RighteousTrader

FAILURE to stabilize the Eurozone well lead to a 1930s-style depression in Europe.
Speaking to Geoff Candy on Mineweb.com's Gold Weekly podcast, Franco-Nevada Chair, Pierre Lassonde, said that he does not see the healthy countries in the region, like France and Germany allowing this to happen. Instead, they will find the resources to throw money at the problem and, in the process, "there will be massive monetization of debt."
According to Lassonde, the US, while in a healthier position economically than Europe, is also continuing to monetize its debt which will further add to inflation in that country.
All of this, he says, will be good for gold, as will the inflation that has been rearing its head in China.
But, it is not just the monetization of debt or the inflation that will give a further lift to prices of the yellow metal, it is also the continued expansion of gold's role as a financial asset.
Looking again at the European situation, Lassonde says, "Italy ...

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The U.S. has decided to allow BP Plc (BP, BP.LN) to bid on new oil-drilling leases that go up for sale in the Gulf of Mexico later this year, less than two years after BP's Macondo well erupted and caused the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history.
While testifying at a House hearing Thursday, offshore safety chief Michael Bromwich said his agency "considered and thought about this issue quite a lot," but eventually determined to allow the British oil giant to bid for leases in an upcoming auction known as Lease Sale 218.
"We don't think it's appropriate [to exclude BP] in these circumstances," said Bromwich, director of the Interior Department's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement.
On Wednesday, the Interior Department issued its first set of citations related to the spill at the Deepwater Horizon rig, accusing BP and two of its contractors of breaking several rules. The citations are likely to carry fines.
Scheduled for ...

Hedge Fund Ratio Spread Trades Continue to Distort the Value of the Mining Shares



I hope to have further on this topic sometime this weekend depending on time constraints but I wanted to at least get some charts up to demonstrate how severely undervalued many of the mining shares are in relation to the underlying metal as a result of the plying of this particular trading strategy.

One of the factors that I believe are involved with this severe underperformance of the shares in general is the advent of the ETF's. Those who want LEVERAGED EXPOSURE to either or both gold and silver can now use the ETF's to do so.

Formerly, there were two methods available - commodity futures or mining shares. Since the charters of some funds prevents them from investing or trading in commodity futures, funds who wanted this leveraged exposure to the metals were forced to go into the mining shares in the past. That implied that bull markets in the ...

Short-term investments are very bullish, erratic, unpredictable and undependable. But, long term investments are, relatively, considered safe and reliable. Precious metals like gold and silver are considered to be true money, and governments have been bastardizing precious metals since the night of time. It's all about printing fake money anyway. Even as stocks were losing their value, gold was marching steadily, increasing by five percent in US dollars.
However, this 'buy and hold' strategy might not work anymore as the sub-prime crisis has shaken this belief in the long term investment mode. Now, has gold joined the bandwagon of safe long-term investment going awry by treading the path of the sub-prime crisis?
The counterfeit story

This October, bankers in Hong Kong were in for a rude shock when they discovered some gold bars from the US to be actually gold plated tungsten i.e., fake gold bars. Acting fast, the Chinese officials found the perpetrators within ...

Originally Posted by RighteousTrader

Originally Posted by RighteousTrader

NEW YORK: Gold prices jumped nearly 1.5 percent on Tuesday, topping $1,400 an ounce for the first time in two weeks as the dollar sank and dealers anticipated an unprecedented eleventh annual rise next year.

After several weeks of trendless trade, gold staged its biggest one-day gain since Dec. 3 as many investors bet that economic uncertainty and currency diversity would fuel more demand from investors and banks. Prices are on track to rise 28 percent this year, a record 10th consecutive annual gain.

"The end of the year loss of confidence in the dollar value has brought gold players back into the market on the long side. It's hard to say more than that," said George Nickas, a gold broker at FC Stone in New York.

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Originally Posted by Darth DTF

While gold has deservedly received a great deal of attention for setting numerous new all-time highs this year, silver has continued to outperform the yellow metal in 2010. In mid-day trading silver futures for December delivery surged as much as $1.60, or 5.8%, to $29.03, another new 30-year high.
With today’s advance, silver extended its year-to-date gain to $12.15, or 72.1%, compared to a 29.8% gain for gold.

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