthly )

88. From 1973 to 1990, real median income of U.S. families aged 65 and
over went up 39 percent, while it dropped 16 percent for families headed
by someone aged 30 or under. ( U.S. Bureau of the Census )

89. In 1979, 74 percent of working Americans under age 25 were earning
an hourly wage which - if received full-time and year-round - exceeded
the cash poverty level for a family of three. By 1991, that share had
fallen to 47 percent. ( The Children's Defense Fund )

90. In the early 1970s, for a typical married couple under age 30, the
after-tax cost of owning a first home consumed just 12 percent of
income. By the 1990s, the after-tax cost of owning the same house had
risen to 29 percent of income. ( Joint Center for Housing Studies of
Harvard University )

91. In 1990, a couple in their twenties with one worker, a baby, and
$30,000 in income had to pay five times as much tax to the government
( $5,055 ) as the typical retired couple in their late sixties with the
same incomes from public and private pensions ( $1,073 ) . ( Congressional
Ways and Means Committee )

92. Since 1965, juvenile violent-crime arrest rates have tripled. ( U.S.
Federal Bureau of Investigation )

93. Among Americans aged 25 to 29, the number of homeowners declined by
11 percent from 1981 to 1989, while the number of renters rose by 16
percent. ( Housing in America Report )

94. Given the way things are, it will be much harder for people in our
generation to live as comfortably as those in previous generations.
Agree: 65%, Disagree: 33%. ( Time magazine poll of Americans under 30 )

95. In 1987, Colgate-Palmolive started a program to groom recent college
graduates for overseas managerial careers. By the early 1990s, more than
15,000 young people were vying for the 15 slots available each year,
( Wall Street Journal )



96. Number and proportions of persons not covered by health insurance at
any time during 1990, by age bracket. ( U.S. Bureau of the Census )

* Under Age 18 - 8.4 million ( 24.3% )

* Age 18 to 34 - 14.8 million ( 42.8% )

* Age 35 to 64 - 11.1 million ( 32.1% )

* Age 65 and Over - 0.3 million ( 0.8% )

97. The average 30-year-old home-owner in the 1950s could make the
monthly mortgage payment using 14 percent of his income. Today it would
take 40 percent. ( Frank Levy )

98. In 1900, the U.S. government consumed less than 9 percent of the
gross national product ( the nation's total economic output ) . By 1990,
the government was costing almost 40 percent of the gross national
product. On a per-capita basis the growth in the cost of government was
even greater, going from $1,651 per person in 1900 to $23,000 in 1990.
These statistics are based on real 1990 dollars. ( Institute for Policy
Innovation )

99. During every 100 hours on our inner-city streets, three times more
young American men lose their lives in gunfire than were young American
men killed during the 100 hours of Operation Desert Storm. ( U.S. Bureau
of the Census )

100. In 1992, handguns were used in the murders of 33 people in Britain,
36 in Sweden, 97 in Switzerland, 128 in Canada, 13 in Australia, 60 in
Japan, and 13,220 in the United States. ( New York Times )

Haggis
Not a problem - no harm in listening to reality.
Just take off the rose coloured glasses.

A look at
http://quote.yahoo.com/intlmarkets
Will reveal that volatility is escalating.
Not only will they go down fast but they can come back fast.
Obviously the stage of capitulation has yet to be seen.
While the dippies still exhist the correction is not finished.

I believe that until the state of capitulation is reached,
Then the markets have not finished their balancing.

What is being seached for is a state of equilibrium.
When buyer and seller is satisfied.
When volatility is reduced back to its normal range.

PS will SEG do an ORCL tonight?
Just another $10 bilion or so.

And the beat goes on.

And the beat goes on.

Sharefin, you are definitely the best poet ( and the most interesting analyst ) on this forum.

Haggis -- Nice set of stats. Just don't expect them to make an impact on the 'liberal' set except for more costly policies/taxes as in the past that basically caused them in the first place! Next step is the BIG Nazi style boot-print in the face! It won't have the swastica on the heal. It'l have something that decries 'democracy' though! HAR!

Farfel
You humble me.

Mu

Mates,

Check the scene. How far do you want the Asian currencies to drop.

GOING DOWN.................check it out.........

http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/cgi-bin/xrplot?db=dat&b=1&Plot=multi&fd=1&fm=4&fy=1997&ld=31&lm=3&ly=1998&p=GIF&Base=USD&c=THB&c=KRW&c=IDR&c=MYR&c=PHP

Aye, Haggis

I notice most of your harshist are from quite liberal sources ( including govt agencies! ) and many are questionable, at least in scope. Does the US have problems? Of course. Doesn't every country? I am not being critical of your posting the list. I am printing it for both of my kids and it certainly makes us, again, aware of the challenges. Are we doing anywhere near enough to solve the problems. Of course not. We lack a media, eduacational system, and the leaders to really get serious about solving them. And most people have it too good materially here. Will they be solved some day? One way or the other, yes.

G'Day from Kalgoorlie in Western Australia.

I am an outsider looking in.

My main concern is that not enough insiders ( Americans ) look out.

With respect,

Aye, Haggis

You are so right. I truly did appreciate the post. You are in my book a very observant and intelligent gent and I read your posts with great interest ;- ) The 100 are still the harshist ( i intentional -EB will understand ;- ) aka sheiss mon.

It is rather informative, for those who are interested, to source:

http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/plot.html

then:

1. Plot

Gold and the American Dollar:

Gold and the Australian Dollar

Gold and the South Korean Won

compare

2. plot Silver against any currency, including the Swiss Franc.....

Conclusions - metals are not dead, paper is shakyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

Aye, back in Scotland we have a "little something" that is surely better than Drambuie...........unknown to oor North American cousins!

Goldbug23 -- I MUST argue with your statement that 'most people have it too good materially here.' First of all, IF OUR government, with their policies, hadn't caused the exportation of SO MANY jobs, we would not now necessarily have a trade deficit AND a whole hell of a lot of people wouldn't be underemployed, if unemployed at all! Don't believe those unemployment stats that only count those who are on the dole and their 'time' hasn't run out. We only have it 'so' good here because we EARNED it!!! Now, all that is fading away. We have been exporting our posterity since the Reagan years. We are the biggest debtor nation of all. Perhaps bigger than all the rest combined. And we exported our jobs to do this? WONDERFUL!!! Now, when this debt bubble comes due, we will see what small shards are left to pick up. Perhaps those too will have debt attached! But for you to say that the people here are too materially well off makes it sound like the people here did not earn it. Yes they did, and now they have GIVEN it away, and even PAID for it to be taken away! What was once the GREATEST and most industrious people on Earth has brought ITSELF DOWN to the lowest common denominator! We came here for freedom and not only sold ourselves, but GAVE ourselves and our whole heritage of freedom away. MARVELOUS! Now, instead of being able to help other countries to 'bootstrap' themselves up, we are bought down to their level with none left to do so. We leave the whole world as a serfdom of a few bankers and such. SWELL! Paradise for some perhaps, should their perceptions harken from a 'nether' world. I think if I were GOD, I would be 'slightly' pissed! This could be polished a bit, but why bother. The essence is intact.

( Better than a Gold Mine......................... ) ID#398105:

PRECIOUS METALS AUSTRALIA LIMITED

http://www.reflections.com.au/PMA/index.html

The Company's Windimurra Vanadium Project near Mt Magnet has

the potential to be the world's largest and lowest cost producer of this

strategic metal. Unfortunately, when the project was poised for

development in 1992, vanadium prices fell to their lowest levels in ten

years. The vanadium price has since tripled and has held above US$3/lb

of V2O5 ( vanadium pentoxide ) for four years, and the project is now

under development as a jouint venture between PMA and Glencore AG of

Switzerland.

A comparison with gold equivalent is:

...............................Actual Project............Gold Equivalent

Mineable Reserves..... 44 million tonnes.....44 million tonnes

Stripping Ratio.....12 ore/1 waste.....12 ore/1 waste

Grade in-situ...

( Better than a Gold Mine......................... ) ID#398105:
PRECIOUS METALS AUSTRALIA LIMITED
http://www.reflections.com.au/PMA/index.html
The Company's Windimurra Vanadium Project near Mt Magnet has
the potential to be the world's largest and lowest cost producer of this
strategic metal. Unfortunately, when the project was poised for
development in 1992, vanadium prices fell to their lowest levels in ten
years. The vanadium price has since tripled and has held above US$3/lb
of V2O5 ( vanadium pentoxide ) for four years, and the project is now
under development as a jouint venture between PMA and Glencore AG of
Switzerland.
A comparison with gold equivalent is:
...............................Actual Project............Gold Equivalent
Mineable Reserves..... 44 million tonnes.....44 million tonnes
Stripping Ratio.....12 ore/1 waste.....12 ore/1 waste
Grade in-situ.....0.56% V205.....3.6 g/tonne gold
MetalReserves.....543 million lbs.....V205 5 million oz gold
Operating Costs.....US$1.61/lb V205.....US$175/oz gold
Output.....3,700 tonnes V205/year.....77,000 oz gold/year
Whilst the current mineable reserve is 44 million tonnes, the geological
resource is the order of 300 million tonnes. The bye products are iron
oxide and titanium oxide. The iron oxide may be converted to PIg Iron in
due course, and should this take place would result is in an increase
value to the project the order of $2 billion dollars ( potential ) .
It's a RIPPER...............CHECK IT OUT via an Australian Broker:
http://www.minmet.com.au/links7.html
BUY, BUY, BUY.................
Aye, Haggis


Date: Wed Jan 07 1998 23:07

Hey do think an unhedged heavy-weight like Lihir could grandstand all
the other producers if gold gets along a bit. And have they increased
plant size to accomodate the great wealth of the deep? And could they
have some rights to the ocean floor around the island? Cheers and you
can call me wishfull.

G'Day from Kalgoorlie,

Aussie gold stock, when compared to North American stocks, are cheap.
With a bit of research, there are some very good buys.

You may wish to check out the following:

1. J Gutnicks companies, in particular Johnson's Well Mining
http://www.ausgold.com/index.html

2. Local "gossip" via
http://www.hotcopper.com.au/Default.htm

3. Australian Stock Brokers via
http://www.minmet.com.au/links7.html

4. Ongoing stock, exploration and mining news via
http://www.oberon.com.au/Paydirt_Online/index.html

5. Australia Stock Exchange via
http://www.asx.com.au/

6. General Aussie exploration and mining scene
http://goldsheet.simplenet.com/
http://www.reflections.com.au/MiningandExploration/index.html

I bid you all a belated goodnight.

Haggis
I am a hedonist - please pass the bottle.

You sure that these co's have the readies to survive a liquidity crash?
Cash flow to survive when funding is not available?
Plus low debt ratios for when the sqeeze is in?

If BHP and MIM are being squeezed out of their pearls,
How are the small fry to survive?

How many OZ co's have more cash than debt.
And a regular inflow of this.

It would be interesting to do a study of mining co's in Asia.
To look at their books and see whether they are survivors.
After all they are currently in the seat which we could be trying out.

The effects of debts, interest rates, cash flows, wages, etc would provide an interesting story.
Especially since the gold price has been rising there.

I do not follow Asian gold shares, but would be interested to see how they have fared over the last few months.
Has their share prices been falling or rising?

Perhaps some Kitcoites can enlighten us to how well Asian gold shares have performed.

Untill the equity markets have corrected,
I will not enter the mining sector.
Even with MIM @ 80c.

Maybe I am wrong or just cautious.
Time will tell.

A wee doch an doris

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980107/mexico_s_peso_hit_ag_1.html

Tt is a RIPPER.........you could not possibly lose

The Lihir gold deposit was discovered in 1982, and is the largest known
undeveloped gold resource in the world outside South Africa. The
geological resource is currently estimated at 42 million ounces of gold.
Proved and probable reserves are 104.0 million tonnes ( dry ) averaging
4.37 g/t and containing 14.6 million ounces of gold. Gold production is planned to continue for 36 years.

Rio Tinto ( of the Rothchild stable ) are one of the JV partners.

I trie to source the current share price, but had a problem getting through. The current share price can be sourced via:
htty://www.asx.com.au

Ijust went through all the crap you people are strewing .You sound like a bunch of spoiled brats. THINK..if you lived in Asia this instant. Paper money wouldn't buy a sandwich ,would it? It's time to put the wagons in a circle !!!

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980107/belgium_gold_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980107/markets_gold_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980107/europe_deflation_1.html

Haggis
A wee drappie o uisce beathadh?
A deoch an doruis.

Certainly.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980107/forex_settlement_sim_1.html

sharefin:

Good evening. I have the same hesitation over mining stocks exacerbated by my distance from these markets - that is, my circadian rhythm is out of whack with the rest of the woirld.

TANGIWAI
Until the other day Tangiwai really only meant one thing to a NZer. ( I do not have the facts at hand, so cave lector ) Tangiwai, was the scene of NZ's worst ever railway disaster. It happened in 1953 during the newly crowned Queen Elisabeth II's tour of the colonies. There was a ferocious storm and the railway bridge at Tangiwai was washed out, the evening train from Wellington to Auckland went straight into the raging torrent, most of the passengers and crew lost their lives.

That coincidence has been held as propitious in some circles of Maoridom. The Queen returned to NZ in 1962 ( ? ) There was another disaster whose details escape me. Tangiwai, has an identical meaning to Waitangi, the place of the signing of the peace treaty between Queen Victoria and the combined Maori tribes, it means river of tears.

This week Tangiwai has again been prominent in the news, probably for the first time since 1953. Tangiwai, population a few hundred, is the first small town in Heartland New Zealand directly affected by the Asian meltdown. Tangiwai boasts only one industry, a saw mill. The saw mill was purchased by Hong Kong interests a few years ago, and supplies sawn timber to Korea.

One of the undiscussed effects of the meltdown, is on other commodities. Korea was the recipient of 60% ( ? ) of NZ Sawn timber. Korean is no longer buying any timber. That is affecting the price of timber around the world. The small mill at Tangiwai, that had been viable for several decades found itself without a market overnight. The capital expenditure needed to upgrade and modernise the mill was not available from its Hong Kong owners, and it was deprived of its market virtually overnight.
The mill will close next week, all workers lose their jobs, the only other employment in the vacinity relates to the MT Ruapehu ski field. A couple of bad winters, a volcanic eruption or two, and the downturn in Asian tourists all add up to deep pain in the heartland of NZ.


This contagion is spreading fast. We can no longer be satisfied with such names as Asian Contagion, or Asian Meltdown. We are dealing with a PANDEMIC. The plague will spontaneously appear far from its apparent locus or source and begin to affect those lives nearby. IT will jump across fire walls and leap oceans. This, pandemic will, unfortunately, not be contained.

To all those who believe that their paper gold certificates and gold shares WILL BE REDEEMABLE, I should like to refer you to a post by TIM last June concerning the ability of COMEX to change the rules, and the lack of practical recourse available for major defaults by broking houses and banks. This, I believe emphasises what ANOTHER was saying when the panic hits, perhaps the worst affected will be the "best" prepared. Those who think that they can leverage off paper profits ( Gold Shares or shorting NYSE, holding URSA ) into precious may find themselves worse off that if they had held paper currency during the pandemic.




aurator_@2ndHorseman_of_the_Apocalypso

In Australia, junior explorers are, for all intents and purposes, dead.

Junior miners are having a difficult time, especially those who focused on exploration rather than development on resources/reserves.

Those who did focus on resources/reserves, and who have sufficient tonnes and, at this time, higher grades are winners, in the short to medium term.

There are a number of junior companies who are considering closing out there forwards, stopping production, and sitting on reserves. These companies may be take over targets, dependent on the share holdings.

Then there a few companies who are very quick on their feet, and are contract miners who have longer term contracts with large producers, and
are essentially locked in on the majors forwards via the contracts. These companies can diversify and take over junior producers and gain tax advantages. These companies tend to have restricted but effective exploration/development programme, emphasis on effective. They also tend to be hands on and aggressive, and do not suffer from the "Big Company Syndrome". Look what happened to CRA, and BHP are going through the same process.

One must always remember that there are other metals apart from gold. Four key ones at this time are silver, platinium, palladium and vanadium.

If gold is rooted, then it is. However, I would humbly suggest that it will come back, even to US$350 - it is required as a balance and check in International trade. Even the DollarBugs could not sensibly deny this

Whatever happen to Old Ronnie Regan - it really does show you what an Irishman can do to you. Is Clinto Irish too. I recon that the Irish moved away from Ireland to the States simply to get away from the Scots...

When are you going to lock up those White Collar Clowns on Wall Street?

For Haggis

Your posts getting better - You taking vitamins or something ??

Your 03:28 ?? to Mr Bugg and dreamboat outstanding - But its a

futile effort as they will be unable to comprehend. I predict

mr bugg will presumably spew out a lot of claptrap in "response",

And karlita pie will chime in later saying something like "that

was a breath of fresh air" when it was more like a stale you know what.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980105/czech_crown_1.html

everything...just like Roosevelt, HIS HERO, did.

sharefin:

Good evening. I have the same hesitation over mining stocks exacerbated by my distance from these markets - that is, my circadian rhythm is out of whack with the rest of the woirld.

TANGIWAI
Until the other day Tangiwai really only meant one thing to a NZer. ( I do not have the facts at hand, so cave lector ) Tangiwai, was the scene of NZ's worst ever railway disaster. It happened in 1953 during the newly crowned Queen Elisabeth II's tour of the colonies. There was a ferocious storm and the railway bridge at Tangiwai was washed out, the evening train from Wellington to Auckland went straight into the raging torrent, most of the passengers and crew lost their lives.

That coincidence has been held as propitious in some circles of Maoridom. The Queen returned to NZ in 1962 ( ? ) There was another disaster whose details escape me. Tangiwai, has an identical meaning to Waitangi, the place of the signing of the peace treaty between Queen Victoria and the combined Maori tribes, it means river of tears.

This week Tangiwai has again been prominent in the news, probably for the first time since 1953. Tangiwai, population a few hundred, is the first small town in Heartland New Zealand directly affected by the Asian meltdown. Tangiwai boasts only one industry, a saw mill. The saw mill was purchased by Hong Kong interests a few years ago, and supplies sawn timber to Korea.

One of the undiscussed effects of the meltdown, is on other commodities. Korea was the recipient of 60% ( ? ) of NZ Sawn timber. Korean is no longer buying any timber. That is affecting the price of timber around the world. The small mill at Tangiwai, that had been viable for several decades found itself without a market overnight. The capital expenditure needed to upgrade and modernise the mill was not available from its Hong Kong owners, and it was deprived of its market virtually overnight.
The mill will close next week, all workers lose their jobs, the only other employment in the vacinity relates to the MT Ruapehu ski field. A couple of bad winters, a volcanic eruption or two, and the downturn in Asian tourists all add up to deep pain in the heartland of NZ.


This contagion is spreading fast. We can no longer be satisfied with such names as Asian Contagion, or Asian Meltdown. We are dealing with a PANDEMIC. The plague will spontaneously appear far from its apparent locus or source and begin to affect those lives nearby. IT will jump across fire walls and leap oceans. This, pandemic will, unfortunately, not be contained.

To all those who believe that their paper gold certificates and gold shares WILL BE REDEEMABLE, I should like to refer you to a post by TIM last June concerning the ability of COMEX to change the rules, and the lack of practical recourse available for major defaults by broking houses and banks. This, I believe emphasises what ANOTHER was saying when the panic hits, perhaps the worst affected will be the "best" prepared. Those who think that they can leverage off paper profits ( Gold Shares or shorting NYSE, holding URSA ) into precious may find themselves worse off that if they had held paper currency during the pandemic.




aurator_@2ndHorseman_of_the_Apocalypso

BART: When ya goin ta fix this site??

apo -loggies for double post
zzzz

TED, How're ya bro? haven't seen ya for a while. I gotta turn in, don't let the bstards grind ya down.

throw willy a bone for me.

( Oh, is that vulgar in amerispeak? - is quite innocent here )

nite for real, although I have noticed I am not the only one who has trouble logging off, eh JTF?

I have a feeling that Karlito cannot reply. Earlier this week, I asked him how many thumbs he had, and asked if he could pull at least one out of his ars. .....
No reply, so presumibly, both are still .....!

WSJ on Indonesia:
January 8, 1998

Worries About Fate of IMF Deal
Send Equities Market Down 12%

An INTERACTIVE JOURNAL News Roundup

Indonesia's stock market fell 12% and the rupiah plummeted on Thursday
amid fears that an International Monetary Fund rescue package could
become unglued.

The Jakarta Stock Exchange's Composite index fell 47.131 to 347.108.
The index touched a low of 321.078 points at midafternoon, 19% below
its close on Wednesday.

In late trading, the rupiah was trading at 9,800 to the dollar compared with
Wednesday's close at 7,800. The rupiah hit a historic low at 10,000 to the
dollar at the midday break.

The selling was prompted by news that the IMF may be questioning the
Indonesian government's ability to implement the reforms necessary to
save the economy.

In comments to reporters following a Thursday meeting with President
Suharto, Bank Indonesia Governor Soedradjad Djiwandono said that the
first $3 billion tranche of aid from the multilateral body had already been
delivered.

He noted, however, that the second tranche was being "processed" and
that negotiations still needed to be held before the money could be
disbursed.

The second tranche of IMF aid has become a contentious issue as
high-ranking IMF officials in Washington have stated the money could be
withheld due to the slow pace of structural reform in Indonesia. Under the
nearly $40 billion IMF aid package, Indonesia is obligated to undergo
significant reforms in order to draw down on the money.

The IMF plans to send a team of officials to Jakarta during the last two
weeks of January to assess the state of Indonesia's reform measures.

Indonesia's budget, released Tuesday, was viewed as a key indicator of
the government's willingness to cope seriously with its problems.

The country's financial markets had hoped for austere measures in the
budget, including cuts in fuel subsidies, some blueprint for the nation's
handling of cash-strapped and insolvent companies, and repeals on
foreign-ownership limits on property and financial institutions. Instead, Mr.
Suharto pledged a 32% spending increase to 133.5 trillion rupiah, a
seven-trillion rupiah increase in petroleum subsidies, and other budget
projections that appeared to conflict with a financial-rescue package
agreed to last year with the IMF.

Indonesia's woes sent Singapore shares into a tailspin, sending the key
index down 7.1% to a five-and-a-half year low.

Hong Kong fell 3%, depressed by the volatility of Asian currencies and
high levels of local interbank rates. The benchmark three-month Hong
Kong Interbank Offered Rate was up sharply to 14.5%, compared with
12.5% late Wednesday. The more volatile overnight rate was also quoted
higher at 6.5%, up from 4.5% late Wednesday.

Return to top of page
Copyright  1998 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Sold 1,000 shares of FRO ( 26.5 ) @ the close yesterday ( watch the bastard soar now ) .....Need house building money and don't know if I want to redeem by Canadian Dollars @ their currently depressed price....

WSJ:Gold, Platinum, Palladium Rise
While the Price for Silver Falls

By AARON LUCCHETTI
Dow Jones Newswires

A weakening dollar and a sluggish performance for stocks and bonds gave
gold prices a modest boost.

In moderate trading in the futures pits at the Comex division of the New
York Mercantile Exchange, gold for February delivery rose $2.40 a troy
ounce to $284.70. Platinum and palladium prices also rose, while the price
for silver fell.

The cooling of the stock market and red-hot bonds convinced some
speculators and metals dealers to accumulate gold Wednesday in a day of
reversal for the precious metals. Since the beginning of December, the
gold price slid 4.1% to a fresh 12 1/2-year low while silver skipped ahead
15.1%, hitting an 8 1/2-year high Dec. 30.

That has changed, at least temporarily, analysts said. "Gold is extremely
oversold, and there's some bargain buying at these levels," said Bernard
Savaiko, head of commodities research at PaineWebber. Although
Wednesday's gold move represented a gain of only 0.85%, some traders
interpreted the buying as a bullish sign because it helped keep gold a few
dollars above the $281 an ounce mark. The nearby gold future on the
Comex has traded below $282 four times since Dec. 9, but has never
slipped more than 50 cents below that level. Wednesday, February gold
bottomed out at $281.60 an ounce.

