But If Not...

November 1967



April 1967




April 3, 1968, the day before he was murdered for speaking truth to power.


A time comes, for every one of us, all children of God, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, Hindu, and Christian alike, and all who love God and hear these words, when we must choose. We will choose to bear the mark of the dark powers and principalities of this world, or we will refuse, and bind

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Bear Raid Marks First Notice Day For Comex Silver

The silver shorts have their backs up against the wall. And that makes them dangerous.

Intraday commentary here.

It looks like there will not be a criminal case in the MF Global theft of customer funds, but they could face a fine of up to $140,000.  

The viral moral hazard unleashed by TARP continues to multiply and reverberate through US financial markets to their detriment.   It has a

NYT: No Criminal Case, But MF Global May Possibly Face a Fine of Up To $140,000

As Janet Tavakoli said the other day, the media coverage of this scandal has been a comedic lightweight fly by that no one in the know could possibly take seriously.

And as Chris Whalen said, we always have known where the money ended up. And that is a big part of the problem. Corzine is Too Big to Jail and the Banks are Too Big To Fail.

Perfect illustration of the credibility trap that

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Retreat Back to Support

Anyone who thought Bernanke was going to announce QE3 today is delusional.

Today is the First Notice Day for Silver and So We Have This Shameless Bear Raid on Metals

Feb. 29 Comex March silver futures first notice day
Feb. 29 Comex March copper futures first notice day
Feb. 29 Nymex March palladium futures first notice day


Last night Harvey Organ said:
"This is the first time in quite a while that gold and silver rose big time a day before first day notice. The bankers try and influence our longs not to take delivery so they generally raid. Today was

Long Term Dow Industrial Average Chart

A failure in this broadening top could, if activated, take the DJIA down closer to the bottom of the long term logarithmic trading channel.

The Federal Reserve will do all it can in order to create liquidity to prevent this sort of major market crash.

I can also that resulting in a sideways market, within a fairly broad range of 7,000 to 15,000 on this log chart, until 2020, as we see

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Silver Roars Higher

Silver roared higher cracking up to the 37.00 level as the shorts were on the run.

Let's see if it can hold these levels through the end of the week. There will be very serious resistance around 41 if it should break higher from here.

Gold may be forming a massive skewed W consolidation formation on the daily chart. The neckline is around 1800. From the daily low close at 1550, on a

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Dow 13,000

The Dow Jones Industrial Average managed to eke out a close above 13,000 as the big cap techs roared higher.

There was a bit of a divergence with notable softness in the broader stock averages.

Jamie Dimon today said that JPM would not be buying back their stocks 'at these lofty price levels.'

As a reminder, this is a Leap Year and February will have 29 days. So we may have another day

Are US Corporations Immune From Liability For Rape, Torture, Murder, and even Genocide?

The US Supreme Court will be deciding if US corporations are only people when it comes to peddling influence and paying off politicians with campaign contributions, but not when engaging in promoting and supporting the rape, torture and murder of peaceful protesters.

If the Court finds in favor of the corporations, would it also apply to domestic law?

This might open up exciting new

Biderman: Real Time Economic Data Shows No Recovery, US Dollar Is a 'Phantom.'

"Gold is not a phantom currency as many say, it is the US currency that is the phantom."

Charles Biderman, February 27, 2012
Charles Biderman gives a step by step analysis of the key data that some say shows an 'economic recovery.'

Accounting tricks, statistical smoke and mirrors, and a stock rally fueled by Fed printing do not reflect the real state of the US economy.

There is evidence that

Tavakoli: The Great MF Global Comedy Cover Up

Powerful interests are involved. Too Big To Fail and Too Connected To Jail.

This brief piece by noted financial analyst and author Janet Tavakoli is the sharp edge of her incisive wit.

