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ARCHIVED DISCUSSION FROM 5/30/2003
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(Yesterday's Discussion.)
Waverider
(5/30/03; 23:58:52MT - usagold.com msg#: 103848)
Congratulations...
...to the lucky contest winners...and thank you Sir MK and Sir Gandalf for the contests - they are sooo....much fun...now to catch up on the last week of posts.
A great weekend to All!
Great Albino Bat
(5/30/03; 23:22:00MT - usagold.com msg#: 103847)
Towncrier - your post #103830 with parts of Henry C.K. Liu's thoughts...
This Liu chap is on the ball with his comments on Japan, and I agree with his views: the Japanese adopted a flawed model as a means to a flawed objective, and with Japanese thoroughness, completely ruined themselves.
This situation will not change, there can be no spontaneous "cultural readjustment" so to speak. The Japanese will "go down with the ship", because that is what they must do. Order, obedience and solidarity above all - even if it ruins them. This is the way they are. Remember the solitary Japanese soldier that turned up in the jungles of the Philipines some thirty years after WWII was over? He was loyal to his orders...
Again, I say, the Japanese model and objective for their national effort will not change spontaneously; it will change when from ABOVE, the order is given to change. Then, all Japan will take the new orders, and fulfill them.
In due course the model will change, but I venture to say that when it does, it will come accompanied with a burst of repressed rage whose violence we can hardly imagine. "America made fools of the Japanese people; revenge is due."
This new order coming from above, may not be from those who are PRESENTLY ABOVE, but from a revolutionary nationalist group that takes power in a coup, old style. Heads will roll!
Forget soft words about "international cooperation", then! The "new order" will not be pussyfooting, count on it.
Furthermore, I will express something I think, and have not seen mentioned anywhere: the YAKUZA. These are supposed to be a fearful caste of criminals. I have a sneaking feeling that the Yakuza are not just ordinary criminals. They are - this is Royal Guano - actually the old samurai, the old, old warrior caste, hard-bitten nationalists who pose and act as criminals, but they are the diamond-hard-core of old Japan.
Criminals, in such an orderly country as Japan, with bullet trains, etc.? No such guano for this old bat! This "criminality" is merely a cover for the real core of Japan. When the time is ripe, this hard core will take over, and then - watch out!
Sunday morning guano from the GAB.
Black Blade
(05/30/03; 22:24:43MT - usagold.com msg#: 103846)
Goldilox – Unemployment Data
The methodology used by the BLS is outlined in two reports (BLS Report 640 and 641). They essentially use a random "phone poll" along with state unemployment claims, then they "normalize" the data and adjust using various statistical filters to smooth out data such as "seasonality" among others. Of course statistical analysis can be heavily abused and massaged for a desired outcome. Obviously it would be a political nightmare if the raw data were made public, therefore we get the 6% unemployment figure rather than the 10-12% figure. Another item I didn't mention was that the "mass layoff" measurement has been increasing month by month. The BLS defines "mass layoff" as the firing of 50 or employees from a single company. Curiously the carnival barkers in the financial media such as CNBC tend to brush off unemployment data as a "lagging indicator". Hmmm…
- Black Blade
Black Blade
(05/30/03; 22:09:47MT - usagold.com msg#: 103845)
N.America natural gas prices seen staying high
http://biz.yahoo.com/rc/030530/energy_naturalgas_outlook_3.html
Snippit:
NEW YORK, May 30 (Reuters) - Natural gas prices are likely to stay high as North American output continues to decline despite an increase in drilling activity, offering further proof that the region's gas resources are running low, J.P. Morgan analyst Shannon Nome said. Historically, output has closely tracked the number of gas rigs, but in the past year production fell more than 3.5 percent even as drilling rose. Last week oil services company Baker Hughes Inc. (NYSE:BHI) counted 896 gas rigs at work in the U.S., up 20 percent from Jan. 2002 and surging 27 percent so far this year. "Going into '03 we're seeing a dramatic divergence between rig counts and production," Nome said at a recent investor conference. "We think this is direct evidence of basin exhaustion: the declining base of gas production in the United States." Nome, who watches gas markets and the stocks of independent energy producers -- estimates rig counts should be even higher, closer to 1,000, based on the gas prices. Industry executives attribute the lower than expected activity to greater spending discipline and a heightened focus on returns. Nome blames the shortfall on "prospect starvation." In recent years, the average size of new discoveries has dwindled as the big, easy-to-find resources have been tapped. In the Gulf of Mexico, for example, the average discovery yields 5 billion cubic feet (bcf), compared with 100 bcf in the 1980s. Finding and development costs have, in turn, doubled to about $10 per barrel of oil-equivalent. Last year output fell 3.5 percent, in large part because many companies chose not to boost drilling and conserve capital. Nome estimates output will slip 1.6 percent in 2003, staying flat for the remainder of the year even as rig counts rise.
Black Blade: The NatGas situation is looking very ugly now and is expected to worsen as rig counts remain low, pipeline capacity restrained, and production declines. One point though is that an additional 200+ drill rigs are needed immediately to keep current production steady by year end. I'm sure that this will be topic number one at the President's special emergency NatGas meeting next month. Perhaps we will be "lucky" enough to have a severe economic collapse to kill enough demand. "Interesting Times" are upon us.
BTW, Louis Rukeyser's guest tonight pretty much laid it out on the NatGas issue. Still, I am amazed there is very little media attention on this (yet).
Goldilox
(05/30/03; 21:25:08MT - usagold.com msg#: 103844)
Unemployment rate estimates
I'd like to repeat an observation I voiced a couple of weeks ago.
How does the BLS actually decide WHEN someone that has fallen off the unemployment roles has actually "ceased looking for work"? Many counted among such laggards have probably NOT stopped looking, IMHO. They may, however, have stopped bothering to tell the poorly undermanned and nearly incapable state employment department. My experience with these offices has convinced me that they have little clue about jobs beyond physical laborer or MS Word specialist, whatever that is...
Having just come from the corporate training business, I am amused by the number of companies offering to use the available state training funds to certify me as a desktop technical aide, MS Word specialist, or network administrator. In 1999-2001, my company was already expanding the skills training of many computer "certified professionals" who found their A+, MCSE and Cisco certs were sadly sufficient in a market glutted with entry level high-tech newbees.
Unfortunately, even if the figures were reasonably accurate (which it seems many people doubt), I don't for a second believe anyone is really polling the minions "dropped" from the roles to see if they have given up looking. My personal belief is that they are bunched into that category arbitrarily, to help pad the unemployment numbers to the low side.
I have more faith in BB's original numbers of 12% or more.
Cavan Man
(05/30/03; 21:24:14MT - usagold.com msg#: 103843)
Will the real Patriots please stand up.
This is good for gold because....
.....larceny on the high dunes destabilizes the dollar.
Straw, Powell had serious doubts over their Iraqi weapons claims
Secret transcript revealed
Dan Plesch and Richard Norton-Taylor
Saturday May 31, 2003
The Guardian
Jack Straw and his US counterpart, Colin Powell, privately expressed serious doubts about the quality of intelligence on Iraq's banned weapons programme at the very time they were publicly trumpeting it to get UN support for a war on Iraq, the Guardian has learned.
Their deep concerns about the intelligence - and about claims being made by their political bosses, Tony Blair and George Bush - emerged at a private meeting between the two men shortly before a crucial UN security council session on February 5.
The meeting took place at the Waldorf hotel in New York, where they discussed the growing diplomatic crisis. The exchange about the validity of their respective governments' intelligence reports on Iraq lasted less than 10 minutes, according to a diplomatic source who has read a transcript of the conversation.
The foreign secretary reportedly expressed concern that claims being made by Mr Blair and President Bush could not be proved. The problem, explained Mr Straw, was the lack of corroborative evidence to back up the claims.
Much of the intelligence were assumptions and assessments not supported by hard facts or other sources.
Mr Powell shared the concern about intelligence assessments, especially those being presented by the Pentagon's office of special plans set up by the US deputy defence secretary, Paul Wolfowitz.
Mr Powell said he had all but "moved in" with US intelligence to prepare his briefings for the UN security council, according to the transcripts.
But he told Mr Straw he had come away from the meetings "apprehensive" about what he called, at best, circumstantial evidence highly tilted in favour of assessments drawn from them, rather than any actual raw intelligence.
Mr Powell told the foreign secretary he hoped the facts, when they came out, would not "explode in their faces".
What are called the "Waldorf transcripts" are being circulated in Nato diplomatic circles. It is not being revealed how the transcripts came to be made; however, they appear to have been leaked by diplomats who supported the war against Iraq even when the evidence about Saddam Hussein's programme of weapons of mass destruction was fuzzy, and who now believe they were lied to.
HOW ABOUT THAT POOR LAD WHO HAD BOTH ARMS BLOWN OFF AND LOST HIS PARENTS; WAS IT WORTH IT NEOCONS AND OLDCONS?
Aristotle
(05/30/03; 21:17:40MT - usagold.com msg#: 103842)
"All the sugar in the world"
Nice expression, Mr. Cockerel1.
--- Ari
Max Rabbitz
(05/30/03; 21:05:51MT - usagold.com msg#: 103841)
DOLLAR DUMPED BY GOLD DIGGERS
http://www.nypost.com/business/76961.htm
by PAUL THARP
A few snips from a short article in the NY Post.
"The sinking dollar has prompted Asia's central banks to call a session next month on whether to unload their dollar holdings which account for about 90 percent of the world's dollar reserves.
Currency speculators increasingly are using gold to hedge their gambles with the dollar, euro and yen. Some investors believe that if U.S. Treasury bonds get dumped by more foreign investors, gold could skyrocket."
Shapur
(05/30/03; 20:47:20MT - usagold.com msg#: 103840)
real unemployment rate
If the unemployment rate is really 10%, taking into account discouraged and part time workers who want full time then we must really have a strong recovery in order to take on that many more labor force participants.
I don't see it happening.
a nation of one
(05/30/03; 20:23:30MT - usagold.com msg#: 103839)
original intention
I think it is much better for the future of pog that gold has fallen back some, since excessive increases tend to fall back more violently than milder ones. To me this seems to justify an expectation that gold's present primary trend of 'UP!' will be somewhat shored and strengthened as it proceeds, rather than jerking way high and then zooming down low.
a nation of one
(05/30/03; 20:10:03MT - usagold.com msg#: 103838)
Reply to CoBra(too) (05/30/03; 19:40:45MT - usagold.com msg#: 103836)
"... history holds numerous examples of prior empires sowing the seeds of their own destruction by monetary
excesses." You ask: Well, again, what's the difference?
