Precious Metals

Is idiosyncracy the substitute for a fledgling Sovereign Bond Market?  Including our recommendations for 2012

Continuing our tradition of listing what according to Zero Hedge readers were the key news events of the year for the third year in a row (2009 and 2010 can be found here and here), we present, as is now customary, the most popular posts of the year as determined by the number of page views, or said otherwise - by the readers themselves. So without further ado, here are this year's top 20.

The metals space has had a rather disconcerting start to the week this evening with Silver and Copper dropping almost 2% from their opening levels and then Gold following suit. All this as the USD inches very gradually up tracking almost perfectly with Crude for now. These moves seem very liquidation-like in their velocity but have for now stabilized at the lows. The last few minutes saw some of the ugliest macro data we have seen in a while come out of India as it's Industrial Production growth missed expectations by a mile falling to levels only seen in the middle of the global economic shutdown in Q1 2009. So another leg in the EM-will-save-us-all stool just got kicked out and still we are to believe the US will decouple and 'muddle-through'?

This article was written by DoctoRx for the Daily Capitalist. He is a successful investor with 30 years of markets experience. The Doc gives us a look at where silver is going, plus a look at PSLV.

Three months ago, Zero Hedge presented the first of many narratives that started the thread of explaining the "unmitigated disaster" that would ensue should the Euro break up, which in the words of authors Stephane Deo and Larry Hatheway, would leads to such mutually assured destruction outcomes as complete bank failure and/or civil war or far worse. Because if there is one thing the banks have learned in the aftermath of Hank Paulson, is that scaremongering when bonuses are at stake is the only to get taxpayer money to fund exorbitant lifestyles.,, Today, Larry Hataway has released yet another sequel to the original piece, focusing on this so very critical week for Europe, which as Olli Rehn said, must find a solution by Friday or see the EU "disintegrate", in which the vivid imagery, loud warnings and level of destruction are even greater than before. In other words, Europe has 4 more days, something which S&P tried it best to remind Europe of, as the alternative is "or else." And here comes UBS to remind everyone that anything but a "fix" to a system that was broken from the very beginning, would be a catastrophe, captured probably the best in Hatheway's recommendations of assets to be bought as a hedge to a Euro collapse: "I suppose there might be some assets worthy of consideration—precious metals, for example. But other metals would make wise investments, too. Among them tinned goods and small calibre weapons." But even that is nothing compared to the kicker: "Break-up runs the risk of becoming one wretched scenario. Sadly, however, it can’t be ruled out, just as it would have been improper to rule out the horrors of the first half of the 20th century before they happened." And there you have it: a reversion by Europe to the perfectly stable system from a decade ago, is now somehow supposed to result in World War. And with that the global banking cartel has official jumped the shark, just like the FT's latest rumor earlier today did the same by indicating that the well of European "bailout" ideas has officially run dry.

Turd Ferguson is a funny guy. But there's one thing this irreverent, acerbically goofball forecaster is stone-cold serious about: the need to build personal exposure to the  precious metals. For him, it's a straightforward mathematical certainty that the global economy must collapse under the weight of the excessive (and exponentially compounding) credit amassed over the past several decades. The debt is simply too large to be serviced. As a growing number of analysts (including Chris) are predicting, Turd sees the replacement of the world's current monetary regimes as the endgame to this story. And he believes we are watching that endgame unfold in real-time now. In this interview with Chris, Turd discusses his reasons why gold and silver offer the best prospect for preserving wealth through the coming devaluation of world currencies, despite his strong conviction that the markets for these metals are heavily price-manipulated.

