Middle East

Egypt’s Support for Intervention in Syria Was the Straw that Broke the Camel’s Back

The volatility of recent weeks is but a mere small taste of the volatility in store for all markets in the coming months and years. The global debt crisis is likely to continue for the rest of the decade as politicians and central bankers have merely delayed the day of reckoning. They have ensured that when the day of reckoning comes it will be even more painful and costly then it would have been previously.

The real question is when will the Feral Hogs fix their sights on the WTI market, and take it down to $80 like they have the last two years. My guess now that they have had their fun with the Gold and Silver markets, they will start looking around for their next target.

In a somewhat surprising move (given the proxy war under way), Russia has evacuated all military personnel from its small naval base in Syria. "We have neither servicemen nor civilians in Syria anymore," the newspaper Vedomosti reported quoting an unnamed Defense Ministry employee, "or Russian military instructors assigned to units of the Syrian regular army, for that matter." As The Washington Post reports, a 16-ship Russian naval task force in the eastern Mediterranean remains on post, reports said. Cyprus has made its ports available to the Russian fleet if needed, but the base at Tartus (that we described in detail here) has been Russia’s only foothold in the Middle East. A person with knowledge of the Kremlin’s decision told Russia’s RT television channel that the withdrawal reflected concerns about the risks posed by Syria’s ongoing civil war, as well as the fear of an incident involving the Russian military that could have larger consequences.

If oil and gas is a profoundly dynamic phenomenon, then so too must be environmental risk and conflicts over natural resources - and we are not getting the full picture from the mainstream media, according to Michael T. Klare, professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College. As risks multiply, conventional sources evaporate and we are left with “extreme” energy, renewables may be the only way to avoid war and disaster.

"If you believe that [Bernanke] means what he says," explains Gloom, Boom, and Doom's Marc Faber to a spell-bound Trish Regan on Bloomberg TV, "then you believe in Father Christmas." Simply out, Faber adds, "we are going to see QE99," and while he notes that equities, bonds, and gold are "very oversold," he would "rather buy bonds and gold than equities." From his views on Laszlo Birinyi to inflation, the 'taper', US housing, and China, Faber calmly warns that "the S&P could drop 20-30% from the recent highs - easily."

"The only thing that I know is that I want to own some physical gold because I don't want all of my assets in financial assets."

"I am not a prophet, I don't know exactly where the price will be on a month by month basis, but I want to have some wealth, some of my assets in physical gold. I can see a lot of problems coming into the world including expropriation through taxation or through regulation or even through revolution and social strife."

The Government Actually DID Spy On the Bad Guys Before 9/11

• China cash crunch deepens as PBOC withholds funding (FT), just a week behind ZH
• Platts in hot manipulated crude again: Traders Try to Game Platts Oil-Price Benchmarks (WSJ)
• Kabul Suspends Security Talks With U.S., jeopardizing plans to maintain a U.S. military presence (WSJ)
• Afghan government irked over U.S. talks with Taliban (Reuters)
• BOJ Kuroda: BOJ to Adjust Policy If Japan Econ Changes (MNI)
• Google Considering Private-Equity Alliances (BBG)
• Korean Air Buying 747-8s to End Boeing’s Sales Drought (BBG)
• Syria's Islamists seize control as moderates dither (Reuters)
• SEC considers policy shift on admissions of wrongdoing (FT)
• U.K. Banker Bonuses Face Decade Delays in Industry Overhaul (BBG)

As noted yesterday, and perhspa even more prescient now Anastasiades is back with the begging bowl, the debt crisis in Cyprus and the subsequent "bail-in" confiscation of bank depositors' money matter for two reasons: 1. The banking/debt crisis in Cyprus shares many characteristics with other banking/debt crises. 2. The official Eurozone resolution of the crisis may provide a template for future resolutions of other banking/debt crises. It also matters for another reason: not only is the bail-in a direct theft of depositors' money, the entire bailout is essentially a wholesale theft of national assets. This is the inevitable result of political Elites swearing allegiance to the European Monetary Union.

A mixed picture is starting to emerge from the Middle East in terms of oil production. Several members of the 12-member OPEC oil cartel are embroiled in turmoil or struggling to ensure post-war political gains. Oil production from the Middle East declined by 1.5 million barrels per day in 2009. Production from most Middle East countries has slowed down or leveled off, though gains from Iraq have offset some of those declines. With economic recovery seemingly on the horizon, a new OPEC may be developing from the ashes of the recession.

So much for that revolution, but don't worry about the oil companies losing money, price rises are assured. 

The Vietnamese Central Bank sold another 25,700 taels (37.5 grams, 1.2 troy ounces) at a gold bar auction on Friday in order to try and satiate the massive public demand for gold in Vietnam.

The Central Bank hopes that the sale of gold into the market will reduce the very high premiums paid by gold buyers in Vietnam, the largest buyer of gold in Southeast Asia after Thailand and one of the largest physical buyers of gold per capita in the world.

Vietnamese people hold gold as a store of wealth for protection against war, inflation and currency depreciation. In recent months, the bursting of bubbles in the stock market (see chart) and property market and the continuing devaluation of the dong has led to record demand in Vietnam and a surging premium over the spot price of gold.

Today, the premium was close to 5.5 million dong which is the equivalent of a very high premium of $217 per ounce over spot. 

• Obama prepares for chilly talks with Putin over Syria (Reuters)
• G8 opens amid dispute on Syria arms (FT)
• Economists Blame Fed for Higher Bond Yields (WSJ) - wait... what? Isn't the "stronger economy" to blame?
• What a novel concept - In the Czech Republic, a spying scandal has forced the PM to resign (BBG)
• Rigged-Benchmark Probes Proliferate From Singapore to UK (BBG)
• Economists Wary as Fed's Next Forecast Looms  (Hilsenleak)
• Banks Balk at New Rules for Small Loans (WSJ)
• Sporadic clashes in Turkey as Erdogan asserts authority (Reuters)

While the world awaits Russia's formal response to last week's US escalation in Syria (as Putin demonstratively arrived an hour late for talks on Syria with UK PM David Cameron) another country: Iran - fresh from an election in which moderate candidate Hassan Rohani became the new president - is taking matters into its own hands. The Independent Reports that "a military decision has been taken in Iran – even before last week’s presidential election – to send a first contingent of 4,000 Iranian Revolutionary Guards to Syria to support President Bashar al-Assad’s forces against the largely Sunni rebellion that has cost almost 100,000 lives in just over two years.  Iran is now fully committed to preserving Assad’s regime, according to pro-Iranian sources which have been deeply involved in the Islamic Republic’s security, even to the extent of proposing to open up a new ‘Syrian’ front on the Golan Heights against Israel."

Well, isn't that convenient?  At the moment when the Obama administration is feeling more heat then ever before, it starts another war.  Suddenly everyone in the mainstream media is talking all about Syria and not about the IRS scandal, Benghazi, NSA snooping or any of the other political scandals that have popped up in recent weeks. As if on cue, Obama made headlines all over the globe on Thursday by claiming that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons against the rebels "multiple times", and that the U.S. was now ready to do more to assist the rebels. As far as the Obama administration is concerned, there is no such thing as a coincidence.  The timing of this announcement regarding Syria was not an accident.