The difference is a matter of language and its effects. Saying that 'empires [are] sowing the seeds of their own destruction,' doesn't pin the tail on the donkey. It conveys the impression -by linguistic means- that an abstraction is the cause. The information is avoided, that a relatively few individuals are the cause. You might say, "of course everyone knows this." But then why not say it explicitly?
I am not sure what to make of your next expression.
But with regard to, "PS: I hate to be "observed"!, I don't think that you can have it both ways, that is, post on a popular Internet forum and not be observed. Also, since you were not the author of the quote, it's not really you that is being observed.
Greetings, incidentally.
Kilo
(05/30/03; 19:43:14MT - usagold.com msg#: 103837)
Antipodean Bug - Silver HUH ?
>>>>>$3.27 per oz is the price today based on last year's
dollar!!<<<<<<
I'd be interested in how you are coming to your price. Or better, where you could have received 38.5 percent on your money since last year...... ;^) Just assuming you are using the "real" inflation figures of additions to M-3 perhaps ?
Have been tracking the AU:AG ratios and inflation adjusted silver levels based on the 1998 dollar by "official" inflation figures, and can only drag the current adjusted price of AU down to the $3.78 level myself in 1998 dollar terms. Maybe we need to go back and do it all over again using the M-3 figures. Would be interesting, no ?
CoBra(too)
(05/30/03; 19:40:45MT - usagold.com msg#: 103836)
SO?! - @ a nation of one
(05/30/03; 19:11:47MT - usagold.com msg#: 103835)
Observations on CoBra(too) (05/30/03; 15:52:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103825)
"... history holds numerous examples of prior empires sowing the seeds of their own destruction by monetary
excesses."
... Well, again, what's the difference?
The few, who are holding their populace at ransom, like Cesar, Alexander, Napoleon or, god beware Hitler, Lenin/Stalin/Mao, or new despots like Mugabe, Arafat and the likes of former terrorists (Jehova, beware) Sharon, to name a few more ... are merely examples fronting their masters excesses?
Yes, Sir noo, i've heard that before and also had to bear the (mental) consequences... cb2 (Was nu?)
PS: I hate to be "observed"!
a nation of one
(05/30/03; 19:11:47MT - usagold.com msg#: 103835)
Observations on CoBra(too) (05/30/03; 15:52:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103825)
"... history holds numerous examples of prior empires sowing the seeds of their own destruction by monetary
excesses."
Actually, what history is full of is examples of empires being destroyed by seeds sown by just a few
individuals acting in their own perceived self-interests. It wasn't the general citizens of the empires that did
this. And of course it was not the empires, since empires are abstract concepts, not living entities. But find a
way to eliminate such individual persons from ever coming to power, and the seeds of destruction that they
sow will not be sown.
MK
(05/30/03; 18:52:59MT - usagold.com msg#: 103834)
One more mention.....
I forgot in my previous message to thank all the posters who have said such kind things over the past few days about this Forum, website and the firm which sponsors. It hasn't gone unnoticed.
MK
(05/30/03; 18:46:22MT - usagold.com msg#: 103833)
Contest Thoughts........
I was watching the Evening News for one of the major networks a while ago and was amazed that they gave this ultra-important G8 meeting in Evian only a cursory mention and then moved on to one marginally important story after another until the thirty minutes were gone, and no one was the wiser for it. The fact that the media could become even more concentrated by new rules being considered by the FCC will only exacerbate this problem of dumbing down the public. But we shouldn't let that bother us. It only raises the importance of websites like this to a higher level. We actually believe our readership is intelligent and attempt to cater to that intelligence. And at no time does this become more evident that contest time at the august Table Round.
I would like to thank all of our contest participants especially the essay entrants as I know how difficult it is to sit down and express one's thinking lucidly enough to have a shot at taking home the gold. For most of us, it doesn't come easy but I think the discipline required somehow does us all some good -- especially our better posters. That's not to diminish the price guessing entries. I know how much the Table loves a price guessing contest, and I too avidly follow the progress. I was amazed to learn that 37 different knights and ladies had a chance at the gold today. It was a great time. Thanks to Gandalf -- our incredible wizard -- for the fine job he does in keeping these contests on track.
Onward, my fellow goldmeisters. And thanks for being a part of this noble experiment called the USAGOLD Forum.
CoBra(too)
(05/30/03; 18:39:39MT - usagold.com msg#: 103832)
Re- Henry C.K. Liu
@TC - Liu's essay is essentially seen from a "still" working hegemonial US Dollar perspective - and that's why i feel it's fundamentally "lopsided" - to say the least.
Not worth "my" time nor drink - respectfully cb2
21mabry
(05/30/03; 18:34:44MT - usagold.com msg#: 103831)
commanding heights
Has anyone been watching the commanding heights series on PBS.Its on their website to.The series is on the past present and future of the world economy.
TownCrier
(05/30/03; 17:53:32MT - usagold.com msg#: 103830)
Your single MUST READ article for the day, by Henry C K Liu
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Asian_Economy/EE31Dk01.html
Still hot off the press, key excerpts from his May 31st installment of the "Banking Bunkum" series. You will want to read this with my #103818 post in the back of your mind.You'll want to crack open a cold beverage to get through this good one. It's rather longish.
(excerpts from Liu)
The domestic problems in Japan are caused by its economy's tilt toward export, compounded by export trade being denominated mostly in dollars, not yen.
...The relationship of Japanese banks to their clients is structurally different than what the New Deal set up for US banks, with an arm's-length relationship between lenders and borrowers. Japanese banks own substantial shares of their corporate borrowers, thus there is little financial advantage in corporate debt foreclosure.
This credit relationship is natural for a national banking regime and has evolved to achieve maximum efficiency for financing export production...
The reason dollar assets yield higher returns than yen assets is that yen assets are not structured for highest returns but for effective support of the Japanese export regime. Japanese banks are not profit centers. They are service institutions in support of a national purpose.
...the nation [was steered] along a traditional but obsolete path of export dependency, hiding the transfer of national wealth overseas with a speculative bubble of the 1980s. It was inevitable that this bubble would burst, as the economic benefits of this export "success" could not be repatriated back to Japan because of dollar hegemony.
Japanese ... inability to develop a heightened consciousness of themselves as consumers of the fruits of their efforts, instead of exporters. ... The war of export was won by a denial of domestic consumption that fitted cerebrally the Japanese culture of self-restraint. To overcome this export fixation, the political system and administrative apparatus have to change. ... ...requires that consumers take responsibility for their own decisions.
...Since the end of the Bretton Woods regime, the relentless Japanese quest for trade surplus in dollars and not in yen has been a big mistake. Dollars can no longer be converted to gold and dollars cannot be spent in Japan. Dollars can only buy dollar assets such as the Rockefeller Center in New York.
The Germans have been making an even bigger mistake with their quest for trade surplus in dollars. Everyone accepted deutschmarks before the birth of the euro. Japan and Germany should have incurred as large a trade deficit in their own currencies as their trading partners would accept. Trade yields currency. When export yields another country's currency, it is hard to benefit the domestic economy with it.
It is hard for Americans to understand this because world trade yields dollars that are usable in the United States. It is also hard for the rest of the world to understand this because they did not catch on to the meaning of the dollar being no longer backed by gold.
...Japan's institutional and economic history has been front and center mercantilist. Japan does not export to live. It lives to export. Yet since the Bretton Woods fixed-exchange-rate regime based on a gold-backed dollar ended in 1971, Japan has been exporting not for gold, nor for gold-backed dollars. It has been exporting for a fiat currency called the dollar that the United States can print at will and at no cost. Japan has been shipping its goods overseas in exchange for paper that cannot buy anything in Japan.
The trade surplus in dollars is merely pieces of paper than can buy other pieces of paper called US Treasuries, or share certificates of US companies that compete with Japanese companies. Or certificates of ownership of dollar assets outside of Japan that pay dividends in pieces of paper that cannot be spent in Japan.
The conventional wisdom is that Japan must earn dollars to buy needed imports such as oil and other commodities that Japan does not produce. But Japan exports way in excess of its import needs. Notwithstanding the fact that if Japan exports less, it will also need to import less oil and iron ore, there is no reason Japan needs to have a trade surplus, or that a trade surplus is of benefit to Japan.
...a high saving rate, a result of cultural behavior, has created a high level of net financial asset for an average household of more than 14 million yen ($130,000) in September 2001...
----(see url above for full article)---
No further comment needed... would only be overstating the obvious.
R.
contrarian
(05/30/03; 17:32:30MT - usagold.com msg#: 103829)
Vicious Circles and US Credit
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/willie/willie053003.html
Yes, Cobra, this is an excellent article, another excellent one by Jim Willie CB at www.goldenjackass.com.
I've enjoyed his cogent analysis of the big picture.
Antipodean Bug
(05/30/03; 17:10:53MT - usagold.com msg#: 103828)
Silver to $3.27
Close your eyes and feel your emotions
at the prospect of silver prices sinking to
just $3.27 over the next year.
Scary isn't it.
It seems too cheap at these levels already.
Not possible I hear you say?
Well it's already happened.
$3.27 per oz is the price today based on last year's
dollar!!
Scary .....or a once-in-a-life-time opportunity?
Some $US prices can't levitate artifically for very much
longer.
Black Blade
(05/30/03; 17:04:29MT - usagold.com msg#: 103827)
Real unemployment rate worse than 6%
http://www.freep.com/money/business/jobs30_20030530.htm
Statisticians skip over frustrated job seekers
Snippit:
NEW YORK -- The nation's unemployment rate has edged up to 6 percent while Michigan's is 6.6 percent, but frustrated job seekers, shoulder-to-shoulder with so many others who recently lost work, are convinced the numbers miss something. They're right, experts say. It does not count the substantial number of Americans who have gone back to school because they can't find a job or those who have taken a part-time job for much less pay. It does not include people who, unable to find work, have set themselves up in their own businesses, many as home-based consultants. And it does not count people who have become so demoralized that they've just given up looking. If all those people were included, economists and the Labor Department's own figures say, the figure would be about 10 percent of the workforce. "Right now the unemployment rate isn't telling the full story," said Jared Bernstein, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based research group.
