Best Of The Best Share Discussion Threads

[traderabc] 03/11/2009 14:42

The Gold bull market is a few currencies.

[traderabc] 03/11/2009 12:24

FINAL WARNING
October 22nd, 2009 by Egon von Greyerz, GoldSwitzerland


The severe problems that the world economy and financial system have experienced in the last couple of years will seem like a walk in the park compared to what will happen in the next couple of years.

For the investors who haven’t yet protected themselves, let us tell you that you are very lucky. You are lucky that you have been given yet one more chance to protect yourself. But let us be very clear, you have a very short time to put your house in order. Because during the month of November the events that we outlined in our Newsletter “A Shocking Fall” are going to start to unfold.

[traderabc] 02/11/2009 12:42

Sunday, November 1, 2009
Do not bailout Wall Street Lamborghinis Jim Rogers on Aljazeera 30 Oct 2009


Aljazeera Frost over the World with Jim Rogers & Michael Sandel - 30 Oct 09

[traderabc] 02/11/2009 12:40

GoldMoney at Baird & Co.

[traderabc] 02/11/2009 12:31

CIT files for 5th largest U.S. bankruptcy


CNNMoney.com
Monday, Nov 2nd, 2009

CIT Group Inc., one of the nation’s leading funders of small and medium-sized businesses, filed for the fifth largest bankruptcy by assets in U.S. history Sunday as part of a reorganization plan that has the support of an overwhelming majority of debtholders.

In a statement, the company said it is asking the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York for a quick approval of the prepackaged plan. CIT said none of its operating subsidiaries would be affected by the filing, allowing them to continue operations.

“The decision to proceed with our plan of reorganization will allow CIT to continue to provide funding to our small business and middle market customers, two sectors that remain vitally important to the U.S. economy,” said CIT (CIT, Fortune 500) chairman Jeffrey M. Peek.

In the bankruptcy filing, CIT said it had $71 billion in assets and $64.9 billion in liabilities. Only Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual, Worldcom and General Motors had more in assets when they filed for protection.

[traderabc] 02/11/2009 12:30

McClatchy: How Goldman secretly bet on the U.S. housing crash


Youtube
Monday, Nov 2nd, 2009

In 2006 and 2007, Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting.

Goldman’s sales and its clandestine wagers, completed at the brink of the housing market meltdown, enabled the nation’s premier investment bank to pass most of its potential losses to others before a flood of mortgage defaults staggered the U.S. and global economies.

NOTE: Because McClatchy does not use an easily sharable video service such as YouTube, I have uploaded their video here in order to drive traffic to their story, because it’s an important one.

[traderabc] 31/10/2009 11:14

I'm beginning to like this, he knows the score and says it as it is, this is a good interview.

On the Edge with Max Keiser - 30 October 2009 (1/4)

[traderabc] 31/10/2009 10:19

Inflation Supply Shock Inferno (Crisis & Globalization II)

Daniel R. Amerman, CFA, DanielAmerman.com
Overview

The gasoline for rampant inflation already permeates the US economy – and all it will take is one bad day for a series of interrelated supply shocks to set off an inflationary inferno. As we will cover in this article, the accelerant in this case is the $700 billion annual United States trade deficit. We’ll explore how the real world economics of being the world’s largest debtor in a globalized economy trump insular deflationist monetary theory, as well as what happens when you pit exogenous supply shocks against Santa Claus.
Some Radical Questions

What would happen if the United States had to actually live on what we all produce? What would happen if other nations would only provide us with the goods and services that we could pay for with our own goods and services? What if other nations stopped manipulating the value of the dollar, stopped propping it up, and let it find its free market value?


If the video above doesn't load, it can also be seen here


This idea of living within our means –whether we want to or not – is radical stuff, but it could be happening fairly soon given the current global economic situation.

[traderabc] 30/10/2009 17:07

Gold: Cause For Alarm
by Adam Brochert, Goldversuspaper.blogspot.com | October 30, 2009
Print

The paperbugs need to fear the future. It is coming. It is inevitable. It is not gloom and doom, it is not guns and food in a wilderness cabin, it is not the end of the world, and it is not the inflation or deflation debate. It is simply a Gold bubble.