"Gold tested the level of support," and bounced higher, said Edward
Kempf, senior research analyst at CPM Group, a New York metals
consultancy. "There's incredibly strong demand for gold at these prices."

In addition to the bargain-basement price levels, buyers of gold were
inspired by the weakening of the dollar, which helps metals prices rise.
Increased instability in the stock market, which saw early losses, also
caused some speculators to get out of trades that increased in value as
gold prices fell. Such liquidation helped prices higher, says William O'Neill,
chief futures strategist at Merrill Lynch. With further losses in Thai
currencies this week, "There's a little bit of a turmoil atmosphere," coming
from Asia, and dealers are starting to nibble in gold, because of that, said
Mr. O'Neill. Gold tends to perform better in an uncertain financial climate
where inflation is a particular threat.

The lack of inflation has encouraged investors and some central banks to
turn in their gold for interest-bearing financial instruments. According to the
CPM Group, central banks sold off 20 million ounces of gold last year,
twice as much as they sold in 1996. And despite lower profits in the
mining sector, primary mine production was projected to increase 1.7% to
62.6 million ounces in 1997. Many analysts predict a curtailing of that
growth this year as higher-cost mines are shut.

For silver, Wednesday's fall stopped a furious rally during the last three
months. Buoyed by speculative interest and industrial demand, silver rose
over $6 an ounce, and has stayed there in recent weeks. But silver bulls
face potential problems including possible profit-taking by speculators and
reduced demand from Indian jewelry consumers, who are known for their
sensitivity to price hikes.

"Indian demand for silver has virtually dried up," said Merrill's Mr. O'Neill.
"We expect less demand from that country in 1998." Wednesday, the
most active March silver futures contract slipped under $6, but bounced
higher to finish at $6.01 an ounce, down 4.7 cents.

GRAINS AND OILSEEDS: Soybean futures drifted higher Wednesday
as traders focused on rumors that China is interested in purchasing U.S.
soyoil. In trading at the Chicago Board of Trade, Ja

Aussie gold price trend - "Stabilised" at AU$440
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/plot.html

Nikkei 36 day trend - new floor
http://satellite.nikkei.co.jp/enews/TNKS/stox/strend.html

"Looks" like the US$ gold has found a new floor - going up or down??!! Isn't it extraordinary that Old Soros shoots off the Korea, the Koreans collect their gold, gold price drops, new floor. So where is Old Soros off to next - has to be Japan?!

Oh what a lovely war......and to think that the ultimate prize is China.

PPI due out @ 8:30 ( EST ) -consensus est. down 0.1%....Feb. Gold down 1.10 @ 283.60...S+P futures down 2.00 but Europe ignores Asian equity carnage ( what me worry )

The baaaaad weather hit ya yet??---and that ain't much of a spread....

Just endless rain. Rain showers. Rain. Clouds. Rain.....

Got to go now. The commute beckons me! Later............

It's been raining off and on since Sunday around here. Later dude!

Have a good day!

If one was an asian investor and sold all their equity shares 6 months ago and invested their funds in physical gold, their material wealth would have gone up exponentially compared to someone who thought that the share market was always safe and held their shares.

In their time of troubles, physical has rocketed.
Looking at these charts, I would be selling Asian gold and buying US gold.

Wouldn't you?

Korean gold price.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/cache/KRWXAU00-2450451-2450820.GIF
Indonesian gold price.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/cache/IDRXAU00-2450451-2450820.GIF
Thai gold price.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/cache/THBXAU00-2450451-2450820.GIF

USA gold price.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/cache/USDXAU00-2450451-2450820.GIF
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Physical gold obviously has a relative intrinsic value - globally.

http://www.herald.ns.ca/cgi-bin/home/secfront?1998/01/08+NovaScotia
Donkin is one of the most beautiful oceanfront areas in all of Cape Breton ( another coal mine on the ocean outta help tourism and the 'image' here...eh ) and the coal there has a very high sulpher content and being under the ocean it is hard and expensive to mine ( let alone factoring in the unreliable work-force ) ...The ONLY future ( ?? ) Cape Breton has is tourism and 'clean industry' but the politicians and the 'yocals' are too damn stupid to see the forest through the trees....After five years here I can confidently say the only 'future' in CB is a continuation of government hand outs to a lazy+ SPOILED society....

Donald
The merging of CLS Services, Exchange Clearing House, and Multinet International Bank, strikes me as similiar to the merger of those two Swiss banks.
Are they joining forces to hide past loses?
And if they crashed?

The pyramid grows higher.
Another rung in the ladder.

Raining here still ( 41F ) Just got an e.mail from my son in DC, still raining there. Figure on a couple more days at least.

Really missed you and your insights. Glad you are back. The trap is fully set. This is going to be a big one for the history books; if there any history books in our future.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/markets_go_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/gold_holds_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/upi/98/01/08/international_news/chinanazi_1.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/indonesia__4.html

I simply love to talk against, so here I go again

Theres lots of talk about gains/savings of these asians who held gold instead of local currencies.

What about those who did not invested in gold but in dollars?

The point is that whats happening in SE Asia is not a proof that gold is THE MONEY. The facts from SE Asia have proven only that its almost as good as dollar so far : ) .

Geb

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/indonesia_to_import__1.html

HONG KONG DOWN 3%
INDONESIA DOWN 12%
SINGAPORE DOWN 7%
MALEYSIA DOWN 3%
PHILIPPINES DOWN 5%
TAIWAN DOWN 1%
THAILAND DOWN 3%
CHINA DOWN 1%
INDIA DOWN 2%

Tsunami Tidal Wave of Stock Market Loses Wash Over Asia

During the last six months of currency chaos and stock market
havoc - both which continue as I speak - the average citizen of
the average country of this Southeast Asia, who had the foresight of converting his currency into GOLD, would now be about 76% RICHER - reflecting the average increase in gold's value in the five besieged paper currencies.

Five charts showing the explosive price rise in Asian currencies will indeed convince even the most skeptical that only GOLD is providing a safe harbor for local investors. The regional gold price trajectory is literally ORBITAL.

Regrettably, most Asians must RELEARN the universal and timeless truism: GOLD IS THE ULTIMATE STANDARD OF VALUE, and paper is just paper!
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/oracle010798.html

The dollar hit a low of 1.70 dmarks in Jan of 1980 before going to 2.60 in July of 1981.

The key phrase is "so far". Unless you know the EXACT date the dollar is less favored than gold. Have some gold ready just in case. Would you wait until the day before your next auto accident to buy car insurance?

FWIW.The bankstocks will get hit severely,goldstocks will drift south
gold drops below 280 stocks will go over the cliff.liquidity crisis looming ...globally.Cash is king
Have a good day

Wash DC metro area currently @65 degrees this AM.

Is this Korea gold sale thing being used because the CB story is old. If I were an Asian the announcements by the govts there would make me buy more gold. Do their CBs have any gold or is that also a lie.

Almost 1/2 of jobs created in this wonderful US economy would not support a family above the poverty line. Happy talk about US Econ is to keep capital flowing to support overvalued and oversupply of US financial assets. The bubble grows.

Thanks Donald
It's great to be back.

FTSE 100 stays one pct up as futures squeeze holds
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/ftse_100_s_2.html
``You can see the market getting squeezed up. It's all the futures, it's very thin, there are no real stories,''

Mahathir says don't panic over economy
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/malaysia_e_1.html

Jakarta calm despite Indonesia financial crisis
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/jakarta_ca_1.html
Despite rumours to the contrary in financial markets, traffic flowed usually and there was no sign of any increased presence of troops.
Witnesses said hundreds of people crowded supermarkets to stock up on food and other essentials amid fear prices would rise, but the situation was peaceful.

Indonesia's military calls on people not to panic
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/indonesia__4.html
JAKARTA, Jan 8 ( Reuters ) - Indonesia's powerful military on Thursday urged the public not to panic over the meltdown in the country's financial markets.
They said rice, flour, sugar and cooking oil had disappeared from most supermarket shelves and that supplies of milk were fast dwindling.
FOCUS-S.Korea strives for international debt deal
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/korea_bank_5.html
``What's clear is Korea has $20 billion due by the end of January that either has to be rolled over or converted,'' he said. ``The problem is that because of our urgent situation, we don't have much bargaining leverage.''
The country faces another estimated $20 billion debt bill coming due in February and March.

You are, of course, right. However, gold certainly confirmed its 2000 year history as a store of value for those Asians fortunate enough to hold the stuff. Of much more immediate import is whether the battle between the dollar and gold has now run its course. If it has, there may be a few more charts looking remarkably similar to those posted by sharefin, but in currencies closer to the hearts of all of us in the West ( and the Antipodes ) .

It is no more an unlikely scenario than that envisaged by the emerging market investors just a few short months ago.

UK's Schroders warns of profit downgrades to come
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/uk_s_schro_1.html
LONDON, Jan 8 ( Reuters ) - European company earnings forecasts could be seriously over-optimistic in the light of the continuing Asian financial crisis, analysts at Schroders Securities warned on Thursday.
Yet Schroders is one of the few investment banks that have so far put forward an overtly bearish stock market view on the basis of the Asian situation, which continues to be regarded as an essentially peripheral -- or even positive -- factor by many market watchers.
The U.S. is less exposed to imports than other developed economies but could still see zero overall profit growth in 1998 compared with consensus expectations of eight percent,
Investors concerned to reduce Asia-related risks should avoid European auto stocks, selected banks exposed to Asian loans, along with some chemical, drinks, engineering, oil, transport and luxury goods companies.
The debate over looming deflationary forces gathered strength earlier this week, after U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan warned that sharp falls in the price of assets such as shares and real estate had the potential to be a ``virulently negative'' force.

``It is a genuinely important issue that is going to be difficult for a lot of people,'' said one dealer, ``and I think we are going to hear a lot more about it in coming weeks and months.''

Gebernax: REF Your Commentary, "The point is that whats happening in SE Asia is not a proof that gold is THE MONEY."

May I respectfully suggest that if you study the history of money in Asia... you might well appreciate that ALL ASIANS of a certain age level much prefer a Dollar's worth of GOLD than a Dollar's worth of paper, including the temporaily popular "greenback."

CHUK KAM IS SOLID GOLD UNIVERASLLY EXCHANGABLE AS MONEY IN ALL ASIA

The company which employs me has grown at a 40% rate for three years and the stock has gone up accordingly. Tuesday night, the ceo spoke to analysts and said that we would grow at only 10% next year. Our stock dropped 17% in 1 hour Wednesday morning. We set a new 52-week low on record high volume. We are making money, expanding operations, hiring more staff and spending more on infrastructure. This market is manic, with most of the players still convinced that they can beat 10% per year, every year. CAVEAT EMPTOR! Those of us who are taking hits for buying gold and silver are going to have the last "I told you so".

on another topic: There are plenty of decent jobs in many fields in Houston. Wages are going up.

Can the collapse continue? - Williams de Bro Gold Comment:

http://www.gold.org/Gedt/Speeches/Debr9712/Debroe1.htm

Why the European Central Bank should hold gold - WGC official statement:

http://www.gold.org/Gedt/Speeches/Ecb/Ecb1.htm

-- Parn --

Donald: Your "Would you wait until the day before your next auto accident to buy car insurance?"

This is by far the best and most succinct expression of explaining why everyone should have a core-position in GOLD. INDEED a POWERFUL SENTENCE.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/ukraine_ch_1.html

I agree that the key phrase is "so far".

The point is that the ability to do something, anything, of CB-s of Malaisia, Indonesia, Singapore etc., yes even the 12th largest economy S.-Korea is not comparable to US Fed.

Eventually, yes the whole system has to collapse under its own weight or at least go through a drastic change. But eventually means anything up to a century.

I would remind you that the failure of Soviet system was clear for everybody in the 60ties. Yet it took 30 more years to reach to changes. The system just went on running on its own weight, it was SO big.

And, do you know what happened to the guys who said in 1968 that the system is inhuman and has to be changed? Hope it wont be your fate, and mine as a matter of fact, since I share your opinion. I only disagree with time table.

Geb

And I agree with you.

All I was trying to point at was that both the asians who held gold and asians who held dollars are better off than their pals who held rupiah, ringgit or won.

The FACTS so far support only claims that the later ones are less reliable than both dollar and gold ( as if I had not known that before 1997 ) .

Geb

Gene Inger correctly asserts that the growing strength of the US dollar will eventually come back to haunt the American economy. ...every upward tick in the Dollar puts more future pricing risk into the domestic manufacturing sector versus foreign market competition.

Overall Inger remains bearish on the stock market.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/inger010798.html

Interesting that Europe is slipping into the red.
Earlier they were ingoning Asia's woes.
Maybe they are rethinking their stance.

Globex is starting to fluctuate.
Which way will the spin masters push it today?

Got to run around this morning, so I won't be able to watch the fun and games. Bonds will be strong this morning. Stocks will have a very challenging day. It will be interesting if the late day dipsters will rush in again today???

Platinum, Palladium, Silver looking good. Gold will fall in line with them, IMHO. As money exits stocks, I am expecting some funds to flow into gold ( as a hedge ) . As we all know, all we need is to have a little money flow this way to have a major impact.

Well, I won't know if I am right until later today. Any positive close for gold today will be very good. Got to run. Good luck to all of us.

HOW WILL ASIA'S CRASH AFFECT US?

The 1929-like crash in Asia is causing misery on a biblical scale, threatening the solvency of banks, stockbrokers, margin calls undermining investors, while the crackpots running the central banks raise taxes and interest rates, wreaking havoc on the middle class and poor.

If all nations printed paper money at different rates, how could there possibly be stability?

Over the millennia, gold has been the traditional receptacle for Mass Fear, along with silver and perhaps platinum. On a "spike" there is no telling how high gold might go when so many try to buy at the same time, like a herd of elephants trying to get through a revolving door at the same time. FULL REPORT at:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_98/dines010798.html

There is no history of any country importing itself into recession. Inflation and growth, while they can certainly be influenced by external events, are still determined by internal policies: monetary, trade, tax, regulatory and spending.

When I look at the mix of US policy there is nothing there that indicates either deflation or recession. Monetary policy is expansive, the budget deficit is the lowest of any developed country, trade is open and freer than just about any other country, banks are appropriately regulated and in good financial shape. It is that mix of policy that will produce growth in the US this year and keep the dogs of deflation from our door.

Secondly, we will not be importing deflation. The collapse of Asian currencies is creating inflation in those countries. The local price of any good being sold to the US is going up, once you take the change in local price into account, the chances of any deflation being imported into the US grows even more remote.

The sharks ate Jimmy last night. He was a good man, not much of a meal for the fish, though. Lt.Don and Ens. Dom made off with our only life raft. Kinda' knew they would. Radio battery is weak...Probably our last signal has been sent...all hope gone. Boat lost. God bless America.

Unemployment Claims Up
Prices of Food & Energy etc. Down.
Deflation
"Rapid decline of assets" AG
"Deflation Depression" CNBC
"We have never seen anything like this" CNBC

GM auto sales Up.
New Home Sales Up.
My Food Cost has not gone down.
Is the Lexus or Chevrolet Cheaper?

They have a number to fit every body's need it seems.
Which Is It?

S&P Futures -5.50

You are quite right- We should not be anticipating deflation. With the flood of dollars flowing out from the US government printing presses, INFLATION is in the cards.

Donald-Weather: 22 degrees and snowing....S+P futures down 5.0 ( glad I sold FRO yesterday! ) ....go team gold!!...EB: Looks like Van Axcel is playin himself out of a job---knew that fast start couldn't last!!..Weather update: spposed ta change to sleet-ice-rain later in the day ( me + Willy are hanging infront of the fireplace with some home-made bread bakin in the oven ) yum-yum....

http://quote.yahoo.com/intlmarkets?u

15% to 25%. Predicting 9% average increase in 98.

As a passing thought, EVERY news broadcast here in Australia does NOT quote the gold price in Australian Dollars, but in US Dollars. This is strange, as locally we produce and sell gold in Australian Dollars.

The Media, talk about "brain washing". It makes you wonder!?

I wonder why the US Dollar is never quoted in terms of GOLD?

As I speak, I have the air conditioner on at FULL, a pair of shorts on...
it was 42 deg C ( 120 deg F ) in Kalgoorlie today, and it is still a wee bit warm tonight.

Aye

A Tsunami RED Tidal Wave Sweeps World Stock Markets -

Yahoo covers 45 of the world' major stock markets. Yesterday showed 89% of all stock markets WORLDWIDE as DOWN, ONLY 6% WERE UP ( just 3 ) , and 5% were spared the pounding by being closed.

Needless to say the stock markets are heralding the contagion of the DOMINO EFFECT which will eventually wreak havoc on all shores.

And as old LBJ used to say, "IT'S GONNA GET ALOT WORSE, BEFORE IT GETS ANY BETTER!"

Haggis__A ( Ted........... ) : hey, can you tell me a URL where I migtt get tourist information on your neck of the woods?

A Japanese freighter sailed by late last night. Signalled distress...hoped they might rescue. No response. War is a Red Hell.

Have you ever had an "in depth" discussion with a Broker/Analyst, and
walked away from the discussion and thought..."Now, do I now know more
or less than I did half an hour ago".

On the other hand, the Broker/Analyst is most likely saying to
himself... "Thank God for those self meditation tapes that I made up: heavy metal, hyena roars, crocodile rattles and the noise of vicious aardvark attacks - have to get back to the office and put theory into practice. Where is my gun?"

Aye, Haggis

Much is happening now. Governments, IMF, BIS, LBMA and many others, are very much in the middle of this fire. Very large buy orders have stopped the CBs from lending now. The BIS has been asked/told "lower gold no more"! The US$ price has stopped. I will offer many thoughts on the 10th.

Haggis
Just like our politicians.
Second rate.

Silver/gold being dumped.

Silver
SIH8 just hit $5.85
Is it heading down to close its gap?

Perhaps this might help.......

http://www.reyngraph.com.au/dnd/welcome.html

May be booked out for this year, but there is always standby......

Now look what you have gone and done!

sharefin: I saw your earlier post showing your prediction of the second ping. Given the worsening situation in SEAsia, I find it incomprehensible that the US markets will still go up. However the perception in the US is still bullish -- it will take months before all the dippers catch on to the less than rosy picture. We have at least one dipster in our midst, and he/they are still not convinced!

My point/question to you is the following, after I read your earlier post about the fund managers and the traders propping up the market yesterday. That was a very organized, synchronized operation, implemented 20 minutes before closing. It could not have been due to panic buying by SEAsian investors, but rather internal to the US. My point is this -- the effect on the markets was just like the action of the PPT, and if the PPT were to do something, they ( through RR ) might well have used the same group to achieve the same end.

A more important question is that of motivation and reserves. If the threat is a massive collapse of our equities, I think all parties capable of acting in concert will do so, until the funds "run out". If federal funds are available for this the PPT action will go on for a longer period of time than if it were entirely private. But, eventually, this coordinated support effort will diminish, at it will be "all hands for the life boats". Your point is well taken that the actions of the PPT ( or whomever ) will be focused on times of greatest investor anxiety, as that will be the most efficient use of funds. However, I suspect that with the apparent weakening and potential collapse of South America, that the anxiety level will very soon reach a creshendo, and the PPT ( or whoevever ) will find themselves trying to stop Niagara falls, and will just have to step out of the way.

Perhaps what will happen next will be analogous to the surges during the 1929 crash, as the pros go with the flow, riding the market down, and riding it back up with the dipsters, with each subsequent high lower than the previous one, until the dipsters give up inexhaustion months later.

I'm waiting for the first big downsurge to shake down the gold stocks one more time, and so that the "smart money" starts heading fo the exits. After Niagara falls really starts flowing, I think gold will be left alone. Even then, using 1929 as a guide, most of the profits in gold stocks will be well after the crash, when gold mining profits got a big boost, and everyone is looking for a save haven.

Comments?

YIKES! Old news if you see the numbers above, but gold just shot through its previous low at warp 9, heading for 2-8-0 land. Silver down .26 at 5-7-8. What in the name of the man-eating marsupials is going on here?

ANOTHER: You have done it again -- we anticipate your post, even if ( it seems ) that the mystery never ends!

maria bartiromo seems to have lost her smiley-face
disposition......they're ( talking heads ) all just
not themselves when the bull has been bitten by
the bear......applying a paper-poultice will hide
the obvious wound, while the gangrene spreads
to the rest of the body......an amputation would
save the patient, yet the poison spreads un-abated...

listen to your eyes.........they speak the truth..

shoot from the hip, aim for their lip......time is short....

!;

My, My, My... time to buy silver? Patience still ... 5.50 could come before 6.50.

SNP's have 960 to contend with and then, ughhh... don't want to guess the bottom on that one - PPT or no.

Bonds pause, and then yields go down for months.

--don't be afraid of the lawn-mower blade...

the silver bulls
ba!!s are being harvested for sale......mountain oysters for
those who will swallow ANYTHING...... $1.00 per dozen.......
there are plenty to go around.....ALLABOARD......

options for safety....

Remember that Dr Jamison was also a Scot. Look what he did to you last time..........for our North American friends, a little bit of history!

Where is the Blood River URL???

Aye

Remember that Dr Jamison was also a Scot. Lokk what he did to you last time..........for our North American friends, a little bit of history!

Where is the Blood River URL???

Aye

All: Silver is dropping like a stone -- somethings up! Given that silver is ( or just was ) in a rally, but gold was not -- I think gold is going to drop even more! This may well be the PPT covering the exits!

I'm sitting on my new deck----freezing my damn ass off!!..Don't rub it in buddy~~~~~~~~~

JTF
It is my belief that we are at the top of a mania.
As such its reversal will be knife quick.
Just like silver today.

I think that the MF's and other big players are leading the market around.
Let the sellers sell it in the morning but prop it in the afternoon.
The big players want time to roll out to maximize their profits.

One day there will be a psycological change in the market players and they will just abandon the buying and sell, sell, sell.
This could well happen on this wave.

I remember last Oct when I was short how bullish avid was.
So much confidence in the direction of the market.
It is the same tonight.
When the crash comes it will be on a bullish day.
Sentiment will be bouyant, and then just disappear.
As it has in the past.
I believe it should have happened on that wave last Oct.
But it was propped.
If we go into this down wave it will be a stronger down wave.
Will they choose to stop it this time?

Todays action let alone this last weeks is not what bull markets are made of.
With the supposedly high cash inflows this week the markets should be roaring ahead.
Instead it acts like a bear.
The whipsawing I am observing in some charts and indicators,
Tend to make me feel that we are on a high probability crash wave like in Oct.
Perhaps they can prop it this time but the sellers will be back again.
And the contained volatility must be released.

The next few days are absolutely pivotal.
IMHO

Thanks for the reminder. Always preffered the Irish version, sold in bottles by Dr. Jamieson......a lot more predictable.

It's 26 degrees and snowing here in Cape Breton---do you really want tourist info. on this place????---On the 'bright' ( ?? ) side it's supposed ta change ta freezing rain this afternoon~~~~~~~

Ted
You could always come to Cairns where all good tourists go.
Temps around 29C and its been raining since the week before Xmas.
Hot, wet and sweaty.
Real rain - inches and inches.
All the touro's have got such glum faces.

...looks like gold has found support at 281..for now... I don't have a clue as to what silver is doing -- I get dizzy just watching those .20+ cent swings...

G'day Mate!---The rain I can relate to but can't handle them 'hot' temps and plus I HATE tourists!!....Feb.Gold down 2.20 and Silver down 23.8 cents ( ouch )

$26 million ( Aussies dollars ) hit. according to Friday's Australian Financial Review. Suncorp-Metway Bank is a large regional bank in Brisbane. It is
a "second tier" bank in Australia. They have appointed KPMG as receivers to Charter Towers. Charter Towers is an operator of a gold mine in the city of Charter Towers in Queensland. Sorry I cannot post the url but I just don't know how to do it.

Ted ( Vronsky..................and are you serious ) : Not really my cup of tea.

brush it off my car this morning. Fortunately, the temperatures not quite cold enough for it to stick .