For example, in April, the last month for which the government released data, 8.8 million people were counted as unemployed. That figure did not include 4.8 million people who work part time but want a full-time job, up about 600,000 from the previous year. In addition, the survey found another 1.4 million people who want to work are available and have looked for a job in the last year. But because they haven't looked in the last four weeks, they weren't counted as unemployed. That group includes about 437,000 people deemed discouraged -- those who have given up looking. That figure is up from 320,000 a year ago.
According to the government's formula, if people lose a job and just give up looking "then you just disappear altogether. You're not in the labor force anymore," said Sophia Koropeckyj, an economist with Economy.com, a research firm in West Chester, Pa. That compares to a recent low of 6.3 percent in October of 2000, when the traditional unemployment rate stood at 3.9 percent.
Black Blade: I have posted on this repeatedly in the past but I haven't gone through the gory details lately. A few months ago I had pointed out that the real unemployment rate was between 11-12%. Now it may be only 10% but I will have to do some digging and number crunching when I get time. The point is – the economy is nowhere near "recovery" and until the employment picture begins to improve it doesn't good very likely either. I suspect that the real number is somewhat near this mark or actually a bit higher as the BLS tends to fudge the numbers a lot.
Off to the gym! Sorry Gresham, no precious metals weights where I'm going but I may take up lifting a few glasses of "golden nector" later - just to "tone up" ya know. ;-)
Goldilox
(05/30/03; 17:00:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103826)
The Italian Job
OK Goldbuggers! "The Italian Job" opens today at a theater near you. Should be a very fun romp based on a Gold Heist, LA traffic, and a fleet of BMW Minis. I'm off to the matinee now!!
For the men, Charlize Theron does a lot of her own driving stunts. She's wild behind the wheel, according to her co-stars!
CoBra(too)
(05/30/03; 15:52:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103825)
Vicious Circles & US Credit
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/willie/willie053003.html
An excellent round up of the state of affairs - and I personally got a kick out of the following paragraph:
*** In order to support the unsupportable USDollar, to defend the indefensible, to continue the unsustainable, the majority of our national gold treasure has been dumped on the world market. A large portion of our gold supply has been dumped at prices below the current $350-370 per oz range, on behalf of the Federal Reserve and the European Central Banks. A large portion of that supply has been purchased by Asians, most notably China. A credible argument can be made that we have shipped our national wealth apparatus (mfg plant, jobs, money) to Asia and China in a failed attempt to reinforce our financial system, a system built on paper-based securities and ballooning debt, undermined by the Federal Reserve's hidden tax on the USDollar through massive monetary inflation. And banker clowns claim we have a deflation problem! Our monetary expansion has not slowed since Greenspan came to the helm, and now has produced the cursed price deflation from worldwide overproduction. And the remedy is more liquidity? Hell no! The solution begins with system-wide bankruptcies and an additional 30-40% markdown in the bloated USDollar.***
Wow, if that's not a loud and clear message to go GOLD - whatever else will convince you, or me?
St. Petersburg (been there) and Evian over the weekend are just other delusional sound bites, without any consequences to the naked reality of the ongoing meltdown of the current global fiat currency reserve system under the hegemonial regime of the US Dollar.
...And as the admin's neo-cons are aware of the rout the next target of the axis of evil comes into its cross-hairs. And as it's not for oil alone - it's also the urge to impress the seal of (super-)power and its invincibility as the last defense to its reserve currency hegemonial status.
Unfortunately, the ploy has been called (last but not least by the legacy of Paul O'Neill - the 44 Trillion obligation) and the days of unfettered fiat Dollar creation will draw to an end, or end in Weimar type hyper-inflation.
One question comes to mind - would it matter either way? - as the dire consequences can't possibly be averted anymore ... why stop midway? - let's go all the way, after all who's going to stop the last standing global super power?!
... No one other than the same ... as history holds numerous examples of prior empires sowing the seeds of their own destruction by monetary excesses.
In case of the US the excesses of monetary usurpation are truly unprecedented throughout known history ...
sadly cb2
goldquest
(5/30/03; 14:30:56MT - usagold.com msg#: 103824)
One More Try
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EE22Ak03.html
If this one does'nt work, go to: http://www.orlingrabbe.com/homepage.html and scroll down to the Bilderberg article.
TownCrier
(5/30/03; 14:16:26MT - usagold.com msg#: 103823)
Latest weekly growth in U.S. money supply
For the latest reporting week of May 19th, the Federal Reserve indicated the following.
M-1 was up $13.0 billion to $1,261.0 billion
M-2 was up $10.3 billion to $6,012.5 billion
M-3 was up $5.5 billion to $8,691.6 billion
Over the past four weekly reporting periods M-1 has grown by $20 billion, M-2 has grown by $103 billion, and M-3 had grown by $100 billion.
You can try to keep treading water in the swelling paper ocean, tossed about upon the waves of international government action and reaction, or you can stand at ease upon an island of gold.
R.
goldquest
(5/30/03; 14:08:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103822)
Bilderberg: West On Brink of Financial Meltdown
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EE22AK03.html
It sounds like a little Dis-harmony amongst the Bildies!
TownCrier
(5/30/03; 13:58:41MT - usagold.com msg#: 103821)
Italy. Have you discovered the latest item offered in the Buyers' Group?
http://www.usagold.com/gold/special/current.html
Special coins and special prices.
JemeJordan
(5/30/03; 13:52:08MT - usagold.com msg#: 103820)
U.S. Lowers Terror Alert Level One Step
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58361-2003May30.html
U.S. Lowers Terror Alert Level One Step
Clink!
(5/30/03; 13:41:08MT - usagold.com msg#: 103819)
@ Gandalf
Take an aspirin, that's all ?! I had to go change my...Ahem, but that's probably WAY more than anyone wants to know about ...
C!
TownCrier
(5/30/03; 13:36:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103818)
"Paper" : Does the fate and value of your wealth rest in the hands of a government?
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/030530/financial_japan_intervention_1.html
HEADLINE: Japan FX intervention hits monthly high
TOKYO, May 30 (Reuters) - Japan conducted the largest ever monthly volume of yen-selling currency intervention in May with the action aimed at stemming the yen's rise...
Japan's yen-selling totalled about 3.9825 trillion yen ($33.70 billion) -- a record single month figure...
Dealers believe Japan wants to keep the dollar from falling below the crucial 115 yen mark, the level which is believed to be the break-even point for exporters.
Junya Tanase global markets officer at JP Morgan Chase in Tokyo: "An interesting element is that it seems the Japanese authorities did not budge even after U.S. Treasury Secretary (John) Snow made some negative comments about intervention."
...BOJ data showed that the MOF paid the amount to the private sector through its foreign exchange account, which mostly represents foreign exchange intervention.
...Some dealers suspect Tokyo stepped in as recently as Tuesday, when the dollar fell to around 116.20 yen in post-Asian trade.
Japan is believed to have intervened heavily in the past two weeks, and this was thought to be stopping the dollar from falling below 115 yen, dealers said.
"Without the interventions, I feel that the dollar would be down all the way below 110 yen by now."
-----(see url for full article)-----
On a related note, the level of custody holdings of U.S. securities held at the Federal Reserve on behalf of foreign central banks has climbed by $31 billion in the past two weeks to nearly $928 billion.
Three cheers for the Japanese who are sacrificing the purchasing power of their own currency so that we might continue to act now to protect ourselves in the long run.
Take advantage while it lasts. Thanks to our Pacific Rim friends getting gold into your portfolio is still as easy as lifting a finger to dial a toll free number. You can reach the helpful brokers at USAGOLD-Centennial at 800-869-515.
R.
Socrates964
(5/30/03; 13:19:05MT - usagold.com msg#: 103817)
Nakajima
Depends what your currency of reference is and whether you hedge it. Let`s say you short the Dow at 8,000 and it moves to 8,800, then (assuming $1 per point), you are down $800. Now assume that over the same period, the Euro moves from $1 to $1.10. The Euro value of the Dow remains E8,000, but you have a dollar denominated instrument that will generate a loss in $, and unless you take out a corresponding short on the $ against the Euro, you won`t reap the currency profit that offsets your loss on the Dow trade.
This is actually a moot point, since in a hyperinflationary market, stock prices rise continuously, so it`s extremely unlikely that you`ll make a nominal profit on a straight short. Instead, you have to go short the stock and long an inflation index (the government bond is usually used as an inflation proxy). When most people buy a stock at $1 and sell it at $2, they assume they`ve made $1 of profit, and don`t adjust for the fact that that dollar may have lost several % of its purchasing power over the life of the trade.
Jing Zu
(5/30/03; 12:55:02MT - usagold.com msg#: 103816)
Wow! Gandalf the White (5/30/03; 12:30:02MT - usagold.com msg#: 103811)
Wow,
Gandalf the White,
Thank you so much for having this contest. It was a big surprise to win!
I want to thank Gandalf the White, all that were responsible and USA GOLD. I am delighted.
With thy wisdom and with thine understanding thou hast gotten thee riches, and hast gotten
gold and silver into thy treasures:
Thank you so much,
I will enjoy my new Dutch Queen Wilhelmina 10 Guilder gold coin.
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 12:51:32MT - usagold.com msg#: 103815)
Yes Sir Clink! -- The COMEX GOLD PIT was JUMPING !
Clink! (5/30/03; 12:40:05MT - usagold.com msg#: 103812)
===
YES indeed Sir Clink! IT was WILD !
Even the last half-hour was extremely VOLATILE !!
You were atop the Hill until the last minute and THAT LAST trade of $363.5 against all the former trades at $365. caused me to wonder where the SETTLEMENT would end !
I need to go take an asprin !
<;-)
Clink!
(5/30/03; 12:46:55MT - usagold.com msg#: 103814)
The parable of the cards
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/sanders/sanders053003.html
There was talk a few days ago about trying to gather material for a 'beginners guide'. As it happens, I have been trying to find a good way of explaining to my daughter (bright 14-year old) how fiat money has to lose value over time by definition because of interest. And then this excellent little story came along. In fact, it deals with a slightly different subject matter, but I can see many ways it can be extended to 'what if' situations.
Enjoy !
C!
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 12:41:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103813)
NOTICE --- The $$$$ ESSAY CONTEST $$$$ is NOW CLOSED !!!
