A nice little essay from The Mining Journal. Scroll until you get to the blurb about A Year to Forget and the asia crisis. http://www.mining-journal.com/mj/

Any news out about Christmas retail sales?

A little levity,


Product Warnings:

"Caution: The contents of this bottle should not be fed to fish." -- On a
bottle of shampoo for dogs.

"Do not use while sleeping." -- On a hair dryer.

"Do not light in face. Do not expose to flame." -- On a lighter.

"Do not attempt to stop the blade with your hand." -- In the manual for a
Swedish chainsaw.

"Do not eat." -- On a slip of paper in a stereo box, referring to the
styrofoam packing.

"Access hole only -- not intended for use in lifting box." -- On the sides
of a shipping carton, just above cut-out openings which one would
assume were handholds.

"Warning: May cause drowsiness." -- On a bottle of Nytol, a brand of
sleeping pills.

"Warning: Misuse may cause injury or death." -- Stamped on the metal
barrel of a .22 calibre rifle.

"Turn off motor before using this product." -- On the packaging for a
chain saw file, used to sharpen the cutting teeth on the chain.

"Not to be used as a personal flotation device." -- On a 6x10 inch
inflatable picture frame.

"Do not put in mouth." -- On a box of bottle rockets.

"Please remove before driving." -- On the back of a cardboard windshield
( for keeping the car from getting too hot when parked ) .

"Remove plastic before eating." -- On the wrapper of a Fruit Roll-Up
snack.

"Do not drive cars in ocean." -- In small print at the bottom of the
screen during a car commercial which shows a car in the ocean.

"Not dishwasher safe." -- On a remote control for a TV.

"For lifting purposes only." -- On the box for a car jack.

"Do not put lit candles on phone." -- On the instructions for a cordless
phone.

I've been away from my desk, away from home, and away from my computer these last few days. I'm catching up now on the last few days and want to say thanks for all the kind wishes and messages of support for our fine group.

Although I'm a little late even for boxing day I'd like to extend my sincerest holiday wishes to all the many excellent contributors who are responsible for creating and maintaining the quality of this site and to the lurkers who keep our ratings up.

I would spend more time here myself, but as demands on my time for other things increase I'm finding I have less available than I had previously.

I am told that we are Y1.999K compliant ( unlike last year ) . I'm anxious to see if this holds true to see if I'll use the same guys to give us our Y2K seal of approval.

Best wishes to all !

Auric
I spend Christmas with my sister who asked me to pass on her deep thanks; she sends you a flight of fantails. The 1/2oz Gold Kiwi disappeared into her Jewellery box, and her eyes glistened for a while.

Wish I could have seen it, my friend. I gave half ounce Maple Leafs to my two nephews and niece Actually, they were given a choice between that and $100. Ha, they all picked the $100 until I told them the price of Gold. They all then chose the Gold.

Bart
In the past I have led a campaign to annihilate the golden "en", {ens are people too} as it mysteriously appears in golden eagle when that site name {also the name of a merkan gold coin} is posted here. Although the campaign has raised a significant capital base for a fighting fund, {and lifted my profile ready for elections} I now realise that my energies were misapplied.
I hereby announce my resignation from the Bored of Directors for the Society against Ennism.
Why do I take this radical step? Simply because I visited the Golden Beagles' "discussion group" today and noticed that the posts were comprised, for the most part of info lifted from the news first posted here.

Someone, perhaps someone at the golden flugle merely has been copying kitco and calling it the golden weavil discussion group.


In view of this plagiarism, and the fact that I can't stand split infinitives

"De purpose be to determine whence we came and where we presently is - in o'da' to hopefully fo'esee where we are goin'."

I freely admit I was wrong. Enism is __GOOD__

Thanks for the cyte...

Auric
And Beautiful Jewel received her gold pig. She was quite beside herself. Oh yes, she loves that gold pig.
Sounds like your nephews and niece know how to calculate value.

Had a chance to talk to some of my relatives and various friends this week, it being the holidays and all. Was able to get a pretty good read on sentiment, at least here in the states, regarding the US equity markets and that type of thing. Seems like the concensus is: the economy is good, stocks are going to fly. One cousin in particular struck me because he is determined to start buying MSFT stock this week with the money he got as a bonus from work, the funny part being that he had absolutely no idea what stock even was when I asked him about it. I've heard this quote two ways, "Those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad", which seems like a pretty good angle on this market. The other way I've heard the quote is, "Those whom the gods would destroy, they first make proud", which might be a little closer to the point. I had a nice Christmas, woman liked the oriental gold bangles I bought her: extremely beautiful, sort of magical in a way, slender with nice lines, glow in the sunlight and sparkles in the moonlight. The bracelets I gave her are pretty too.

of Charmin over the next year."
----------------------------------------------------------------------
http://nypostonline.com/business/8838.htm

for lease rate fans ..
agree farfel inflation rate is key item in forward rate
effect on pog ..
example see january 1988 .. forward rate is 6.3 !!
gold is 490 .. just before start of decline that
persisted to 1993 ..
HOWEVER .. checked pile of Economists to 1988 and
caramba .. inflation was 4.5! so real forward rate
was 6.3 - 4.5 or under 2 !!
I believe that the focus of the effects of inflation,
and interest rate ( and lease rate ) are at the juncture
of the forward rate less inflation.
Should inflation surprise all the deflationary chaps..
and the fed cuts rates to match the euro cut ..
we could have a gold surprise package.. because the
cpi is at 1.5 % now .. so we are at a "real" forward
rate of close to 2 at present.

My daughter gave me twenty gold coins for Christmas. She knows how fond I am of these things. Only problem was that that they had chocolate centres. She ended up eating most of them as well. The moral of the story is to make sure you hide your...er...'chocolate' well. I gave her some earrings for pierced ears made of 'guess what'. We had told her that she couldn't pierce her ears until she was 18 ( now 14 ) . It took 30 seconds for the implications of this present to dawn on her. Worth its weight in hugs...er...gold!!

Gooday from the chilly Midwest ! We hope all of you survived feasting and libation reasonably. Golden good morning to all ! See there is a tad of rancor in the Fatherland http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_242000/242761.stm

www.rush-online.com/townhall.htm

http://nt.excite.com/news/r/981227/04/business-oil

http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm199899/cmselect/cmenvtra/90/9002.htm

----
Y2K diary - not mine - worth reading
http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=000Knr

---------
No Cause For Complacency
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/foc1226e.htm

rate is already dignificantly under 2%. I make it
forward rate of 4.55-1.72 = 2.83% less the inflation rate
of 1.5% equals 1.33 for the 'real' forward rate. But the last
figure I saw for the inflation rate was .7% which would give
us a real forward rate of 2.13, or just above the critical
threshold of 2%.

My conclusions re the gold/silver carry are based on the chart
patterns of POG, POS and forward rate ( unadjusted for inflation )
I had a look at POS over the past three years, and plotted
the unadjusted ( unreal ) forward rate against it, ( a time when
the Fed was holding iterest rates at a remarkably constant
( and high ) level of 5.5% ) Particularly in Oct, Nov 1997, the
forward rate was range bound at 2.2 to 3.4%. During Oct-Nov
of 1997, the forward rate dipped below 2.3% only 4 times and
only for 1 or two days at a time. During this period, silver
declined from 5.25 to 4.65 and then firmed back up to 5.50.
There was an almost perfect correlation between peaks in the
forward rate and down spikes in POS and down spikes in forward
rates and peaks in POS. Until the Buffet play in Dec of '97,
there was a remarkable hesitation for lease rates to go below
2.2%. If memory serves, the inflation rate at the time was
between 1.5 and 2%.