The coverage of MF Global by the financial print media has been laughable, with the notable exception of Forbes. MF Global was the eighth largest bankruptcy in the US, with thousands of customers victimized

Scientific Study Shows That The Powerful and Privileged Are More LIkely to Lie, Cheat, and Steal

I seem to recall my grandmother telling me this about 50 years ago.

I have encountered quite a few of the nouveau riche, barely upper middle class, that are unscrupulous and almost unbearable. And I have met a number of very wealthy people, both old money people and the accidental rich, who are kindly, enjoyable, and exceptionally hospitable.

From my own experience it is not whether a

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - SP Cuts Greece to 'Selective Default'

Metals were capped most of the day. Could just be a consolidation.

Breaking news after the bell, S&P has cut Greece to 'selective default.' The action is based on the modification of the terms of the debt with some of the bondholders.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts

Looks toppy here.

Feds Key In on $325 Million Wire Transfer Made in Last Hours of MF Global

I wonder if this newly released MF Global information is some of the data that the creditor team has been examining and only recently released to Federal investigators.

It was surprising to hear that JPM as a creditor gets to decide how and when customers can have information about their MF Global accounts as reported here.

The truth may come out some day, but will be heavily coated in

Performance of Stocks, Bonds, and Gold In an Inflationary Environment

Jeremy Grantham's GMO group has produced an interesting study showing the performance of three asset classes against inflation.

I think the true correlation is with negative real interest rates rather than inflation itself. In an inflationary period, interest rates tend to lag the increase in inflation, producing negative real rates.

But in a period of economic decline in which the Fed

What Is the 'Spot Price' of Gold and Silver?

This is a partial reprise of a post from two years ago. The question has again arisen about the discrepancy between the spot price of gold and silver, and the prices shown on the front month of the futures market.

When you ask even an experienced trader, or even an economist who may have received a Nobel prize, 'What is the spot price, where does it come from, who sets it?' you will often

Warren Buffett Buys US Precious Metals Business from Cookson Group

Apparently Berkshire's Richline Group didn't get the memo that Warren doesn't like silver or gold.

Richline is involved in the fabrication of precious metals into jewelry. The acquisition of US Precious Metals will bring them into the mill and findings portion of the precious metals industry, as well as acquiring European and Asian distribution channels.

A small deal for Berkshire, but it is

Tokyo Based Hedge Fund AIJ May Have Lost/Stolen All Customer Pension Fund Money

Some of my friends in Japan are keeping an eye on this one for me, and I thank them for their help. I never learned to read Japanese beyond memorizing subway stations and street signs and the like, in addition to the usual polite conversational ability which has badly faded with the years.

The problem I have is finding good articles in English. The Japanese Shimbuns are also notoriously

AIJ Tokyo Asset Management: Billions In Customer Funds Are Missing

This is more Madoff than Corzine, but the song of unforeseen counterparty risk remains the same.

The Japanese regulators have decided to take a closer look to see how many more of the 299 asset management firms have funding problems like this.

Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got 'til its gone?

Wall Street Journal Japan
Missing Funds at AIJ: Watchdogging Japan
By

Ellliot Wave Projection for the Price of Gold

Thanks to my friend Nick Laird at Sharelynx for this.

Critical Mass: The Mispricing of Derivatives Risk And How the Financial World Ends

Jim Sinclair does a good job of explaining the difference between the notional and real value of derivatives, and how that real value comes to bear on the financial system in the event of a default. You can read this here for a review of the basic concept if you do not understand it.

Within my own view of money, uncollateralized financial instruments like derivatives are credits, or potential

Franklin D. Roosevelt on Problems of The Day: August 1932

One of the pivotal issues of the 1930's was 'regimentation' versus 'individualism.' The Republicans Herbert Hoover and Alf Landon that actions taken by the government in social and economic matters would lead to 'regimentation' and the loss of liberty, which for them was laissez-faire business as in the 1920's.