You may be right, but whatever the CB's/BIS has started has taken on a life of it's own.
Every idiot out there believes US$ = GOOD, GOLD = BAD.
This is market is fueled by perception and interpretation, and little fact.
Looks like GOLD has to make a new significant low before better times.
Meanwhile tens of thousands of inocent miners will be without jobs for years.
Thank Canada, Australia, IMF, Camdessus, BIS, A.G., Rubin, Freemasons, Belgium etc. etc. etc.
We are in for some very rough unpredictable times around the world,
fasten your seatbelts...........

The Hong Kong Oracle has given another insightful and perhaps even alarming prediction of what currency turmoil to expect in Asia during 1998. It is definitely NOT a pretty picture. Milhouse gives his considered opinion on most major currencies and GOLD.

Gold will be the major beneficiary of the increasing currency
volatility wrought by EMU and the drive to inflate which is
already underway in almost every country. The reason it will
benefit is because it is the only form of money which exists
outside the financial system. As such, it is the only truly effective hedge against inflation. Any method of hedging against inflation which exists within the financial system involves a payment risk. Also, even if your non-gold hedge is 100% effective, you simply end up with a larger quantity of paper.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/milhouse010598.html

The silver /Gold Ratio was 46.84 at the close yesterday. It is 48.88 right now.

1. Downsizing has got rid of the $25.00 goldbricks, yes they will only get lower paying jobs, and lose the gravy train...That's all they deserve.
2. People are paid for each hour they work..the employer owes them nothing else...Period! What they EARNED they already RECEIVED!
3. What has made this county great is not he winers, but those who can stand up to adversity & go on to live successful lives.
4. The US..WAS, IS, and will ALWAYS be the light of a dark world.
5. Only a small God would smile on some people of the world & cast poverty and ruin on the others.

Interesting story in PC Magazine. If the paper tiger doesn't shred us first, Y2K just might. Full story at

http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/news/trends/t980107a.htm

Stepping into this fray recently, William McDonough, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, sounded a clear warning and wake-up call to the international banking industry. Speaking before the annual meeting of the Institute of International Finance in September, he said that "the century date change poses a very significant risk for financial markets." Emphasizing that the problem is not just technical, he asserted that "credit officers should monitor the progress of customers who rely on technology on a regular basis."

McDonough called special attention to Y2K-related security issues, pointing out that security software is not exempt from the problem and that updating and testing it must not compromise banks' security. He concluded by saying that Y2K is a critical issue facing the global economy. "Failure to get it right will affect the integrity of the payments system and the performance of the domestic and maybe even the global economy."

Meanwhile Edward Yardeni, chief economist for Deutsche Morgan Grenfell, has stated that the Y2K bug--"a trivial yet overwhelming problem"--increases the probability of a 20 percent drop in the stock market. Such a drop could, depending on its global scope, add trillions of dollars to the Y2K price tag and spark a sharp economic downturn all by itself.

The Japanese Central bank, in the last desperate action, is inflating the M3 at the rate of 1% a day ( !!! not a month ) for the last 3 weeks. This is a historic rate by any measure.
Soon, we will know if inflation or deflation will be the world's next curse. Watch closely the US M3 to be released after 4pm EDT today.

Clearly, things are getting out of control.

The CFTC is currently investigating the synocate which was tring to buy all the silver and force the price up. I do not know what the outcome will be. It may be nothing or it may be the US Gov. forcing them to liquidate there position. If they are forced to sell expect a swift decline. In either case expect more vol.. Me, I'm staying away from silver both long and short. Gold seems so much more reasonable to predicted.

Looking forward to your contributions.

For OLD-GOLD: Here is another consideration regarding YOUR commentary that possible GOLD LOAN DEFAULTS may NOT be too much to worry about. The sage and insightful commentary is from the SI "Gold price Monitor" thread:

"Bankers are bankers; and they make loans on a bank reserve system basis, e.g. they make $20 of loans for every $1 on deposit with them. Who is there to say that they don't lend out $20 in PAPER gold for every $1 in
PHYSICAL gold that they hold in deposit?????? How can you otherwise reconcile 30-40 million ounces of PAPER gold traded on the London market alone DAILY ( times 250 trading days in a year makes the value traded in a year equal to $2 trillion ) with the 8000 tons lent by CB's valued at $100 Billion or with the total above-ground PHYSICAL gold of 100,000 tons valued at roughly $1 trillion only. Is the total PHYSICAL gold traded MANY times over in a year in London alone???? Hardly!!!

Ask the ladies in India how many times a year they trade in their jewelry !!! How much PAPER gold is traded in N.Y., Sydney and Hong Kong and Zurich??? You can clearly see that the PAPER gold is a MULTIPLE of the PHYSICAL gold and that the bankers did it again, i.e. lent something like $20 of PAPER gold out against every $1 of PHYSICAL GOLD on in their vault!!! Get this:

1 ) The POG is controlled primarily by the trading in derivatives/PAPER GOLD!!!

2 ) The POG control will remain until it is unravelled through taking of DELIVERY OF ACTUAL PHYSICAL GOLD and PUTTING IT IN PRIVATE INVESTOR
VAULTS ( NOT THE BANK VAULTS WHERE THE BANK CAN LEND OUT MORE PAPER GOLD AGAINST IT ) !!!"

Jaakko

Frankly, that's a great deal to worry about!!!!!!!!!!!

don't you just hate it when a market does what
you expect it to?--si---

the paper-tiger is fibrillating------and they say the asian
contagion CANNOT STOP THE BULL....ON CNCB taking stock right now!!

the sleepwalkers, when they look in the mirror, do not see the
furry face staring back.....they have never seen a lemming, and
if man, thinks of having to shave now, if woman, thinks of
having to shave in the future........IT LOOKS AND FEELS NATURAL!

ag and the fed fixing to shock the world.....rates going up...

the changelings---------poor peopleo.......never to have known
they were really homo-sapiens and not rudimetirus-ankle-biterus...

!;--------bond-bombII-is-set-to-explode-------again----

Avalon
http://www.afr.com.au/content/980109/invest/invest2.html
This company is sitting on a gold mine.
Liquidity squeeze

Swing chart updated
http://www.kitcomm.com/pub/discussion/Sswing.gif

Ted so do I.
That's why I stay at home.

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/malaysia_e_1.html

Tsunami Tidal Wave of Stock Market Loses Wash Over Asia

During the last six months of currency chaos and stock market
havoc - both which continue as I speak - the average citizen of
the average country of this Southeast Asia, who had the foresight of converting his currency into GOLD, would now be about 76% RICHER - reflecting the average increase in gold's value in the five besieged paper currencies.

Five charts showing the explosive price rise in Asian currencies ( Indonesia, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia & the Philippines ) will indeed convince even the most skeptical that only GOLD is providing a safe harbor for local investors. The rising gold price trend in local currencies is literally ORBITAL.

Regrettably, most Asians must RELEARN the universal and timeless truism: GOLD IS THE ULTIMATE STANDARD OF VALUE, and paper is just paper!
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/oracle010798.html

Add 2/3 of all government employees ( minus military ) , accountants and lawyers to the gravy train list and I might just begin to give your conversation some credence. Operative word there - might.

Oh, and brokers.

I wouldn't be so worried about the silver syndicate breaking up because they don't really exist. Paladium was supposedly squeezed by the same 'boys' but then became a $200 commodity instead of a $100. Silver in the $5's just isn't rich. $20 silver is rich.

I still think that the market my move down to $5.50 maybe even $5.20 but given that the world money supply is going up enormously and that I doubt people will buy stocks once the earning story is over and volatility evident - the PM's and real estate are the only things left. Bonds are catching the flows for now, and will for several more months - but the yields are not realistic for a fiat money economy.

ANZ bank, a local OZ bank has the greatest exposure of Oz banks to Asia.
Sitting at 13.8 billion when the co has a mkt cap of $14.5 billion.
The company has stated that Asia's problems will not hurt it's profits.
They must be so heavily leveraged if these sort of figures don't worry them.
Time will tell and my puts will grow fat.

Religious posts are so often frowned upon in this forum, but I must assert that it takes a very large God indeed to allow His creations to live with the consequences of their actions, even if they are harming themselves. As a parent, I know this from watching my children make mistakes and trying hard to allow them to learn from the experience rather than dashing in to shield them from it. To bring this back on-topic ( sort of ) , as General so aptly stated yesterday, gold will not be of any help to you if you ignore it's Maker.

According to CRU Precious Metals Monitor, published monthly in London, one half of the Gold mines around the world are loosing money with a gold price at $325.00. So if you were a CEO of a gold mine who could not survive with Gold at $325.00, would you close the mine up and lay everyone off if gold touches $325.00 intraday on COMEX?? Problable not. After all gold touch $325.0 in '93 and that was the low and a great buy! So how about if gold was at 325.0 for a whole week. Naw! Gold going to a million and as a CEO who are the leading goldbug of them all! So how long would gold have to stay at $325.00 for you to through in the towel?? After a long discussion with some knowledgeable people we came to the conclusion that if the 200 day moving average was at $325.00 that would be significant! Well as of the close of business Wednesday the 200 day moving average of spot gold was exactly $324.50! Expect to hear about mine closures on a regular basis from this point forward. This is real. Gold is at $280.00 and the downtrend does not look like it is over.

Well put!
As a general rule WE DO make our own good fortune by following universal laws of physics, finance, et.al.. Violation of them is what brings us the pain and misery of which the POOR whine!

O'tay, I hear ya!

Glenn: Thanks for the tip -- my silver profits vanished into thin air, but at least it wasn't a loss! Looks like Silver caught the attention of the authorities. This may also be the reason for the gold fall -- it will be interesting to see if it goes below 280!

I wonder -- perhaps the investigation into the silver corner was carefully timed to correspond with the current risk of a market downturn --- no -- they wouldn't do that -- or would they?

Cherokee: You sem to have got the silver correction right. Youdid sya a coorection of 50% within the general upward movement. Still feel that way? If so or if not why? Your comments would be appreciated.

Thanks for adding what I forgot to put in my post.

Ooops! Pardon my typos.

WHoever it was that had the bet about 280 gold before 300, gold just rocketed thru all supports and stands at 278.70 as of 11:10. Winner please step forward and claim your prize while the rest of us cry for the drop.

Silver down .36 now at 5.68

Glenn:

According to what I have heard the CFTC investigation is rumor not fact.There is also the rumor of a class action suit being filed against the 'manipulators'. Anyone want to bet that the source of the rumors real or imagined is the work of the party conducting the short raid?

If the CFTC gets involved the outcome is going to be very strange. From what I know of what's going on the physical silver is being bought and stored offshore. How is the CFTC going to walk up to a warehouse somewhere in Europe and demand that silver be sold back to the US at some price they decide is right. The last time this game went on, Phibro made the mistake of dealing largely on the Comex. The players have learned.

I don't see the silver market being manipulated in the sense that the supply and demand are in balance and warehouse stocks are large and that someone is coming in with large money to overwhelm an otherwise functioning market. I see a market where there is a large supply / demand imbalance, supplies are small, and someone has decided to park some wealth in a tangible asset.

If the CFTC really does get involved the publicity might just get this thing going crazy. Imagine if the bull case is given real media coverage. I'd love to have an article in the WSJ that stated the facts of the silver market,juxtaposed them against a chart of US money growth along with a section debunking the CPI.

One other note. I am actually getting feedback from mainstream Wall St. metals desks that the Fed really does have an interest in keeping the 'inflation' indicators ( precious metals ) at bay. To realize that these thoughts are begining to seep beyond the confines of our little world at Kitco is remarkable. The tide may be imperceptibly turning.

I think the difference between silver and paladium was two fold. First the real squeeze in paladium was alot of supply coming off the market from Russia and the main traders loosing money were from japan. In silver there was no unique event to start it to blame the problem on and there was some US traders who lost alot because of this run up. No doupt they added in complaining to the CFTC.

While the Asian financial mess has certainly taken its toll on currencies
and equities in that region of the world, it is also doing a number on
gold. Far from being a source of calm in the storm, gold is taking a beating right along with stocks.

WHY, because its a commodity just like oil, soybeans or cabbage. Asians have had a strong demand for gold. The numbers Bart posted here yesterday were very revealing. They have also endured big losses for that misguided taste. The drop in Asian wealth means that Asians will not be buying much gold in the future. Even without cb sales, the price of gold can go only one way in the current envronment and that's down.

I am still short gold stocks and will stay that way until the worm turns. In the interim I am hoping that CAU actually files for bankruptcy. I have never shorted a stock that went completely bust before, with HM on the s&p credit watch there is a chance they could go bust as well. A few more bad purchases like they made last month would accelerate that process.

The missile I sent is still spinning out of control.....might have to abort............ ( boom ) ...

this in my box this a.m.:

----- The following addresses had transient non-fatal errors -----

Warning: message still undelivered after 4 hours

Will keep trying until message is 5 days old

Don't be suprised if you receive a five day old message. Although if I must abort I think I'll do it above Kalgooooooriaayemate. It is not liking us too much. What to do? hmmmmmmmmm.....

Well, this WORLD CITIZEN will go to work now and try to do his best for ALL mankind ( and some not so kind ) ...because the world owes me NOTHING and I owe it my life.

oh yeah........ gold looks sick ( again ) and is not a buy ( he says while turning blue in the face ) ...... it may be bouncing right now but EVERYday ( lately ) FEB GOLD has set NEW lows.....and when new lows are set it is NOT prudent to buy..............but what do I know ( i is a lowly, hated 'merican with no brains but brawn ) .................the clock ticks........follow the trend......it could very well be your friend.

away... AYE



i understand GB-23....yes i do......

Steady, I have heard the same rumours concerning the astoundingly
rapid growth in money in Japan, for a friend called yesterday and
asked if this were true. I answered likely not. Where did you
see this news, for I'd be very interested in reading it, and I'd be
beholden to you for the favour. regards, tgl

Steady, I have heard the same rumours concerning the astoundingly
rapid growth in money in Japan, for a friend called yesterday and
asked if this were true. I answered likely not. Where did you
see this news, for I'd be very interested in reading it, and I'd be
beholden to you for the favour. regards, tgl

Pssst -- FRB is SOL on Y2K -- pass it on.
http://guide-p.infoseek.com/Content?arn=ix.AMB265225&col=IX

The Year 2000 problem has the potential to disrupt "virtually all of everyday commerce," said Federal Reserve Board Governor Edward Kelley to the Professional Banker's Association in Washington.

Your quote: "There is no history of any country importing itself ito recession"

Wrong.
During the 1960's, when LBJ preferred his 'guns and butter' fiscal policy, US imports expanded enough to produce very large trade deficits and an outflow of dollars. The stock market and mutual funds were zooming at the time and dollars were being returned, led by deGaulle, for US gold. By 1971, Nixon shut the door, but the value of the dollar fell enough by 1973 that the Arab oil produces wanted a higher price for their oil, which we were importing ( 30% of usage was imported then, now over 50% ) . The recession began before 1973, but it became serious then.

Too many overseas dollars caused by too many trade deficits and current account deficits caused directly by too much importing, caused the recession. Gold and silver took off for several years. The president resigned.

I see a very close resemblance to today, but it will happen only when the dollar turns down when all those foreigners realize they've been had.

If it looks, smells, and tastes like deflation, it must be Deflation..

since you bring him up.. After reading the post from the General I am beginning to like Mr. sheller and Vronsky even better. Sure am glad I am buying the yellow stuff!! When those pesky Demon's come around I like the General can buy them off with GOLD.... they will certainly not take fiat dolars or credit cards I have. POOR demented soul..guess the instutions allow patients net access. Regards EH

Karlito said that in current situation gold can only go down.

I guess Karlito can answer what is the situation when gold goes up...

If Karlito can not answer, shame on Karlito...

I do not work for the CFTC and do not know what is actually happening, I am simply reporting to Kitco what I heard from what I believe was a reliable source. This source was NOT a floor trader who was short. Perhaps you are right DA but everyone here should know you are also long the silver market.

As far as gold is concerned I agree that the trend is about to change. When it does change it should last a very long time. I do not what to support this market all by myself in the mean time because I may not be alive when the trend finally does change. I think we go down a few more months and a few more dollars. If I'm wrong I'll admit it and jump on board. I will bottom pick at some point, just not yet.

Mil Gracias, y mira el Nio!

Looks to me as if the rice futures will be a good place to spend a little time and research, due to el Nios peregrinations.
Corn, palm oil also!Gonna just hold gold positions. Too volatile for my limited capabilities. Silver too is gonna be let alone by me.
For now, that is!

My mention of an institutional buyer propping up the stock price in the face of falling POG since mid-November...my speculation leans more toward an investment fund rather than another mining interest. Here's why: due to Canyon's low share price with respect to their proven reserves in Montana and California ( w/ active mine ) , the company last year adopted a shareholder's rights plan that gives shareholders protection against an unnegotiated takeover bid to the tune of $15 per share purchasing power. This would tend to encourage 'up front' negotiations ( of which I have no knowledge--should I? ) . However, Homestake clearly demonstrated with its recent Australian acquisition that they are willing to pay a premium. Perhaps "Shareholder Rights be damned" says some unknown large-cap mine?

HOW WILL ASIA'S CRASH AFFECT US?

The 1929-like crash in Asia is causing misery on a biblical scale, threatening the solvency of banks, stockbrokers, margin calls undermining investors, while the crackpots running the central banks raise taxes and interest rates, wreaking havoc on the middle class and poor.

If all nations printed paper money at different rates, how could there possibly be stability?

Over the millennia, gold has been the traditional receptacle for Mass Fear, along with silver and perhaps platinum. On a "spike" there is no telling how high gold might go when so many try to buy at the same time, like a herd of elephants trying to get through a revolving door at the same time. FULL REPORT at:
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_98/dines010798.html

I agree with DA about the CFTC silver rumor. If silver weren't in short supply why did COMEX have to BORROW silver to complete December deliveries? Today's price action is very similar to the knockdown that came just after Christmas. LOW volume day in advance of the employment numbers coming out tomorrow and the shorters figured it was an ideal time to manipulate the price down with a rumor.

I have a Feb 98 280 gold put and it expires tomorrow. If the future is $280 or lower I have to cash in or convert to a future contract. It is worth about $150. now and I paid $400. Would you sell or try to hold for a future contract ( short ) ? Thanks

Yahoo has all markets except Australia and Korea which are closed. Never saw that before. Many down 2 & 3%

The elevator has gone down....
http://www.kitco.com/gold.graph.html

D.A. - you are a worthy adversary....but........


I WIN!!! YAHOO!!

Let us make the arrangements. It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. Now, how low can we go?? The BIG support has been 'violated'. Uh huh.

away...to collect WINKY-DINK
$27.94richer...h M!

The next wave - next week.
Dow tank.
Gold tank.
Silver tank.

And a new paradigm.

The next wave - next week.
Dow tank.
Gold tank.
Silver tank.

And a new paradigm.

Thanks for the input as of late, you add alot of credible to this forume, no speculation. I'm curiuos on your volume, bullion or jewelery grades, I would think the holiday rush is over and any increases would be that of flight to quality! The pre christmas rise was attributed to the season of giving by the media ( LGB and LGB_2 ,what is with the second couldn't he come up with a name of his own, and Karlito said goldbugs aren't giving. Huh! )

Do not need hard numbers, ball park % would suffice

Like most here I comend you on your efforts with this sight, very glad I stumble on to it. It was comforting to know that there is other that have the fever ( gold fever ) as I.

Oh....... also do you by chance employ Karlito, Lgb 1&2 to stir the pot and get our minds functioning. I do expect an answer on that, cause it would take away the fun!


Lurker777


It would seem to me if you exercised your option you would indeed be living the life on the edge.

IM Novice HO

I am a Prozac-taking, gun-toting, MRE storing, obsessive-compulsive
sort of guy but to date have not been institutionalized ( I can even
spell the word right, unlike you ) . Sorry to disappoint you.
For those of you who put some credibility in this prophesy, you can
order copies of a series of books called PREPARE FOR THE GREAT
TRIBULATION AND THE ERA OF PEACE by John Leary, published by
Queenship publishing, PO Box 42028 Santa Barbara, CA 93140
1-800-647-9882.

tgl - the info is from a couple of sources:

1.Milhouse 1/5/98 .....
...."During the first half of 1998 we get the "Big Bang" financial reforms which will
hopefully address items 2 and 3 above. However, the Japanese authorities have clearly
decided to inflate their way out of trouble, with the money supply recently increasing
at the incredible rate of 1% per day. In this way they hope to stimulate spending
inside Japan and cause asset prices to rise. Whether or not this tactic is successful in
generating economic growth, it will certainly dilute the value of the Yen. During
1998 we should therefore see the Yen move much lower against the Dollar. " e-mail sas@hk.gin.net

2.Money Supply Growth Stats ( checking the records for source )

Steady.

A hardy southern USA howdy to all !
Why is Nippon making such a fuss over falling Yen VS. US$ ? Or is it merely concern over the pace of devaluation ? Are they afraid of capital flight A LA Indonesia ? Rubin says he likes the strong US$ just fine & seems oblivious to asaian pricing competition on US shores ! Nippon claims that it is worried about US protectionest response to Nippon exports & pricing pressure, but surly these are two things that Nippon, Inc., could control directly from it's shore by volantary ( read imposed ) Export/price controls.
I'll bet the discussion at Treasury this week went something like...NIP/BOJ : "Our banking system must have relief from Strong US$." RR : "Japan must clean up it's systemic banking deficiencies ( read subsidies which make it impossible for US banks to compete for Asaian Tiger market share ) ,open it's markets & stimulate domestic demand". BOJ : "We will decimate your economy with cheap imports & withdraw our support from the US bond market !" RR: "Go ahead & make my day punk...well, do ya feel lucky punk ? AG, stand by to monetize Japan's $360 Billion !"
Cheap Yen helps their merchantile exports, but strong US$ makes their Asaian Tigers unable to repay ( read bankrupt ) US$ denominated debt & as Yen weakens, debts to Nippon banks from ASAIN TIGERS & Hong Kong ( payable in HK$ pegged to US$ )
Does any one have statistics re YEN vs other asain currencies ?
What are thoughts of group re above ?
Y.O.S.
Tar Baby

FWIW cover the shorts and go long abx for the bounce,or stand aside.
XAU 65 holding ABX 16 holding stops accordingly

If you live in Hong Kong, and the
wife needs a new bra, travel to Thailand
and buy ten for the price of one.

Watch the Hong Kong crash...Coming soon.

Hong Kong

THE CHICKENS
COME
HOME TO
ROOST

And bras are too
expensive.

HONG KONG - Southeast
Asia's collapsing
currencies and stock
markets combined
Wednesday to send Hong
Kong share prices
plunging, raising fears that
Hong Kong could become
the next domino to topple.

Few analysts here
expected any letup from
the huge selling spree as
long as the region's
currencies continued to
crumble. This renewed
doubts about whether Hong
Kong would long be able to
defend its currency's fixed
exchange rate to the U.S.
dollar, a peg that has
allowed the territory to
remain a relative bastion of
stability for investors.

The Hang Seng index
plummeted through the
psychologically important
10,000-point barrier,
ending the day at 9,538.61
for a loss of nearly 6
percent. The biggest losers
were property companies,
and the analysts said the
huge drop was due mainly
to concerted selling by big
U.S. brokerage houses.

The Hong Kong drop
followed similar declines in
Singapore and Taiwan. The
three had been seen as the
three cash-rich economies
that had successfully
resisted the regional
meltdown.

But as the manager of one
local hedge fund put it
Wednesday, ''The second
phase of the economic
crisis in Asia is now
unfolding.''

Unlike a few months ago,
when the Hong Kong index
dropped below 10,000,
analysts this time do not
expect a quick rebound.

They said the huge drop
Wednesday reflected a
fundamental weakening of
the market, amid concern
that the territory has
become far too expensive
compared with its
neighbors and the
realization that it is no
longer a safe haven from
the turmoil.

