Jack H Barnes's blog

When a nation becomes greedy, while not a unique event, it is rarely good for the national long-term best interests of its citizens. There is a case already brewing that will be interesting to watch unfold.

The Chinese economy is heading toward an economic hard landing; it will overshoot to the downside and become the economic Black Swan event of 2011-2012. Inflation, yes both types, will be the story in China in the coming months.

For the second time in the last few months, China’s Central Bank has raised its rates to fight internal inflation. The new rate goes into effect Sunday. Here is an English version of their announcement.

The Danish tax authority has been robbed blind by a carbon trading scandal that has rocked the market for carbon off sets: while the story saw some press a year ago, significantly higher losses have since been reported and the MSM has ignored the story.

The gold market for physical gold is getting warmer every day. I don’t mean gold coins or gold measured in grams. I am talking about Gold measured in oz. per ton.

There are more ways to be exposed to gold besides buying the shiny metal in its finished refined state. There is also a way to own physical gold reserves in the ground. I call it Natural Gold. It’s still trapped in the rock. There is no reason the gold you own, has to be refined and shiny.

I don’t know if you have noticed what I have, but lately it appears that people are using Copper as a poor mans currency. I started to notice during the crash of 2008, that copper was being sold in a .999 pure bullion. The photo attached is for a single troy oz of “Fine Copper”. The list price for this copper, as is, was 12 dollars. Think about that for a moment.

In an opinion piece submitted to The Wall Street Journal, U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy wrote that governments need to act to curb a "dangerously volatile" oil price that defies "the accepted rules of economics" and "could undermine confidence just as we are pushing for recovery."

Hours earlier in Washington, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the main futures-market regulator in the U.S., announced it would hold hearings on whether to introduce tougher regulation of oil-futures markets. The rules, which drew immediate criticism from traders, would seek to curb the influence of speculative investors such as hedge funds and investment banks by limiting how much money any single trader can bet on any one commodity at a given time.

UNG the equity ETF symbol that is the largest holder of NG contracts by size, had its symbol halted today, while they issued new units.

“Title IV, Subtitle B, Part 2, Section 426, of the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 states: ‘An eligible worker (specifically, workers who lose their jobs as a result of this measure) may receive a climate change adjustment allowance under this subsection for a period of not longer than 156 weeks…80 percent of the monthly premium of any health insurance coverage…up to a maximum payment of $1,500 in relocation allowance…and job search expenses not exceed[ing] $1,500.’”

“This is the world of smart securitisation,” said Geoff Smailes, managing director of global credit solutions at BarCap. “It’s not securitisation for leverage and arbitrage purposes any more. This is all about restructuring portfolios of assets to achieve risk, capital and funding efficiency in a transparent and less complex way.”

Rogue Trader in the Brent oil market causes spike in prices.

Sweden slashes repo rate to .25 with an implied negative interest rate of -.25

Proactive or Panic over the coming Latvia Default?