Roosevelt went on the attack, with the theme that liberty and political equality

The Great Crash of 1929 - Bonfire of the Vanities

"There seems little question that in 1929, modifying a famous cliche, the economy was fundamentally unsound. This is a circumstance of first-rate importance. Many things were wrong, but five weaknesses seem to have had an especially intimate bearing on the ensuing disaster. They are:
(1) The bad distribution of income...
(2) The bad corporate structure...
(3) The bad banking structure...
(4)

Stockton California Takes First Step Towards Bankruptcy - "Somebody Has to Suffer"

"Somebody has to suffer and in this case the city manager has decided it should be the bondholders..."
As we go forward, more than ever before, it is all about managing counterparty risk, including 'accounting errors' and outright fraud.

Sometimes you may be able to adequately prepare and allow for risk of loss.

But at other times it can come suddenly and unexpectedly, as it did to the

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

This was a relatively quiet day.

The silver shorts did not deliver a 'gut check' to the market as one might have expected.

The markets seem almost 'controlled.'

Have a pleasant weekend.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts

It's little more than a liquidity puffball now. That applies to both the markets and the economy.

The Banks must be restrained, and the financial system reformed, with balance between individuals and the corporations restored to the economy, before there can be any sustained recovery.

MF Global Turns Into Battle For Scraps Between Hedge Funds and Customers

"Some of the likely litigation targets are MF Global's main trading partners, its primary banker JPMorganChase, and clearinghouses that processed last minute trades for MF Global as it spiraled towards bankruptcy. Another possibility is MF Global's own United Kingdom affiliate, where about $700 million in customer money is tied up.

But recovering any funds won't be easy.

'In terms of resources

An Attempt to Inflate Financial Asset Prices and Maintain Negative Real Interest Rates

As you may recall I said early this year that the stock market had the flavor of a 'market operation' on the tape, a conscious effort to inflate asset prices.

If you look at some of the key market charts below, the price action has pretty much been a thrown rope, almost never violating the 15 Day Moving Average.

It has been a while since I have seen a Williams%R pegged to the topside like

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Tales of Brave Ulysses

"...we are overdone with banking institutions which have banished the precious metals and substituted a more fluctuating and unsafe medium, that these have withdrawn capital from useful improvements and employments to nourish idleness, that the wars of the world have swollen our commerce beyond the wholesome limits of exchanging our own productions for our own wants, and that, for the emolument

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts

"From a time long ago when we sold our vote to no man, we have abdicated our responsibilities. The People who, once upon a time, handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now sits in craven silence, and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses."

Juvenal, Satire X
Perhaps that would better be translated for the modern mind, smartphones and reality shows

US Treasuries - Negative Returns Almost As Far As the Eye Can See

These charts compare the Nominal and Real Treasury Yield Curves provided by the Treasury Department.

The 'real' return is the return on the debt less expected inflation. A note on how the Treasury calculates this is below. Since they use TIPS the real yield are only done for notes of 5 years or more duration.

The comparison is between February 22 data from this year and last year.

As one

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Funds

This appears to be a rather 'normal' set of numbers.

With a little tinkering it is almost at my internal 'benchmark.'

Tavakoli: Who's To Blame? Not 'Flawed,' Fraud.

This is a fairly nice description of the tip of the credibility trap.

It is a description of moral hazard, of a partnership between the corporations and individuals in government. And it is a corrosive acid on the body politic. MF Global is not the end of it, but only a new beginning.

With every unpunished crime, with every successful deception, the monied interests grow more self-assured

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Bears Strain As Metals Rally Higher

The Bank is leaning on silver, but the metals are straining to break higher and run.

When silver breaks the bear grip and runs they will be carrying the shorts out of the pits on stretchers.

But when Jesse when?

Don't know, don't care. I just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Call me when it breaks $100.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Walk Don't Run

They are doing a great job of inflating this asset bubble in equities.

It can keep going higher on light volumes and printed money.

But if it breaks, there isn't much beneath it, so get out of its way.