''I think there's a
realization that although we
were seen as a safe haven,
we are an integral part of
the region,'' said James
Osborn, director and head
of sales for Barings.

Compared with the stock
market collapses of late
last year, he said, ''I think
the situation this time is a
bit more severe because of
what's happened
elsewhere. We're in a bit of
a no-man's-land.''

Another analyst here said,
''Hong Kong is in the
middle of Asia, and Asia
has just gone through this
absolute nightmare.'' The
analyst added: ''No one is
immune from the virus.''

The region's collapsing
stock and currency
markets were cited for the
dramatic sell-off in Hong
Kong on Wednesday. As
capital flees the region, and
with few people willing to
buy in the volatile local
market, many are now
speculating that the fixed
exchange rate may be the
next casualty.

''As a lot of regional
currencies depreciate, it
makes the Hong Kong
dollar look very
expensive,'' said Patrick
Chia, a researcher at China
Everbright Securities Ltd.
''I think the
competitiveness of Hong
Kong is definitely going to
be affected.''

While the government has
pledged to maintain the
fixed exchange rate,
analysts said they saw few
alternatives to a continued
battering of the stock
market, soaring interest
rates and an eventual
recession that could see
property prices crashing,
companies going bust and
more people thrown out of
work. The government
drove the overnight
borrowing rate up to 300
percent in a move to ward
off speculators.

''I think it's a chain effect,''
a broker said. ''If they want
to hold the Hong Kong
dollar at the current level,
the stock market and the
property market will
continue to fall.''

And the manager of a Hong
Kong-based mutual fund
said: ''Nobody's buying
property, nobody's buying
stocks. People are selling
property and stocks.

''The cost of a bra in
Thailand is one-tenth the
cost of a bra in Hong
Kong,'' he continued.
''Hong Kong has just got to
adjust. It's probably the
most expensive property
market in the world, and
it's sitting in a region that
has become comparatively
cheaper. The probability is
there will have to be a
recession, unless an
adjustment in prices comes
very quickly.''

He predicted, ''We'll
probably have a
bankruptcy or two in the
next few weeks.''

Analysts were at a loss to
explain why the regional
collapse showed no sign of
abating this week, or to
predict with any certainty
how far down local stock
and currency values might
plunge before regaining
any sort of footing.

The main problem now,
they agreed, was that local
investors from Jakarta to
Bangkok to Kuala Lumpur
had lost confidence in their
own economies and were
driving down the value of
their own currencies by
frantically fleeing to U.S.
dollars to pay their dollar
debts, or just as a
protective hedge against
further devaluations.

That assessment appeared
to contradict the claims of
Prime Minister Mahathir
bin Mohamad of Malaysia,
among others, that outside
currency speculators are
responsible for the turmoil.

''As far as Southeast Asia
is concerned,'' said an
analyst in Singapore who
follows the region, ''I think
the problem right now is
not the confidence of
foreign investors in these
markets, but the local
investors themselves.
Local investors are looking
for safer havens. If you
were in Indonesian rupiah
or Malaysian ringgit,
maybe it's better to park
your funds in a currency
that's not going down so
quickly.''

He added, ''Most foreign
investors, if they wanted to
sell these markets, have
already done so.'' And, he
said, ''local conglomerates
and local companies are
now selling down their own
currencies. That makes it
much more difficult to
predict a bottom to this
thing.''

Simon Ogus, chief
economist for Asia at SBC
Warburg Dillon Read, said
the U.S. dollar in the region
now has become ''like a
bag of rice in a famine,''
with a value far beyond its
real worth. ''You want to
see who the biggest
speculators are,'' he said,
''it's the local companies.''

The circumstances of the
turmoil vary. In Thailand,
the main problem now
seems to be a recognition
that a bailout package by
the International Monetary
Fund will be inadequate to
address the country's
crisis. In Indonesia, the
problem is mainly the fear
that local companies and
banks will not be able to
pay their short-term
foreign debts, which have
ballooned dramatically with
the rupiah's plunge.

International Herald
Tribune, Jan. 8, 1998

this site before they appear on the main site ?

The U.S. dollar started dropping about September 1929 as the stock market
and economy reached their peak. The dollar drop was the result of the
U.S. trade accounts going into deficit. The dollar drop reached the gold
point and gold began to leave the U.S. The Smoot-Hawley tariff was the
policy response of the U.S. Congress and Hoover. Read The Day the Bubble
Burst. The gold drain was the major reason Livermore started shorting
the market. He made a killing in the crash and then got back in too soon and eventually went bust.

Wonder why? Are you sure you have John Leary spelled correctly? Sure its not Timothy Leary ??

The time has come, get in are miss the boat!

If gold closes higer , look out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hold onto the Feb 280 Gold put, of course! You say it's currently worth $150 ( what You paid for it is immaterial ) , so if it expires worthless, you've risked $150. On the other hand, now that Feb Gold has taken out $280, we could go to $275, $270, or lower...So what's your potential upside? $500, $1000, or more. I like that kind of risk-reward ratio!!!

Vronsky:

You might well consider making a change or perhaps a footnote to your xeroxed piece which we were treated to again @ 10:17 in which you rant that had asians had enough forsight to invest in gold instead of their home currencies they would now be 76% richer. The footnote that I suggest would point out that they would be even richer if they had invested in US dollars since gold has fallen in dollar terms during this same time.

All:

We read in these pages every day about the store of value aspect of precious metals. But where is our store of value in a world where silver can plummet $.30 in a matter of an hour? We can still buy just as much food and/or ________ ( fill in just about anything in the blank ) now as we could have an hour ago. In fact, the media claims this morning that producers got more for their money this month.

These suggestions brought to you with the idea that we tone down some of our rhetoric a bit and try for a little contact with reality every now and then.

Steady, I agree...things have gotten out of control. Economists do not take societal mood swings into account and now that the Grizzly Bear is back after 60 odd years they can only do what they know...push the knobs they are used to.
Inflating the hell out of things just won't work...people have had enough consumption to the point of regurgetation. Advertising mind-twisting and shoving unnecessary junk down our throats won't work either....the world's open concern about the environment is a shift towards prudence and frugality...if they print ( create ) more money people will just ferret it away because the perception is now that things are BAD...and because this so, they will be.
Political leaders and financial bureaucrats will be the last to admit this because they feel they have failed to make everything good for ever. Reality is it is time for humanity to take stock, where are we at?, where are we going? Something is afoot and everybody knows it but they just don't know what.
What the leaders should be doing is ensuring that the same thing doesn't happen the last time this mood overcome the world, world wars. Now should be the time for strengthening global relations...but it won't happen. When the populace gets anxious the leaders get anxious and the bickering and fighting will begin in earnest...then the gold will look good.
Gold is the bridge into the 21st century...paper can't withstand the weight of 5 billion healthy wealthy humans...in fact maybe this planet can't either?

Although I am what is known as a pre-millenialist ( nothing to do with Y2K ) and believe in a coming time of 'tribulation' ( an overused word in biblical circles ) , I have never toted a gun and never will. I am that strange breed of Christians that believe what Jesus said, re: 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you...love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who persecute you.' I have never understood those who advocated doing harm in the name of good. The Bible says "if they persecute you in this city, flee to the next". It seems that some think "if they persecute you in this city, shoot 'em and take over". I am not among them. Do not paint all Christians with the same broad brush. As for General, I am not in agreement with the specifics he quoted, but I do not think that a certain measure of general preparedness for disaster is uncalled-for, including gold. God, greens, and gold -- yes. Guns and gin--no. If 'they' come to take it away from me, my fate is not in 'their' hands, but God's, who is able to preserve me in time of trouble as he preserved Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the king's furnace.

Sorry I brought all this up again. The clunking sound you hear is me putting my soapbox back into the hall closet...

The world stock market ( Yahoo: International Markets ) report for today:

4 winners, 40 losers, overall average drop including winners and losers is 1%.

Not a steep drop, but a universal one; Of the few winners, most of them ( New Zealand, Australia ) may have been in bed ( due to the world being round. The sun only shines on one side at a time - remember that ) by the time things really started sliding.

Happy New Year to all.

Larry_A: Your 11:24 is right about the $ being the key. I bought my first stock in 1962 ( Collins Radio ) and this market is ready go down any day now.

PH in LA
I sure made good money on silvers last rise and want to catch the next one.
What else is a commodity but something to trade.
Buy low - sell high.
Do it again.

1430 Order of the Golden Fleece established
http://www.chivalricorders.org/chivalric/goldflee.htm

1806 Dutch in Cape Town, South Africa surrender to the British.

1870 John D. Rockefeller incorporated Standard Oil.

1901, First oil found at Spindletop, Beaumont, Texas.
The first Texas oil well, the "Lucas Gusher," began to flow with a
capacity of more than 70,000 barrels per day.
Land values rocketed- a single well sold for a 1,250,000 dollars, and a
million was refused for another.

1920 Silver reaches record $1.37 an ounce.

1920 League of Nations established as the Treaty of Versailles went into effect.

1946 the first General Assembly of the United Nations convened in London.

1984 U.S. and Vatican established full diplomatic relations for the first time in more than a century.

1991 US Congress begins debate on Persian Gulf crisis.

1996 Fuel oil spill by Russian tanker "Nakhodka" on Japanese coast.

1997 Renewal of the Challenge of Mubahila of 1988 - Declaration that
General Zia-ul-Haq's death in plane crash was due to Mubahila
http://www.nl-marketing.com/rashid/open97.htm

1997 Ramadan began ( was Jan. 10 - Feb. 11 in 1997, is Dec. 31 1997 - Jan 29 1998 in 1997/1998 ) .

League of Nations Day.

Geriants Day holiday ( Wales ) .

Day of Freyja holiday ( Norse ) .

James the Major and St. John day ( Armenian Orthodox ) .

Peculiar People Day.

Oh, and January is "Prevention to Cruelty to Your Money Month".

Looks like a few buy programs just cut in.
Bull rally for the arvo.
PREM shows the story.

I do take Prozac as a stimulant to battle fatigue and I do believe
in the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms but I do
consider myself a God-fearing and obedient Christian who would
never harm anyone unless in extremis with a firearm. I like
firearms for their collectibilty, and target shooting as well.
As a tangible asset, I believe they will be a store of value
much the same as the PMs if we ever did get down to the need
for barter ( ie in the event of a fiat currency collapse ) .
If one doesn't feel the need for any type of "life ( including
'eternal life' ) insurance" by preparing for end times ( whether
personal or a great Chastisement for all ) , why bother with the
"trivial stuff" like fire, home, flood, and life insurance?
Chances are you will never collect on any of these ( while you
are alive ) but you still buy them anyway. And you can't even
get much cash value for these if you want to exchange them for
something else ( you can with guns, gold, food, etc. ) . Okay,
I'm off my soap box too "clunk".

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/980108/news/stories/weather_2.html

Your comments on children wise. You would be a good neighbor to have.Regards: EH

January 8, 1998
German December jobless rate hits post-war record

BONN, Germany ( Reuters ) - German unemployment rose to a post-war record 4.522 million in December from 4.321 million the month before, without adjustment for seasonal factors, political sources said Thursday.

The unadjusted unemployment rate rose to 11.8 percent in December from 11.3 percent in November, said the sources, who had access to the official data.

The Federal Labor Office is due to release the official data Friday.

In west Germany, joblessness rose to 3.065 million from 2.941 million, and the rate rose to 9.9 percent from 9.5 percent. In east Germany, the total number of jobless rose to 1.457 million from 1.379 million, while the rate rose to 19.4 percent from 18.3 percent, the sources said.

General: I don't think you're crazy, I just prefer different religious authors. ;oD

How will all* the hoarded gold in Korea, Thialand and Indonesia at $280+ begin to cover even a small portion of their international obligations? Then are their citizen's so stupid, as not to see who caused the problems?

* ( I said all as an example, as 10% to 15% is probably closer to reality )

Are the international money mongers planing a gold revaluation, assuming they get it all?

I need help in indentifying a publicly-traded maker of body bags, preferably a "pure play"...not caskets, Formalin or incinerators. And would they be in position to make delivery in the New York area, oh let's say, tomorrow? Thank you in advance for your recommendations.

Does Comex have more than one session per day??

Y2KBug: My dictionary provides the following definitions of "persecute" and "murder".

Persecute: To harass in a manner designed to injure, grieve or afflict

Murder: The crime of unlawfully killing a person

If someone came to my city to persecute my family and I then moving elsewhere would be a distinct possibility. On the other hand, if someone came to my city to murder my family and I then I would hope to have the means to defend them in the absence of effective law enforcement. Nothing, absolutely NOTHING, would make me feel more of a failure than to be unable to defend my loved ones in such a situation. I feel that one of the responsibilities that God has given man is the protection of his family. By not fullfilling this role properly I would feel
that I failed them, myself and God.

Regarding guns in general ( pun pun ) , a gun is a tool, nothing more. Like any tool, it can be misused by a fool.

I tell you these things not to be critical of your own outlook but to try and help you understand why many of us have this tool in our toolkits. We believe we are responsible for protecting our families and there could be situations where effective law enforcement fails us.

fundaMETAList

January 8, 1998
U.S. wholesale price index at 11-year low

WASHINGTON ( Reuters ) - Wholesale prices fell unexpectedly in December and recorded the biggest drop in 11 years in 1997, the government said Thursday in a report hailed by economists as a sign of tame inflation but not the start of a cycle of tumbling prices reminiscent of the 1930s.

The Labor Department said its Producer Price Index fell 0.2 percent last month, despite forecasts for an unchanged reading, after an identical decline in the prior month.

For all of 1997, the index slid 1.2 percent, the first negative reading on an annual basis since 1991 and the steepest drop since a 2.3 percent fall in 1986.

"The PPI, in large part, continues to reflect ongoing softness in commodity prices in the U.S. and global economies," said Stephen Roach, chief economist at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter Discover & Co. "It also reflects the lingering effects of sluggishness in the broader global economy."

However, Roach dismissed talk of deflation, or broad declines in prices, as "hype."


"When it comes to commodity prices, we have deflation," Sohn said. However, he added that tight U.S. labor markets and an unemployment rate at a 24-year low of 4.6 percent were a recipe for upward pressure on labor costs. "Labor costs, which account for two-thirds of the Consumer Price Index, have been and will continue to accelerate."


Brian Catron, economist at the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics, also said talk of deflation was premature. "Deflation on an economy-wide scale really isn't evident yet," he said. "It's the commodities areas only that are really seeing the deflation, which I think is one of the points perhaps that Alan Greenspan was bringing out."
http://canoe2.canoe.ca/ReutersNews/ECONOMY.html

Bill Seidman on CNBC " We ( US ) have replaced gold as the safe place to be."

hmmmm

richard burke---

--50% corrections are probably one of the least
traded chartist formations...yet..they happen with
astounding regularity.....

as to the direction of silver..........i have a bad feeling
about actuarial stocks.......silver has been very low for a LONG
time....more than enough time for a 'play' to be made....
i feel this is more of a bre-x play........in reverse...

be very care-ful.....NOBODY KNOWS AS MUCH AS YOU think they do!!

use your own mind...

if i had a big profit from the recent run-up in si, i'd pocket some,
and invest the rest in options......spread-out in several markets..i.e...

......corn puts are cheap ( 210 strike ) ...
......silver calls ( 750-800 strike ) ...
......bond puts ( 112-116 strike ) ...
......dow puts ( 6500 strike ) ...

lots of volatile areas that are screaming for attention....any one
of them could be a 'one way ticket to paradise.' eddie money----


just as bre-x was played-out here for all to see.......from the
beginning, i told all they were a fraud......remember?

!;....tracking-the-peopleo-in-the-wilder-ness-----

D.A.: Interesting comment -- if this "secret" is not really a secret anymore, it means that the active suppression of gold and silver may no longer have the desired effect anymore. If the market operators, brokers, etc are catching on, they may no longer look for that rise in precious metals as the warning indicator to sell equities, and buy "flight to safety" assets. They will be looking for something else, or they may even bail out alltogether. As you say, the perceptions are changing. Utimately this will be good for precious metals.

With reagard to the silver business, it really does not matter whether there is a real investigation or not of a silver "corner". The market responded as if the rumor was true. I wonder -- could the rumor have been spread to push gold down one more time? If the "powers that be" must go to these lengths -- or to use the big "D" word, they must be getting desperate. Gold sales are now passe' ( pardon my French ) .

sharefin: Don't forget about sell high - buy low. Which I failed to do today. Darn. Did all the silver bulls leave the pit to use the bathroom at the same time?

fundatMETAList

Don't worry, gut em freeze em, put em on ice, for the brokers food lines.

To upstage some of the other commedians on CNBC

I love it when you talk that way...the meek attitude of late has left me somewhat wanting..."I'll have the heads of their maidens!" Draw thy tool. Away!

Not belittling your point -- we all have to do what we decide is right.

I could never kill someone, for any reason or justification, choosing instead to rely on an infallible God to protect and defend better than I ever could, armed or not. It is my responsibility to prepare as I see fit, seeking God's guildance, to care for those whose care He has entrusted to me. It is when dealing with a God-given and almost universally recognized principle ( prohibiting murder ) that I must rely totally on His infinite wisdom and power, and not my fallible intelligence and firearms, to defend my family. If it's 'us or them', I am content to let Him decide that.

BTW, though I disagree, I do not condemn you for your position. That is between you and God. And I could be very wrong. Let us both pray that the situation we are discussing never presents itself.

To upstage some of the other comedians on CNBC

Rumors were spread as a way to push down gold before options expiration tomorrow. It just hit silver harder. COMEX silver stocks fell net 12k last night, fundamentals still look good. I see retracement to 550 to 535 on short term.
More to follow

It does not make a dent in their debts. It does however wrestle what little they had left from them.

I am less clear on the subject of non-lethal self defense. A good sawed-off shotgun filled with rock salt might not be amiss... :o )

with 523 million shares traded to this time. Let's see what happen in the
last hour.

Seidman, the feeble old-numb skull, doesn't have the ability to run a lemonade stand...what an em'bareass'ment to us all. He doesn't have the sense to come in out of the piss or pour the rain out of his boots. Case closed.

1. There is certainly a time and a place to use them. For instance, Im certainly glad that so many Christians ( and others ) took up arms to stop Hitler in WW II. Usually, its better to flee, but there comes a time to stand your ground.

2. I would rather trust my fate with 12 people on a jury, rather than with an armed drug addict that breaks into my home at 3 a.m.

Regarding your response to Y2KBug, WELL SAID !!!!!
God does expect us to protect ourselves, our families, and
communities. Hopefully, one would never have to use a gun
for defensive purposes but it, along with other tools such
as your PM stash, may come in handy one day. By successfully
defending oneself not only have you stopped one assault but
possibly several if the perpetrator had been able to continue
assaulting others. Again the least amount of violence necessary
should be used, which is often a tough call.

ANYONE ELSE OUT THERE GET RIPPED OFF BY AURIC UNITED, A PRECIOUS
METALS FIRM WHO WENT BANKRUPT SEVERAL YEARS AGO AFTER EMBEZELLING
FUNDS FROM ITS CUSTOMERS. I LOST ABOUT $11K WHILE TRYING TO START
A DOLLAR COST AVERAGING ACCUMULATION PROGRAM. I'D BE SITTING PRETTY
IF I COULD HAVE KEPT THAT UP AT $300/MONTH.

January 8, 1998
GM retirees to continue fight to restore benefits

DETROIT ( Reuters ) - The 84,000 General Motors Corp. retirees who were stunned by a federal appeals court ruling that GM could break a promise to provide them with free lifetime health care benefits, plan to take their case to the U.S. Supreme Court, their lawyer said Thursday.

"There will be a petition to the Supreme Court," attorney Richard Fay said. "I can't imagine that the 84,000 people who have fought for this for 10 years will give up now."

"This gives companies carte blanche to break promises to their employees. That's the way I read the decision," Fay said. Sears, Roebuck & Co.retirees sued the retailer in October after the company informed them of plans to slash their free life insurance benefits over the next 10 years to $5,000 from up to $100,000. Sears had asked them to begin paying premiums to restore full coverage.

The Sears retirees have asked the U.S. District Court in Chicago to restore the benefits to promised levels and pay restitution for premiums paid.

GM had argued that it had told retirees that it maintained the right to change or terminate the health benefits plan, and five of the eight judges on the appeals panel agreed.

Judge Boyce Martin Jr., writing for the three dissenting judges, wrote that the decision could spell disaster for retiree health care plans because it "bestows upon General Motors the freedom to eliminate health care coverage completely."
http://canoe2.canoe.ca/ReutersNews/AUTOS-GM-RETIREES.html

go to http://www.e-gold.com I think you will find it interesting. I am a customer and staunch supporter of the concept. The ultimate payments system totally out of the current funny money apparatus.

I point you there because of your last post.

You will be proven incorrect regarding silver. NHAMOOTS

The Hong Kong Oracle has given another insightful and perhaps even alarming prediction of what currency turmoil to expect in Asia during 1998. It is definitely NOT a pretty picture. Milhouse gives his considered opinion on most major currencies and GOLD.

Gold will be the major beneficiary of the increasing currency
volatility wrought by EMU and the drive to inflate which is
already underway in almost every country. The reason it will
benefit is because it is the only form of money which exists
outside the financial system. As such, it is the only truly effective hedge against inflation. Any method of hedging against inflation which exists within the financial system involves a payment risk. Also, even if your non-gold hedge is 100% effective, you simply end up with a larger quantity of paper.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/milhouse010598.html

By the hair of our chinny chin chin today!

Tally Ho

Bill Siedman, a member of the secret cartel, hmmmmm.

As Farfel says, change the perception. I want each and every Goldbug on Kitco to find some other investment chat room and give the real details of the world financial markets. At least once every other day you must promote gold to a forum of equity investors. Please report back so that I can give out gold stars to this new congregation of Goldbuggery. You are the ambassadors.

Steve

nothing humble about my opinion on this subject

Been gone for awhile, but tried to keep up with the flow here. I have been asked to discuss my feelings about the silver market for the near to medium future from a fundamentals perspective, no disrespect to you chart watchers out there.

We all have been following the market and are aware that silver spiked on the 24th to a nine-year high. This has presumably been driven by the dramatic drawdown in the COMEX warehouses since late June. The million dollar question is: Where have those physicals gone? Some possibilities are:
1. Actual demand from consumers, i.e. photographic film manufacturers, electronics, jewelry etc.
2. taken off exchange by speculators trying to create a squeeze in the market, much like was done a few years ago with out of the money options being exercised.
3. Exported to Asia, specifically, India.
I believe it is a combination of the three along with a reduction in the amount of finished silver coming on the market.

Secondary Production.
The key to Silvers price direction over the medium term is secondary production, if demand stays constant or mildly increasing. The market has slowly worked its way through the mountain of silver that was created during the last bull market ( 1979-1982 ) . I estimate upwards of 750 million ounces of secondary production silver came on the market as a result of increased prices. Most of this silver was bought by investors back then, who unloaded it into the market from 1985 onward. Most of this silver was gone by 1993.

current situation:

I have spoken with two medium sized refineries over the last week, and their volume of silver scrap ( coins, sterling, flake etc. ) has increased markedly in the last 3 weeks. Large coin wholesalers spoke with have said that there has been an a lot of action of silver coin flowing into their businesses, with little being sold out. They are instead moving it to the refineries. This silver is the built up supply at smaller dealers who purchase small quantities on a near daily basis. They are all unloading now. ( The coin market has not been overly profitable for a few years, except for upper end sales, and they are happy to get some cash into the business ) There has been little inflow into the small dealers from retail customers.
When this silver is finished at the refineries, most of it will hit the COMEX. My estimate is 10-12 million ounces. Once it is gone, there will not be much more volume to follow until price gets over $7.50 when dealers will go through their inventory and pull other coins out to sell for silver.

I disagree with statement in WSJ today that India will buy no Silver. India is now the #1 supplier of inexpensive silver jewelry in the world. This export amounts to millions of ounces a year. There has been an explosion of silver jewelry stores in the U.S., just check out the kiosks at any mall. Its popularity will continue to increase, especially with the Gen-Xers.