My purpose in looking at silver prices, was to determine if there
was a similar pattern to gold prices with forward rates. There
is. Price spikes occur when forward rates get down to 2.25%.
If we could obtain very accurate inflation data, say on a monthly
basis and had some figures on costs in operating the gold/silver
carry, we could actually determine to the day ( with Dabchick's
data ) when ( if ) the Fed will lose control of the POG and POS.

On March 6 of 1998, I think they almost lost control when lease
rate went up over 3%. The forward rate was about 2.25% and
gold was moving to $314. At the time, there was a spat of
announcements of Swiss, Belgian CB gold sales and some negative
comments by Duisenberg to the effect that ECB gold reserves would
be only 15% of total reserves. So most definitely, there has
been an American and ECB campaign against gold. The question
still remains, will the ECB still be participating after Jan 1999?
I would think their interests would be served by a rise in POG
as the EURO is introduced. After all, all signs point to a decline
in the USD against the yen and other currencies in the new year.

FWIW, Rhody.

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/bs/story.html?s=v/nm/19981227/bs/retail_2.html

Sunday December 27 1:25 AM ET

Bargain Hunters Chasing Away U.S. Retailers' Blues

Lifted from comp.software.year-2000.

"I have been making an attempt to convince my friends & family that the 'y2k

thing' is significant and that preparing is important. HHS has now done part

( most ) of that job for me.

My sister is the "personnel administrator" ( ? ) for an assisted living center

( nursing home ) in Minnesota. She received a letter last week from HHS. I have

not read the letter, ( and so cannot guarantee the accuracy of the following )

but this is what she tells me it says: HHS will not have their systems upgraded

by January of 2000. Therefore sometime late next year, around August, they

will transfer a large sum of money to a local ( to the nursing home ) bank, which

will then disburse to the nursing home a certain amount of money each month.

The amount will be based on average monthly disbursements from the previous

months. They will be unable to figure out how much ( specifically ) to give out."

The consensus of responses to this post is that at least the gov't. has recognized the problem and is taking some action while there is still time.

http://www.russiatoday.com:80/rtoday/business/news/98121712.html

for Rhody ..
last number I have is 1.5 % year
on year cpi for USA for October..
dont know if November is out yet ..

http://www.canoe.ca/Money/ye_moneymonitor.html

http://www.phillynews.com:80/inquirer/98/Dec/27/business/STOX27.htm

to all ..
does anybody know why the lease rate
and forward rate tables dont have
any numbers in them ??
.. have we been put on a need to know
basis ??

GOLDTECK, regarding your recent request for RANGY info, please email me at rangy@usa.net

or if you're already on my mailing list, you'll be getting some info within the next few days. Happy Holidays.

http://www.geocities.com/~polarbear47/mailing.htm

http://insidedenver.com:80/news/1227sqat6.shtml

Re your post on "if we knew" all those things at the beginning of 1998. Absent was the big drop in interest rates. It seems to me--it's been some years since I've checked it--that Value Line has fit historical year to year changes in stock prices with a simple equation with only two parameters, corporate profits and interest rates. Prehaps someone has their prediction last year and this year. My own notion is that both interest rates and corporate profits will move in the wrong direction ( for stocks ) this year. Perhaps in a violent way.

start thinking about inflation!!!!!!!!!

To all Kitcoites interested in y2k
Todays NEW YORK TIMES[Sunday]there is a Major front page article re y2k.
Just started to read it, it is three pages long.I am sure that it is
in print just for public awareness.Also understand there is a y2k article in todays San Francisco Examiner.Go Forecross{FRXX].They say that those who dream are haunted but I have hope not dreams for Forecross.

Your figure of 1.5% suggests that the gold carry may already
be uneconomic as it puts the "real" forward rate at only 1.33%.
I wish I know the commission/transfer costs for the gold carry!

Bart charges about 5% for shipping and insurance of 100 oz
bars of silver, ie about $CAN50 for shipping a 100 oz bar of
silver worth about $CAN850. At these rates the gold/silver
carry is already uneconomic. So how can hedge funds remove
and sell bullion from CBs and still make money at just over
a 2% spread in the real forward rates???? Something does not
compute. Maybe we should examine this question amongst the
group. Maybe someone out there knows something about commission
rates for buying and selling one month treasuries.

Incidently, While examining lease rates back to the beginning of
1996, I discovered that while the gold carry is in play, it is
the one month lease rates which fluctuate, while when the funds
lose control, all lease rates spike ( one month through 1 year ) .
This may mean that in order to cover their one month leases
during a price spike, they borrow silver from the 3 month or
the 6 month term in order to replace silver leases coming to
term on the one month leases. So the Buffet play resulted not
so much in a POS spike, but in a lease rate spike.

How do we, as holders of physical metal ever profit from a
lease rate spike? If this is the pattern for future metal
markets, then we are in the wrong business, and the mining
ndustry has a terminal illness called "metal leasing". FWIW.

Your comments are greatly appreciated. Rhody Signing off for
a few hours.

start thinking about buying seasoned gold stocks.

http://www.azcentral.com:80/business/1224madeinamer24.shtml

or forward rates since near the beginning of the year. If you
scroll down in Bart's charts, there are a few figures at the
beginning of 1998, and for years before, but not recently.

I wish Bart hadn't dropped posting those figures, but beggers
can't be complainers.

Bucking dire predictions about the effects of impeachment, declining earnings and sky-high price-to-earnings ratios, the stock market has risen for the past six sessions in a row and could return more than 30 percent in 1999. In fact, the four years that come to a close this Thursday may be the best in history.
A good question is: Why? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1998-12/27/048l-122798-idx.html

Once the IMF gets all these third world debts solidified. Boy!!! will there be some money EXPLOTION!!!! PRINTING OF ALL CURRENCYS.I think that will be a time to find a new currency reserve.

domotomo....

explotion?

maybe explosion.......or exploitation......maybe.
geeeeeeze.....

semantics.

That is a terrible article to post on a gold site. There are enough unhappy and some broke gold bugs who have endured the recent past and now we have predictions of another year of stock profits and a rationization of large earnings. Not the spirit of the season or the last or the previous etc.... It does add to my view that buying gold in the face of deflation requires both a long view and a long life expectancy or the view that the immediate future can't be predicted.

the word was EXPLOSION!!!!!!

us chritians did not go to school.

domo.....

semantics has nothing to do spelling....

don't even attempt to go there....throwing religon
as an alibi.....

geeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeezeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

one more time...

suprise? or surprise?

domo......we know what happened to readin' & writin'......
what about 'rithmitec?

cherokee!;..flaying.hide.from.gelatinous.grey.matter......

100 reasons to buy gold

http://www.gold.org/Gedt/Speeches/Ms/Ms_b.htm

You win you are smarter than me.

It's good to know their is 100 reasons to buy gold but not your own.

domo..

a question....

......if one could not swim, would one attempt
to swim shark infested waters?

this does require an intuitive ability......and
does not determine how smart a person may, or may not be....

sophomoric considerations aside......this is the big fish-bowl...
you can eat.......be eaten.......or hide and watch others be eaten..

!;...chomp...chomp...chomp.........earppppp!

Have you seen a dentist lately??????

as performed by a non-tech feller'.

Over the last few months, my e.mails have become text-distorted. This condition seems to over time. I operate with win95, IE4.01 w/ SP and Microsoft Outlook Express.

"Forwarded" e.mails and original e.mails that contain attachments, such as .wav and .jpg files arrive at the recipient in an unreadable form. The distortion is visually evidenced by groups of capital letters, groups of hex, and various mess.