COT data in the US shows that speculative sentiment has fallen dramatically which is bullish from a contrarian perspective. The Got Gold Report reports that silver futures market data is the most bullish it has been since 2003 - eight years ago. Silver was priced at about $4.40 per ounce then. Large commercial shorts have dramatically reduced their positions after the selloff in recent weeks suggesting that we are likely at or very close to silver bottoming. While the figures for gold are not as dramatic they too show that speculative positions and sentiment has been reduced significantly. Venezuela will repatriate some gold reserves held abroad before December 24th, Central Bank President Nelson Merentes told reporters today in Caracas according to Bloomberg. “I can’t give you an exact date for security reasons,” Merentes said. Venezuela will keep an unspecified portion of its gold reserves in foreign institutions, he said. In August, President Hugo Chavez ordered the central bank to repatriate $11 billion of gold reserves as a safeguard against volatility in financial markets. Venezuela held 211 tons of its 365 tons of gold reserves in US, European, Canadian and Swiss banks as of August.

We noted earlier that German finance minister Schaeuble said bank recaps were not the ECB's problem and the 2nd Greek bailout needed revisions - little did we know this would be the signal for investors to recognize that raising cash might be the safest thing to do. Since that statement TSYs and Gold/Silver flipped their recently well hedged relationship to one of total liquidation of both - correlation is not causation obviously but we though the timing was of note.

We dont have real time pricing on spam, but luckily we do on gold and silver. And to all those who BTFD in the past 2 weeks as we suggested, congratulations. Next up: another futile CME margin hike which will do nothing but confirm that a standalone gold standard is imminent.

Do Zero Hedgers agree?

One picture explains so much. One is the Comex Gold contract, the other is the Hong Kong traded one. One bid is above the other's ask.

When it comes to precious metals, an often discussed topic is whether one should own precious metal stocks or the actual physical metals. Here's some things to ponder if you are considering placing money into either.

Let's ask the question. Why does one own metals' stocks? Answer? Because you expect metal prices to rise. Any answer you give after this, takes second place, third, fourth, whatever!

My name is Grant Williams and I’m a precious metals bug.

There. I’ve said it.

It feels good to get that off my chest.

Of course, those amongst you who have been riding alongside me these past few years probably already had a sneaking suspicion that was the case and, I imagine, several more of you are now tutting, rolling your eyes and muttering “I KNEW it. Where’s that ‘Unsubscribe’ button?” (bottom of the last page – no offence taken). Well today, we’re going to talk about precious metals again I’m afraid, but in a broader sense if that helps at all. For readers who are over the whole precious metals thing, there’s a nice cartoon on the last page and you’ll find several stories about alternate subjects scattered throughout pages 7 to 15). For those of you still reading at this point, join me inside the recesses of my mind. Please keep your hands and arms inside the carriage at all times.

The only things that are doing well are the stock and bond markets. But the markets and the economy are totally different things – except, over a very long period of time, there's no necessary correlation between the economy doing well and the market doing well. My view is that the market is as high as it is right now – with the Dow over 12,000 – solely and entirely because the Federal Reserve has created trillions of dollars, as other central banks around the world have created trillions of their currency units. Those currency units have to go somewhere, and a lot of them have gone into the stock market. As a general rule, I don't believe in conspiracy theories, and I don't believe anything's big enough to manipulate the market successfully over a long period. At the same time, the government recognizes that most people conflate the Dow with the economy, so it is directing money toward the market to keep it up. Of course, the government wants to keep it up for other reasons – not just because it thinks the economy rests on the psychology of the people, which is complete nonsense. Psychology is just about the most ephemeral thing on which you could possibly base an economy. It can blow away like a pile of feathers in a hurricane

Well, those devious gold bugs and sound money advocates are at it again! They had the audacity to produce economic analysis that consistently outshines and embarrasses mainstream Keynesian pundits. They had the nerve to expose the seedy underpinnings of the private Federal Reserve. They even had the gall to bring the long established short manipulations of metals markets by global banks like JP Morgan and HSBC into the light of day, where anyone whose head was not buried in the dark recesses of their own colon could see and say “My god! There really is an organized cabal against gold and silver!” But if you thought all that was outrageous, these people, who promote the insane notion that our currency should actually be backed by tangible wealth and should be under the control of the voting public instead of some unaccountable parasitic corporate central bank, have now brought state legislators into the mix! The return to sound money has begun…