There are ( fill in the blank ) :

_________ dead Algerians who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Cambodians who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Bosnians who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Kurds who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Ukranians who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Nanking'ians who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

_________ dead Jews who'd be alive if they'd had guns for self-defense. They couldn't run fast enough.

Let me assure you, I would have ZERO regrets about shooting any criminal killer who threatened my family, my neighbors or my country's life.

Currently, we are all being herded into paper currency concentration camps, soon to be paper-currency fueled crematoria.

Tell them to take the plungers off their faces ( a la Jim Carrey in Pet Detective ) and hurry over to Broad and Wall. Something bad is happening!

Billy the Buffoon...can't keep a secret. The only cartel he's in is the beanie baby buffooners.

paper-boy, paper-boy, what'cha gonna do? what'cha gonna do when they
...........................COME FOR YOU?

the fibrillation continues un-abated-----waiting on de-fibrillator...

+8 and counting....as sue-'ski-slope'-herra says...'trading is choppy!'

choppy hell......it's called big-time-selling.......

the fuse is burning on the BOND-BOMB.........

if the dow comes back today.......look-out friday and/or monday...

grains are going down a lot more too.......wooooo woooooooo

!;dotssmimmfat

How many do you have turning to the right?

Gold is utilized for a lot of other purposes, maybe a loss leader?

January 7, 1998
Home on the range is getting scary

HORSEFLY, B.C. ( CP ) - It's small and isolated - smack in the middle of Marlboro country where men still ride herd on vast ranches.

Now many of the 400 terrified townsfolk of this Interior Plateau community say it's becoming increasingly lawless. Fed up with what they see as an unchecked wave of vandalism, theft, property damage - even random gunfire - the town is apparently living in constant fear and demanding a full-time Mountie.

"People are scared," Dan Begg said Wednesday. "They're scared of being robbed and terrorized or vandalized," said the 20-year resident who's been designated the town's spokesman.

"Older people are scared and afraid to walk outside at night."

http://www.canoe.ca/NationalTicker/CANOE-wire.Lawless-Town.html

Here's what the citizens of Horsefly, B.C. need to do:

1 ) Buy gold.
2 ) Melt gold into bullets, as it is cheaper than lead and environmentally friendly ( the ducks & geese can eat the shot ) .
3 ) Form a posse.
4 ) Find the b*stards.
5 ) Shoot them.
6 ) Hang corpses on fence leading into town with sign that says "Thugs & criminals welcome, plenty of fence space remaining."

Or, follow the Algerian/"Beaucolic Canadian, Can't We All Just Get Along" plan:

1 ) Watch your wives, children and family be raped, throats slit, and homes burned.

January 8, 1998
Germany set to allow bugging of homes in fight against crime

BONN ( AP )  In an effort to fight organized crime, Germany is set to allow electronic surveillance of people's homes for the first time since the Nazi era.

The agreement, reached late Wednesday by Chancellor Helmut Kohl's ruling coalition and the opposition Social Democrats, caps years of debate over whether rising crime justified amending the German constitution's ban on state snooping in private residences.

The accord clears the way for the law's passage, expected Jan. 16. The proposal is part of a package to fight organized crime. Due to the legacy of human rights violations under the Nazi police state, electronic eavesdropping was the most controversial part.

A constitutional change requires a two-thirds majority in parliament, so Kohl sought support from the Social Democrats.

The compromise legislation, approved after seven hours of debate, makes
priests, defence lawyers and legislators bug-proof. For all others, police will need approval from a judge and will only be allowed to eavesdrop while investigating certain serious crimes.

Conversations with doctors, tax advisers and journalists may be bugged, but a court must then decide afterward whether the results can be used. The same goes for close relatives of a suspect.

Kohl's justice minister resigned in 1995 over the plan, calling it an invasion of privacy. The leftist Greens party called the bill "a black day for basic rights."

But Interior Minister Manfred Kanther defended the compromise bill as a "usable, sensible solution."

The Social Democrats' negotiator, Otto Schily, said he was convinced the compromise better protected a witness's right to refuse to give evidence.

But Greens legal expert Volker Beck said it went too far in violating the sanctity of the home, which is guaranteed in Germany's postwar constitution. "Once again a basic right is being trampled on until it's unrecognizable," he said.

The head of the German Journalists' Association said the measure would hurt reporters. "No source will now be sure that he can talk confidentially at the journalists' workplace or private home," he said.

The police, however, argued that the law should be even stronger. Herman Lutz, chairman of the police union, said mobsters could take advantage of the exceptions to avoid electronic eavesdropping.

It trades on the Nasdaq as an ADR under the symbol LIHRY and sells for about US $20. One ADR equals 20 Lihir common. Vengold, VENGF ( Nasdaq ) and VEN ( toronto ) presently owns over 10% of Lihir Gold. Vengolds site gives a good bit of info on Lihir, try http://www.vengold.com

Get that bastard Camdesuss!

At the point of talk, all is possible. To place your gun onto a fellow human, and pull the trigger, is not done every day. Yes, the thought is front and centre, while in a discussion. No, the people with the mouth, always wait for others to do the deed. Once, done, they point the finger, and discuss how tragic such an event was.

No, humans are all noise, and no action. The situation in Germany proves such, everyone wants rights, no one will fight, they demand that others do the dirty work for them. 10's of Millions died, in the second world war, for nothing.

Here we go again. "Lest We Forget" eh!

JTF:

I don't think that the silver rumors today had anything to do with the Feds trying to knock down the price of gold. My little sparrows have relayed to me that my speculation as to the source of the rumors may well be accurate. The same gentlemen that have been attacking the market in the wee hours of the globex session are apparently behind the rumors. If we see a class action suit ( which I really doubt ) we will know for sure.

Three years ago when Phibro exercised about 30,000,000 ounces of out of the money silver calls on expiration, the CFTC was called in to 'investigate'. The story goes that Phibro claimed that this was the most efficient way for them to purchase such a large position. Apparently the CFTC disagreed and forced them to liquidate the position. Thus we had the complete reversal of the rally.

This time around it may again be Phibro ( Solomon Bros ( warren buffet crowd ) ) on the buy side. This time around they are not messing around in the Comex. Apparently their experience with these 'free' markets have put them off a bit. They are buying physical silver through Europe and stashing it away. By keeping the bid a few cents higher in Europe they cause an arbitrage operation to ensue whereby silver stocks on the Comex are flown out across the pond.

It will be quite irksome to the Comex to find that all their inventories have disappeared. It would make their market kind of irrelavent. It may well be true that pressure will be brought to bare upon those hoarding the metal. I don't think that it will matter. Is the long arm of the CFTC really going to reach into some unknown vault in Switzerland or wherever and pry loose large quantities of silver and return it to its 'rightful' place? Where is it written that people are not allowed to move some portion of their wealth into a physical asset such as silver?

Having sat up nights immersed in the palladium squeeze, my perceptions about this market are surely colored. But I can not escape the feeling that I am watching the same movie with a different acting crew. I read all the articles in the WSJ about how demand would dry up over 160 / ounce and that this was just another speculative bubble that would run its course. The fair price for palladium was supposed to be around 125 / ounce. Here we are 7 months after the 'squeeze' in the midst of rampant 'deflation' with a surging dollar, declining Yen, and guess what, palladium is still selling around $210 / ounce.

The silver market ultimately comes down to the realities of the fundamentals. If it is true that supplies are dwindling and there is an ongoing deficit then the price is going higher. If it is false then the price is going lower. Our bets are still on the former.

Drove to Sydney ta mail the check to the sawmill in Maine so they can begin cutting out the posts+beams+boards etc etc. for the new house --kinda puts some finality on the situation here!....Camdesuss and kiln dried wood SUK!...'Sawmill guy' said the 8x10x16's etc etc. were heavy ( no sh!t Sherlock ) later dudes...oh yeah--go gold ...and the Lakers SUK too!

Said today that Camdesuss and the IMF SUK..~~~~~~~

EB:

Let me be the first ( only? ) one to congratulate you on your victory. I hope that your conscience can live with the fact that I have been forced to lay off many fine men who were constructing the wink museum. Our childrens, children will be deprived of the joy of seeing a wink in all its golden glory. Guess I'll have to ditch the donor's plaque too. Alas my new career as curator will have to be put on hold. It's back to the wars for me.

Very insightful view on the current situation. The firm you mentioned silver poistion was not liquidated by the request of the CFTC but by the request of management because the market went down rather than up.

So much for 'squeezes'. Markets do what they do because they are what they are. The futures open interest creates liquidity and makes such a theoretical exercise difficult.

To "squeeze' silver would require $2-3 billion of real cash and the boys with that cash wouldn't do anything against the advice of counsel or their compliance officer. So much for dark syndicates and investigations.

The rotation of paper from strong hands to weak hands continued today as the Dow lost over 95 points! The mutual fund managers continue to throw the money of the poor at the market while the rich converted their soon to be worthless paper. The bear is gaining much strength and the spin doctors are beginning to panic. The Mutual Fund Game is about to end as funds, many highly leveraged, are having problems stemming the flow of some serious redemptions. Once the rules of the game are made public the financial gurus, known as fund managers, will be held responsible for their poor advice. The poor will be lined up outside of mutual fund offices hoping to get dimes for their dollars! Then and only then will you see a sustainable rally in gold. One other exception and that would be a couple of serious gold loan defaults! Have a great day!

Good Day ( rhetorical salute )

Privacy: 1. You all might find this interesting ( or helpful ) :
The Anonymizer.com, www.anonymizer.com, download a program that allows you to surf the net without revealing any personal information ( free trial access )

2. The Privacy Form: www.vortex.com/privacy/html
Subscribe to the Privacy Forum Digest, an online journal on general topics of personal and collective privacy. Search privacy issues by keyword.

3. Bacard's privacy page
www.well.com/user/abacard/privacy.html

This site provides several tools to get private e-mail, private
compturer files, private cybercash, private telephone calls, and more. It also features a FAQ section.

Computer Privacy Handbook US $24.95/C$31.95 from Peachpit Press,800-283-9444

Inflation: If you live beyond the subsistence level, inflation hits
you much harder than the mythic 3%. You spend most of your money on automobiles, college education, entertainment, travel and other such
"luxuries". The prices of THESE items have MORE than doubled in the
last seven years.

Keep the flame burning.

Seems like gold and silver are victums of a drive by shooting today, but managed to stagger off to the side so as to avoid any more stay bullets. OUCH!!! DOW down 96 pts. Down each day this week so far. Wonder what Friday will bring. Hope ANOTHER has some interesting puzzles to take my ever lovin mind off of the present situation in the PM's. I'm certainly glad my timeline is three to five years. They just CAN'T keep doing this that long can they??? Random thoughts and acts of blindness and all ....

D.A.: I appreciate your comments on the silver situation. It makes alot of sense to corner the silver market as you describe. Just choose a market where you will not be forced to sell your position. I would guess that this could work with just about any internationally traded commodity or precious metal. Must drive any regulated market like Comex nuts.

We could have a repeat of the Hunt brothers corner, but this time it might be different if the exchange doesn't do anything. As I recall, members of the exchange finally closed down the silver market, and wiped the Hunts out.

re: I would rather trust my fate with 12 people on a jury, rather than with an armed drug addict that breaks into my home at 3 a.m.

I would too! Just look what 12 informed jurors did for OJ!

Spud master: evidently you have a rather low opinion of the ability of an almighty being to do what is right. "Our God, whom we serve is able to deliver us...and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods..." Daniel 3:17-18 This is the faith I hope to have, if such a situation presents itself. I will not take a human life, period. Again, as I stated previously, I am less clear on various levels of non-deadly self-defense measures. I might be persuaded to injure, that I might prevent more harm, but I will not kill. Such are my convictions, and I do not demand that you agree with them. OTOH, I would rather not be ridiculed for situations in which only the Almighty can know. Not a single Ukranian, Albanian, Kurd, or Jew fell without God's intimate and complete knowledge of all facets of their

All: Really, folks, I was hoping to generate more comment on the Y2K-related posts I sent out earlier this morning, not religious debate or the relative merits of gun ownership/proficiency. Sorry for the off-topic stuff.

yr. bond at 5.74%. Volume on NYSE 655 million shares.; 132 million shares traded in last hour. My compuer was down otherwise would have posted 20 minutes ago.

I think it's quite a stretch to compare him with the rest of the cnbc comedians. After all, he did fix the S&L fiasco & his forecasting record is very impressive. For 5 yrs in a row he has been bang on with the mkts & interest rates. Ominously for GBs, he has been bearish on au & remains so. Oh well! the man is'nt omniscient ( only Greenspan is ) . Maybe this year he'll be wrong.

ALL: All major world stock markets in the red except New Zealand - It's unreal. And the Far-East blood-bath begins in two hours:
http://quote.yahoo.com/m2?u

Would greatly appreciate hearing from any Thai, Malay, Indonesian, Phillipino, Korean or Nipponese as to what is going on locally! American lap-dog press is doing a poor job.

@6Pak: Grrrr. At the continued risk of posting religious topics, I assure you that I have complete confidence in God to look out for us. My understanding of the Bible is that He'd have no problem with me defending the innocent against the evil. I will not flench from fighting evil men, whatever and wherever they may be. Be they obvious monsters with jack-boots and guns, or smiling Wall Streeters in three-piece suits, or confidence men with an Arkansas accent.

I will not sit by and let what has happened in Algeria, Bosnia, Cambodia happen here.

JTF:

In theory I agree with you that one could squeeze just about any market given sufficient cash. However, the reason it is not done, is that in order to make a profit on a squeeze one must eventually have an exit strategy. The commodities markets that have gone ballistic in the last several years have all had the same low inventory, supply/demand deficit characteristics. The squeeze is not so much a squeeze as it is a play against the consumer class. These plays are only successful because the consumers are unwilling to hold or build inventories during times of plentiful supply. When for whatever reason, global inventories decline, they are in no position to weather the storm. The speculative crowd tends to do more research in these areas than the commercial consuming crowd. When the specs see a market where the consumers are understocked and exchange stockpiles are dwindling, they run in and buy as much of the remaining stocks as is possible. The ongoing deficit in the market forces the consumers to pay up for the stocks that have been bought by the specs. The most bizarre feature of these markets has been that the pre-squeeze prices have been so low, in complete defiance of the apparent fundamentals. Time and again the shortages are well reported and well documented way before anything happens to the prices. I get the feeling that without speculators, the prices of these commodities would be a flatline up until the point when there was absolutely nothing left.

Here are the latest Comex inventory figures released after trading today:

Gold: Fell 1621 troy ounces to 479,135

Silver: Fell 23,001 troy ounces to 110,581,971 Just above a 13 year low

Quite a day in the metals today and indications are quite strong that we are living the very last days of a huge transition phase that will give them a new direction.

Today's dip in Silver will look as a minor dip once we'll look back from higher prices coming back very soon because the missing inventory will not show up.

It may have already posted but any idea why ABX got whacked today?

Here are the latest Comex inventory figures released after trading today:

Gold: Fell 1621 troy ounces to 479,135

Silver: Fell 23,001 troy ounces to 110,581,971 Just above a 13 year low

Quite a day in the metals today and indications are quite strong that we are living the very last days of a huge transition phase that will give them a new direction.

Today's dip in Silver will look very minor once we'll look back from higher prices coming back very soon because the missing inventory will not show up and in fact will continue to slowly erode.

There is probably no one reason. Spot gold hit new low sice 1979 at 278, ABX had a nice rally before year end when gold bounced up and Peter Munk announced buy back of shares. ABX will test recent lows and who knows from there. ABX break up at current prices only around 10 per share so might see that yet overthe next few months. I wonder if ABX has bought any of their shares back yet? I'd wager not. and they probably won't IMO.

He speaks the status quo. Question is what will topple the status quo?

He speaks the status quo. Question is what will topple the status quo?

Bring me Camdesuss. The Court Room awaits. Take that fancy fork out of his mouth. Put him in the van for the trip. Bologna sandwiches are served in the prison mess tonight. And it's the good kind, only three weeks old.

Gold and the truth.

I read a lot of comment to the effect there is some gigantic worldwide conspiricy to drive down the price of gold and if only the conspirators would stop the price of gold would go back up to it's rightful level. I disagree. Gold has been an accurate predicter of the inflation level for many many years. Right now gold is predicting DEFLATION. I can't see gold making a comeback until inflation makes a comeback. That may well happen but the current course has been set and it must run it's course before that can happen. I still say gold will hit 140 before it goes the other way.

well, what can say its my first time folks.

"Grrr." Is a statement, that can be taken in different ways eh!

No, I will not get into a discussion about GOD, those that worship GOD are always right. If there is doubt, ask a believer, and you will be put right. Hell, Millions upon Millions, have been killed by the true believers eh!

North American First Nations People, are proof of that fact. No, Mr. Spud Master, you do not have to look beyond North America, for proof of GOD'S constructive works, put forth by the true believers, in their fight against evil. Interesting, this constructive work has been done always with an eye for an economic advantage. Maybe GOD is MONEY EH!

To refer: I couldn't tell you volume changes really but I do notice an increase in demand in investor bars, especially before the holidays. Our suppliers who are also the manufacturers aren't delivering for another two weeks.

No I don't emply Karlito or LGB to stir the pot. Au contraire ; they pay Kitco for the privelidge. I was doing really well with this guy named hepcat, but I had to raise his premiums and so I think he took his business elsewhere.

To 223: We could have used the power failures LAST week. Better late than never. But don't worry about our discussion group - it's being hosted in sunny Boca Raton Florida , maybe even near a beach.

Ted: WHAT's the problem!

Other news: - Rhodium up : $400-440 NTARC and design changes on the way...

ABX looks like a great buy to me. Why are you down on the stock. I've been buying withe both hands since it went below 18 the first time!

Yes, you are correct IMHO, it is not a conspiracy, it is business as usual. And in doing so, which is a repeat of historical past cycles, they have most likely driven us into a deflationary period which many times ends in a hyperinflationary environment. They know this and are or have already started preparing for that next cycle.

HighRise

Thanks,
HighRise

Was the Soros trip to Korea a "brief passing in time" and a partial attempt to cover gold short position by "buying" Korean gold and a knock down price..........maybe it ( GOLD ) all helps!

"The price of gold made an 18 year record low on January 6th, despite
the fact that annual production from mines and scrap recovery yield
about 3,000 tonnes while consumption demand for jewellery etc. comes to
about 3,500 tonnes. In other words, there is a supply shortage which
should be driving the price up, and the amount likely to be collected
from Koreans ( which will probably diminish from now on ) will not be
sufficient to make up the shortfall. This is also not taking into
account shortages outstanding from gold loans and short selling
deficits, which could be as much as 8000 tonnes".

Source: http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~netking/finan.htm

Aye, it makes you wonder!
Haggis

Does anyone have the latest Money Supply figures? Arf, Buddy

Japan down below 15k
Our SPI breaking support and heading down.
My swing chart is one day from issueing a sell signal.
Volatility to rise excessively.
Watch out below.

I am sure some one made a bundle on shorting or putting Gold prior to each of the downturns. I know that, if I were them, I certainly would have taken advantage of the move.

Who was it that posted several months ago that the Fed and other CB's generate much of their income from plays like this?

Following on from the earlier posting -

( Soros and Korean Gold..............trying to cover the shorts? ) ....

The question is now raised - Are the ( Western ) Central Banks and their proxies ( eg Soros ) actively persuing a program of "foreign" currency attacks in order to cover their own short positions in the GOLD futures/derivatives market, by acquiring the gold resources/reserves of these countries at "knock down" gold prices.

A further example of this may be the current attack on Indonesia, given that "they fail to follow IMF policy", when infact they have substantial GOLD resources and reserves.

I wonder. Comments please.

Aye, Haggis

To the contrary, I hold a quite significant, for me, position in ABX - I am actually mulling buying more here as a short term, hopefully, in & out w/profits. Golden Boy, I agree w/u - thanks for the inputs!

You are about to be vindicated BIG TIME!!! Tomorrow ( Friday 1/9/98 ) the stock market will drop like a rock and take out 7600; but Monday we will see a mind-numbing collapse to under 7000 !!! The Great OZ has spoken.

The last three appearances he has made on CNBC, that I've seen, he has not answered questions, has not demonstrated ingenuity and has exuded an aloof aire of hard-headedness. He's an old banker lost in a hyper-changing world in which he is ill-equipped to contribute. I freely admit to my acrid, prejudicial attitude against bankers...especially investment bankers. I loathe their arrogance and glamourized self-perception that they have of their "role". They are wealthy pushers of a very deadly drug...borrowed money which they score from the government, and "hook" their way into their user's business and life. Their lofty position in society belies the fact that they are normally lazy, passive egotists that are much more effective on the course at Thunderbird in Rancho Mirage than they are telling owners of factories in Middletown how to run their business. But, they don't know the difference. He needs to stay at his place in the desert.

South Korea
Seoul Composite
^KS11
7:36PM
411.87
-12.09
-2.85

Crystal Ball: Monday is important, that's because it's a full-moon -- six weeks before a solar eclipse. The last time we had a 6-week topping patten at the full-moon, stocks crashed in Asia. With the 6-week top now complete on the S&P 500 index, the crash is ready to progress. A tremendous collapse to somewhere between 2000 and 5000 on the DJIA will probably take place during January.

The New Year rally has already failed. A break in Hong Kong to below 9000 will be another important confirmation. Also, if Tokyo breaks below 14,000 that will be another nail in the coffin of the bull. I believe they will all take place soon.

For those interested:

"South East Asian Oil, Gas, Coal and Mineral deposits"
by Professor C S Hutchison
Oxford Science Publication
ISBN 0 19 854295 X

I will source out other publications concerning gold mineralisation in Korea, China and Japan.

From my earlier postings, I conclude that GOLD is not the problem - BUT THE LACK OF IT IS! The Central Banks/Fund Managers may have got themselves in a "wee" bit" of a problem............what is their way out?!

So "the problem" as far as the Central Banks/Fund Managers is concerned is - How to keep the US Dollar up, at the same time acquire gold resources/reserves to cover their short positions using excess US Dollars.

Aye, Haggis

Crystal Ball: Monday is important, that's because it's a full-moon -- six weeks before a solar eclipse. The last time we had a 6-week topping patten at the full-moon, stocks crashed in Asia. With the 6-week top now complete on the S&P 500 index, the crash is ready to progress. A tremendous collapse to somewhere between 2000 and 5000 on the DJIA will probably take place during January.

The New Year rally has already failed. A break in Hong Kong to below 9000 will be another important confirmation. Also, if Tokyo breaks below 14,000 that will be another nail in the coffin of the bull. I believe they will all take place soon.

I read they collected 10 tons. Since the speculator short position is
at least 2200 tons, they failed. +++++++++++++++++

Before I ship the bodies, where is situ?

With Gold hovering just above $280, I'm happy to say I've pumped more money into ABX ( 500 more shrs ) and an equal amount of $ into maple leafs.
My safe box will be heavier than ever.

Hey, the only good thing about the low gold price is the ability to easily accumulate what you want!!!

Cause when gold takes off, at least I won't be left in the dust.

BTW trading volume in ABX was heavy today, the turnaround in gold is just around the corner...

And as Farfel says, I can just smell that short squeeze...

Already --
JapanNikkei 225^N225 7:39PM 14889.41 -129.77 -0.86%
South Korea Seoul Composite ^KS11 7:38PM 411.19 -12.77 -3.01%

It's the IMF.

Whoa 'der. Toxic and carcinogenic? At $400 per ounce? Maybe I don't need any rhodium. But in the table of uses they use it in jewelry? Looking up Palladium they list it as toxic and carcinogenic but they use it in dental devices? A good site to know about: http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/A-C/chem/web-elements/nofr-biol/Rh.html

I have no training in Latin or its use...don't know what "status quo" means...and don't know if I want it toppled or not. Sorry that I offended your sensibilities.

Really slow tonite on the web, everywhere. You wouldn't think a measly 100 pt drop in DJIA would cause so much activity.