It just cracks me up that the same old voices are back again talking up another bubble ginned up by the Banks.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Picture of the Housing Bubble Collapse

As the banking regulator and monetary authority, the Fed was particularly culpable and responsible for the housing asset bubble, the collapse of which is shown in the last chart.

Their 'job' is to take away the punch bowl when the party starts getting out of hand. Instead, first Greenspan and then Bernanke fed and at times even promoted through the stifling of dissent the malinvestment and

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - "C'est pas la chute qui fait mal, c'est l'atterissage."

Stocks hit Dow 13,000 and then pulled back.

I did not see anything approaching serious selling. The markets are zombie like.

Why Inequality Matters: Saving Capitalist Society from Obsessive Greed and Lawlessness

I think this is about as good a statement of the problem facing the US economic system today.

The 'checks and balances' and 'equal protection under the law' of the Constitution has been trampled upon by the monied interests. The obsessions of the few will not permit them to relent on their quest for all the marbles, even to a Pyrrhic victory.

In addition to the massive mortgage and

Modern Monetary Theory Explained Simply and Questioned Again

It is often difficult to get a clear and simple definition or summation of what Modern Monetary Theory is, and what its adherents actually believe.

This is because some of its proponents tend to speak disparagingly and condescendingly to those who ask what it is that they believe. And they do not like to answer simple questions, preferring to engage in lengthy theoretical explanations that

RealNews: Is Obama Getting Serious About Bank Reform and Financial Fraud?

One only has to look at the unfolding travesty of MF Global to see how serious he is in not pursuing justice and reform.

More at The Real News

See The Real News here.

SP 500 Futures

The futures are up about 6 1/4 from Friday.

But as you can see, the bulls really need to take it up tomorrow to keep the rally going, or allow this doji of indecision to gap down and leave an 'island top.'

These Greek bailouts are like the US government's financial reforms: oft repeated and long on rhetoric, but containing little of substance.

Free Kindle Edition of The New Robber Barons By Janet Tavakoli

"The value of the e-book is that it has the embedded links in the book, unlike mainstream publishers. The other part about this book is that it is arranged chronologically by topic; one sees how much Congress and regulators have let us down, enabled cover-ups and then failed to act as evidence reached the public domain. We’re seeing it all over again with MF Global."

Janet Tavakoli
For today

Weimar Berlin in the 1920's

This is from the television documentary 'Legendary Sin Cities' which was broadcast in 2005 by the CBC Canada.   The three part series covered Berlin, Paris, and Shanghai.

It provides insight into the Weimar Republic and the cultural ferment between the wars.

It is definitely R rated so be advised.

(I am informed by a reader that the entire three part documentary, including Paris and

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Palpable Fear of a Rise In Gold

“That paper money has some advantages is admitted. But that its abuses also are inevitable and, by breaking up the measure of value, makes a lottery of all private property, cannot be denied.”

Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Josephus B. Stuart, 1817
The fear in the money masters is palpable. Silence, darkness, and the fog of confusion are their most reliable allies.

The schemes of the monied

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - 'A Great Reckoning in a Little Room'

"When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit
seconded with the forward child Understanding, it strikes a man
more dead than a great reckoning in a little room."

William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act 3 Sc III
Today was an option expiration.

There was an interesting divergence between the financials and big tech.

Monday the US markets will be closed. Another Greek drama

Comex and Nymex Metals Calendar for 2012; Something Nasty on the Way?

A few people have asked me to post the complete Comex Metals Calendar for 2012.

So here it is, and you can find it here. I am afraid that the usual futures brokers have not published a handy pocket calendar of the key dates again this year, possibly as MF Global has cast a general pall on enthusiasm for the markets.

As a word of caution for all you amateur analysts, not all expirations and

The Greek Experiment: Wir Kinder der Hölle und der Wille zur Macht

What time does the next train arrive, Herr Doktor?