Thanks to all that have given us such a number of diverse and thoughtful essays to consider. Townie and I now have the "task" of trying to judge these masterpieces !
This may take until 9/1/03 to do so and THEN we could find out who had the CORRECT POG !
NAW ---
<;-)
Clink!
(5/30/03; 12:40:05MT - usagold.com msg#: 103812)
@ Gandalf
That was the closest one yet - over a third of the contestants (37) had the right answer at some point in todays trading !
Thanks to MK for the competition, Gandalf for the admin, and congrats to all the winners.
C!
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 12:30:02MT - usagold.com msg#: 103811)
TA TA TA TAAAAAAAAAAAAA -- we have WNNERS !!!
USAGOLD - Centennial Precious Metals, Inc. --- POG CONTEST !!
COMEX June GOLD (GC3M) HIGH = $369.6 with a low = $360.5 and a SETTLEMENT of $364.5 making a Change of - $5.1 from yesterday's Settlement.
THEREFORE, looking at the Prognostications Listings ---
THE WINNERS are:
**** $364.8 **** Toolie (5/28/03; 19:28:21MT - usagold.com msg#: 103671)
**** $364.5 **** Jing Zu (5/28/03; 10:49:23MT - usagold.com msg#: 103635)
**** $364.3 **** J-Bullion (5/21/03; 09:25:42MT - usagold.com msg#: 103229)
=====
Sir Jing Zu wins the GOLD (Dutch Queen Wilhelmina 10 Guilder gold coin (.1947 oz) for AN EXACT PRICE ENTRY --- and Sir Toolie and Sir J-Bullion are EACH the RUNNERS-UP winners of the Silver one-ounce Canadian Maple Leaf.
CONGRATULATIONS !!
Please if these three would advise Marie at USAGOLD - Centennial Precious Metals, Inc. -- via email at
marie@usagold.com
of your REAL names and "snailmail" addresses, the PRECIOUS will be posted.
THANKS ALL of the 110 persons that entered the contest !
<;-)
USAGOLD / Centennial Precious Metals, Inc.
(5/30/03; 11:59:44MT - usagold.com msg#: 103810)
What you need to know before you buy your first ounce of gold...
http://www.usagold.com/cpm/goldhelp.html
Q. What makes USAGOLD / Centennial Precious Metals different from its competitors in terms of its interaction with clients?
MK. Our business philosophy allows us to take a more laid-back approach. We don't employ a room full of brokers spinning the phones day and night. We don't have multi-million dollar advertising expenses dictating what kind of advice we give clients. This is all by choice. I decided long ago that I didn't want the headaches that go with managing a large number of brokers and the support staff and facilities required. At the same time, we get hundreds of requests each month for introductory information packets. We do not make cold calls. We do not work mailing lists. We do not call people at all hours of the day or night. We do not use marketing and sales gimmicks -- leaders, bait and switch, and the rest of it. We primarily work with clients who have discovered us, like what they see, and want to form a long term relationship with a reputable and reliable gold firm.
Q. Does the "laid-back approach" limit your business?
MK. Yes and no. In the short run, "yes." In the long run, "no." We probably lose a few prospects to the aggressive companies which use hard-sell tactics but we will not be changing our client-friendly approach. We know that not every prospective investor is going to become a client of USAGOLD / Centennial. However, we know that the client who chooses us is likely to be the type of client we are accustomed to doing business with. We work with a large number of professional people and business owners -- active, retired and semi-retired. In fact, we work with clientele that span the economic spectrum and all walks of life. Getting back to how our approach sets us apart from our competitors, we get quite a few disgruntled high net worth clients who come to us after being run through the mill by some of the boiler-room operations I've referred to earlier. They are usually grateful that they found us.
Q. And finally, is there anything else you would like to share with us?
MK. Fundamentally, we believe that we are here to serve the client. Anyone who has done business with us will vouch for the courteous and professional service he or she has received. Our staff is carefully chosen and it shows. We get referrals on nearly a daily basis and are kept busy with strong repeat business. I would also like to call attention to the solid informational services offered at this website. We believe that any of our clients or visitors will find USAGOLD head and shoulders above anything else out there. I would encourage anyone attending this site to have a look around. We also publish a very good hard copy newsletter called News & Views: A Bi-monthly Review of Forecasts, Commentary & Analysis on the Economy and Precious Metals. Above and beyond that, the most important thing is the way we treat our clientele. From first inquiry through order fulfillment, we want to make the gold investing experience as pleasant and rewarding as possible. We have a large and satisfied clientele and that's the way we want to keep it.
TownCrier
(5/30/03; 11:56:38MT - usagold.com msg#: 103809)
WGC on volatility
http://www.gold.org
5/30/03 excerpt:
"Gold remains volatile and, in line with dealer expectations expressed yesterday, is being driven largely by currency movements. After dropping towards $360/ounce where physical demand emerged, spot prices approached $370/ounce in late New York trade on the back of dollar weakness. This was then reversed in Asian hours and as the dollar regained some ground, and gold fell back under profit taking and is this morning trading in mid-range. Thin conditions are contributing to the market's volatility, exacerbated to some degree yesterday by European holidays for Ascension Day. The London Bullion Market Association annual conference takes place next Monday and Tuesday, and is frequently accompanied by price volatility, so the market continues to expect wide range trading in the short term."
White Rose
(5/30/03; 11:55:12MT - usagold.com msg#: 103808)
My very, very short essay give the case for $440 gold
I believe that the dollar will fall to $1.45 to the Euro by September 1, 2003. Why? Because it seems that is where all the big institutions have their sites.
By straight arithmetic, this imlies a dollar price of gold at about $440/oz.
By itself, this is a troubling number to those who are very, very short on gold. I think there is a huge amount of intentional volitility to the gold price right now to allow those short to obtain real gold for the lowest possible price, and to unload "paper gold" for the highest possible price.
Once the preliminaries are over, and once the institutions have their seatbelts properly affixed, then the price will jerk upwards to a new trading range. At that point, things will be ever so much more volitile and mean.
Once interest rates start rising, the scope of the disaster will be ever more apparent. Take physical delivery. Build an addition to your house with your gold place under the foundations. Who knew that real estate could be such a good investment.
USAGOLD / Centennial Precious Metals, Inc.
(5/30/03; 11:44:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103807)
Don't be fooled by inflatable paper substitutes
http://www.usagold.com/gold-coins.html
Gold Today!
Because you never know what tomorrow will bring.In this global marketplace, a single event on the far side of the world can suddenly and adversely affect the performance and credibility value of the commercial positions within your investment portfolio.
Gold has no employees, no overhead, and no financial statement to balance. It cannot go bankrupt. Gold is wealth itself. It is valued worldwide on the basis of its uniquely reliable form and function -- a steadfast financial asset which is immune to the contagious collapses to which all financial paper is prone.
In the final analysis -- in times of stress -- paper is only paper.How solid is your portfolio?USAGOLD - Centennial is here to help.
1-800-869-5115
Gonlyold
(5/30/03; 11:38:33MT - usagold.com msg#: 103806)
$$$$ESSAY CONTEST$$$$
What do you think will be the price of gold by summer's traditional end -- Labor Day, midnight September 1st 2003 -- and why?"
I believe gold will meander up and down within a range of $350 to $450 an ounce and be at a temporary level of $410 on September 1, 2003 before it comes back down. I see no breakout to higher limits as many hope for. The reason for my opinion is this.
The quantity of gold available in the world! Many articles have been written attempting to quantify the amount of gold in this world. The question is do you believe them? Are we to believe that the bankers, politicians, and businessmen are looking out for our, the peoples, best interest and welfare? I think not. So why should we believe their statistics on the quantity of gold? I have opted to consult the Creator of gold and sought to see what He says about the quantity of gold in the world.
I read in Zechariah 9:3 that Tyrus "…did build herself a stronghold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets." How much gold does one have to have before it becomes "mire"? I'm not sure but it seems like a lot. And since I haven't heard of any gold rich country constructing streets of gold yet, and since gold cannot be destroyed, must mean that that quantity is still around here somewhere.
And what about the future quantity of gold? In speaking about the New Jerusalem, Revelation 21:18 says, "…the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass." It appears that the Creator has chosen to use gold as construction material!
Side comment: A fitting end to the question of what is/who is more important in the world. By the way, as I understand it, when God purifies gold it becomes clear. How would you like to have a proof set of some clear gold coins?
So if gold is going to be used for construction, must mean there's going to be a bunch of it around here. Therefore, I think those published statistics are a little in error now and will be in error about the future.
Will this affect the price by September 1, 2002? Not hardly. But it's a harbinger of things to come. Gold, it's out there: just have to find it.
Also, what's more important, food, clothing, shelter, or gold?
Operative
(5/30/03; 11:36:59MT - usagold.com msg#: 103805)
@ John The Jute
Your creative post made for the perfect lunch break. Tuna melt and ale for the body, your essay entry for brainfood.
Thanks.
Max Rabbitz
(5/30/03; 11:16:24MT - usagold.com msg#: 103804)
$$$Essay Contest$$$
355 Euros by year end.
I can't say in dollars because I don't print/create the stuff and have no way of telling how much will be out there or how much people will still want to use it. The euro price of gold needs to increase or the EU needs to start buying gold to provide greater reserves and euro liquidity for the increasing demand......if the EU is to maintain 15% of their reserves in gold. I'm estimating a 15% rise in euro gold price by year end to allow central banks to continue diversifying out of dollars without driving the euro to intolerable highs.
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 11:15:59MT - usagold.com msg#: 103803)
$$$$$$ ESSAY CONTEST $$$$$$ --- LAST Call !!! <;-)
Less than ONE HOUR to post your entry !
<;-)
contrarianthinker
(5/30/03; 10:59:56MT - usagold.com msg#: 103802)
$$$$ Essay Contest Entry $$$$
PS to my previous post into the above contest -
By September I expect the HUI to be heading to 275-300 from it present 140 - about double. Since gold rises 1/3 as fast on average I would guess a price around
POG $432.10
by then.
John the Jute
(5/30/03; 10:42:24MT - usagold.com msg#: 103801)
$$$$ ESSAY CONTEST ENTRY $$$$
What do you think will be the price of gold by traditional summers-end -- Labor Day, midnight, September 1, 2003? And why?