Much discussion on the forum ( and elsewhere ) today of rumors that the pullback in silver is related to market manipulation. I say OF COURSE, the silver market is being manipulated. Even the rumors of manipulation are perhaps in themselves, just that.

WE WANT it to be manipulated!!

The Hunt Bro's tried their market corner, when there was about 5 times as much silver in world commercial stockpiles as now, and the USG had a billion oz or so in strategic reserve.
TODAY, a well-financed bunch really could buy the whole world 200-300 million ounce stockpile, kit and kaboodle for only US$1.5 billion or so - a fly spec on the daily financial scene. I SAY, LET THEM DO IT!

You could see this pullback coming a mile off. Commercial traders way short, speculators way long - just a matter of time before the shakeout.

On the technical side, the March Ag futures chart looks to me like a typical a-b-c zigzag retracement from the high back to the uptrend from the summer low. Elliott Wavers would say the end of wave 2 ( of 5 ) , I think. Pan American Silver chart looks similar.

Not to worry; silver is likely to go to about $7 on the next wave up, and to AT LEAST $10 ( even if gold goes nowhere ) sooner or later, based on the gold/silver ratio trend. ( and maybe a LOT more than that! )

I think the END GAME in SILVER will be visible within 6 months or so, when the REAL market manipulation and a market corner begins to form. Hang in there; it should be very exciting these next months and years, fellow goldmeisters and silvermeisters!

Maybe you were refering to me instead of Crunch. I am down on ABX because they are way over valued relative to other gold mining companies and because they are trading way over book value which nobody really knows what it really is. What happens if gold keeps dropping which it sure looks like it going to especially after today again breaking below the previous lows for both spot and Feb'98? I know ABX is not Rhe Gold but looked what happened there? It looked good at 10 cents and they went bankrupt. Now ABX is far from that but who can say how close they might be to 10 dollars and if you're in at 21 Canadian, what then. I's agree with crunch, if you feel like taking a chance, but have stops in place just in case. Their are other companies around that are trading for cash value with their properties thrown in as bonus. 2 names in Canada, Peruvian gold and Corsair exploration. Check them out if you're interested.

"status quo" = the existing state ( of affairs )
Get Camdessus!!

28 countries including Canada are signing a trade agreement with the Multinationals in Paris, May 98. This information was leaked on the internet in Guatemala. This agreement gives the Multinationals complete
control of every Scocio-Economic affair in each country. If anyone has
has any knowledge on this subject, please post any info. In the meantime
I'll keep digging, a grave of 6 feet is acceptable in Canada . By God,
Gold is so cheap one can be buried as a Pharo for future prosperity. These days one could easily perish from a falling gold brick, rather
than by lightning. Gold is not moving, except down for awhile yet. Gold
575 Spring 2001. A 100% return in 3 years, playing the Bear rallies inbetween should top 200% not bad if you're losing the farm. More Later!

The Ghost In The Machine
Increases In The Statutory "Limits" To
U.S. Federal Debt

From 1940 To Date

------------------------------------------------------------------------

DATE

STATUS

DEBT CEILING
June 25, 1940Permanent$US 49,000,000,000February 19, 1941Permanent$US
65,000,000,000U.S. enters World War II after Pearl Harbour - December 7,
1941.March 28, 1942Permanent$US 125,000,000,000April 11, 1943Permanent
$US 210,000,000,000June 9, 1944Permanent$US 260,000,000,000U.S. Dollar
becomes the World's Reserve Currency - at Bretton Woods.April 3, 1945
Permanent$US 300,000,000,000End of World War II - September 1, 1945 in
Tokyo BayJune 26, 1946Decrease$US 275,000,000,000"Marshall Plan" -
Berlin Air Lift - start of "Cold War"August 28, 1954"Temporary"$US
281,000,000,000June 30, 1955"Extension"$US 281,000,000,000July 9, 1956
"Temp. Decrease"$US 275,000,000,000February 26, 1958"Temporary"$US
280,000,000,000September 2, 1958"Temporary"$US 288,000,000,000June 30,
1959"Temporary"$US 295,000,000,000June 30, 1960"Temp. Decrease"$US
293,000,000,000June 30, 1961"Temporary"$US 298,000,000,000U.S. Debt back
to ceiling mandated at the end of World War II.
Now you know why the 1950s were the "Golden Decade".July 1, 1962
"Temporary"$US 308,000,000,000March 31, 1963"Temp. Decrease"$US
305,000,000,000June 25, 1963"Temp. Decrease"$US 300,000,000,000June 30,
1963"Temporary"$US 307,000,000,000August 31, 1963"Temporary"$US
309,000,000,000Kennedy Assassination - The End Of "Innocence".November
26, 1963"Temporary"$US 315,000,000,000June 29, 1964"Temporary"$US
324,000,000,000June 24, 1965"Temporary"$US 328,000,000,000June 24, 1966
"Temporary"$US 330,000,000,000March 2, 1967"Temporary"$US
336,000,000,000June 30, 1967"Temporary"$US 358,000,000,000July 1, 1968
"Temporary"$US 365,000,000,0001969 - Apollo 11 - Woodstock - The LAST
Balanced BudgetApril 7, 1969"Temporary"$US 377,000,000,000June 30, 1970
"Temporary"$US 395,000,000,000
On June 30, 1970, the PERMANENT debt ceiling was raised to $US 380
Billion. On March 17, 1971, it was raised to $US 400 Billion. The
"PERMANENT" ceiling didn't move for 11 years. The "TEMPORARY" one did -
as you will see as we continue.
March 17, 1971"Temporary"$US 430,000,000,000
The "Fiat Currency" era begins on August 15, 1971 when Nixon closes the
"Gold Window". For the first time since the redemption of the
"Greenbacks" in 1879 - the U.S. Dollar has NO Gold backing. For the
first time since 700 BC - NO currency has any connection to Gold.
March 15, 1972"Temporary"$US 450,000,000,000October 27, 1972"Temporary"
$US 465,000,000,000June 30, 1974"Temporary"$US 495,000,000,000February
19, 1975"Temporary"$US 577,000,000,000November 14, 1975"Temporary"$US
595,000,000,000March 15, 1976"Temporary"$US 627,000,000,000June 30, 1976
"Temporary"$US 636,000,000,000September 30, 1976"Temporary"$US
682,000,000,000April 1, 1977"Temporary"$US 700,000,000,000On October 1,
1977 - the "limit" to revert to $US 400,000,000,000!!October 4, 1977
"VERY Temporary"$US 752,000,000,000August 3, 1978"Temporary"$US
798,000,000,000On April 1, 1979 - the "limit" to revert to $US
400,000,000,000!!April 2, 1979"VERY Temporary"$US 830,000,000,000The
"Temporary" ceiling is now bigger than the "Permanent"
$US 400,000,000,000 ceiling!!September 29, 1979"Temporary"$US
879,000,000,000Gold hits $US 871 per ounce ( intra-day ) - January 21,
1980June 28, 1980"Temporary"$US 925,000,000,000December 19, 1980
"Temporary"$US 935,000,000,000February 7, 1981"Temporary"$US
985,000,000,000September 30, 1981"Temporary"$US 1,079,000,000,000June
28, 1982"Temporary"$US 1,143,000,000,000September 30, 1982"Temporary"$US
1,290,200,000,000What the hell! Distinction between "Temporary" and
"Permanent" ceiling eliminated.May 26, 1983Permanent$US
1,389,000,000,000November 21, 1983Permanent$US 1,490,000,000,000May, 25,
1984Permanent$US 1,520,000,000,000July 6, 1984Permanent$US
1,573,000,000,000October 13, 1984Permanent$US 1,823,000,000,000U.S.
Dollar "Tops Out" - U.S. Becomes Net EXTERNAL Debtor.November 14, 1985
"Temporary"$US 1,903,800,000,000December 12, 1985Permanent$US
2,078,700,000,000August 21, 1986Permanent$US 2,111,000,000,000October
21, 1986"Temporary"$US 2,300,000,000,000May 15, 1987"Temporary"$US
2,320,000,000,000August 10, 1987"Temporary"$US 2,352,000,000,000
September 29, 1987Permanent$US 2,800,000,000,000Debt Ceiling raised by
$US 448 Billion - to get through the 1988 election.One Small Problem -
October 19, 1987 - Black Monday - The Dow Crashes 508 Points!August 7,
1989"Temporary"$US 2,870,000,000,000November 8, 1989Permanent$US
3,122,700,000,000Berlin Wall falls - Collapse of Communism - End of
"Cold War".August 9, 1990"Temporary"$US 3,195,000,000,000Budget "Train
Wreck" in Congress - National Parks and Washington Museums closed.
October 28, 1990"Temporary"$US 3,230,000,000,000November 5, 1990
PERMANENT$US 4,145,000,000,000DEBT CEILING RAISED BY $US 915 BILLION -
to get through the 1992 election.April 6, 1993"Temporary"$US
4,370,000,000,000August 10, 1993Permanent$US 4,900,000,000,000November
1994 - Historic Republican landslide - majorities in both HousesMarch
29, 1996Permanent$US 5,500,000,000,000November 1996 - Bill Clinton
( Democrat ) elected for a second term as President.August 5, 1997
Permanent$US 5,950,000,000,000


------------------------------------------------------------------------
All data presented above is from the U.S. Treasury itself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Synopsis
Compare the myriads of Debt Ceiling increases between 1971 and 1987 with
the very few which have occurred since the stock market crash of 1987.
Ask yourself why - and then ask yourself when was the last time that you
saw anything regarding the U.S. Debt Ceiling appear in the media.
On November 15, 1995, the day that the U.S. government went into a
six-day default and Secretary Rubin started "raiding the piggy banks",
the U.S. Treasury reported a U.S. funded debt of $US 4, 899,975,000,000.
That reported debt level stayed at exactly the same level for 4 1/2
months, until March 29, 1996.

This is unprecedented, and clearly illustrates the fact that the U.S.
government is not at all keen to bring any attention to the issue of the
debt ceiling. Hardly surprising, when the major U.S. political focus
over most of 1995 had been the debate over the "balanced budget" plan
for the year 2002.

On March 29, 1996, President Clinton signed into law a bill which raised
the debt ceiling of the United States by $US 600 Billion to $US 5.5
TRILLION.

On June 6, 1996, the U.S. Senate again failed to pass a bill calling for
an amendment to the Constitution to effect a balanced budget by the year
2002. In March, 1995, the measure failed by one vote. This time, it
failed by two votes.

According to Congress,the $US 600 Billion debt ceiling increase to $US
5.5 TRILLION would last the U.S. government until September 1997. It
did. The official Treasury total for US funded debt as of 9/30/97 was
$US 5,413,416,011,397.

But please note this carefully. Here is the increase in US funded debt
as officially reported by the Treasury for fiscal 1997.
Increase In Debt For Fiscal 1997September 30, 1997$5,413,146,011,397
September 30, 1996$5,224,811,939,135
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Increase$188,334,072,262President Clinton claimed that the budget
deficit for fiscal 1997 was $US 23 Billion
The Latest ( 12/31/97 )

In August 5, 1997, without announcement of fanfare, the "Statutory Debt
Limit" of the U.S. Treasury was raised by $US 450 Billion to $5.95
TRILLION. In stark contrast to the events of late 1995-early 1996, there
was no discussion or reporting of this event.

For the present level of US Debt, see the U.S. Treasury's website
where it is reported "To The Penny".
As of December 31, 1997 the debt stood at $US 5,502,388,012,375.95.

This puts the increase in the funded debt for the first three months
of fiscal 1998 at $US 89.24 Billion.

As of 12/31/97, the debt has exceeded the limit in force prior to August
5,
01/07/1998 $5,484,646,071,706.36




Current
Month Amount

01/06/1998 $5,486,352,648,906.21
01/05/1998 $5,481,924,290,553.50
01/02/1998 $5,476,836,236,537.09



Prior
Months

12/31/1997 $5,502,388,012,375.95
11/28/1997 $5,462,621,557,837.57
10/31/1997 $5,427,225,185,059.66
09/30/1997 $5,413,146,011,397.34
08/29/1997 $5,404,420,294,885.51
07/31/1997 $5,373,228,560,474.27
06/30/1997 $5,376,151,252,876.02
05/30/1997 $5,344,961,362,266.83
04/30/1997 $5,353,971,314,439.39
03/31/1997 $5,380,889,857,391.59
02/28/1997 $5,349,937,360,942.68
01/31/1997 $5,313,997,018,848.05
12/31/1996 $5,323,171,750,783.19
11/29/1996 $5,296,548,923,143.63


Prior
Years

09/30/1997 $5,413,146,011,397.34
09/30/1996 $5,224,810,939,135.73
09/29/1995 $4,973,982,900,709.39
09/30/1994 $4,692,749,910,013.32
09/30/1993 $4,411,488,883,139.38
09/30/1992 $4,064,620,655,521.66
09/30/1991 $3,665,303,351,697.03
09/28/1990 $3,233,313,451,777.25
09/29/1989 $2,857,430,960,187.32
09/30/1988 $2,602,337,712,041.16
09/30/1987 $2,350,276,890,953.00

Source: Bureau of the Public Debt

dollar backing off a bit so far tonight. So where do they put that smokin "money" now?

I said the people here aren't all bad. But the dirtbags in Washington are.

Roll up, roll up, step right this way.............

Korea is only the first round of a fifteen round knock out competition. Ear biting will be strictly forbidden, as it may shorten the length of the fight.

Now, where is Don King, you can never find him when you need him......

I was just remined of another thing: Why would ABX management buy their own shares back when they are double the book value? How does that equate to adding shareholder value? Another thing is that they have, what? close to 250-300 million shares outstanding? Trading a million a day is not a big deal. It would be nice to know who all the sellers are. Maybe some mutuals getting out.

We must let the bodies lie where they are, in their gutless, heartless manner...untouched by our "human" hands. Theirs is an intolerable contagion...we mustn't be exposed. Tell it like is...T#1.

I had a chance to meet and work with Bill Seidman during his tenure at the RTC ( Resolution Trust Corp ) . While he may have lost a step or two in recent years he is a very capable administor and a man of deep convictions and integrety.

He was a close advisor of President Ford's and was instrumental in bringing a young and somewhat radical economist on board by the name of Alan Greenspan.

It was his great skill that minimized the damage caused by the S&L disaster on the US economy. What the world needs now are more men with the skills of this gifted and dedicated public servant. You kitcoites who dis him only show your own lack of understand of the recent financial history of the US.

email me :ajent@mena-ark.com

1.Children born in 1994 will face lifetime tax rates of more than 80
percent. ( Clinton administration 1994 budget ) 2.A teenager in 1990 was
less likely to die of an accident, a cardiovascular disease, or
pneumonia than his or her peer in 1960, but more than twice as likely to
die by homicide or suicide. ( Public Health Service of the United States )
3.Since the first members of our generation were born ( 1961 ) , America
has experienced a 560 percent increase in violent crime, a 400 percent
increase in births to unwed mothers, a tripling in teenage suicide, and
a drop of almost 80 points in SAT scores. ( Index of Leading Cultural
Indicators, William Bennett ) 4.Real wages peaked in 1973 and have been
declining ever since, yet we work an average of one month more per year
than we did two decades ago. ( The Great U-Turn ) 5.Air pollution costs
the US as much as $40 billion annually in health care and lost economic
productivity. ( Worldwatch State of the World Report ) 6.Each year U.S.
factories spew 3 million tons of toxic chemicals into the air, land, and
water. That compounds the over one-half billion tons of solid hazardous
wastes - we're not talking about your garbage here - that get dumped
across the nation for our generation to one day clean up. ( The Gale
Environmental Scorecard ) 7.Black teenagers are three times more likely
to be killed by gun violence than by natural causes. ( Children's Defense
Fund Adolescent Fact Book ) 8.During the last 30 years the number of
children living in poverty has increased by nearly 30 percent - with the
greatest increase among white kids. ( Vanashing Dreams ) 9.A monthly
investment of $50 for 20 years will only provide for one year of tuition
at a public college or university. ( USA Today ) 10.The total cost to
clean up our toxic waste mess is almost three-quarters of a trillion
dollars - half the entire U.S. budget for a year. ( Worldwatch State of
the World Report ) 11.Fifteen percent of all infants born in 1994 will be
exposed to illegal drugs while in the womb, and over 100,000 babies are
born with crack addiction. ( Forham University and the Office of National
Drug Control ) 12.Since the mid-1970s, poverty among young adults ( 18 to
34 ) has gone up by 50 percent - while the median income of under-30
parents fell by a third. ( Vanishing Dreams ) 13.The median wage for an
18- to 24-year-old man dropped nearly 20 percent during the 1980s - and
it continues to decline. ( Vanishing Dreams ) 14.Half of the nation's
uninsured population is under the age of 25. ( National Health Survey,
1984 ) 15.In 1987, the U.S. released 1.2 million tons of toxic chemicals
into our atmosphere, 670,000 tons into our soil, and 250,000 tons into
our water. ( International Wildlife magazine ) 16.In 1970, the Japanese
had none of the world market share in dynamic random access memories, a
semiconductor device; by 1988, that share had risen to 80 percent.
( Selling Our Security ) 17.In 1993, AIDS was the top killer of young
adults in 64 cities and five states. In addition, the number of people
with AIDS worldwide is expected to go from 14 million to 30 million by
2000. ( USA Today ) 18.25 percent of all African-American men in their 20s
are either in prison, on probation, or on parole. And in the nation's
capital, 70 percent of all black men will be arrested at least once
before reaching the age of 35. ( Two Nations ) 19.Each year, 24,000
Americans - on average, 65 each day - are killed with handguns, and we
spend over $1 billion annually to treat firearm injuries. ( Handgun
Control, Inc ) 20.Almost half of all Americans between the ages of 21 and
25 lack basic literary skills, and are unable to balance a checkbook or
read a map. ( Children's Defense Fund - State of America's Children,
1992 ) 21.One in five Philadelphia teenagers misses school every day.
( Monitor Radio ) 22.American teenagers ranked number one in the world in
saying they were good at math - and last in a simultaneously
administered international math proficiency test. ( Educational Testing
Service ) 23.A young black man in Harlem, New York, is less likely to
live until age 40 than a young man in Bangladesh. ( New England Journal
of Medicine ) 24.Nearly half of all the new full-time jobs created in the
1980s paid less than $250 a week, or $13,000 a year, below the poverty
line for a family of four. ( Fortune magazine ) 25.According to "moderate
projections," between 1995 and 2005 there will be almost half a million
more new college graduates a year entering the job market than there
will be new jobs. ( Bureau of Labor Statistics ) 26.Every day, over 2500
American children witness the divorce or separation of their parents.
Every day, 90 kids are taken from their parents' custody and committed
to foster homes. Every day, 13 Americans aged 15 to 24 commit suicide,
and another 16 are murdered. ( Thirteenth Generation ) 27.In the last ten
years, the number of functionally illiterate 17-year-olds has more than
doubled. Today, 7 million teenagers are functionally illiterate.
( Children's Defense Fund ) 28.In 1974, the U.S. government declared a
health care crisis because we spent 7.5 percent of our gross national
product on medical costs. Today we spend twice that much. ( State of the
Union 1994 ) 29.U.S. health care spending has risen from $121 billion in
1961 to a projected $1.3 trillion by 2000. ( Congressional Budget Office )
30.In 1991 the U.S. trailed most industrialized countries in spending on
social programs and led in defense spending. ( The World Bank ) 31.In the
early 1990s report, the government's own accountants found that if
current trends continue, federal expenditures will grow from 23 percent
of the GNP to 42 percent by 2020, pushing up taxes. ( U.S. General
Accounting Office ) 32.The elderly ( age 65 and up ) population will grow
153 percent between now and 2040. ( Social Security Administration ) 33.
American firms pay twice as much to borrow money and make new
investments as do their foreign counterparts. ( U.S. News and World
Report ) 34.The collapse of America's savings and loans will cost
taxpayers at least $180 billion. ( Congressional Budget Office ) 35.
Ninety-five percent of our solid waste is disposed of in almost-filled
landfills - and one out of every two of those landfills desperately
needs repair so it won't leak. ( National Urban League ) 36.Almost
two-thirds of the nation's roads need repair. More than 41 percent of
our bridges are structurally unsound. ( National Urban League ) 37.
According to Vice President Al Gore, we are losing species of animals
and plants 1000 times faster than at any time in the past 65 million
years. ( Earth in the Balance ) 38."Federal judges have ordered jails
closed and new ones built because the conditions violated the rights of
the prisoner. Some of our schools wouldn't pass such scrutiny." ( Rep.
Dale Kildee, member of the House Education Committee ) 39.America has the
largest number of functional illiterates in the industrial world.
( Richard Lamm, Uncompetitive Society ) 40.The average murderer serves
less than seven years because of prison crowding. ( U.S. Bureau of
Justice Statistics ) 41.Since 1970, arrests for violent crimes by youths
have jumped 91 percent. ( Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency ) 42.
The number of guns in America increased from 54 million in 1950 to 201
million in 1990. ( Bureau of Justice Statistics ) 43.The Fortune 500
industrial companies employed 3.7 million fewer workers in 1991 than in
1981 - a loss of about one job in four. That trend will only worsen in
the next century. ( Fortune ) 44.Today's average, married senior citizen
paid $83,852 in Social Security and Medicare taxes in his/her lifetime.
The average senior will get back $308,328. ( Ways and Means Committee )
45.Only 2.8 percent of German children live in poverty. Over 20 percent
of all American kids do. ( Pete Peterson, Facing Up ) 46.In the last
twenty years, income for parents under the age of 30 dropped 28.6
percent, while it rose 28.4 percent for seniors. ( 1992 census survey )
47.In the next 35 years, health care spending is expected to eat up
twice as much of our economy as it does today. ( U.S. Health Care
Financing Administration ) 48.The U.S. infant mortality rate is higher
than 18 other major industrialized countries. ( State of the World's
Children, UNICEF ) 49.We're behind every major country except Hong Kong
in average science test scores for 14-year-olds. ( International
Association for the Evolution of Educational Achievement, 1988 ) 50.The
U.S. ranks 17th in the world in public spending on education
( Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development ) 51."Vital parts
of the military equipment that helped win the Gulf War were made in
Germany, Japan, and other foreign countries," write Martin and Susan
Tolchin. "The need to beg foreign embassies for essential parts was
chilling." ( Selling Our Security ) 52.There are 3 million homeless people
in America - the same number as in all of Europe. ( Coalition for the
Homeless, 1992 ) 53.The current average skill level of 21- to
25-year-olds is 40 percent lower than the skill level that will be
required of new workers in the year 2000 - only a handful of years away.
( Hudson Institute ) 54.The median home price, adjusted for inflation, has
jumped 78 percent since the early 1960s, making ownership out of reach
of many young families. ( Forbes ) 55.In 1975, the U.S. planned on having
a high-level nuclear waste disposal site operating by 1985. It will not
be ready until 2010 at best. ( Vital Statistics, Worldwatch Institute )
56.Nearly one in three college graduates between 1990 and 2005 is
expected to take a job that doesn't require a college degree - up from 1
in 10 in the 1960s. ( Wall Street Journal ) 57."It's hard to see why
someone age 68 should automatically pay lower taxes than someone age 28
with the same income. Yet, that happens." ( Robert Samuelson, Newsweek )
58.A 30-year-old man in the early 1970s earned 15 percent more than his
father did at that age. Today's 30-year-old can expect to bring in 25
percent less than his dad did. ( Forbes ) 59.By 2002, Uncle Sam will have
stolen over $1 trillion from the Social Security trust fund. ( OASDHI
1993 ) 60.Poverty affected 11.1 percent of Americans in 1973 and 14
percent by the early 1990s. ( 1992 Census ) 61."The Great American Job
Machine... is shifting gears - downward. Solid middle-class jobs... have
been disappearing in record numbers and are being replaced more often
than not by lower wage jobs." ( Fortune ) 62.Since the early 1970s, the
poverty rate among under-30 households has doubled. ( The Economic Policy
Institute ) 63.From 1929 to 1933 ( the years of the Great Depression ) ,
real income fell by 25 percent. For couples with kids in our generation,
it's dropped 30 percent. ( Thirteenth Generation ) 64.Estimated costs of
cleaning up the 24,000 contaminated federal nuclear facilities range
from $100 billion to $400 billion. ( The Environmental Protection Agency )
65.In 1948, a family of four earning the median income would have paid
no income tax and a mere 1 percent to Social Security. By 1955, income
tax and Social Security would require 9 percent, and by 1990 the
combined tax burden was 25 to 28 percent. And that does not even
consider sales tax. ( Boiling Point ) 66.Baby boomers are saving only
about one-third as much as they need. This means their kids will have to
finance their retirements. ( Merrill Lynch ) 67.From 1981 to 1989, the
number of American home-owners between the ages of 25 and 29 declined by
11 percent, while the number of renters in that same age group rose by
16 percent. ( "Housing in America", U.S. Dept of Commerce, 1992 ) 68.
Today's 63-year-old will get back roughly $200 for every $100 he or she
pays into Social Security. Today's 25-year-old will lose over $100 for
every $450 paid into Social Security. ( The Wyatt Company ) 69.As a share
of workers' payroll, the total cost of Social Security and Medicare
could climb from 17 percent today to over 50 percent by 2040. ( OASDHI,
1992 ) 70.Twenty-five percent of full-time workers do not earn enough to
rise out of poverty. ( U.S. Census Bureau ) 71.The U.S. spends 6 percent
of the GNP on the military; Japan spends less than 1 percent. Seventy
percent of all U.S. research and development testing and evaluation goes
to the military. ( Uncompetitive Society Report ) 72.From 1971 to 1988,
only 50 percent of all eligible voters turned out on election day - the
worst record of any major democracy. ( World Values Survey, January 1987 )
73.America spends more money on health care than any other country - but
American males rank 15th in world life expectancy, and females are
eighth. ( Uncompetitive Society Report ) 74."There are two kinds of U.S.
electronics companies," explains the chairman of the American
Electronics Association, "those that are screaming in pain from the
Japanese and those that will be screaming in pain." 75.When the national
debt hits $6.5 trillion, interest on the debt will gobble up 85 percent
of all personal taxes. ( Bankruptcy 1995 ) 76.The average cost in 1990
dollars of attending a private four-year college more than doubled from
1965 to 1990. ( U.S. Dept of Education ) 77.From the mid-1970s to the late
1980s, the average tuition at a private college as a part of an average
family income rose in ratio almost 50 percent. ( USA Today ) 78.The U.S.
spends nearly $1 trillion annually on health care, yet nearly 75 million
Americans are underinsured or completely uninsured. Both Canada and
Germany spend 30 to 40 percent less on health care per capita, and both
provide universal health care. ( The Washington Monthly ) 79.Every day,
the typical 14-year-old watched three hours of TV and does one hour of
homework. Every day, over 2,200 kids drop out of school. Every day,
3,610 teenagers are assaulted, 630 are robbed, and 80 are raped. Every
day, 500 adolescents begin using illegal drugs and 1,000 begin drinking
alcohol. Every day, 1,000 unwed teenage girls become mothers.
( Thirteenth Generation ) 80.The president of American Express, Louis
Gerstner, Jr., stated, "Forty percent of high school seniors can't name
three South American countries... one-third of today's ninth graders
can't write a brief summary of a newspaper story. Will [these people] be
able to take phone messages from important clients?" 81.Only 66 percent
of eighth graders and 77 percent of twelfth graders correctly totaled
the cost of soup, burger, fries, and cola on a restaurant menu. ( USA
Today ) 82.Contrast the very different television experiences of a
typical boomer born in the late 1940s with a typical 13er born two
decades later. By age five, the boomer had seen little or no television;
the 13er had seen 5,000 hours' worth, thanks to a parent who probably
used TV as a baby-sitter. ( Thirteenth Generation ) 83.Since 1969, in
inflation-adjusted dollars, the average Social Security benefit for a
retired worker has risen by 80 percent. Meanwhile, the
inflation-adjusted average AFDC benefit for a child in poverty has
declined by over 10 percent. ( Social Security Administration ) 84.Some 3
million attempted or completed street crimes ( assault, rape, robbery,
theft ) take place on school property annually. One in 20 teachers is
assaulted each year. One in five of today's high school students has at
one time carried a gun or other weapon to school. That amounts to 32
percent of all boys, 8 percent of all girls. ( U.S. Public Health
Service ) 85.In his book Powernomics: Economics and Strategy After the
Cold War, former U.S. trade negotiator Clyde Prestowitz stated, "On a
national basis, about 25 percent of our students drop out of high
school, consigned to a social and economic scrap heap before they even
begin their adult lives. The U.S. is the only major nation of the world
that tolerates such human waste." 86.Each year through the 1980s, 5,000
youths between the ages of 15 and 25 killed themselves. Surveys show
that 10 percent of adolescent boys and 18 percent of adolescent girls
are willing to admit that they have attempted suicide. "What can one say
about a generation 1,000,000 of whom have tried ( or will try ) to kill
themselves before age 30 - and 100,000 of whom have succeeded ( or will
succeed ) in their final effort?" ( Thirteenth Generation ) 87.In 1992, the
U.S. spent $24.9 billion to jail 1.3 million prisoners - a per prisoner
cost of $20,072 - while we spent $4,000 per public school student.
( Washington Monthly ) 88.From 1973 to 1990, real median income of U.S.
families aged 65 and over went up 39 percent, while it dropped 16
percent for families headed by someone aged 30 or under. ( U.S. Bureau of
the Census ) 89.In 1979, 74 percent of working Americans under age 25
were earning an hourly wage which - if received full-time and year-round
- exceeded the cash poverty level for a family of three. By 1991, that
share had fallen to 47 percent. ( The Children's Defense Fund ) 90.In the
early 1970s, for a typical married couple under age 30, the after-tax
cost of owning a first home consumed just 12 percent of income. By the
1990s, the after-tax cost of owning the same house had risen to 29
percent of income. ( Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard
University ) 91.In 1990, a couple in their twenties with one worker, a
baby, and $30,000 in income had to pay five times as much tax to the
government ( $5,055 ) as the typical retired couple in their late sixties
with the same incomes from public and private pensions ( $1,073 ) .
( Congressional Ways and Means Committee ) 92.Since 1965, juvenile
violent-crime arrest rates have tripled. ( U.S. Federal Bureau of
Investigation ) 93.Among Americans aged 25 to 29, the number of
homeowners declined by 11 percent from 1981 to 1989, while the number of
renters rose by 16 percent. ( Housing in America Report ) 94.Given the way
things are, it will be much harder for people in our generation to live
as comfortably as those in previous generations. Agree: 65%, Disagree:
33%. ( Time magazine poll of Americans under 30 ) 95.In 1987,
Colgate-Palmolive started a program to groom recent college graduates
for overseas managerial careers. By the early 1990s, more than 15,000
young people were vying for the 15 slots available each year, ( Wall
Street Journal ) 96.Number and proportions of persons not covered by
health insurance at any time during 1990, by age bracket. ( U.S. Bureau
of the Census ) Under Age 18 - 8.4 million ( 24.3% ) Age 18 to 34 - 14.8
million ( 42.8% ) Age 35 to 64 - 11.1 million ( 32.1% ) Age 65 and Over -
0.3 million ( 0.8% ) 97.The average 30-year-old home-owner in the 1950s
could make the monthly mortgage payment using 14 percent of his income.
Today it would take 40 percent. ( Frank Levy ) 98.In 1900, the U.S.
government consumed less than 9 percent of the gross national product
( the nation's total economic output ) . By 1990, the government was
costing almost 40 percent of the gross national product. On a per-capita
basis the growth in the cost of government was even greater, going from
$1,651 per person in 1900 to $23,000 in 1990. These statistics are based
on real 1990 dollars. ( Institute for Policy Innovation ) 99.During every
100 hours on our inner-city streets, three times more young American men
lose their lives in gunfire than were young American men killed during
the 100 hours of Operation Desert Storm. ( U.S. Bureau of the Census )
100.In 1992, handguns were used in the murders of 33 people in Britain,
36 in Sweden, 97 in Switzerland, 128 in Canada, 13 in Australia, 60 in
Japan, and 13,220 in the United States. ( New York Times )