The irony of course is that it is not the Germans but the Anglo-American banks and the global monied interests that have perfected and employed this modern financial warfare, again and again, around the world for the last forty years or more. They have been using debt, money, and the subversion of democratic law to take down whole

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Early Bear Raid, Metals Bounce Back

"The truth is incontrovertible. Panic may resent it, ignorance may deride it, malice may distort it, but, there it is."

Winston Churchill

As a reminder this is a stock option expiration week.

Next week is a Comex silver option expiry.

The US has a three day weekend for the market because of President's Day.

Shenanigans abounding.

Feb. 23 Comex March silver options expiry
Feb. 23 Comex

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - La Vie En Rose

Nothing but upside, if one is wearing rose colored glasses.

Barry Ritholtz Has the Main Theme Right, But Gets a Few Specifics Wrong About MF Global

For the record, I am an admirer of Barry Ritholtz, and have been so for quite a long time. He is smart, honest, and what the old folks used to call a mensch.

In a recent piece titled MF Global Reveals You Are a Bank Counter-Party he makes a very strong case that financial institutions that trade for their own accounts place everyone who has money with their firm at counter-party risk.

He uses

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

A bounce back up in the metals that stuck with gold even though the equity markets reversed sharply intraday.

Precious metals are coiling on the charts below key overhead resistance, but it may take something perhaps to allow the metals to finally break free.

If a major exchange defaults on silver, I wonder if anyone will be prosecuted, or if there will even be a serious investigation.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - "It's All Upside From Here"

The trader being interviewed this afternoon on Bloomberg television said, "It's all upside from here, for the rest of the year" and the spokesmodel du jour answered, "Go USA!"

Do I hear a bell ringing? Maybe, but don't get in front of it. Let the trend change show its hand, if and when it does. While volumes remain light it can continue to drift higher on the excess liquidity being provided

Describing the Fraud Underlying the Financial Crisis So Even an Economist Can Understand It

William K. Black is one of the US' leading experts on financial fraud in general, and on banking fraud in particular.

This is why you will rarely see him interviewed or even quoted in the mainstream media. And why he gains so little traction with the Congress and this Administration. He is an informed and honest voice, at a time when the status quo just does not want to hear it. They are

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Hard Time Killin' Floor Blues

The credibility trap, or gap if you will, is yawning ever wider.

I am not sure of the source of this latest crisis, what exactly is coming and when, but I suggest you not let your savings, your 401ks' and IRA's, or your trading book get caught on the killing floor when it arrives.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - VIX

Late day rally on light volumes brought US stocks back to nearly unchanged, or slightly higher.

Nader and Fein: "America's Lawless Empire"

"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."

Edmund Burke

Chris Whalen: JPM and the Banks Have the MF Global Money And the Status Quo Is Protecting Them

"But please, to our friends in the Big Media, could we stop saying that we don't know the location of the missing $1.6 billion of client funds from MF Global? The money is safe and sound at JPM and other counterparties. As with Goldman Sachs et al and American International Group, the banks have been bailed out at the cost of somebody else. And the various agencies of the federal government are

Silver Option Expiry Next Week

Source: CME Group 2012

Feb. 23 Comex March silver options expiry
Feb. 23 Comex March copper options expiry
Feb. 24 Nymex February platinum futures last trading day
Feb. 24 Nymex February palladium futures last trading day
Feb. 27 Comex February gold futures last trading day
Feb. 27 Comex February copper futures last trading day
Feb. 27 Comex February E-micro gold futures

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Les Cahiers de la Nuit Surveillée

"People who lie to themselves, and believe their own lies, becomes unable to recognize the truth, either in themselves or in anyone else. 

And they end up losing respect for themselves and for others. When they have no respect, they can no longer love.

So they yield themselves up to their impulses, indulging in the lowest forms of pleasure, and behave in the end like a thing obsessed in

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Plus C'est La Même Chose

“I know that life is a doorway to eternity, and yet my heart so often gets lost in petty anxieties. It forgets the great way home that lies before it.”