Of course, when I say that it is a Gold bubble, what I mean is that the Gold bubble has just begun. This occurred when Gold broke out above $1000 strongly, to create $1000/oz as a floor for Gold rather than a ceiling. This clears the way for much higher Gold prices. I don't mean to misrepresent myself as a prognosticator, as we are all just bozos on the speculation bus, but I think the path is now clear for Gold to go much higher. I believe that $2000/oz. is a conservative target for Gold, but $3000-$10,000/oz. wouldn't shock me. In any case, I use the Dow to Gold ratio to guide my thoughts and decisions. I believe the Dow to Gold ratio will reach 2 at a minimum and less than 1 this cycle wouldn't be surprising.

[traderabc] 29/10/2009 19:59

It's time to end World War II

Hugo Salinas Price
Oct 29, 2009

The shooting, the bombing and the killing of World War II stopped in August of 1945, and the War was formally over.

The United States and Britain knew the War was won, in 1944.

At that time, a Conference was called among the 44 Allied Powers, to determine the nature of the world's monetary and financial system after the fighting was over. It was held at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA, in July of 1944.

As a result of the Conference, a set of Agreements were signed.

The most important of all the agreements was the one that established that gold should be the money to be used to settle all trade deficits between nations, but in lieu of gold, dollars could be used to settle these deficits; at the option of all Central Banks, these banks could demand gold from the United States Treasury at a redemption rate of $35 dollars for each ounce demanded.

Thus, the United States could pay for its trade deficits either in gold or in dollars. No other nation was allowed to pay for its trade deficits in its own currency; for all other nations, settlement of trade deficits had to be done with gold or with dollars previously acquired in the course of trade with the U.S. or with other nations who had dollars. In other words, dollars - and only dollars - were as good as gold.

General de Gaulle (President of France, 1959 - 1969) has been quoted as saying that this was "an exorbitant privilege". And so it was, a privilege of the victor in World War II.

[traderabc] 29/10/2009 10:45

The war over the dollar versus gold
by Clif Droke
October 26, 2009

A fierce war of words has erupted in recent weeks between the two major camps in monetary circles. The first camp – the gold bulls/dollar bears – have been loudly voicing their twin belief that the gold price is poised to skyrocket while the dollar price is perched for a collapse. The other side – the gold bears/dollar bulls – are making the counter claim the gold price is setting up for a crash.

Both sides have spared no expense in trying to convince the investing public of the merits of their respective arguments. In just the past couple of weeks I’ve received in the mail two elaborate promotional campaigns for financial advisory services. One of those packages contained on the outside envelope following warning: “ALERT: Dollar Crash Looms! Your Last Chance to Evacuate the Greenback Before the Stampede Begins.” The other package contained the following words on the envelope: “Shocking report reveals why GOLD is about to CRASH, not soar. Savvy traders are about to make a fortune SELLING gold to millions of panicking investors.”

Of these two promotionals, I received in the span of two weeks two copies of the mailing alerting of the dollar crash. I can only surmise that this particular mailing “pulled” very well for the publisher and probably for good reason: the public fears a dollar collapse much more than a gold crash. According to one sentiment poll mentioned on CNBC recently, nearly 98 percent of all respondents were bearish on the U.S. dollar. Assuming this figure is anywhere near accurate, this has to be an all-time record for bearish sentiment on the greenback.

[traderabc] 29/10/2009 10:39

A Short History of British Bankruptcy
by Adrian Ash, Editor, Bullion Vault | October 28, 2009
Print

"If we manage to escape national bankruptcy, we have set up a slavery far more oppressive than any previous form of bondage..."

BRITAIN'S BANKRUPTCY has been a long time coming.

"By our political folly we have a put a large part, probably the greater part, of the nation in possession of rights to draw from the public purse," wrote Ernest J.P.Benn in his hilarious Account Rendered of 1930.

How hilarious? Forced to live with the "smudge readers" at passport control, policemen demanding to see one's driving license down at the station, and Whitehall drones obsessed with how many pencil sharpeners their department controlled, Britain's moneyed classes knew the lower orders could only travel, drive and wear white-collared shirts if kill-joy regulations applied to the gentry and their staff alike.

But modern liberty, with its motor cars and mortgages, offered to keep Bolshevism out of Britain. Along with homes "fit for heroes" and the basic state pension, however, regulating it all added to the government's annual expense – equal at the start of the Thirties to barely one-quarter of the economy.

That was already too great for the Pound Sterling to bear...