"And what, pray, is so fascinating about the price of gold?"
I came back from my day-dreaming with a start. "I beg your pardon, Holmes?" I said.
"Well, Watson, you stopped reading those papers in front of you some while ago, and have been in a reverie since then, thinking about the price of gold. I was just wondering why?"
"But how on Earth could you have known what I was thinking?"
"You know my methods, Watson. Apply them."
"But how? I can't imagine what you can have noticed. It's not as though I had taken a sovereign out of my pocket and was studying it."
"I didn't 'notice' anything: I observed. When you first lowered the papers to your lap, you gazed at the photograph on the wall which you took when you lived in Australia in your youth."
"So I did."
"And then you transferred your gaze to that stain on your hand which has resulted from your use of the wet collodion process for printing your photographs. You were thinking either of photography or of something from your days in 'Oz', as I think they call it."
"Please don't call Australia 'Oz', Holmes. Oz is quite a different story."
"No matter. The next subject of your gaze was the teapot. What, I asked myself, does a teapot have in common with the wet collodion process? The answer is obvious: silver.
"But the mines you knew in Australia were the gold mines of Ballarat in Victoria. Was the teapot just a tangent into precious metals in general? I watched carefully, and observed you feeling with your tongue at that large gold filling you have recently had in a tooth. And then you shook your head in just the same way as you did when you lamented the cost of that filling. Ergo, the price of gold."
"Wonderful," I said.
"Elementary," Holmes replied. "What is in those papers that started your chain of day-dreaming?"
"These are really very strange. Mr H G Wells says that they came back to him in his Time Machine from 108 years in the future. They come from something called the "Inter Net" and relate to a contest in which people attempt to predict the future price of gold."
"And is this 'Inter Net' a sort of cloth netting used in place of a shroud, to wrap corpses before they are interred?"
"I'm not sure, Holmes. Wells is not at all clear."
"Hmmm. I suspect Wells's fertile imagination rather than a real example of time travel. But the problem is interesting enough. From the very nature of the question, I presume that the gold standard has not lasted until this year 2003."
"Clearly not. Which seems strange to me. The gold standard seems to be spreading all over the World. Even India, that bastion of silver coinage, adopted a gold standard two years ago. The United States is the only great power still using both silver and gold standards."
"Quite so. And unless Mr William Jennings Bryan has his way, they too will adopt a gold standard soon. But a major war could blow that asunder. At least, it could if John Keynes is right."
"I'm sorry, Holmes. Who is John Keynes?"
"John Keynes is a schoolboy. A quite astonishingly precocious schoolboy."
"I see," I said chuckling. "Well, have a look at these letters from the Inter Net and see what you make of it all."
"Why not? I'll just light a pipe before I read."
"Ah, that's another thing. Wells tells me that in this future time, people are not allowed to smoke in public."
"Ridiculous! You'll be telling me that they have banned cocaine next."
I forbore from entering into that issue, one of our few major disagreements, and watched while Holmes scanned the Inter Net letters at great speed.
At last, he put his pipe down, and looked at me. "A strange world, this 2003. There would seem to be two major factors that will affect the price of gold that summer. One is War and the other is Politics. Supply is stable and well-known, so that won't have an impact in such a short time. And the Economies of the great powers appear to be in a mess, so the gold price is rising steadily as that mess becomes more and more apparent. But War and Politics could change everything in a period of three months.
"War in country A is bad for the economy of country A but can be good for the economy of country B. Take the United States for instance, since so many of the letters come from people living there. The War Between the States -- or whatever we are now supposed to call it -- was disastrous for the economy, particularly of the Confederacy. But the perennial squabbles in the Balkans have done wonders for the sale of Mr Winchester's rifles."
"Oh, Holmes!" I cried. "That's far too hard-hearted a way of looking at things! The real disaster of the War Between the States was the death of so many brave young men."
"I am sorry, Watson," he replied. "I should have said that better. Yes, indeed, the human cost is the greatest cost. But we cannot ignore the economic results. Particularly when there are people who exploit them.
"During a war, the antagonists spend freely on the materials of war and, after the war, they spend as much as they have left on the materials of reconstruction. A country whose industries are undamaged -- and particularly a country like the United States, which is geared to responding to needs in the marketplace -- will benefit from that. And I'm not thinking of war profiteering. Quite ordinary industries, making weighing scales, or gas mantles, or telegraph machines, will receive a boost to their sales -- a boost which will trickle down to the rest of the economy.
"If the economies of the great powers benefit from such reconstruction in the summer of 2003, then the pressure on the gold price will ease.
"And there is also the effect of Politics. Elected politicians, such as the President of the United States, and our own Prime Minister, want their voters to feel that the economy is doing well. Partly of course, they want the economy to be doing well in actual fact -- that's why they went into politics -- but little more than a twelvemonth before a US presidential election, there will be a focus on the perception as well. Which again will ease the pressure on the gold price."
"So what do you think the gold price will be in September 2003?"
"It isn't so much a price as a probability distribution."
"What does that mean?"
"It means that the price of gold will be between 70 and 90 pounds. If you must have a single number, then let it be 80 pounds."
"The contest requires a value in US dollars. What rate should I use for the conversion?"
"The traditional one, as first calculated by Sir Isaac Newton, of one dollar to four shillings and sixpence ha'penny."
"Hmmm. A pound is 240 pence; four shillings and sixpence ha'penny is 54.5 pence. So eighty pounds is (19200 divided by 54.5) dollars."
I scribbled on a scrap of paper for a minute or so, wishing that someone would invent a pocket machine for long division.
"$352.30. That's a rather bearish view."
"Perhaps it is. Maybe I am giving more credence to market manipulation than to market forces. But my experience of crime leads me that way."
"Is this what you meant when you spoke of those who exploit the economic results of war?"
"It is indeed. Some of the greatest criminals in London, far worse than the late Professor Moriarty, are those who not only exploit war but even foster war so that they can exploit it. And these criminals are all too often welcomed into our highest society because of their wealth. But we mustn't get dragged into depression by Wells's little game."
"So you doubt whether the papers are genuine?"
"The nature of the prizes is significant, I think. One is a 10 guilder coin from the present Dutch Queen, Wilhelmina, and the other is a 10 guilder coin from the late King Willem III. Why should a contest in the early 21st century use money from the late 19th century? Have they no reliable money of their own?"
7nomads
(5/30/03; 09:58:01MT - usagold.com msg#: 103800)
$$$$Essay Contest$$$$
After reading many of the great essays posted I feel I have little to add. The work done on the FED by Griffin, the new ownership of gold by Chinese individuals and subsequent disconnect between the Yuan and U.S. dollar, the up coming use of the gold dinar, the monetary expansion as a result of federal budget deficient, and an imbalance in the supply and demand of gold will lead to an astronomical increase in gold.
I would like to add on more seemingly obtuse factor to the increase in POG. The Middle-East conflict or Middle-East quagmire as it is better described.
U.S. efforts to bring about an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will stumble over the issue of Jerusalem. Once former President Clinton put Jerusalem on the table, U.S. peace efforts were dead in the water. No living Arab will relinquish the old city of Jerusalem "Al Queds" (The Holy, as translated). If he tried he wouldn't be living very long (the former king of Jordan was assassinated for his "peace efforts" with the Jews). No living Jew would do the same (Mr. Rabin could testify).
For example, in 1999 Arafat said a lot of eloquent words, but negated them by his final phase "In-Shal-la" (which was not translated into English at the time). In Arabic the phase negates everything before it and allows one to say anything his listener wants to hear without technically lying. Of course Sharon, at the time only a MK in the Keneset took a stroll on the Temple Mount with a thousand others (who happen to be policemen). The result was a riot, heavy lethal police action, and an end to the peace efforts.
More can be said on this subject, but suffice it to say there is and will be no peace, compromise, or solution over Jerusalem. Of course, the Jews and Arabs should realize they are pawns in the hands of the Globalists. The world elite put the Jews there in order to eventual wrestle it away from the Arabs. Jerusalem will become the religious seat of the New World Order.
A short comment on Iraq, it has been written in War and Peace that Russia's two generals are January and February. If this was true, as Napoleon found out, Iraq's generals would be July and August. I hope loss will be minimal. But if anyone has been in 120+ degree heat for any amount of time, they would be concerned for our troops.
Of course, personally I favor a strong dollar and a low price of gold. I've enjoyed adding to my retirement plan and I would like to keep increasing my fund. Gold won't make us rich, but will keep us from going broke.
Therefore, the POG will rise to $480 an ounce by Labor Day on the dollar's weakness towards other fiat currencies, especially the Euro and eventually theYuan.
Nakajima
(5/30/03; 09:44:04MT - usagold.com msg#: 103799)
gold and the stock market
This may be slightly off topic, but I'd appreciate anyone's comments.
I have a modest gold position and a modest short position against the major stock market indices (obviously this has been getting killed lately!) as part of my overall investment strategy.
The question is, with continuing fall of the dollar, we talk about the value of gold going up, but isn't it really just holding its value, and is worth more dollars because the dollar is worth less?
And in the Stock Market, if the dollar has fallen, say 30%, against the average world currency, doesn't that mean that a dollar denominated asset like a U.S. Stock has fallen 30% in value even if its value as listed on the exchange has not changed at all?
What I'm questioning is, in shorting the market, I may be watching it go down in real value due to the dollar fall, while in fact the indices are going up, costing me money.
Thanks.
Shanti
(5/30/03; 09:33:48MT - usagold.com msg#: 103798)
$$$$$$Essay Contest Entry$$$$$$$
POG on 01-09-2003
KIS (KEEP IT SIMPLE)
Who could be better guessing the POG than all the best expert's on this forum?
- Take all the expert's guesses together from the contest for june 477,7 to 344,5 divide by 109 =377,89
- Compare with the actual POG = -/- 13,99
- 13,99 x 3 (months)41,97
- trend = up
- actual POG 363,9 + 41,97 = 405,8 et Voila !
Sal-OM All !!
Shanti
Lothar of the Hill People
(5/30/03; 09:00:18MT - usagold.com msg#: 103797)
$$$Essay Contest$$$
I am Lothar, of the Hill People. I am honored for the opportunity to address the Lords and Ladies of this great Hall.