I have reloaded programs, installed service packs from the Billy Gates Stalinista Company...tried everything to no avail.

Yesterday, acting on the recommendation of my ISP, I installed Eudora Light ( the free version ) to handle the mail. It is running beautifully and very fast....and mighty friendly to a technOdumbass too!

If is downloadable from download.com without charge. FREE! and better than the communistic versions of Outlook or Outlook Express.

Iam.stu.2.U

for the eagle.eye'O'da'cherOkee...


Date: Sun Dec 27 1998 11:19
STUDIO.R ( @mutilated e.mails.......an attempt at public service...... ) ID#119358:
Copyright  1998 STUDIO.R/Kitco Inc. All rights reserved
as performed by a non-tech feller'.

Over the last few months, my e.mails have become text-distorted. This condition seems to worsen over time. I operate with win95, IE4.01 w/ SP and Microsoft Outlook Express.

"Forwarded" e.mails and original e.mails that contain attachments, such as .wav and .jpg files arrive at the recipient in an unreadable form. The distortion is visually evidenced by groups of capital letters, groups of hex, and various mess.

I have reloaded programs, installed service packs from the Billy Gates Stalinista Company...tried everything to no avail.

Yesterday, acting on the recommendation of my ISP, I installed Eudora Light ( the free version ) to handle the mail. It is running beautifully and very fast....and mighty friendly to a technOdumbass too!

It is downloadable from download.com without charge. FREE! and better than the communistic versions of Outlook and Outlook Express.

Iam.stu.2.U


Return to Kitco Homepage

( Re: Your 10:47 - "don't even attempt to go there....throwing religon as an alibi..... ) Mary Chrismas mon compadero! I no dat surtan top-icks r verbotten 'round hear butt right's know at's dis times uf yar I's quess dat's a liddle RELIGION ees OkeyDokee's, M. cherokees! ;- )
( From Mooney's up and coming novel, "100 Reasons It Is Not Polite to Correct Other Weine Wackers Spelling Misstakes".

domo...

a lesson for free........

there are 2 different spellings for -----there------

their-----possesive
there-----

small wonder our society loses ground daily.....the basics
of communication have been bastardized...we have semi-literate
semi-adults graduating ( ? ) from school without the basics
of education.....spelling IS a basic..........and irregardless
has no place in the dictionary...

e-bonics be us.........tomo......carry on tomo......
the mouth monitor watches from afar....ready to
jack-slap the frog from the defilers of the word.

!;...semantics.my.@ss.....look.it.up.in.the.dictionary....domo..

I don't pretend to be versed in spelling I spent four years getting a degree in genetics at the university of western ont.. Played varsity football and beat Toronto for the Colledge Bowl in 1974 at the CNE.This must be strange to a SHARK like you.

their-----possesive
there----- Try - POSSESSIVE!

just in case you have problems "setting up" larger variants of domo's in the future..... http://www.wwi.com.au/support/majordomo/2.htm

stu.says...where's mi majordomO when I need him?

happy 1.999 to YA!!! G&P

moonman----

thank you......now spit the hook out.....


domo.......you reply as to skills--via university--accentuates the
truth.......

You win I give up.

Cherokee: Examine thyself. "irregardless" is redundant and not used by talented linguists

Cherokee, tomo, mon freres, let us re-kindle the so soon departed Xmas spirit with a toast to each other. Let us chop-a-saki away with words ( AWAY with words, I say! ) and give only warm, silent, cyber glances of good will toward posters and lurkers alike. Besides, oh friend Cherokee, we wouldn't want to rile a fellow who messes with Genes the way you mess so delightfully with smoke-mobility!

I hope I have not interrepted something pleasant fror both of you...Please see my next post for a genuine plea for help...Cerokee - you might be able to help me on this...

it is rather obvious that our polar rocks are in accelerating liquificational transistion...we must flee the future Island that is Long Since Drowned to a much higher stratification.

did you get mi eudora.mailees? huhOhuhOhuh?

Does anyone have anything to share about O'Okiep Copper? ( OKP ) . Please feel free to offer any info, real or imagined. Thanks in advance.

it is rather obvious that our polar rocks are in accelerating liquificational transistion...we must flee the future Island that is Long Since Drowned to a much higher stratication.

did you get mi eudora.mailees? huhOhuhOhuh?

I am trying to find the highest peak on the Island...Coor's country eh...
Hmmmmmm...only if we can tube the outhouse into the NWO headquarters under the Denver Airport...

Indo-China Goldfields...ING...yup...uh huh..

silver plate...

exactly....that is why it is not found in the dictionary....
it was used as an example.....to attenuate....or filter.......
as should ALL be attenuated...or filtered......

the sharks swim with-out knowing they swim....who swims here
with-out water?

moke sheller....

howdy from the state that is big.......know nothing of the paper
copper entity you ask of......are you aware of what comes from
the aether towards the earth from afar? it has a date with the
carbo-earth-anouts around easter.....hearing snippets from
different places.....who needs an x-ray?

t1.....

puffs a-plenty from the ssm.........should be over-head shortly..

!;...removing.hooks........setting.fish.free....

http://www.siliconinvestor.com/~wsapi/investor/Subject-23993

Goldteck: Thanks for the Washington Post article posting. It expresses a point of view very clearly. This is the way many money managers think, isn't it? The successful follow current wisdom, the trend. Investors generally would have fared better buying the index funds, than entrusting their funds to managers, I think. ( Of course, most stocks have not risen this year, and many have not recovered from sharp declines ) . The analysis presented makes clear why this was so. It also assumes the US is in control of future events to a greater degree than I see to be the case.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1998-12/27/137l-122798-idx.html

hak...cough...cough...glug...

thanks for the plug for IndoChina Goldfields. Please be a tad understanding of my reluctance to contemplate exploration in SE Asian jungles. In any event, if you should have any information about OKP, it would be appreciated.
Holiday Greetings from down the road on the Island that is Long.

http://www.newswire.ca//releases/November1998/02/c0038.html and all the links I have found so far for o'kiep copper are dead...I am looking...

http://mbendi.co.za/orgs/cbnm.htm

did you get my voice.mail? huh? ( puff ) ( hack ) ( hack ) ( plop )

ronnietO

got technology?

Fascinating article. I have heard that when the bulls start talking about "new" economics, and sustainable PE's of 50 to 100, it's time to start looking for the Exit.

was sending to your old e.mail address......no vunder!. mi address book was lost in studio's e.mail dark ages.

got address book?

Are oil stocks now a buy?
. http://www.forbes.com/forbes/98/1228/6214050a.htm

It's mighty tempting to short those sky-high Internet stocks. But everyone who has tried to do this is getting murdered. http://www.forbes.com/forbes/98/1228/6214101a.htm

for mike ..
7 million shares .. owned mostly by goldfields ..
does not trade in rsa .. but adrs trade in US ..
. you can maybe get info if you can find a goldfields
site...

Date: Sat Dec 26 1998 15:27
Jack ( @2BR02B....ref to your 13:04...and some random thoughts )

Who was that poster mentioned by Andy Smith?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sorry for the delayed response, this 5-member household doesn't
frequent the occasion for sustained participation...dad I need the
computer, hon I need the telephone, time to pick that one up,
drop that one off to and from their activities. By the time
one logs back on hours or a day later the iron has quite cooled.