[traderabc] 29/10/2009 00:02

10/28/09 Jim Rogers on Bloomberg (Part 1/3)

[careful] 28/10/2009 19:49

why quote rogers when you have a capable bloke like bernanki.
rogers is a lightweight who oversimplifies.
he bangs on about food prices. it is far too easy to overproduce food if the price is right.
brazil and every mountain in africa is dug up for copper and other metals.
soon massive overproduction and price collapses.

he was on Bloomberg last night, he is a lightweight.

[traderabc] 28/10/2009 19:06

Former Chairman of Citigroup: Restore Glass-Steagall

[traderabc] 28/10/2009 12:02

This is a bit old, but I couldn't resist as he recommends stockpiling 'stuff'.

Peter Schiff: Americans must prepare for deepening unemployment, inflation and possible breadlines

[traderabc] 27/10/2009 15:02

I think the Gold breakout has been confirmed, $1000 should/could hold, looking to buy (more) soon.

[traderabc] 27/10/2009 14:59

Gold Neckline Play. Easy The Trampoline

Stewart Thomson
email: [e-mail]
Oct 27, 2009

1. All hail the regulators. They've done it again. The banksters are masters at directing the public's anger at a red herring, while they operate a vastly larger robbery elsewhere. An example is bank manager salaries. The public is focused on those salaries, not on the trillions of dollars that have simply disappeared after being handed to the banksters, printed money now, to be paid in real money by your great grandchildren over the next 100 years. Should any taxpayer refuse to pay his share to the banksters, it's "hi ho hi ho off to the clink you go."

[traderabc] 27/10/2009 13:46

It already has, but things will get worse before they get better...

When Will Inflation Really Hit Us?

Terry Coxon
Editor, The Casey Report
Oct 27, 2009

Most of us are gathered at the station, watching for the Inflation Express to come rumbling in. But we've been waiting for a while now. Just when should we expect the big locomotive to arrive and start pushing the prices of most things uphill?

We'd all like to know the exact date, of course, but no one can know for sure. Not even a careful reading of the Mayan calendar will help. What we can do is estimate a time range for price inflation to show up, and that alone should have some important implications for investment decisions.

[traderabc] 27/10/2009 13:40

Galbraith: Fed is Unlawfully Withholding Information from Congress


Washington’s Blog
Tuesday, Oct 27th, 2009

The Federal Reserve is unlawfully withholding information from Congress.

Says who?

Says noted economist James Galbraith:

To this day, Chairman Ben Bernanke has refused to disclose to Congress exactly who has received help under the many crisis measures and under what terms. The legal and constitutional situation is clear: Congress has a right to this information. There are no plausible national security concerns.

Galbraith also slams the idea that the Fed should be the main regulator:

Finally, there is the question of financial reform. In the new effort to bring systemically dangerous institutions (now called “Tier One Financial Holding Companies”) under effective supervision, the administration proposes to vest regulation of those entities in the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve naturally agrees. But the Federal Reserve has never been an effective regulator for the straightforward reason that it is dominated by economists and bankers and not by dedicated skeptics who make bank regulation a full-time profession.

If you think Galbraith is wrong about the Fed’s capacity to act as regulator-in-chief, look at this article by the Washington Post.

[traderabc] 26/10/2009 19:47

Saying it as it is, this is good.

Max Keiser - Face Off - "Is the Crisis Over?" (1/2)



PART 2

[traderabc] 26/10/2009 13:28

On the Edge with . . . Paul Craig Roberts (3/4)

[traderabc] 26/10/2009 13:27

Possible Credit Dislocation: Be Warned

Karl Denninger
Market Ticker
Oct 26, 2009

I have reason to suspect that the "monetary transmission mechanism" is full of rocks (again), and we are about to have another instance of what could colloquially be called "fun." (Yes, that's sarcasm.)

Here's what we know and what I can deduce from it:

[traderabc] 26/10/2009 13:22

The US as Failed State
The Super Rich are Laughing

Paul Craig Roberts
Oct 26, 2009

As always, thank you, Paul, for publication permission :-)

The US has every characteristic of a failed state.

The US government's current operating budget is dependent on foreign financing and money creation.

Too politically weak to be able to advance its interests through diplomacy, the US relies on terrorism and military aggression.

[traderabc] 26/10/2009 13:21

Return To What?

Peter Souleles
Sydney, Australia
Oct 26, 2009

"Sacred cows must be slaughtered, especially if they are too fat to walk on their own. Cash for clunkers, stimulus cheques, tax credits for home buyers, and rescue packages for auto manufacturers are nothing more than the equivalent of burning ones furniture to keep warm."