Lothar has great respect for the lessons of history—the trends observed. Behold the events of the near-past: Tribulations of Sept 11. A controversial war begun and ended. Dollar decent, volatile markets, national and personal dept escalates, unemployment rises, corporate scandal, NATO weakened, UN discredited, interest rates drop, fiat printed, Soro weighed in.
And what of the golden response of the past? POG spiked above 380 and retreated to 330, jumped above 370 and retreats. BUT, overall, POG steady ascends.
Lothar sees no great future event, no irresistible force applied to change the present course. Portents favor more of the same throughout the summer. More terrorist attacks. More war, or at least rumors of war, arising from the "cold war" on terrorism. Signs suggest continuation of dept growth, economic decline, uncertainty and volatility.
Lothar believes POG will complete the retreat begun, will form the "right shoulder," will again advance and retreat. Gold will continue a steady slow ascent breaching 380 and establishing support in the 370s by summer's end. It will be 375 on midnight Labor Day.
Fare thee well. I am Lothar, of the Hill People.
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 08:47:46MT - usagold.com msg#: 103796)
REMINDER to Sir GAB and all other procrastinators !! <;-)
The time remaining before the $$$$$ ESSAY CONTEST $$$$$ deadline is less than THREE (3) HOURS ! That DEADLINE is HIGH NOON (12:00 o'clock MDT) Denver Time.
HURRY, HURRY, Scamper!!!
<;-)
Gandalf the White
(5/30/03; 08:38:42MT - usagold.com msg#: 103795)
WOWSERS --- This VOLATILITY is getting ME dizzy !!! <;-)
http://focus.comdirect.co.uk/en/detail/_pages/charts/main_large.html?sSymbol=GLD.FX1
$10 moves within a NY COMEX trading session is indicating that there is CERTAINLY NOT ANY manipulation in the GOLD market ! Yes ?
<;-)
cockerel1
(5/30/03; 08:37:44MT - usagold.com msg#: 103794)
$$$$ Essay Contest Entry $$$$
The price of gold on Sept. 1st and why.
First of all, let me say that regardless of what the price will be, the analysts, to a man, will have all the reasons why it is what it is, but always after the fact.
My granddaughter (she is six) has a very simple way of analysing value, thanks, in no small part to a family tradition, started long before I can remember.
If someone/thing is "of value" to her, she first decides how old that person/thing is, and then relates it to "bags of sugar" or "sacks of coal": sugar being the ultimate sweetness, and coal being the nastiest, at least to little kids.
She has a little gold bracelet that used to belong to her grandma. I told her what it was made from, and how the gold came to be. I then asked her how much she loved it.
Her answer "All the sugar in the world".
rsjacksr
(5/30/03; 08:17:11MT - usagold.com msg#: 103793)
The Dollar and gold
silvercollector
Gold is priced in Dollars. If your currency appreciates upwards relative to the dollar, as the dollar and the price of gold both fall, it becomes cheaper in your currency
silvercollector
(5/30/03; 07:53:30MT - usagold.com msg#: 103792)
I.H. & contrarianthinker
Thanks Invisible! You may be correct.
c.t. : Since my 'homeland' peso has appreciated proportionately and equally to the US greenback, gold has been flat in my currency. Again, how does it get 'cheaper' if the dollar is falling?
TIA
Socrates964
(5/30/03; 07:52:38MT - usagold.com msg#: 103791)
Sundeck
"Sundeck: What effect on gold would a revalueing of its currency have? Initially, the price of gold to Chinese buyers would be cheaper, but then all those Chinese already in gold would take an instant loss, would they not? How would a revaluation be handled?"
This assumes that the price of gold in dollars remains the same. There are plenty of good reasons for assuming that a Yuan revaluation would force up the price of gold in dollar terms.
Zhisheng
(5/30/03; 07:15:53MT - usagold.com msg#: 103790)
The Shorts
They are pushing the beach ball underwater again this morning.
contrarianthinker
(5/30/03; 06:30:55MT - usagold.com msg#: 103789)
$$$$ Essay Contest Entry $$$$
OOPS! I did not read the competition instructions before my previous post on this topic. I had the same problem with plastic construction kits - which is why the undercarriage never retracted on my 1/72nd scale Handley Page Herald.
I write this essay to encourage debate and to be educated by any responses it might stimulate. The title of the essay is
MONEY MOMENTUM
I like to apply classical physics analogies to economics. This helps me get the picture. Economic activity can be measured in a number of ways. If I improve my garden at no cost but some effort, then no money has changed hands, but wealth has been created. Value has been added to my garden.
Self-sufficiency requires little money.
However, if I buy goods and services money flows, in a direction counter to that of the goods/services. The faster this money flows, the more economic activity is involved, though it is the economic activity that causes the money to flow, not vice versa. That is an important point.
The rate of flow of money times the amount of money flowing is a measure of traded value as opposed to created value.
In physics momentum = mass times velocity. I think that the AMOUNT of money in circulation (mass) times its velocity might be considered to be money momentum. And money momentum could be a better yardstick for how much a currency should be worth, as opposed to counting the number of dollars sitting around.
Gold has next to no momentum, which is what holds it back during a thriving trading economy even as dollars are pumped into the system in monetary inflation. This is what the FED is trying to do now. But it is economic activity that moves money - if the money justs sits around doing nothing, not even gaining interest, we lose interest in it. It loses value. This is happening to dollars right now.
Debt saturation is now beginning to slow up the dollar and other currencies. Trading is dwindling, dollars are staying put for longer. A slow dollar has low momentum. When finally the 'buck stops' gold and PMs will explode. There will be nowhere else for all that expanded semi-stationary money supply to go.
misetich
(5/30/03; 06:24:22MT - usagold.com msg#: 103788)
New Iraqi administration rejects $3.8 billion LUKoil deal
http://www.albawaba.com/headlines/TheNews.php3?action=story&sid=250307&lang=e&dir=
Snip:
Iraq's newly appointed oil minister Thamir Ghadhban has confirmed that the US appointed Iraqi administration has no intention of re-activating a cancelled oil contract to Russia's LUKoil.
...............
LUKoil spokesman Dmitry Dolgov said the company still considers its Iraqi contract valid and would sue any new contender for the field for at least $20 billion. "We will hold negotiations on the contract when there is a sovereign, internationally recognized government in place in Baghdad," he said in Moscow Times. "But if we are stopped we will take our case to the Geneva arbitration court."
*************
Misetich
Part Deux on the fight for Iraq's vast amount of oil reserves coming up in the courts -
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
misetich
(5/30/03; 06:05:23MT - usagold.com msg#: 103787)
Japan life insurers hit by weak stocks, low rates
http://www.forbes.com/newswire/2003/05/30/rtr986254.html
Snip:
TOKYO, May 30 (Reuters) - Japan's top life insurers posted bleak business results on Friday for the year ended in March with sagging stocks, puny interest rates and the declining value of policy contracts threatening their financial health.
Eight of the nation's 10 major life insurers reported falls in a key gauge of their ability to pay policy obligations, highlighting the precarious state of their finances as the Nikkei share average <.N225> fell 28 percent in fiscal 2002/03.
..............
Life insurers wrote off a substantial amount of valuation on their equity holdings and accelerated their stock disposals," said Brett Hemsley, financial institution analyst at Fitch Ratings.
"As a result, the lower book valuation of their smaller portfolios are less vulnerable to future stock price volatility," he said.
All insurers saw either their latent gains from domestic stockholdings shrink or their latent losses increase by the end of March from a year earlier.
Together, the top 10 insurers' had unrealised losses of 379 billion yen, down sharply from gains of 1.87 trillion yen a year earlier.
NEGATIVE SPREADS
Rock bottom interest rates have also hit most Japanese insurers and coupled with falling share prices have left them plagued by what are known as "negative spreads", or the gap between what they earn on their investments and what they have guaranteed to policyholders.
***********
Misetich
As the Japanese economy continues down its deflationary path, there's little relief in sight for Japanese investors and the Nikkei -
Worse still for these life insurers however could be the hit of a declining US $ and the effect on their US investments portfolio
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
contrarianthinker
(5/30/03; 05:51:29MT - usagold.com msg#: 103786)
@ silvercollector
I too collect silver. POG and POS are quoted in dollars. If your currency appreciates versus $ then the metal gets cheaper for you along with the $.
misetich
(5/30/03; 05:49:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103785)
Report: Prudential Faces Probe
http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=businessNews&storyID=2849296
Snip:
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street's self-regulatory body is investigating the actions of brokers, salespeople and managers of Prudential Securities, a unit of Prudential Financial Inc., over whether they faked documents to increase sales, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
Citing unnamed people familiar with the situation, the newspaper reported that the National Association of Securities Dealers' probe comes after an internal Prudential investigation showed some managers or brokers might have forged documents to have clients replace one annuity with another.
************
Misetich
Brokers, investment bank etc continuing fraudlent practices and activities continue undermining investors confidence
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
Sundeck
(5/30/03; 05:48:59MT - usagold.com msg#: 103784)
Economic harmony likely to elude leaders
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1051390439877
Snip:
"...
In private, other European policymakers are less relaxed, not least because no one really know where the euro's rise will stop.
A return to 1995 levels, equivalent to $1.40 to the euro, would mean deflation not just in Germany but in the eurozone as a whole, according to the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, a London- based think-tank.
The European Central Bank is expected to cut interest rates next week, perhaps by half a percentage point, which would take its main interest rate to 2 per cent. There is still a good chance it will be too little, too late.
Mr Chirac's dismissal of the prospect of serious discussion of exchange rates may be nothing more than simple realism. There are no prizes for guessing what the answer would be if the Europeans were to beg the US for help.
One answer to Europe's problems that the US might be prepared to consider would be to try putting pressure on China to revalue its currency against the dollar, easing the effective exchange rate of the euro. The summit may serve some other useful purposes, but restoring global economic co-operation is not likely to be one of them.
..."
Sundeck: What effect on gold would a revalueing of its currency have? Initially, the price of gold to Chinese buyers would be cheaper, but then all those Chinese already in gold would take an instant loss, would they not? How would a revaluation be handled?
contrarianthinker
(5/30/03; 05:45:27MT - usagold.com msg#: 103783)
Money Momentum
I have been a keeen observer of this forum, possibly the last bastion of chivalry. May I thank you for your excellent posts, especially articles written from a European perspective.
I am already convinced of the coming fiat collapse and have positioned myself accordingly.