Dunno who posted that referred to by A. Smith, but vaguely
recall the post. Further down in that monthly commentary:

http://www.mitsui-gold.com/

...was an interesting graph overlaying the rising bar charts of
Eagle sales mirrored by the rising option interest in that unusual
Dec99 $390 Comex contract, some 100 tons naked. Maybe just a coincidence.
But if Mr. Market speaks with an anticipatory, composite voice of
participants and their varying reasons/purposes/opinions, that chart
depicts a propitious outlook for the price of gold in '99.

Smith also noted in that commentary that, even taking into account
the remarkable record Eagle sales this year, the entire sales of American
Eagles in their eight years of minting don't amount to the most recent
Belgian central bank sale announcement.

Correction-- eight years of Eagle sales should be 8 1/2mil
ounces total.

Saturday 26 December 1998Placer Dome staying bullish on prospects for coming yearThe Vancouver SunRod Nutt, Sun Business Reporter Vancouver Sun Despite low gold prices, Placer Dome Inc. expects to report "decent" earnings next year, Placer Dome official Hugh Leggatt said Thursday.Leggatt says the Vancouver company's main focus in early 1999 will be to close the two major acquisitions it has recently announced.Placer Dome made a profit of $74 million in the first nine months of this year, up from $35 million in the same period of the previous year."We expect decent earnings this year and next, and we will concentrate on completing due diligence for the acquisition of Getchell Gold and Western Areas," Leggatt said.Earlier this month, Placer Dome said it intends to acquire Getchell Gold Corp. of Denver in a share exchange worth about $1.1 billion US.Placer expects Getchell to produce more than 800,000 ounces of gold by 2003.The company also announced the acquisition of half the assets of Western Areas Ltd. of Johannesburg, South Africa, for $235 million US.The two acquisitions will increase Placer's gold reserves to almost 80 million ounces. "We expect to produce 3.2 million ounces of gold in 1999 at a cost of $170 US an ounce," Leggatt said.For 1998, the company will produce 2.9 million ounces at a cost of $160 US an ounce.Placer is also forging ahead with the development of the Las Cristinas gold property in Venezuela.Leggatt said financing for the $575-million US mine should be in place before the end of January.Negotiations for a $250-million US loan from an international banking syndicate led by CS First Boston Corp. of New York should conclude in the near future.Las Cristinas, which is expected to produce 530,000 ounces of gold a year, is 70-per-cent owned by Placer Dome and 30-per-cent owned by Venezuela's state mining company, Corporacion Venezolana de Guyana.Placer halted construction at Las Cristinas about a year ago after Crystallex International Corp. of Vancouver launched an unsuccessful lawsuit claiming key blocks of the property.

Please post your thoughts regardless of the thought police, the spelling police, the religion police, or whatever power might appear to be in control of the conversation at the time. If you have something to say, say it, do whatever it takes. If you can't write, draw crayon pictures on newspaper and sign them with hot wax and an impression from your signet ring. Make a tape recording of your thoughts and send them to someone who can post them to the forum. Find someone who plans to travel to a goldbug's business and paint your thoughts on their naked body so your message will get delivered in person. If nothing else works, sit down in the middle of a public street and threaten to set yourself on fire until someone posts your thoughts to the forum. Do whatever it takes, but please post, you'll always have an audience here.

Thanks for the Goldfields hint on OKP.
Happy New Year!

after trying all those communication gestures you advised, I found it much more pleasant and a good deal safer to simply post at Kitco. Long live Bart and Company!

http://iamexwiwww.unibe.ch/studenten/zumstein/cap/cap.txt

Jupiter
Did you manage to find a copy of Jastram's The Golden Constant? I thought I had one in my grasp, but it proved to be a chimera, composed of smoke and reflected in a glass, darkly. Rather like this gold market. Of course, "the market is the reality, intelligence just an illusion," as Au_Producer's friend says.

Planetariumaurator

Item #57 ( in which it is stated that Brian Mulroney former PM of
Canada and ex President of the Bank of Canada are both promoting
the holding of gold in CBs ) is SOOOO ironic. Brian Mulroney and
his sidekick John Crow were the characters who implimented the
present day policy of the BANK OF CANADA to SELL Canada's gold
reserves. Mulroney then leaves the country, and becomes a
director of none other than Barrick Gold. If all of this strikes
anyone else as perverse and ironic, let me know.

Mulroney would know what this would do to the gold market,
and I expect he would know about when this CB selling would likely
end. He has positioned himself to maximize his gains when gold
finally reverts back to a more reasonable price level. Number 57
is bullish for gold alright, but only because one of the most
manipulative hacks in the world has positioned himself to profit
at others' expense.

http://www.absa.co.za/international_banking/prods_gold.html

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 21:34
Puetz ( bpuetz@holli.com ) ID#222167:
The "run on the mutual funds" intensified this week. If I heard the AMG numbers on CNBC correctly. Forced sales by mutual fund managers will follow shortly. I believe the number for last week were over $9 billion of net redemptions. That was preceded by redemptions of $1 billion and $2 billion in the prior two weeks. The nervousness, impatience, and selling is grow with each passing week. THe BIG panic is not too far away.

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 18:42
cherokee__A ( @-----spears-of-a-feather----------arrows-cloistered-together-------- ) ID#344308:
yes, we do agree.......time is short, and we all are in deep sh!t.
please, no zin------ss's will do quite nicely
big week ahead..........paper goin down.....big..
cherokee! ) ----looking-for-the-big-bear------again---

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 18:20
Schultz ( Inflation or Deflation? ) ID#288239:
To gain some certainty on how deflation is absolutely impossible, study what it is that G7 does when they meet to set exchange rates. Has anyone here ever wondered what G7 does?

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 14:20
Allen ( USA ) ( Karlito_99 re: "we shall see .." ) ID#246224:
Hope you are not hurt to badly by the market as it collapses because everyones speculative assumptions were not supported by reality.

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 13:49
vronsky ( GOLD BETWEEN $3,500 TO $8,400...? ) ID#426220:
This prediction gains tremendous credibility after you read the credentials of its author...

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 12:38
cherokee__A ( @-----'the best defense is a strong offense' ---THE gen. g. patton--- ) ID#344308:
santa claus rally? the door is fixing to slam shut on the paper-tiger
and her remaining riders...next week.
next week--------the mother of all sell-offs......
cherokee!;-------ridin-the-limb-of-life--&---climbing-the-beanstalk

Date: Fri Dec 26 1997 00:56
Silver Bull ( SILVER STREAK ) ID#287312:
Fundamentally and technically silver should be bought on pull backs of 8 to 15 cents ( if you get the chance ) .

Date: Sat Dec 27 1997 19:44
farfel ( HAGGIS...Yet another Scottish ditty found in my closet... ) ID#28585:
Oh, just once in a century, a man might discover
The one gold mine that's unlike any other,
He'll never have to kiss any more asses,
Never be short of comely fair lasses,
And now I know just where to find,
That once in a lifetime motherlode mine,
No, it's not anywhere near ABX or PDG,
Nor anywhere near NEM, as far as I can see,
In fact, it's straight ahead, right in front of you,
It's name is Pegasus, the symbol PGU.

Date: Sat Dec 27 1997 18:50
farfel ( Haggis...pursuant to my previous post re: Pegasus... ) ID#28585:
Bottom Line: Pego is probably the best buy in the XAU crowd! ( i.e., for
specs with balls of steel )

Date: Sat Dec 27 1997 16:33
cherokee__A ( @----his-highness-of-the-information-highway-----------thanks----- ) ID#344308:
greetings, oh great receiver and relayer of smoke-signals....
what say you of the current topping-out of bonds....? looking
good from many angles....