The presses are well oiled and running!! ( Actually, all they need is a terminal and some electricity )

Latest week - M3 went from $5,287,600,000,000 to 5,297,100,000,000 ( annualized rate of 9.9% )

3 month average ( excluding Dec ) is at 9.6%

:well below BOJ rate. BOJ is now feverishly monetizing debt at 1% a day for last 3 weeks - hard to believe that!

The interest alone on the US National Debt is eating up the budget and adding to the Debt like an aggressive malignant tumor. ( The magic of compounding ) We are at the point where it goes vertically asymptotic; a googolplex won't be enough to enumerate the size of the debt, and they'll have to start printing the bank notes on only one side just to save ink and paper. Anybody remember the Hungarian Pengoe? Polish Zloty? BUY GOLD!

Australia -2.06%
India -2.31%
Japan -1.31%
Malaysia -2.33%
Singapore -4.14%
Korea -1.98%

Only New Zealand and Taiwan in good shape

I don't work for the IMF or think all that much of them, they are better than no action at all... but not much

I was arguing in my 11:16 post that no country had ever imported itself into a recession. I stand by that statement.

Your example of 1929 as a case where the US imported itself into a depression is not an example of a country importing itself into recession. In fact, I can not think of a better example of the exact opposite of what I was saying.

The depression of 1929 came about because we STOPPED importing. The sharp increases in tariffs put an end to imports and to world growth. The example you gave me is an example of the exact opposite of the point you were making.... Try again big guy, but don't strain yourself.

Aye, point taken - I thank the God Lord that I can go gold detecting at the weekends!

If I may, you should change your "name" to Golden Ball - feels better!

GoldenBoy:

Management wants to buy back its shares ( ABX ) cause the PRIMARY players will then own more of the company and subsequently realize greater profits. TrizecHahn ( Peter Munk ) owns 16% Barrick right now. So it's really Peter Munk who wants to buy back shares ( not his of course ) and he is not a stupid man. You don't need 50.1% ownership to run things. ABX wants to buy back 31Million shares, thats about 10% of the O/S Shares! Also, consider, there are 12Million shares shorted. Therefore, it's reasonable to assume 43Million shares need to be bought back soon. They will do it before gold rises of course cause they are better informed than I am.

Also, I wouldn't be surprised ( after they buy back the shares ) that ABX will buy back their hedge position for a nice profit! A big profit!!

OF COURSE, THEY WILL DO THIS BEFORE gold BEGINS ITS GLORIOUS rise!

I'm hanging in tough and all the money I am able to save and borrow is going into ABX and Leafs. Forget about that diversification stuff I learned in school. Gold is the place to be right now and you have to look long term.

If gold hits a $1000, I'm a mulitmillionare on ABX stock alone. It's definately worth the risk.

Anyone care to comment?

Looks like the US govt deficit.

As a share of GDP it is lower than any other developed country in the world.

No one worries about the debt IBM or GM carries. WHY? Because they have income generateing assets on the other side of the balance sheet.

If you were to put together a balance sheet for the US goverment you would find trillions of dollars of assets on the other side of the balance sheet ( national parks, office buildings, military assets to protect limp wristed allies like Australia, that sort of thing )
against a mere $5 trillion in debt. The conclusion I would draw is that the US government is underleveraged.

Maybe you view this period through the eyes of a hired gun for the man. Fat retainers for skillful butchers and janitors for misguided dreams of over-zealous entrepeneurs.

I see Bill's bunch and their deeds as overeactionary, wasteful to a degree I've never witnessed and unjust. I was not on the winning side of what is now his legacy...and I'm not going to waste my breath educating you. Don't assume you know more than anybody on Kitco.

May you get everything you deserve.

..

WE UNDERSTAND..............

Share your problems with us. Then wonder whether everyone thinks you're neurotic, incompetent, or a BUREAUCRAT............

Now, these figures - it has got something to do with, and I will make this easy for you and put it in BIG letters - UNITED STATES DEBT!

01/07/1998 $5,484,646,071,706.36

Hot off the press.........

So, if you keep the dollar strong - your debt goes up even faster? Or doesn't that matter anymore?

I read your list of 100 things wrong with America earlier this morning but did not have time to respond.

the list is impressive. Some of the data is shoddy. Some of it is just plain irrelevant. But some of it, sadly is very much on target.

Any society that is as free as the US is, is going to have problems the likes of which you have listed. Freedom has a cost. Freedom is not for everyone.

America is a violent, poverty ridden society. There is no question about it. And yet, what other country has to put up barriers to keep people from coming here.

What over country inspires the kind of devotion that America does. Do people in developing countries around the world wake up one morning and wish to be Japanesse, or French. Prehaps a few do, but millions wake up praying to be Americans.

America is an ideal. As an ideal it will never be completely fulfilled. And yet, there is no other country in the world that has the diversity of population that the US has. In my neighborhood today I heard Arabic, Mandrian, Spanish and Russian being spoken. We are a melting pot of the best and the worst that humanity has to offer. Yes there is more crime here, but there are more Nobel prize winners too and more millionaires as well. The arts, the fashions, the writers, the poets of America lead the world too. Great success often has great costs.

There is no other country in the world where hard work and a bit of luck can move someone from poverty to affluence in the span of a single generation.

Say what you will about America but it is still the beacon of freedom and hope for the rest of the world.

...

Y2KBug, All: I went back in the posts and saw your Y2K stuff regarding the banks. It's almost idiotic that they still talk in terms that there is a chance we will get through the Year 2000 problem ok.

William McDonough, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York: "Failure to get it right will affect the integrity of the payments system and the performance of the domestic and maybe even the global economy."

"The Year 2000 problem has the potential to disrupt "virtually all of everyday commerce," said Federal Reserve Board Governor Edward Kelley to the Professional Banker's Association in Washington. "

We have already failed to get it right! Simply put, if a bank is not well into their Year 2000 remediation work now they just won't make it. Period. End of story. Give me a list of banks that are still in the discovery or inventory phase and I'll show you a list of banks that are going to fail.

One thing I'm wondering about is mergers. I don't know much about the mechanics of a bank merger. Does anyone have any experience in this area? The main thing I'm wondering about, of course, is the software. Before Y2K came along would both banks continue to use their own
software or would all the operations be moved to just one of the software systems? What I'm getting at here is this: Could banks that have failed to address their Y2K problems merge with banks that have addressed these issues? If the general procedure in a merger is for the two separate companies to merge to one software system then there is a way out and we are going to have some MEGA-Banks. If the ongoing use of software in place prior to the merger is the norm then these dudes are between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

fundaMETAList, EDPM of IT

To paraphrase Winston Churchill: "...lift up your hearts...all will come right..." February gold up a dollat to 282.8

Dost thou not rise, indignant shade,

And smile with spurning scorn,

When they wha wad hae starved thy life

Thy senseless turf adorn?

Aye, Bobbie Burns

YOU ARE A BUREAUCRAT............

Judging from the way you hit the key board Mate, it would suggest that you have two limped wrists. Do you live in San Francisco?

"My" list is not mine - it was compiled by one of YOUR FELLOW AMERICANS.

Now don't get upset, practice harsh shallow breathing!!!!!

Aye, Haggis

I lived in DC when I was a very small kid. My dad was a career Army officer and worked in the Pentagon for a few years and we lived in DC. I travel to DC frequently, I find it a rather boring town, too many lawyers and politicians for my taste.

WRT US debt, wake up and smell the coffee old man. $5 trillion seems like a lot of money but against a $100 trillion is assets, its small potatoes. Whats even more important, as a share of gdp, debt is shrinking. If the US economy remains strong, which IMNSHO it will this year, the actual deficit will shrink. The deficit is yesterdays problem.
The dollar is appreciating because the US has the strongest and most attractive economy in the world. Investors are rushing to put their money here because it gets treated a lot better than it does just about anywhere else. A stronger dollar makes it easier to finance US debt, not harder. It is the collapse of currencies in the far east that is making their debt burden more of a burden.

If you are going to make an argument about the demise of America, stick to the sociological issues, at least there you are on more solid ground.

Well said. Would like to know more about your management consulting work one of these days.

if it will make you fell better. But the fact of the matter is that I have never been a bureaucrat, I have never worked in the government sector and have no interest in doing so. Try reading what I actually write and thinking about what I say instead of making lame ad hominem attacks on me.

What makes you conclude that the USA is a free country? My take is that it is in fact a slave society. You know the old saying about if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, etc. it is a duck. What distribution of wealth would a slave society produce? Take a pre "War between the States" southern plantation as a micro economy. A family of ten owners, a few hired hands and a few hundred slaves. A skewed distribution of wealth to say the least. A sure sign that you have a slave society is a distribution of wealth where the mean exceeds the median. The average man does not have an average amount of wealth. And as for voting, who runs for political office but those who believe in government rule of peoples' lives ( hardy a condition of freedom ) .

I would say that between the direct plunder of wealth by government and the massive transfer of wealth from the average person to those granted privelege by the government ( monopolists ) that we are in a slave society with the evident results.

Poverty for the majority is the principal result of slavery. From poverty flows the many breakdowns in society you see.

Please don't tell me I am free because I can vote, or because I can speak freely. Were my voice to become loud enough, I would surely be silenced as would any similar believer in freedom.

T Rex: I've been thinking too about this diversification thing. Warren Buffet didn't diversify so why should we. The problem is to identify a company or two to invest in. ABX might be one even if they don't buy back their shares. I think a person has to be ready to hang in for the real long haul if you take this approach. Good investing!

Just before the sushi break:

Japan -1.72%
Australia -1.72%
Malaysia -3.15%
PHILIPPINES -7.10%
Singapore -8.15%
S.Korea -1.61%


It is a sea of RED.

Hong Kong is ready to join the partyin few minutes!!

Karlito - DEBT does not matter!!! ???

Gold closed at $281. Technically $280 was only slightly breached but rebounded to high ground before the close of day. The charts for eternity will only show a close above $280. The war goes on and we are on the defensive. We Goldbugs have dug in and are armed with the last of our dry powder. We will support $280 until the last Goldbug is ravaged by the BEAR. We will never quit or retreat. YES, WE BELIEVE!

``We will not hesitate to take every possible measure to defend the stability of the financial system and restore confidence
in the system both at home and abroad,'' Koji said, speaking to journalists at the National Press Club here.
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/japan_to_t_1.html

Traders said institutional investors were pulling out of stocks for fixed-return instruments.
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/argentine__4.html

``ADRs were massacred today after Asia's falls,'' a trad
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/chilean_st_1.html
Chile to form group to study Asian crisis impact
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/chile_to_f_1.html

Brazil inflation falls to near 50-year low
Brazil
Bovespa Index
^BVSP
2:21PM
9658
-221 -2.24%
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/brazil_inf_1.html

Mexican stocks sank for the fourth session this week on Thursday, down 2.14 percent to
4,837.18 points, as jitters in Asia continued to scare investors from emerging markets in the Americas.
Mexico
IPC Index
^MXX
4:28PM
4837.180 -105.730 -2.14%
http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/mexican_st_3.html

The gold stocks, for the 30 some years I've been playing the stock market, have carried a P/E multiple ( adverage ) of 35-40. ABX has a price to book ratio of 1.73. That is lower than alot of other sectors are at now. With 373M shares outstanding and 298.4 of that floating I'll be damned if I can figure out how buying 10% back can be a bad thing. That buy back can't do any thing but reduce the number of shares tendered for sale. That reduction equates to a higher price to me.

Down 4.57% in 3 minutes after opening.

I believe Karlitto has been brain washed extraordinair. Everything you said is true and I commend you on being so astute. I recommend that Karlitto read "The Committee of 300" by Dr. John Coleman.

Globex drifting down.
Asia melting away.

HK opened down -344 - 3.72%
Japan down -278

Dow down too below last lows 7680 to 7600.
Gold to have a final washout of a large nature.
All IMHO

fundaMETAList: Here is a Y2K article on British Telecom They may ban any calls to Asia, Africa, and the Middle East http://www.computerweekly.co.uk/news/08_01_98/08735180048/B1.html

fundaMETAList: Here is a Y2K article on British Telecom They may ban any calls to Asia, Africa, and the Middle East http://www.computerweekly.co.uk/news/08_01_98/08735180048/B1.html Arf, Buddy

Hong Kong
Hang Seng
^HSI
9:08PM
8721.09
-533.44
-5.76%

Mate, your 20.38 posting............ I am over whelmed!!.

"O, sad and heavy should I part

but for the sake sae far awa,

Unknowing what my way may thwart -

My native land sae far awa".

I quote -"There is no other country in the world where hard work and a bit of luck can move someone from poverty to affluence in the span of a single generation". WRONG.

As I have said before, don't be afraid to set yourself unrealistic goals - it will be so much more challenging.

Tie me kangaroo down sport, tie me kangaroo down........

S & P Futures DOWN precipitously...opened at 970...now 956.70 ( falling as we speak ) ...forget Black Monday...Tomorrow could be D-Day!
On Wall Street...January 9, 1998 may rival October 24, 1929...if current trends and world events continue...

No doubt this is the greatest place to live, I love the U.S.
BUT: If you add the unfunded pensions and the money owed the social security fund, you are in the $18 trillion neighborhood. As far as the deficit goes the money borrowed from the social security surplus is treated as income and reduces the deficit erroniously. Then consider that the clinton administration along with the tresury dept. reissued long term debt back out as short term to lower the deficit and look good for reelection. These chickens will be coming home to roost sooner rather than later. Also consider that more of our GDP is non productive, it goes for healthcare, prisons, police and so forth. We are not producing as much ( manufacturing ) as we previously had and we cant grow serving each other hamburgers or selling each other imported products.

Year 2000 project head in Britain very worried. http://www.computerweekly.co.uk/news/08_01_98/08735180048/A.html Arf, Buddy

I come from a country that had a feudal system until 1848. Actually, it was not as bad as many people think of it today.

Your total taxes and land lease were paid by your family's 2 month labor for the landlord a year. No more! Today, I work 7 months to pay my state ,federal and other hidden taxes. Relatively speaking, my opressed forefathers worked less time a year to pay their dues to the gov..

If you believe you live in a slave society, then leave... you are free to go.

But before you go read a little Slozhenitsyn or some Pasternak or maybe a little Tolstoy if you want to know what a slave society is all about.

Or if you'd like some US propaganda on slave societies try Harriet Beecher Stowes 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' and then come back and tell me that these are the kind of conditions you live under. Somehow, I doubt it.

The very fact that you have a computer and access to the internet tells me that you have more wealth and more freedom than 99% of all past and present humanity. Use that wealth and access to information and knowledge to educate yourselves.

Try to develop a sense of history about what slavery really is all about before you post such nonsense in the future.

Globex:
S&P 500 MAR98 957.20 -400
US, only 18 Trillion needed.

Don't worry, NO PROBLEM! - the US will loan it to you. PRINT PRINT PRINT

Now what's matter with you? Every where? It's just them! They don't matter! They should get their house in order! On the other side, here in this goog ol' USA we have nothing to worry about. Because we are the best, free, everybody throws money at us, and will prosper from now on forever.

Hmm, when mood strikes us we may even open our border and let a few of those poor fellas get in. They'll be good for shining our shoes.

Just checking the foreign market it appears that not only is every market of substance down in the Orient but Europe seems to be following in order which is a new occurence ( at as of late ) . Tommorow I must concur with others on this site, it is going to get ugly in the USA. Dominos anyone?

..

GOLDBUGS, LET US UNITE!
We can make Camdessus, Alan Greenspan, George Soros, Lou Dobbs, etc. and all those fiat money players and backers sweat blood1
EVERYBODY BUYS ONE OUNCE OF GOLD EACH WEEK TILL FINAL VICTORY, TILL PAPER BECOMES BANKNOTE COLLECTIONS AND TOILET PAPER AROUND THE WORLD!
ONE OUNCE PER WEEK FOR EVERYBODY!
MAKE THEM CONFISCATE OUR PHYSICAL TO COVER THEIR SHORTS!