Can you settle an argument? I say that dollars were not destroyed by bubble collapse, because the dollars went somewhere else. Is there anything wrong with this simplistic reasoning?
"What do you think will be the price of gold by summer's traditional end -- Labor Day, midnight September 1st 2003 -- and why?"
MONEY MOMENTUM
I like to apply classical physics analogies to economics. This helps me get the picture. Economic activity can be measured in a number of ways. If I improve my garden at no cost but some effort, then money has not changed hands, but wealth = added value has been creatde.
Self-sufficiency requires little money.
However, if I buy goods and services then money flows, in a direction counter to that in which the goods/services move. The faster this money flows the more economic activity is involved, though it is the economic activity that creates the money flow, not the other way around. Therefore the rate of flow times the amount of money is a decent measure of traded value as opposed to created value.
In physics momentum = mass times velocity. I think that the AMOUNT of money in circulation (mass) times its velocity might be considered to be money momentum. And money momentum could be a better yardstick for how much a currency should be worth, as opposed to counting the number of dollars sitting around - the monetary inflation.
Gold has next to no momentum, which is what holds it back during a thriving trading economy even as dollars are pumped intom the system.
However, debt saturation is beginning to slow up the dollar and other currencies. Trading is dwindling, dollars are staying put for longer. When finally the 'buck stops' gold and PMs will explode. There will be nowhere else for the fiat to go.
This will probably not happen by Labor Day, but by September the HUI will be headed for 300 according to my contrarian analysis. Gold, at a 1:3 gearing should therefore be around $420.
I therefore guess for gold
$432.10
misetich
(5/30/03; 05:43:35MT - usagold.com msg#: 103782)
Japan Sold 3.98 Trillion Yen in May, BOJ Figures Show
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000101&sid=aeMRFB.MpIew&refer=japan
Snip:
May 30 (Bloomberg) -- Japan sold a record amount of yen in the currency market in May, monthly figures released on the central bank's Web site indicated.
Foreign-exchange transactions in the Bank of Japan's current account balance rose by 3.98 trillion yen ($33.5 billion), a record, this month. A Ministry of Finance official confirmed that Japan sold about the amount of yen in the central bank's figures, declining to say which currencies it bought.
**********
Misetich
Japan is fighting a losing battle - and taking the US and the rest of the global economies down with them as it continues in its deflation path rather than biting the bullet and cleaning up their financial messes once and for all
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
The Invisible Hand
(5/30/03; 05:36:25MT - usagold.com msg#: 103781)
Silvercollector
The reason why you can't make sense out of
"..a falling U.S. dollar makes the metal cheaper for overseas buyers.",
may be that you think that gold is already being "priced" in euro.
misetich
(5/30/03; 05:34:02MT - usagold.com msg#: 103780)
DOLLAR DUMPED BY GOLD DIGGERS
http://www.nypost.com/business/76961.htm
Snip:
May 29, 2003 -- A touch of gold fever is sweeping the world, and could worsen into a deadly allergy to the dollar.
............
Currency speculators increasingly are using gold to hedge their gambles with the dollar, euro and yen. Some investors believe that if U.S. Treasury bonds get dumped by more foreign investors, gold could skyrocket.
**********
Misetich
Excerpts from another article"
Ma--ana economics
Economists keep saying the sun will come out tomorrow ... and tomorrow ... and tomorrow.
"The principal forecast has been the ma--ana forecast," said former Federal Reserve economist Lacy Hunt, now chief economist with Hoisington Investment Management in Austin, Tex. Ma--ana is the Spanish word for "tomorrow," which is when forecasters have consistently said the U.S. economy would get back to full strength.
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
silvercollector
(5/30/03; 05:23:38MT - usagold.com msg#: 103779)
Why can I not make sense out of this statement?
"..a falling U.S. dollar makes the metal cheaper for overseas buyers."
misetich
(5/30/03; 05:23:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103778)
Europe and Russia
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2003/05/30/006.html
Snip:
Yet as the EU-Russia relationship matures, it is not in the headlines or grand declarations that progress is made, but in the quiet, step-by-step cooperation and integration of our peoples.
...........
The EU enlargement signals the opening of a new chapter in European integration, pushing the EU eastward and expanding the common borders and common interests of Russia and the EU. This commonality of interest in a wider Europe underpins the EU's approach to its neighbors and the strategic offer to Russia to create "common spaces" in internal and external security, economy and culture, further exploiting the potential of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement. This summit will have the objective first and foremost of removing obstacles to trade and investment and boosting cooperation in "soft security" (the environment, migration, crime), foreign policy, research and education.
Enlargement will benefit Russia, bringing political stability and greater economic dynamism and growth. This is no mere detail -- after enlargement, the EU will account for over 50 percent of Russian exports. EU investment in the Russian economy is equally significant, with enormous potential to grow. By including the new member states within the trade preferences of our Partnership and Cooperation Agreement we will provide Russia improved access to the EU market of 450 million consumers. Tariffs on Russian exports will be lower overall. For Poland alone, they are expected to drop by 60 million euros per year.
...........
Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis and European Commission President Romano Prodi contributed this comment to The Moscow Times.
*************
Misetich
The title of the article is curiously labeled " A New Europe" - so the campaign of US vs Europe rages on
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
Sundeck
(5/30/03; 05:15:28MT - usagold.com msg#: 103777)
Strong Dollar
Does anyone else get the distinct impression that the US administration is in a state of confusion over the state of the dollar? Beating about the bush in the snow...
The cat seems to be well and truly out of the bag with the renewed reference to the $44T deficit (between expected revenues and predicted expenditures going forward). This issue was discussed briefly on this forum a week or two ago, it went quiet for a while and it has now burst back onto the global financial scene. The $44T figure apparently does not contain forward estimates of expiditionary military campaigns either - but that is probably less than about $1T and relatively insignificant!! Can you believe it?
"Strong dollar" balony. Who does Bush thinks he is kidding? The financial world from Azerbaijan to Zambia know by now the state of the dollar and the creditworthiness of its progenitor (see discussion by Sinclair at jsmineset). Other countries are given credit ratings. What credit rating does the US have?
How is the dollar going to remain "strong"? Is the picture of George Washington going to be replaced with a picture of Superman? Will gold be kryptonite in disguise? How much longer will people pretend that the emperor has on a fine suit of clothes? And what will happen when the little boy cries out from the crowd?
What needs to be discussed at national summit level is how the world is going to extricate itself from this mess so that not too many innocent folk are damaged beyond repair. The great depression severely damaged a generation of lives in many countries (my father being one). What is shaping up here is something akin to a replay. Is the US going to play Superman and try to "fight its way out" of its financial mess or is it going to play mild-mannered Clark Kent and seek a gentler, cooperative way out?
If this thing unwinds smoothly it will be either a miracle or a tribute to the diplomatic skills and the unselfish humanity of a dozen countries.
Perhaps I am too pessimistic...I hope so.
:-)
misetich
(5/30/03; 05:08:56MT - usagold.com msg#: 103776)
Income shortfalls threaten retirees' futures
http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/0503/25pension.html
Snip:
Washington -- Americans are supposed to sail into retirement on as many as three converging streams of income: a company pension, a tax-advantaged savings account and Social Security.
......................
Millions of investors have watched their retirement dreams recede as their 401(k) and IRA statements reported negative numbers quarter after quarter. Some of the unluckiest were Enron Corp. workers, whose savings disappeared in a flash.
And even the Social Security Trust Fund, the sole source of income for one-fifth of all retirees, will begin shriveling within 14 years. Before a person born in 1962 reaches her 80th birthday, the fund will be exhausted unless something is done, according to a government projection.
"This is becoming a catastrophe, and I'm not overusing that word," said Dennis Brommer, a United Steelworkers of America official in Canton, Ohio.
.............
With the first baby boomers reaching retirement age in 2012, there's little time left to correct problems before the demographic tsunami strikes.
........
Misetich
Not a pretty picture
All On Board The Gold Bull Express
WAC (Wide Awake Club)
(5/30/03; 04:49:17MT - usagold.com msg#: 103775)
Deflation and dollar fears for G8 - Analysis By Andrew Walker
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2948646.stm
They used to be called economic summits, now the agenda is much wider - it covers whatever bothers the leaders that they can agree to talk about.
Economics is bound to be discussed and there are some global problems that must be nagging at certain minds at least.
Two issues stand out: deflation and the dollar.
The dollar has sunk to an all time low against the euro or, to put it the other way around, the euro has never been higher.
It is perhaps a potent virility symbol for any euro-lovers who were worried about its decline after the 1999 launch of the European single currency.
But, far more importantly, it is a millstone for European exporters
Topaz
(5/30/03; 04:44:57MT - usagold.com msg#: 103774)
What a Systemic Near-Death experience looks like.
http://www.futuresource.com/charts/charts.asp?r=&type=future%2Cindex&symbols=DX1%21&period=V&varminutes=60&bartype=line&symlist=DX&month=1%21&year=03&study=NONE&STUDY0=&STUDY1=&STUDY2=&STUDY3=&bardensity=LOW&size=SMALL&x=31&y=10
The Dollar can't be allowed to rise...too many people will be tempted into Cash.
Topaz
(5/30/03; 04:18:49MT - usagold.com msg#: 103773)
While America slept....
http://finance.yahoo.com/m5?a=1&s=XAU&t=EUR
A most intriguing sentiment change took place last eve...and it was a sight to behold!
Shortly after the AM Fix, the Pound suddenly reversed it's trend against the Dollar, and in a twinkling "everything" turned. The task of rescuing the Dollar from it's upside fell to MotherEngland in shades of (past??) glory days.
Meanwhile the Euro Chart indicates a brush with 320 (I missed it!) Where do EC-centric people watch live Gold?
WAC (Wide Awake Club)
(5/30/03; 04:12:29MT - usagold.com msg#: 103772)
@IVH, Belgian
Dank u well!!
Belgian
(5/30/03; 03:00:29MT - usagold.com msg#: 103771)
@ WAC
Yes, indeed WAC. I have some other, less subtle, rather strong indications (no naked evidence) of an increasing shortage (?) aka, decline in availability of Physical Gold (bullion, not jewelry) ! But let us not fall into the subjective trap of not believing what we see and only see what we believe !!!
Analysts (?) analysing (?) what is meant by "strong" dollar ? Military strength...? Purchasing strength...? Exchange rate strength...? Manipulation-proof strength...?