Date: Sat Dec 27 1997 15:25
farfel ( HAGGIS...PEGASUS looks like great spec play at 5/8... ) ID#28585:
Bottom line: I love to see situations where the shareholders are gripped with abject fear, fomented and catalyzed by the vulture investment boys.
DAT'S A HOW I MAKEA DA BIGGA BUCKS ( har,har, har ) !!

Date: Sat Dec 27 1997 10:56
cherokee__A ( @-----4 days and counting------- ) ID#344308:
the lights are going OUT this next week for stocks. i've
ridden this damnable limb for 3 weeks with support only
from the tree of knowledge.......
time is short, the ink is flowing......the ink tsunami will wash
upon all shores with indifference to the greetings....AYE
cherokee!;--eya---physics dictate a MAJOR CONTRACTION....immutable

http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/981227/bb.html

I'm starting to believe, that the Kitco poster who Andy Smith used to make a point would better remain unknown, as the comments came after the deed.

The coin sales don't amount to much when averaged over the years, even when the sales of KR's, Maples and the other bullion coins are added in. On paper, it doesn't look promising, but hopefully, the recent uptrend will turn to a flood.

Money coming out of Japan's Postal Savings might find their way into Euro's and Gold, while foreign money parked in US Treasuries may do likewise.

This is probably wishful thinking on my part; but a rush out of, or away from the US dollar seems to be part of the answer, that will spur gold.

Investors around the globe have yet to come to the realization that the markets cannot continue as they have.

The lesson has already been given in Japan, due to their past speculations and to the SE Asians due to the currency crashes. Have they learned? Or do they see gold as a remedy?

Perhaps a derivatives failure by a big US Bank has to occur, this may keep foreigners out of US paper and awaken them to the value of gold. A Y2K breakdown of the big financial institution's computer system might be blamed.

The culprits would be the financial rocket scientists and the banker/broker bosses who funded the new financial wizzardry -a congressional committee will pardon the latter and castigate the former. All IMHO of experiences past.

I read basically every post and don't recall that one at all.

THURSDAY
DECEMBER 24
1998















The U.S. as an aggressor power


One aspect of the Impeachment Week symbolic bombing of
Iraq -- symbolic in that it seems to have had little impact on
the correlation of forces in the area, though it had a more
than symbolic impact on certain Iraqis, and lightened
taxpayers' wallets by a rather concrete $500 billion -- has
hardly been noticed in print. This was one of the first, if not
the very first, military attack by the United States without so
much as a semblance of justification as a defensive action.

I'm not so naive as to imagine that the constitutional
provision giving Congress and only Congress the power to
declare war applies any longer in our Brave New World
Order. Sure, the provision was placed there explicitly to
prevent a future president from spending the taxpayers'
money ( five times the entire federal budget in 1964 ) and
risking the lives of military personnel in useless and
cavalier military actions like the one Mr. Clinton ordered.
But the provision has been shredded over the years, by the
undeclared war in Korea, the undeclared war in Vietnam,
and countless undeclared wars and military actions since
then. The Constitution hasn't been amended, but this
provision has been effectively repealed.

Even when Congress tried to take back some of the powers
presidents had ceded to the presidency by passing the War
Powers Act after Watergate, it implicitly granted the
president more power to undertake military hostility than
the framers of the constitution had ever imagined would be
possible. Under the law the president has to report to
Congress within a certain number of days of launching a
military strike, and theoretically to get its permission to
continue. Even those provisions are routinely ignored.

Until very recently, however, American policy makers were
always careful to cast military activities as necessary
defensive measures rather than as acts of aggression. The
coalition that fought the Gulf War wasn't assembled, and
perhaps couldn't have been assembled, until Saddam
Hussein had invaded Kuwait. Most of the military actions in
Bosnia were at least justified as responses to aggression by
Serb forces. Even last August's Monicagate missiles were
spun as a response to the terrorist bombings of U.S.
embassies in Africa.

Not all the arguments that military actions were undertaken
reluctantly in response to naked aggression were
intellectually sustainable. Some -- see the Gulf of Tonkin
resolution in Vietnam -- were clearly a case of orchestrating
events to create a fig leaf of defensive response. But at least
some effort was made to create the appearance of a defensive
response to aggression, because policy makers, however
much they might be devoted to real politick, were convinced
that Americans were not the kind of people who were
comfortable with the idea of their nation undertaking
military action simply to punish somebody who was seen as
potentially dangerous, or on a whim.

For whatever reason, that final restraint -- of needing to
appear judicious and defensive rather than aggressive for
fear of stirring up negative public opinion -- has gradually
disappeared during the Clinton years. Last February, when
Monica I was raging, President Clinton was fully prepared to
launch missiles -- not because Saddam had done anything to
his neighbors -- yet -- or taken any aggressive action, but
because ( to put it in a deliberately provocative way ) he had
defended his nation's tattered sense of sovereignty against
incursion by minions of the New World Order.

President Clinton was ready to launch an attack on the same
thin pretext in November, then did it in December. The
attack marks an important turning point in the evolution of
the United States into an explicitly imperialistic power -- one
that doesn't need the pretext of real or pretended aggression
to ``give the wogs a whiff o' the grape,'' but feels fully
justified in attacking other countries because their leaders
have failed to acknowledge our suzerainty -- or just because.

Others have noted that by launching the attack without even
the courtesy of pro forma consultation with our ``allies,'' the
United States has set in motion forces that will come back to
bite us -- especially if, as appears likely, Russia decides it's
time to rebuild its military and seize Great Power status in
opposition to the United States. I think the sadder aspect is
that we have become a power that feels free to attack
anybody anywhere in the world without even pretending
the action is really defensive in nature. The American soul
died a little that week.


"Of all the things published about Ruby Ridge, Alan Bock
did the best job. We appreciate his hard work and dedication
to getting as many facts straight as possible.'' -- Randy and
Sara Weaver.

Autographed copies of this landmark book now available to
WorldNetDaily readers at $17.00 ( list price $22.00 ) plus $3.00
shipping and handling. Send check or money order to Alan
W. Bock, c/o Orange County Register, P.O. Drawer 11626,
Santa Ana, CA 92711.


Alan Bock is senior editorial writer for the Orange County
Register, a contributing editor for the National Educator
and author of "Ambush at Ruby Ridge."

Cage Rattler
I went looking for the post that Andy referred to in my new and tiny archive, but the words used are too general, they form part of the usual language of kitco, so the search query resulted in too much noise.

Andy Smith has long stated that he lurks@kitco. Why not?

First, there's the issue of available shares for short selling. There may be no shares available to be loaned out for short selling. A big problem if you want to short a stock.

Second, with price movements measured in TENS of dollars per minutes, you could be wiped out in less than an hour. If you're assuming that stops will save you, there are a couple of problems. The biggest is will your broker accept stops and limit orders on NASDAQ stocks. Not all brokers will! Most that do are dealers of the stock in question and thus you may be trading 'against the house'. Not a good place to be in the NASDAQ stocks.

The other issue is at what price you will be filled at. Most of these stocks move as they due because of poor liquidity. On the surface that may sound like a silly assertion, but, when the market is filled with mostly buyers and few sellers the stock price will skyrocket to convince someone to sell their shares. The converse of this is true also. Beware.