What is the committee of 300 about ?

They are us and tomorrow moring we are them!

HighRise

I apologize for my fellow Americans on this list who can't stop this arrogant bombastic nonsense. They sometimes forget that the list is international and hosted by our friends in Canada.
Not all of us are that bad.

Karlito99's "best of all possible worlds" is about to be vaporized.

The false wealth, based on lies, manipulation and double-speak is going up in flames even as we type this evening.

Misery and human suffering are the price being paid now in Southeast Asia, the US next.

Meanwhile, Karlito, LGB, sit smug and comfortable, oblivious, deluded. Thinking that what is happening is just some distant, trivial "discomfiture" that is of no consequence.

In the French Revolution the question was: "Are you an Aristocrat?"

This time it will be: "Are you a stock broker?"

..

It is normal for bank mergers to result in significant systems
rationalisation between the two banks.

However, this process can take months or, probably, years and a merger would not be a simple "way out" for not having properly prepared for Y2K.

Oops, I hope you know that my post was supposed to be sarcastic.

Your faith in the US National Debt, as the Guaradian of the Free:

reminds me of those who reaffirm their faith in fantasy, and believe in guardian angels and beautiful wee fairies at the bottom of the garden. However, then remember you've killed them all with a weed whacker, the WHACKER being you!!

Have a nice day

Thar she blows -- 9000 is history on the Hong Kong market. Another psycholigally important support level is broken. Tokyo below 14,000 is next. Then comes the big NYSE stock market crash. Stay tuned.

S&P 500 MAR98 955.70B -550
With the market down 100pts today @ the close, a -5.50 suggest right now that the DOW is going to take a big hit at the oppening.

THE PRICE OF LIBERTY IS ETERNAL VIGILANCE.

Does anyone have any info on the following company

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/corona_gol_1.html

So far tonight, the 1st Asian Prize goes to the Philippines with -10.50%
the 2nd Asian Prize goes to Singapore with -8.40%.

( Note, that Indonesia would likely take the 1st Prize , however, yest. -12.5% made the contender to weak to compete tonight )

Yes, I thought so, one has to be careful with this e-mail stuff.
Thanks for the clarification.

HighRise

The Committee of 300 can be located thru any browser. It is a pretty lenghty article and will take some time to read. If you believe we are being controlled and manipulated then it is a must read. Remember, the media says that anyone who subscribes to conspiracy is demented and paranoid. If they say so then it must be true. Call me paranoid!!!

as gold prices require more actual CB selling to stay at these levels, not just the threat of it, since even if you knock a big part of Asian demand out of the equation, the gold market is in fundamental supply deficit", Chases's Dinsa Mehta said.

It's encouraging to read this in the media. Maybe the tide is turing.

http://www.infobeat.com/stories/cgi/story.cgi?id=6846271-107

Like I said in a prior comment, as soon as the Arrogance becomes insulting, they will stop buying our STUFF ( stocks, bonds, dollars ) ..

..

Your post of 21:18 starts with an incorrect statement. You nor any other American is allowed to leave for FREE. Minor detail Exit tax and the IRS can follow you for ten years no matter where you go for ten years and US Law over rules. ( According to USG )

Details my boy, details.

As for the arts, poets, fashions and writers of America leading the world, I say hardly with all due respect to any and all Americans that may be on your list. All encompassing America eh.

The United States Government owns nothing. The PEOPLE of these United States own everything in this country. Everything. Other than that which others rightfully own ( legally ) from foreign countries. And the US Government is way over budget, We the People should clean house, and get new employees that understand what a budget is.

And the S&L disaster is still just that. There are many I am sure that would like to speak with your Mr. Seidman.

Details, details and details.

Thanks:
For more interesting reading check out the John Birch Society on your browser.

time to go eat. see you all later. This is a lot more entertaining than "Wheel of Fortune"

http://www.news.bridge.com/NEWS/gfisum.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/finance/980108/tokyo_stoc_2.html

http://www.cnnfn.com/markets/bridge/700.1.html

Dow/Gold Ratio = 27.70

Tsunami Tidal Wave of Stock Market Loses Wash Over Asia

During the last six months of currency chaos and stock market
havoc - both which continue as I speak - the average citizen of
the average country of this Southeast Asia, who had the foresight of converting his currency into GOLD, would now be about 76% RICHER - reflecting the average increase in gold's value in the five besieged paper currencies.

Five charts showing the explosive price rise in Asian currencies ( Indonesia, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia & the Philippines ) will indeed convince even the most skeptical that only GOLD is providing a safe harbor for local investors. The rising gold price trend in local currencies is literally ORBITAL.

Regrettably, most Asians must RELEARN the universal and timeless truism: GOLD IS THE ULTIMATE STANDARD OF VALUE, and paper is just paper!
http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_98/oracle010798.html

XAU/Spot Ratio = .233

Recently there were some excellent posts on gold by John Kutyn and some not so good on the House of Rothschild and central banks by others. After giving the efforts of these gentlemen some thought, I decided to give an input on these subjects. I'm inclined to hitch my fate to the precious yellow. There are some reasons for this, one is that the banks once before tried to suppress the price of gold during the days of the "London Gold Pool" in the early and middle 1960's. They cried "Uncle" after a long and valiant attempt to keep gold at US$35.00, then Uncle Sam himself called it quits in 1971 when Nixon closed the gold window to foreign bank conversion of US dollars for US gold. To date no one on earth has proven that they were bigger than the markets, ask the Rockefellers, OPEC or any other cartel in the history of mankind. Control is a temporary thing. The DeBeers diamond cartel seems to be the most successful to date but their control stemmed from their control of S. Africa's diamond fields. Diamonds are not as rare as once thought nor are they only found in S. Africa. I suspect they will one day lose their control of the price of diamonds as production comes to the market place from sundry other countries out side of Debeers' cartel.

I remember reading in Barron's some years ago where Malaysia was dictating the price of tin for many a year, like DeBeers they gave their product's price a upward bias, to do so they had to keep tin stock off the market in warehouses. At the start it was good for the cartel but at some point reality was forced upon the tin cartel and to recoup costs, the excess stock was sold at forced liquidation prices. Tin dropped and the protected tin mining industry in Malaysia suffered for years until the imbalances from the hoarded stockpile was feed into the real economy. I wonder how many beautiful gems are being stored in vaults somewhere by DeBeers? There are all to many instances where powerful forces, usually working in conjunction with a government somewhere, are at odds with the market pricing mechanism. Usually cartels want a higher price, but in the case of gold the dollar cartel will always desires a lower gold price, the lower the better as increasing gold prices implies an increased production of US$ and possibly some doubt in the full faith and credit of the US Government. I believe the current low gold prices are the true measure of desperation the dollar cartel is currently feeling. In a free market, the US$ of the latter half of the 20th century could not compete with a barbaric relic like gold. In the end the manipulation of any cartel will always produce the opposite result than what the cartel had desired, often the correction is violent. Typically in the end the cartel gets in so deep that the final actions are acts of desperation by desperate men no longer concerned about maximize profit ( or personal power ) but rather are intent upon economic or personal survival. With gold and the US$ I believe history will show ( once again ) that no one is bigger than the markets.

The issue of gold being made illegal and a one world currency is forced upon the world I think would be very difficult to achieve on a global basis. A strong case can be made that China, India, and many former colonies of the Europeans nations would be unwilling to play that game, Japan too is getting tired of being The United States Government's little whipping boy. Lord knows these countries have more than a little blame for the condition they find themselves in, however, if their politicians are worth their salt, they will find someone to place all the blame on for their current problems. The long gone colonial masters would be perfect, blame it on the British! It will not be harder to whip up the battered masses in SE Asia against the "New World Currency" ( same as the New World Order ) than it is to whip up hatred for the CIA for selling crack cocaine in South Central L.A. The idea is ridiculous but as we are talking about cartels, well how knows but really who cares in South Central L.A. They're mad and upset and just need someone or something to strike out against, the CIA will do. Hate is as addictive as crack and many times as dangerous to civilized society.

I believe that the majority of the world population lies outside the control of the Rothschilds and George Soros. If the third world refuses to do business with this new Rothschild's inspired fiat currency and insist upon a currency that meets with their approval, it will be in their interest, and power of these Pacific Nations to insist upon a fair playing field when doing business with the Atlantic Nations. What would the currency gods of this new currency cartel do if they created a new paper standard and then over half of the world refused to accept it as payment? No doubt the currency cartel would refuse to sell cars, computers, steel, oil to Asia Inc, the only question would be if the boycott was put in effect before or after the high tariffs were in place to keep the Atlantic nation's cars, computers, steel and oil out of Asia Inc! The so called Third world is no longer an area that lacks world class production capability or the brains to manage industry, they can go it alone if need be for both basic materials or high caliber finished goods. The US can't get our allies to stop trading with the very sinister Iraqis, are the new masters of the universe going to pull out all stops for the crippling our former Asian Allies for not accepting this new fiat currency? I think not! There would be some difficulties for an unseen cabal to force a undesirable currency upon what will one day be a solvent S.E. Asia. Remember, as far as the current problems in S.E. Asia are concerned "they too shall pass".

The worst nightmare a puppet master can have is for someone to cut his strings. Reading Malaysian and other SE Asian nations news papers on the Internet, it seems that they are rather peeved at George Soros right now, I don't think he could get them to buy a used car from him let alone a new fiat currency. Think about this; the world's Muslims, Buddhist, Hindus, and Chinese have no connections, cultural or otherwise, with Jewish bankers that could possibly entice them to surrender control over their territories, economies, or national wealth. How would anyone push around billions of people who are economically formidable on their own right and now, in a very post-colonial way, will demand respect?

I think the House of Rothschild is being much maligned by people who have only a superficial understanding of how the real world works. The moneyed jews in the middle ages could tell the Rothschilds a thing or two about doing business in a hostile culture. You don't make King Richard do anything in Merry old England. But then, I suspect that the House of Rothschilds may already know this. Their is danger in wagering your capitol in a hostile environment, risk capital expect a premium. I'm not saying bankers, Jewish or other wise wont try to get the best part a deal, even to the point of taking people to the cleaners; they do. I would do it if I could, and if your honest you'll admit that you never called your broker to give back your capitol gains to bail out some poor soul that was on the losing side of that grand slam trade you made a killing on.

I think only a Marxist could be so willfully ignorant as to waste time in plotting ways to conquer the world: Lenin and that lot dreamed of total world domination as did the leader of the NATIONAL SOCIALIST PARTY, Adolph Hitler himself. If you doubt Hitler's socialism, you should read the diaries of the Nazi's Minister of Propaganda and Public Enlightenment, Dr. Goebbels. He had no problems with his beloved swastika on a field of red. The Nazi's solution for saving the world from this Jewish Banker's obsession with total world domination was WWII. Now some people have gone to great lengths informing us of a great problem with the Rothschilds and co-conspiring banks diabolical design of subduing the world with a one world fiat currency that will destroy all human happiness. Now I'm interested in hearing from those people just what is your solution to this Jewish Banker question? I would like to hear how you would propose to deal with this clear and present danger. Don't be shy, remember, Comrade Stalin's motto: "you can't make an omelet without cracking a few eggs". In the 20th century were you see big government and the ravages it brings, think socialism, not capitalistic Jewish Bankers!

If there is one item I would like to see feedback from readers of this posting, it would be on how a financial collapse in a country would differ from one engineered by Jewish bankers headed by the Rothschilds from say a financial collapse engineered by citizens of Western Democracies themselves by voting in politicians who only did what they were sent to the nations capitol to do: send home the pork at no cost to the voters. I don't pretend to speak for the world, just the U.S. and the problems we have over here don't require the House of Rothschild to explain what is going to happen. Since Roosevelt, in America, we have sent people into office that spent the US Treasury into the poor house and gave us tax breaks and incentives to entice the voters to do like wise. For politicians to have done otherwise would have ended many a brilliant political career. So what would the difference be? I spent many hours doing corrective maintenance on electronics, one of the first things I learnt was you can't fix anything until you can identify the malfunction. I put it to you that the malfunction in America is the morals of the voters who vote in people to office do for them that which they refuse to do themselves, be responsible. In America, we have placed layers of bureaucracy between us and our risks from medical emergencies to retiring in some comfort. "What fools these voter be". We gave our treasure to scoundrels who spent that and then pledged our children's future for the purchase of a ticket for to fools paradise. There use to be a cartoon in the US called "Pogo", and Pogo had a saying "we have met the enemy and he is us."

I like a good conspiracy theory as well as anyone, but the after 1,500 years of worrying about the Jewish bankers obsession with dominating all of Christendom, I for one have finally concluded that if this is so, then the Jewish Bankers they are truly the gang that couldn't shoot straight. For a change I for one would enjoy a conspiracy with the Knights Templars, after all the Templars have been underground since 1314 AD. Most people have never heard of the Knights of the Temple, but let me assure you they walk among us! You will not find any record of tax payment on Templar profits or reference of this organization in any nations where they now currently plot and scheme. Granted a Satanic charter from the Roman Anti-Christ himself, these warrior monks have for 700 years polluted not only every government on earth but also the Free Masons, Italian Mafia, and the Kennedy Family. Why wont a Kennedy ever do hard time, they're Irish Templars!

Silver/Gold Ratio = 48.57

I think Karlito does make a variety of compelling points in his earlier post, "Jude the Obscure." ( one of my favorite Hardy novels, by the way )
He is a compelling, well-read intellect and he spins well. He is a classic example of why New Paradigm analysis is winning the great American Economic Spin Wars.

The response on the Kitco Forum is another classic example of why pro-gold ideology is losing these wars. Again, it is primarily reactive instead of pro-active. It seeks to critique instead of instigate.

Yes, certainly, there is a lot to critique. At times, Karlito's analysis is simplistic...or misrepresentational...or else, it provides analysis that "can't see the forest for the trees," etc. However, ultimately,
it is a damn fine piece of propaganda.

For one thing, Karlito is absolutely right in asserting that a return to a classic gold standard will not provide a state of Nirvana for economic affairs. Historically, it never did and it would be Pollyannish to imagine otherwise. Although there are certainly many advantages to a gold standard, there are also a variety of problems inherent in such a standard and Karlito does a good job of summarizing the more salient examples.

By the same token, there are a great deal of problems in the floating currency exchange system we have today. The central flaw with floating currencies is exactly the same as I described many years ago in one of my more precocious college papers. It has been debated ad nauseum by a variety of notable economists. The majority have come to acknowledge ( privately if not publicly ) that the floating exchange rate system is a time bomb ready to explode. The problem is synchronicity. What happens when certain economic conditions affect all major first world economies AT THE SAME TIME? Unfortunately, the floating currency system is completely incapable of handling this phenomenon. A floating currency system requires asynchronicity, i.e., one economy strong...another economy weak. Economy A pulls Economy B out of its
malaise. But what happens when the same malaise strikes all major economies simultaneously? We are about to witness this interesting phenomenon as the American economy proves itself incapable of acting as the sole lifeboat for a world of sinking economies. ( In a way, the synchronicity problem has been to economists what the Year 2000 problem has been to computer programmers...the great systemic flaw everybody knew about but hoped would never happen in his/her lifetime ) .

My own feeling is that there should be some new hybrid encompassing the best features of the gold standard with the best features of the floating exchange rate system. Ideally, we would strike a middle ground somewhere. In doing so, gold would retain and/or enhance its value.

Is that goal not sufficient? I hope to believe that Kitco is primarily composed of gold investors who wish to protect and/or maximize their wealth against the downside of paper inflation, New Paradigm Ponzi schemes, and other assorted financial manipulations ( e.g., paper pyramids, etc. ) . I hope that Kitcoites are primarily people that want to make their government and major financial institutions responsible and accountable for their actions. Hopefully, it is not composed of people who wish simply to destroy the status quo, gloat at the financial misfortunes of others, and gleefully ride aboard a gold lifeboat while applauding the global economic Titanic as it sinks into an ocean of poverty, war, and ruin.

The main point in my post I wish to hammer home is this: why are gold
investors always trying to defend the shortcomings of their ideology instead of launching much needed attacks upon the manifold flaws in New Paradigm religion? Why are they always reactive instead of proactive?

Take the fight to the New Paradigm purveyors of snake oil, convince the world of the virtues of your arguments, then assist the Establishment in
recreating a viable economic system that will work to the benefit of all.

demon: Thanks. Between a rock and a hard place it is.

Spud Master: In 2000 the question will become "are you a programmer?" I hope all of you here will vouch for me and the other Y2K'ers that we tried to warn and educate others on Y2K. In all fairness the question should be "are you a PHM?" ( Pointy Haired Manager ) but life ain't fair.

fundaMETAList

There is only one significant act to be played out, whne the Hong Kong dollar peg is blown away the DOW and dollar bullsh!t will be cleansed away in the flood and our brave new world is ushered in.
Watch those interest rates drop, just like Japan's earlier this decade...one problem interest can't go negative...because the banks are to greedy to give back some of what the have stolen.

As academic studies have shown all prices go down in a truly deflationary environment, gold included...it's just that gold retains it's purchasing power in these times...i.e. it goes down slower.

In fact historically for many centuries gold does better during deflationary periods than inflationary.

According to GST Global Market Update. Ther are 9800 tons of gold sold short. According to the Veneroso Associates Report they say over 8000 tons short. According to The Financial Reserch Center the money supply over the last 3 months increases by over 10% annually. Somethings got to give !

Freedom is the ideal when people think of America. America may offer more freedom than other countries, but I think what bothers Americans, myself included, is that we are losing freedom. Too many are willing to trade freedom for "security". Perfect security is slavery. We need to strive for the ideal of freedom as a people and can the idea of compromising freedom for security with the bureaucrats. We are resting on our laurels. We must be ever vigilant to preserve our freedom, and I think that right now our momentum is going in the wrong direction. Since this is a gold forum and I need to keep gold in it, the reason I like gold is that it is acceptable to all as value, it is portable and it is private. It reflects the state of contemporary society, although sometimes it may be a leading or lagging indicator. It has never gone out of style, no matter what the current sentiment is.

Oh my--what a night on Kitco

Anybody seen the ads for gold coins on CNBC recently? The gentleman
pitching the coins looks rather embarrassed/sheepish especially at
the end where he turns away from the camera and then back to it.

Just an observation.

Gee Karlitto, I thought "love it or leave it" died with Archie Bunker. Why is it that Pete and I should be forced to flee to escape the plunder of those who contend they own us and have a right to the fruits of our labor. Actually, I have left financially by using a series of tax haven corporations to hold my moderate wealth and to earn my investment income free from the plunder of this group of thugs that call themselves government. I am close to my family and do not wish to forfeit the joy of playing frequently with my grandchildren, else I would probably have already headed to the Caymens, Turks and Caicos, or a similar place where invididual liberty is of concern.
It is interesting that you compare the level of slavery here today with the level at other times or places like I should be happy that I am only 50% slave rather than 85%. Would you be happy because you neighbor beat his spouse every night while your spouse beat you only once a week?
If we created this government then we certainly could not have authorized it as our agent to do anything that we ourselves would have had the right to do. Unfortunately, government has far exceeded any authority they received in their respective corporate charters ( constitutions ) . I live by the principal that I do not have the right to commit an act of agression against another, but otherwise I am free to act as I please whether foolishly or prudently. Unfortunately government acts to impede that freedom and to plunder my wealth and herein is the rub.
There is only a slight difference between the government of Russia and the government of the USA. In Russia they are open about owning everything so people don't bother to produce. Here there is the mass delusion that we are free so people produce and then the government plunders so the level of produciton is higher here. There are some vestages of freedom remaining from the time when government was small which also makes for more wealth here. Have you considered what the level of wealth here would be if in fact we were free people?

Pursuant to my previous post, I should like to highlight the central flaw in Karlito's assault upon gold.

He makes a big issue about gold's poor performance over the past two decades relative to Amercican equities, bonds, and the dollar itself.
Of course, he is right...and the greatest virtue in the American economic system has been the asynchronous performance of these three assets.
In the previous two decades, for all intents and purposes, there has never been an instance in which bonds, equiies, and the dollar have fallen simultaneously over a sustained period of time.

We are now in the incipient stage of complete imminent synchronicity amongst equities, bonds, and the dollar. Just as I described in my previous post that synchronicity would prove to be the undoing of the floating exchange rate system in currencies, synchronicity will also prove to be the Achilles heel in the great American financial bull that has effectively sustained itself for almost two decades.

Thus, when bonds, equities, and the U.S. buck are falling synchronously,
there will be effectively only one pandemic asset class in which to protect wealth, namely precious metals. Barring any government intervention to preclude flight capital moving into precious metals, one would expect an amazing slingshot effect to occur down the road with precious metals soaring upward at an amazing velocity.

Although Sharefin raises very good, valid questions about the viability of various gold mining companies ( with huge debts and low cash reserves ) ,
I believe that if these companies can simply sustain themselves through this rough period, then they will be immediate beneficiaries of the slingshot effect I've described.

An excellent read. Thanks.

Pete: what is the URL for "Committee of 300 by Dr. John Coleman"

Ive been reading you guys for a couple of weeks, and as a result have developed an enthusiasm for the potential the heavy stuff holds for the near future. I appreciate the signifigance of the conflagration on the Pacific Rim,have considered the relationship of gold to what "they" call "money",and have dabbled in the possible scenerios the future holds.The result has been the purchase of what I consider an amount of substantial proportions. Im confident of my direction. Logic,true logic, is singular. Are you guys mostly regular Joe's sittin at home in front of a computer, or are you at work doing this for a livin? ( Im the Joe variety ) Grant

Steady, in response to your 21:16, and... relatively speaking. Why not throw out that bottle of Advil, or just have that tooth pulled instead of that expensive root canal? While you're at it, die about forty years sooner and you will be equating apples with apples. There is a price we pay for this great technology we take for granted, and that price is taxes.

MJPL ( Gold, cartels, and the House of Rothschild ) : When you have time I would like to talk to you: vronsky@netrox.net

This discussion of freedom in a gold forum is I think quite appropriate. What we are talking about with the battle between gold and debt money is really the battle between free markets and government controlled markets. Gold is free market money. Debt based credit ( the current dollar by definition ) is the money favored by governemnt because they can use it as an indirect way to take what purchasing power they do not take by taxes. In a system like ours the banks love the monopoly of loaning new money ( at interest ) into existence. Certainly the effect of the ultimate collapse of this debt bubble will be felt by almost everyone, some in the most dramatic way.

This discussion of freedom in a gold forum is I think quite appropriate. What we are talking about with the battle between gold and debt money is really the battle between free markets and government controlled markets. Gold is free market money. Debt based credit ( the current dollar by definition ) is the money favored by governemnt because they can use it as an indirect way to take what purchasing power they do not take by taxes. In a system like ours the banks love the monopoly of loaning new money ( at interest ) into existence. Certainly the effect of the ultimate collapse of this debt bubble will be felt by almost everyone, some in the most dramatic way.

If you happen to locate the article I spoke of and read pages 115 to 122, you will see a possible explanation of what is occurring in Asia today.

The Clinton administration
and the International
Monetary Fund Thursday night
launched an emergency effort
to pull Indonesia back from
the brink of economic
disaster and stem the
deepening financial crisis
in Asia, Friday's WASHINGTON
POST is reporting. The IMF
announced that its top two
officials will travel to
Jakarta shortly in an effort
to speed Indonesia's $43
billion bailout -- rescuing
the rescue -- as was done
for South Korea two weeks
ago...

Farfel
I subject I know little about.

What will be the Y2K problems for mining companies.
Obviously they will suffer from office associated computor problems.
How much the actual mining equipment rely's upon computers I don't know.
Whether or not they use embedded chips within their equipment.
Then they have indirect potential for problems with banks and supply of materials/equipment for the mining operation.
Also potential for problems with the companies they supply to.
They could also fold, leaving no demand.

They whole overview is rather complex, and should be analysed by someone with knowledge in this field.

I will be bullish on gold/gold stocks but only after a correction.
Then I would target the largest/most safest appearing companies that I feel could survive the Y2k drama.
Or just go back to catching short term trend rises.