Euro immune strenght...?
Bush meeting with Chirac will be protocalair, because he doesn't want to meet Shroder. Mamma mia...
€_$ exchange rate jumping up and down !?
Keep bearing in mind that an enormous amount of equity is in the globe's pension funds of all sorts and that a declining dollar might pull the stockmarket indexes down and torpedo all those supposed safe savings of the boomers heading for their rest-phase ! What a mess we got ourselves in !
The Invisible Hand
(5/30/03; 02:59:06MT - usagold.com msg#: 103770)
WAC in ‘t Engels - 2nd attempt
Exchanging old gold and silver for money?
======================================
Do you know them? The old golden objects or ornaments. Inherited objects or things from grandma's time. Hidden somewhere in boxes and drawers in your house. Ornaments about which you wonder whether they are ‘real gold’. Maybe you are thinking of exchanging them for ‘real money’ (sic, euro, not dollar). Failing to have the correct address, you have always put this idea aside. Our workshop has many years of experience in these matters. For taxation and payment in ‘money’ (sic again) of all your golden and silver ornaments, you can, upon showing your identity card, come to [censured].
What can you exchange?
· ‘marked’ and ‘unmarked’ gold
· tooth-gold
· brooches, pins and golden rings
· gold coins
· golden cuff-links and shirt-links
· golden watches
· chains, collars, bracelets etc.
· silver (also cutlery)
· silver coins
Also purchase of brilliants.
Ingoro (oops!) pays the highest price for your golden ornaments based on the most recent POG.
Only purchase – No sales.
IDENTITY CARD COMPULSORY.
Opening hours
Friday May 30: 10 am - 4 pm
Monday June 2: 10 am – 4 pm
Wednesday June 4: 2 pm – 8 pm
The Invisible Hand
(5/30/03; 02:46:30MT - usagold.com msg#: 103769)
WAC in ‘t Engels
Changing old gold and silver for money?
======================================
Do you know them? The old golden objects or ornaments. Inherited objects or things from grandma's time. Hidden somewhere in boxes and drawers in your house. Ornaments about which you wonder whether they are ‘real gold’. Maybe you are thinking of exchanging them for ‘real money’ (sic, euro, not dollar). Failing to have the correct address, you have always put this idea aside. Our workshop has many years of experience in these matters. For taxation and payment in ‘money’ (sic again) of all your golden and silver ornaments, you can, upon showing your identity card, come to [censured].
What can you exchange?
· ‘marked’ and ‘unmarked’ gold
· tooth-gold
· brooches, pins and golden rings
· gold coins
· golden cuff-links and shirt-links
· golden watches
· chains, collars, bracelets etc.
· silver (also cutlery)
· silver coins
Also purchase of brilliants.
Ingoro (oops!) pays the highest price for your golden ornaments based on the most recent POG.
Only purchase – No sales.
===
The Invisible Hand: Ingoro, is that a merger of ING-Bank and ORO? :-)
Belgian
(5/30/03; 02:33:40MT - usagold.com msg#: 103768)
Evian G8- moods
1/ Bush wants to co-operate with France !?
2/ Bush supports a strong dollar !?
1/ + 2/ = Arm twisting...? Mutual interests...? Blablablah-polite rapprochement efforts...?
To me, it strongly seems more evidence about the dollar's "real" degradating status, most probably irreversable because of very existence of the euro-alternative. Old dollar-theories will NOT be applicable anymore. This will and must boil down to the existing *gold-market* and clear the path for "changes".
Carry the FED's dollar-unreserve at your own incalculable risk.
After G-8...the same message in St. Petersburg, Russia ?
BTW : How come, sudden silence on N.Korea and coincidently SARS thing ???
WAC (Wide Awake Club)
(5/30/03; 02:08:01MT - usagold.com msg#: 103767)
We must be getting close me thinks.
This is the content of an advertising card found on the street in Brussels.
Oud goud en zilver wisselen voor geld?
======================================
Kent u ze? De oude, gouden voorwerpen of sieraden. Erfstukken of dingen uit grootmoeders tijd. Ergens weggestopt in doosjes en laden in uw woning. Sieraden, waarvan u zich afvraagt of ze wei van 'echt goud' zijn? Misschien denkt u eraan om al deze voorwerpen te wisselen voor echt geld? Het onbreken van het juiste adres heeft die gedachte echter steeds weer opzij geschoven. Ons atelier is sinds jaren vertrouwd met deze zaken. Voor taxatie en betaling in geld van al uw gouden en zilveren sieraden of voorwerpen kan u, mits met tonen van uw identiteitskaart, terect bij:
Wat kan u wisselen?
* Gemerkt en ongemerkt goud
* Tandengoud
* Broches, spelden en gouden ringen
* Gouden munten en penningen
* Gouden manchet - en hemdsknopen
* Gouden horloges
* Kettingen, colliers, armbanden, enz.
* Zilver (ook bestek)
* Zilveren munten
Ook inkoop van briljanten.
Ingoro betaalt de hoogste prijs voor uw gouden sieraden en voorweroen gebaseerd op de jongste goudkoers.
Alleen inkoop - geen verkoop!
IDENTITEITSKAART VERPLICHT
Openingstijden:
vrijdag 30 mei van 10.00 - 16.00 uur
maandag 2 juni van 10.00 - 16.00 uur
woensdag 4 juni van 14.00 - 20.00 uur
WAC: I cannot do justice to the translation. But basically, it's saying "bring along those barbaric old relic gold (and silver) that you've been hoarding since your grandma's days, in whatever format) and come and get some good cash. By the way, no money launderers, so bring you Identity card with you.
Over to Belgian or anyone else who is nederlaandtaal for a fuller translation.
slingshot
(5/30/03; 01:49:50MT - usagold.com msg#: 103766)
(No Subject)
If you're wondering if I'm dancing right now?
Yes!
Slingshot---<>
slingshot
(5/30/03; 01:18:50MT - usagold.com msg#: 103765)
OFF TO THE GYM , OH NOOOOOOOO!
Mr.Gresham.
Since there is no exercise machine which uses the weight Of Gold and Silver to use as counterweights, I have found that the accumulation of precious metals have cause me to exercise frequently. Yes, this gut strewn body formed by the lifting of 12 oz. liquidfied weights, has found a new exercise program. One that has taken away my worries and in turn encourages me to put on some music and dance the pounds away. Now thats one for the health books. Buy gold and get healthty. And I'm dancing my way to gold $400.00 and beyond.
Slingshot---------<>
Mr Gresham
(5/30/03; 00:57:20MT - usagold.com msg#: 103764)
Kilo
Thanks, I'm not as experienced in tracking that one, but it does make an interesting chart; makes me want to put all kinds of things in ratio on Stockcharts.
Also, those who buy should remember that the coin (or bar) premium in there (gold 3-4%, silver 10-12%) makes the actual ratio lower, although the trend still applies.
Also, I never would recommend using this as an indicator to "sell one" in order to buy the other. It just tends to act as a magnet for the funneling of excess cash, knowhaddamean? Heavy stuff! ;)
Pretty soon I'll be echoing BB's "Off to the gym!", for I've grown tired of wearing this InterGut after hours and years of pleasant chat with brilliant minds here and elsewhere. Lugging AG don't quite do it. So don't mind me if I'm a little excessive at times, after all, our health in years going forward is going to be a real treasure of its own. No excuses. No one else will do it for you. Hmmmm, maybe we can invent some exercise equipment with gold and silver weights (in adjustable ratios) dangling before us on pullies; enough, to bed zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..........
goldquest
(5/30/03; 00:26:59MT - usagold.com msg#: 103763)
@ slingshot
A Snapper riding lawn mower will work just fine! Make sure that you multiply the tire size by four and then subtract the air pressure from the two back tires! Your total should be within 7 cents! Good luck on the next contest! All in fun, of course! My best and good fortune to all. goldquest
Kilo
(5/30/03; 00:26:46MT - usagold.com msg#: 103762)
Mr. Gresham - Gold:Silver Ratio
Hello Mr. G.....
No, unfortunately the gold:silver ratio is not at an all-time low (or "high", depending on which side of the equation you are on...grin). I have been charting historical AU:AG ratios recently using the 1998 dollar as the basis dollar value, mostly because that was the previously used basis for the chart I was working off of. The AU:AG ratio yesterday topped the 80:1 mark for the first time in quite awhile (last time was late 1996 "very briefly"), but the all-time widest spread between the two metals was in 1939 when silver prices plummeted in relation to the static (fixed value) price of gold. The ratio extreme at that time climbed to 153:1, inflation adjusted basis the 1998 dollar. Interestingly, today's silver PRICE using that same basis was at it's all-time inflation adjusted LOW of $3.78 in 1998 dollars. Non-adjusted ratio tops were in 1940 and 1991 at between 100 and 102 to 1, depending on which market quotes were used. Fun to watch, and possibly a good value indicator vis a vis.
Regards......
Gandalf the White
(05/30/03; 00:02:40MT - usagold.com msg#: 103761)
$$$$ ESSAY CONTEST ENTRY $$$$ ------ Reminder <;-)
http://www.usagold.com/contest.html
Tick Tock --- ONLY 12 Hours to Post your ESSAY Entry !!
THE LABOR DAY DISCUSSION CONTEST -- A discussion statement is a separate contest which you may enter separately from your price guess -- the prize to be awarded to the most clever or thoughtful answer to this question posed by MK:
"What do you think will be the price of gold by summer's traditional end -- Labor Day, midnight September 1st 2003 -- and why?"
NOTE: The winners for this contest will be selected shortly after the entry deadline based (obviously) not on the accuracy of their guesses (after all, how could we judge this element in advance??) but rather on the thoughts contained in the stated rationale behind their guestimated Labor Day price.
1) ENTRY DEADLINE: All Labor Day discussion entries must be posted before the clock in Denver strikes HIGH NOON (12:00) on Friday, May 30th, 2003 (forum time).
2) ENTRY FORMAT: Labor Day Price essays shall be provided in a clearly labeled post that states "ESSAY CONTEST ENTRY" in the subject box enclosed in dollar symbols.
(such as $$$$ ESSAY CONTEST ENTRY $$$$)
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Thanks for the GREAT Entries --- KEEP them coming !
<;-)
ViewYesterday's Discussion.
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