Finally, were does a 'mania' stop? How high is the sky? How tall do trees grow? Would you have liked to have been short AMZN at $280 on 12/18 ( Friday ) only to watch it go to $320 on 12/21 ( Monday at the open ) . BTW, it gapped at the open to $305. How does on cover under those conditions? Hmmmm, let's see if you sold short a thousand shares at $280, then at $305..... all in very short trading time. That's more draw down than I'd care to think about...:- )

I realize that not everyone knows of Pat Buchanan and fewer still enjoy his spin, but this is a funny set of observations on the 1998 economy.

http://www.theamericancause.org/pjb-98-1225.html

realistic.....you stinky devil you.....happy new year!

was wondering when you'd slide into town....so to speak...
the stench preceded you.....yar...welcome to the ok kraal....

here's some more......

oil and gold to the moon before '99 years end......yar.

It's 1971, and a design student named Carolyn Davidson experiments with shapes and sizes until she becomes satisfied with the rounded mark. Taking inspiration from Greek history, she looks to the victory stakes and discovers 'Nike,' the winged goddess of the time. Months pass and what do you know, Miss Davidson - embarking on a bold career move - gets on up and sells the logo for $35. Fourteen years later, the company drops the name and keeps Jerry, Tiger, Andre and the rest of the stars endorsing the label just with one signature mark. And as for Carolyn Davidson, well, let's just make this a lesson for all design students.

*Note - Nike is the Greek goddess of Victory

By going long you make infinity ( before the crash! )

A point that I have long tried to make... Everywhere I turn, I am told via the radio, television, Internet, and print media that all is well! The labor markets are tight and wages high! So rejoice because inflation is low!

If everything is soooo good, why is everyone borrowing soooo much money? Could it be that they can't afford things anymore? So in order to preserve the illusion we must borrow, lease, and promise to pay for that, which we want today, in the certain hopes of paying for it tomorrow? After all, Burger King is offering $6.50 to $7.00 for counter help in New Hampshire.

....and the theoretical losses in shorting 'net stocks approach infinity or broke, which ever comes first. :- ) )

Do you know that if a person worked 40 hours per week at $7 per hour they would make $14.5k per year, minus taxes that comes to nearly $10k? That is a lot when you figure in $4200 per year in food stamps, subsidised housing costing $7.50 per month ( with paid utilities ) , free Medicade health care, SSD at $750 per month, free school lunches at about $4.00 per day per child, free vocational education, and lots more.

Oops, I'm sorry, all those extras don't come if you are working or going to college. Silly me. ( 8-^] )

Fidelity Select Gold ( FSAGX ) and Precious Metals ( FDPMX )
has diverged from The XAU.
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/5969/xau.gif

If a goodly amount of foreign money now tied up in US Treasuries heads for Europe and US entities and investors do not purchase them; doesn't the FED have to?

If this is correct, wouldn't a liquidity crisis ensue if the FED has to be the purchaser? Is the recent spurt in US Money Supply, the FED's, method of compensating for that future probability?

Wouldn't the principal and interest payed to the foreign sellers of Treasuries have to come from US tax receipts?
Or do they just print more, taking further value from the dollars the foreigners would be exchanging into other currencies?

Is it possible that the high US stockmarket is engineered so that US investors will be available to be substitutes for the probable foreign sales.

http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/981227/2.html

To All,
Alarmed about internet bubble?, U.S. market valuations? I read an interesting column here in TO in the biz paper today. The gentleman opined that the overflowing US stock market is literally keeping the world economy from falling into recession or worse...and the pressure on Greenspan ( Chainsaw Al ) to keep the whole overinflated mess afloat. Quite insightful and scary. Me, I am buying more gold coinage in the New Year for the inevitable..
MoinTo

http://www.news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_239000/239810.stm

I have a math problem for you all.
35,000 tons physical gold in the known world times $300 per oz.
Total market cap of MSFT times $140 per share.
Total market cap of GE times $100 per share.
I have not figured it out but I know that the comparison is quite interesting.

Silverbaron is the one to ask on this one, as I have seen him post on it a number of times in the recent past.
.
Cage Rattler, I do recall the post that you ask about, as it struck a raw nerve with me, in that it is all true. I am fairly sure that it was a December post. I was going to print it, but I am too ignorant to know how.

For the Gold bugs I would like to sy that I prefer PT & PD.
I think the boys over at buffettology on SI are kidding themselves
they do not admit Warrens investment in silver in 1998 did not
work. I dare anyone to charge PD & PT with a vengeance. They will
make the Hunt brothers look like rookies.

I have a math problem for you all.
35,000 tons physical gold in the known world times $300 per oz.
Total market cap of MSFT times $140 per share.
Total market cap of GE times $100 per share.
I have not figured it out but I know that the comparison is quite interesting.

market cap = price per share times number of shares outstanding.

Multiplying the market cap again by the price per share would not yield a significant number to relate with POG * total refined surface gold.

One of the posts that Silverbaron had was 10 Dec 20:59.

The Canadians and the Americans are too blind to see that both Countries are in real terms BROKE. The beginning of the EU will uncover just how poorly Greenspan and Rubin have handled this FINANCIAL CRISIS! Like Clinton they have used the spin to put to sleep otherwise intelligent citizens who would normally understand the meaning of trouble. When those boat loads of US Treasuries begin to land the financial health of America will toss aside the spin which will uncover the truth.. Lets face it Asia does not need a military to declare war on the US and they know it. China will begin the unraveling of the USD and few other Countries will sit back and watch the deflating of their major reserve currency. Like never before we will all witness the birth of a new financial power and the US will find itself in the backseat nowhere near the steering wheel. God Bless America!!!!

http://decisionpoint.com/DailyCharts/ADCurrent.html http://decisionpoint.com/DailyCharts/R2000.html http://decisionpoint.com/DailyCharts/NHNLcurrent.html

HOW MANY TROY POUNDS ARE IN A TON OF GOLD.

3 cubed
there are 2,679.22 Troy pounds in a metric Ton and
2,722.2 Troy pounds in a Long Ton

http://decisionpoint.com/HistCharts/ADfiles/AD2830.html

( 35,000tons ) ( 32,151ounces/tons ) ( $300/ounces ) =$337,585,500,000
MSFT2,490,000,000shares ( $140/shares ) =$348,600,000,000
GE3,270,000,000shares ( $100/shares ) =$327,000,000,000
I have a math problem for you all.
35,000 tons physical gold in the known world times $300 per oz.
Total market cap of MSFT times $140 per share.
Total market cap of GE times $100 per share.
I have not figured it out but I know that the comparison is quite interesting.

market cap = price per share times number of shares outstanding.

Multiplying the market cap again by the price per share would not yield a significant number to relate with POG * total refined surface gold.

I was responding to:

Date: Sun Dec 27 1998 18:46
lsc ( To Gold Buggers ) ID#278287:
I have a math problem for you all.
35,000 tons physical gold in the known world times $300 per oz.
Total market cap of MSFT times $140 per share.
Total market cap of GE times $100 per share.
I have not figured it out but I know that the comparison is quite interesting.

Goldteck a back of the envelope figure calculated by me comes very close to yours.Strange.

http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/981227/b1.html

IMPEACHMENT NEWS: An informed source in the White House ( not an intern )
expects that Bill will agree to resign, but only if Hillary replaces
him in
the Oval Office. She will then pardon her husband before filing for a
divorce. You heard it here first. Maybe I scooped the Drudge Report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1998-12/26/050l-122698-idx.html

1sc
but why are you focussing on 35,000 tonnes? This is in the same order of magnitude as CB holdings, not above-ground gold stocks, usually thought to be 130,000 tonnes. {though I doubt this figure more and more}

Of this CB total, some gold is not for sale at any price, like the Bank of Lebanon's 285 tonnes, and, {heh heh} The Swiss 2,361 tonnes. The IMF would have to jump over many hoops to dispose of its 3,217 Tonnes, as would Greece & Germany to sell their 5,000 tonnes combined, and so it goes. Smoke and mirrors, it's all done with smoke and mirrors.

This news page is a week old, so it is no longer relevent except in retrospect:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/bluesky_exnews/19981222_xex_fdic_flooded.shtml

The email address, I found listed in a separate resource was comments@FDIC.gov.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR RESPONSE TO MY QUESTION.

I might upload another potentially interesting URL. IMHO it is relevent in a backdoor way, as it is a civil rights library; presumptively one basic civil right is that of owning gold? http://www.cyberhaven.com/libertarian/

I am not affiliated with the libertarian library in any way and it does not neccessarily express any of my beliefs.

...based on the value of the SDR and The Euro, gold is making new lows. An excellent source of cross currency and metal charts in the URL below.
http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/>http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/

Check out the SDR and Euro charts against gold.

I assume many of us are anticipating that with the launch of the Euro there will be a sudden awakening to value of gold as part of national treasuries' offical reserves.....what if there isn't???

Unless there is something truely magical and fundlemental about the end of the year and account settling regarding the dollar, gold and the Euro that has been manipulated to get gold down as far as possible, seems to me we are in a deflationary downtrend during which time gold is not proving to be of increasing value, but rather, quite the opposite.

Watching the bonds and the dollar. Dollar steady overnight leading to Monday's opening, bonds up 1/2 point. Gold of course is lower. We'll see $282 or less by New Year's. If this stuff is going to rally and be a star performer in '99, it'll be one heck of a surprise based on its year ending performance.

The Dollar, Bonds, Bombs, the presidency and the stock market will all have to fall to rally gold. We've had a crack in the presidency, bombs have fallen, the bonds have had a spill, the dollar has stabalized.

Certainly we all wait to see what the new year will bring....I fear we all anticipate a change of trend with the change of calendar...I'm beginning to doubt we'll see anything but a continuation of what we saw in '98 - manipulation of gold to preserve the illusion that all is well with the paper world.

However there is no getting away from the fact:

GOLD IS JUST PLAIN WEAK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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

If my guess is right, we should see the gold markets start the
week on the weak side, and finish strongly. This to mean, the bull
is ready to start moving.

For a good looking play check out this little fella-

One of the largest organizations specializing in remediation of embedded systems is Tava Technologies, Inc.
Recently Tava Technologies announced that it will offer access to its PlantY2K remediation services to
small manufacturers through the Manufacturing Extension Partnership.

The charts on this one look like a potential intermediate term play,
great for you traders.

Happy New Year to y'all.

http://www.tavatech.com/

Aurator
In earlier posts I stated that I was not a gold expert.I saw somewhere in my research that there was only 35000 tons in bank vaults, I guess
that is wrong.However if the number is 150000 tons the analogy is still
striking.If investors come for gold for any reason there will not be enough.There is something in the human condition that turns people on
when it comes to AU.As an investor/speculator only, I feel that the time is not far away before the commodity lifts.To me the commodity seems like
a tinder dry forest with a hot breeze blowing.Somewhere out there something is going to egnite it.

"groups fear the federal government secretly favors collapse of the financial system and other social institutions, so that it can abolish personal freedoms and establish world government.''

12/23/98- Updated 06:59 AM ET

FBI battles terrorism in Northwest

SEATTLE The FBI is launching a task force on domestic terrorism in the Pacific Northwest, long considered a hotbed for white supremacist and anti-federal government activities.

The action comes as anti-supremacist activists in the Northwest fear an increase in terrorism coinciding with the year 2000. ''We anticipate that 1999 is going to be a pretty tough year,'' says Bill Wassmuth, executive director of the Northwest Coalition Against Malicious Harassment based here.

Already, there is talk about ''Doomsday'' and ''Armageddon,'' among these groups, Wassmuth says, and paranoia about the possible computer collapse at the beginning of the year 2000, commonly called the Y2K problem.

He says these groups fear the federal government secretly favors collapse of the financial system and other social institutions, ''so that it can abolish personal freedoms and establish world government.''

''That is the No. 1 topic at preparedness expos'' organized by the anti-government groups, Wassmuth says.

''There are people buying two years of food and supplies and heading for the hills,'' Wassmuth says. His group is a coalition of organizations in six Northwestern states countering white supremacist and extremist groups.

The FBI task force is still being assembled. It will include agents from federal, state and local law enforcement agencies in eastern Washington, northern Idaho and western Montana, says Burdena Pasenelli, special agent in charge of FBI division headquarters in Seattle.

''Our goal is to find out ahead of time what is planned and to prevent incidents of domestic terrorism,'' she says. ''Historically, this area has had a number of domestic terrorism incidents.''

The task force is a joint effort of the FBI division headquartered in Seattle and Salt Lake City. It is an outgrowth of domestic terrorism legislation and the addition of 500 FBI agents authorized after the 1995 bombing of the federal office building in Oklahoma City.

Formed at a meeting this fall in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, this is the first FBI task force to cross state lines and FBI field offices, Pasenelli says. ''We call it the Inland Empire,'' she says, referring to the three-state region being covered.

Richard Butler, 80, is leader of a group called Aryan Nations, based in Hayden Lake, Idaho, since 1973. He says the task force may be watching his organization but that his members are not involved in any terrorist activity.

''The FBI is just an arm of the money system,'' and is being directed by President Clinton, ''who has appointed nothing but non-Christians and non-whites,'' Butler says.

Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala., and editor of its quarterly Intelligence Report, says, ''The Pacific Northwest has produced some of this nation's leading domestic terrorists.'' The only comparable areas are certain parts of the Ozarks and rural North Carolina, he says.

The center has compiled a list of 26 domestic terrorist incidents between September 1995 and March 1998. Eight of those incidents occurred in the Northwest or were linked to organizations based there.

The report notes that at the time of the Oklahoma City bombing, the FBI had about 100 domestic terrorism investigations under way, compared with about 900 now.

By Patrick McMahon, USA TODAY

Sorry for posting off topic, but had a question for anyone who might be in the know. Does anyone know what the "rules" are for printing your own checks ? I seem to remember there is an ANSI standard for the way they have to be formatted for the bank to accept them. Thanks a bunch.

1sc
That is exactly right. THere is very little gold in this sweet gold world. Oftimes we have amused ourselves with technical questions like the ones you posed. I can't remember what fraction of an ounce that each human bean would receive if all the gold was divied up, less than 1/10th, I think.
When there is a rush to the golden lifeboats, better make sure you've got your place reserved.
One day we will see a $25 rise, it may be followed by another day of greater rise. Paper gold may be worthless in the conflagration, only physical possession of my preciousss will make any difference and secure you a seat in the golden lifeboat.


got tickets?

1sc
Welcome! Good to have you aboard.
One factor often ignored is the difference between above ground stocks and "available" stocks.
There is much gold that has been fabricated into religious icons, treasures in museums and private collections and family heirlooms that is not available for liquification. Also, much of the modern 9kt jewelery is, to all intents and purposes, not available as bullion gold below say, $1,000 per, because of refining and assay costs.

the 35,000 tonnes of CB gold is in the right ballpark for CB reserves, but of the remainder, say 100,000 tonnes, probably less than 33% is held as liquid gold. Much of this would have been purchased above $350. Much of this has been held for generations.

We often see quoted the statistic that all the gold ever mined would fit into a cube of side about 22 yards.

The real quantity of gold availabe to meet market shortfall is very small indeed.

The market price of gold is not the price of gold in the market.

Don't you find the words of the twittish FBI agent provacateur,"The Inland Empire", to be laughable? Here we have some people that are as un-pc as the crap that Farrakanite columnists write in my local newspaper, looking to "head for the hills" with their two years of food. Is this disengagement worthy of the 500 FBI agents that are going to monitor them?
sharefin must be worth 35 of these gommint cretins.
These people are checking out. The county sheriff will take care of any lawbreaking activity by them. The FBI is there to provoke a confrontation.
The BS Southern Poverty Law Center, which is a Commie front ( no kidding ) , mentioned the Ozarks as a fount of domestic terrorism. Yeah, I do recall something about a terrorist assault on a Texas religious community by an Arkansan. He also engages in foreign terrorism.
The most infamous denizen of Arkansas should be as freedom loving and non-interventionist as Mena-man AJ.
Where's AJ anyway?

The main beneficiary of technology and computer automation is efficiency. Greater efficiency translates to lower prices. The cost savings come from saving labor costs and increasing dependability.

Computerization and mechanization ( computers + machinery ) are most beneficial when there is a large scale of repetitive transactions or motions. This has had a pronounced effect in manufacturing costs and subsequent consumer prices.

Increasing dependability decreases costs by lowering reject costs and lowering oversight labor. This is especially true in manufacturing but dependability is also a critical factor in financial transactions. The velocity and volume of financial transactions has both increased profits ( lower costs when universally adopted ) and reduced certain risks. Computerization in real goods has led to decreases in costs through logistical efficiencies such as maximization of forward and return shipping loads, inventory levels needed as dependability of just-in-time increases, and spoilage ( conversely non-spoilage time at market ) .

So my point I am getting to is that Y2K does not have to be a collapse scenario in order to have devastating effects. If we look at todays world as being 100% efficient, as currently achievable, then a 10% decrease in efficiency should have the same effect as a supply shock such as a crop failure or oil shortage. In the information age efficiency is the product. Yes we will survive by going back to manual systems temporarily, but all those reductions in prices we have achieved through computers will all evaporate during the duration of Y2K effects.

If the NRC is correct that there will definately be localized power outages due to Y2K both before and after 01.01.00 then this is a 100% inneficiency for those localities for the duration of the outage. Add to this the distributional relationships and loss of confidence in just-in-time and you already start out with a few percentage of lost national efficiency. Then there is the remediation cost currently underway and the fixing of bad data in the future year and that is worth a pecent or two loss of efficiency.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_236000/236206.stm

Stockpiling of food, money, and other necessities will throw shocks into the current distribution system which counts on long term behavioral consistency. So the self fulfilling aspect of Y2K will remove further efficiencies from the current system regardless of total cataclysm. Add another 4% of innefficiency.

If we are talking about two months of this with 99% of companies and governments entering compliant and tested, then we still have a supply shock equal to a crop failure of a few key foods. Information and our reliance on it is every bit as pervasive as food in todays society. In this scenario we enter 01.01.00 with 10% inneficiency with no unremediated problems except scattered power outages.

I refuse to believe that at todays confirmed pace, that 99% compliance will be achieved. Even Microsoft releases Windows with bugs after three years of work by presumably the best paid and brightest in the industry. Think about many of these legacy systems not being remediated by the best paid and brightest. The economic effects will be much worse but I feel like I have established a minimum which is bad in itself.

The kicker is that this is happening in the context of a deflationary trend. Overprodution from excessively loose monetary policy meets Y2Kzilla.

Steven Pollack
new convert to gold, grub, guns ( well the last two are new )

I had asked a few days ago about 2Rand pieces.
They are the same ( .2354 oz/ .91667 fine, 22K ) as British sovereigns.
Apparently they trade at a miniscule premium over melt. They are far less than the sov's, which,as I have read, many are counterfeit, but to the standard.....Poor sentence, I know, but am too lazy to rewrite.
Have you ever run across any info on when they were produced? I'll guess that it would be after the Boer War. ...Any pictures?
TIA
PS, if I buy some, maybe I'll send you one if you'd like.

http://progressivefarmer.com/countryplace/060796/recipes/index.html

http://www.wildoats.com/links/wildlinks.html

Wierd. Program trades?

http://quote.yahoo.com/q?s=^N225&d=1d

9 karat gold is very much refinable- and at an economical price. I regularly send in oddball 9 karat, 10 karat, gold filled, eyeglass frames, etc for refining. And they charge the same rate; approximately 3  %. Quite a modest fee for all the work involved.

I save, and once a year send in the floor sweeps, ( literally the dust and junk that is swept off the floor ) , the cotton lint and filters from the polishing machines and the sludge collected from washing our hands and ultrasonic cleaners. It's quite amazing the size of the check returned.

I believe the only change I've seen from the drop in gold prices is a higher minimum fee. They now charge 1/10th oz. minimum ( approx $28 ) . So this means If I send in at least 100 grams of karat gold scrap, I pay about 3% fee.

Doubtful. This is very similar to the "charging capacitor"
look that Hong Kong when the government begin actively
buying market shares to prop it up.

I'd say the Japanese have finally gotten desperate enough
for active intervention.

Who Cares- it sure don't look right, on-the-hour. Looks
like government-think.

Amongst all this mumbo jumbo there alot of common sense.One has to be carefull and not go overboard.Alot of funny business is going on off
balance sheet and you guys are all in your different ways getting to the
bottom of it.Just an observation.

The Hong Kong market buyup was very similar except for
the frequency. About every fifteen minutes, the market
would up-spike and move up to a preset level. Slowly
sink again, then upspike again.

The timing on the Japanese market is really interesting.
It's hourly, which I'm not sure would buy them as much
momentum. OTOH, they might be afraid of showing a distinctive
pattern. After all, the HK market was *really* blatant.
Notice the dropoff on the third spike. : )

"no, no, we're not manipulating this" - says BOJ. : )

Very interesting, thanks for bringing to our attention. I
haven't been watching the Nikkei lately.

Earlier I asked if anyone knew any of the requirements for printing your own checks. I researched it on the net a little bit and found some answers, so I thought I post them for anyone who was curious about such things. I didn't find all the answers I was looking for, but I did find the standards that have been published, the standards that vendors of equipment work to, and that the check clearing community processes to. You can indeed print your own checks for your checking account, and the bank will cash them. There are software systems out there available for, well, not exactly minimal, but low enough cost to do the MICR coding ( that little line of computer numbers at the bottom of the check ) and that sort of thing. The vendors of such equipment recommend various blank stocks of paper to use with their systems, which I didn't understand at first. Anyway, after checking around ( no pun intended ) , I found out that the reason you want to use a good blank stock for your checks if you're planning to create your own is that the burden in the states is on YOU, the check writer, and NOT your bank, when and if someone passes off paper that you didn't write and the bank cashes it. The law says something to the effect of whomever goes to the least amount of effort to protect the transaction, so if you just print a check that's easy to duplicate on notebook paper, then you're the one going to the least amount of effort to stop a forgery. IF, however, you have big fancy holograms and that kind of thing on your paper, then it's the banks problem if they cash a check that doesn't follow your convention. I could be wrong, but that's my understanding of the whole thing, you need to make your checks hard to copy. This is speculation on my part, but I'm betting that you could protect yourself a little more from forgery by sending explicit authentication instructions to your bank to help them verify that the paper they're going to paying for is actually paper that you created and not a forgery. There may be other conventions for creating your own paper that I'm not aware of such as the thickness of the paper, the size of the check, etc. Anyway, I'm curious about such things and thought someone else might be as well.

Who Cares-- I'll remember that, an o-scope trace of a
capacitor. Time to turn the 'puter over to daughter.