Sophie Scholl

Riskiness was the trade today as the Greek Parliament voted to place its economy under European austerity measures and the financials rallied.

1350 is the big resistance in the SP futures. Apple is the Titan of the tech sector

SP 500 Deflated By Gold

Much of the recent rally, that nominally looks like a straight shot higher is really due to the monetization going on in the US and Europe.

Such distribution of money through asset bubbles can provide the appearance of vitality, but it is not self-sustaining.

But as we saw in the tech and the housing bubbles, they can go quite far, and inflict serious damage on real economy, before they

MF Global: Francine McKenna of re: The Auditors Gives a Plausible Explanation

Francine McKenna is an ex-auditor from Price, Waterhouse Coopers.

McKenna has a blog called re: The Auditors, and also writes for Forbes.

MF Global is a slowly boiling scandal. It is always the cover up that brings the most damage, rather than the initial criminal acts that are committed by a few.

She provides a very plausible description of what really happened at MF Global, and I find it

Registered Ounces of Silver in the Comex Warehouse

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Bear Raid, Risk Off Trade on Greece

It was 'Risk Off' into the weekend as traders and funds raised cash levels as the markets took a 'wait and see' attitude towards the Greek debt deal.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - VIX Higher On Greek Deal Jitters

All eyes on Europe.

See you Sunday evening.

US Dollar Very Long Term Chart

As I have said previously, the US Dollar DX index may be less useful now because of its almost quaint concentration in the Euro, Yen and Pound, and lack of representaiton in the currencies of the high growth countries of the emerging markets, particularly India, Brazil, Russia and China.

The Anglo-American banking cartel would like to keep it that way as well. Encouraging the western central

The Wall Street Conspiracy: Ascent of the Psychopaths and the Culture of Death

"The privileged have regularly invited their own destruction with their greed."

John Kenneth Galbraith, The Age of Uncertainty


"Psychopaths have a grandiose self-structure which demands a scornful and detached devaluation of others, in order to ward off their envy toward the good perceived in other people."

“He will choose you, disarm you with his words, and control you with his presence.

MF Global: Trail Growing Cold - 'No One to Blame"'

I did predict something like this would happen in about the second week of the scandal, didn't I?

Did you ever imagine that in America a major brokerage firm would brazenly steal over a billion dollars in customer funds and assets, and that no one would even be prosecuted?

And that the financiers would use the courts to just keep the money, and basically tell the broker's customers to eat

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - More of the Same - Monetary Trends

Some economists were saying patently silly things about gold today.

It might be useful to review why gold proves such an irritant to financial engineers and modern monetary theorists.

Typically when this happens we are a few weeks away from a major money episode of some sort, most generally of the printing kind. 

The Fed has a penchant for allowing asset bubbles to form, although that

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Winding Up for a Move - VIX

"Once stock prices reach the point at which it is hard to value them by logical methodology, stocks will be bought as they were in the late 1920s not for investment but to be unloaded at a still higher price. The ensuing break could be disastrous because panic psychology cannot be summarily altered or reversed by easing money policies."

Alan Greenspan, 1959

The Fed and its acolytes in the

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

Bear raid. Boring really.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts

Groupon missed earnings but Cisco beat after the bell.

Light volumes.

JPMorgan Chase Caps Martin Luther King PR Campaign By Foreclosing on Civil Rights Activist

It's not really about the money, its the hypocrisy.

$9,000 is not a lot of money to many people in America these days. And certainly such an amount could be raised fairly quickly with an online drive for funds. Over 40,000 people have signed the online petition protesting this.

What has people upset is the blatant hypocrisy of JPMorgan, in this and so many other things. It is what drives the

Pictures in a Pyramid Scheme

Wax on, wax off.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

The precious metal markets had a good day compliments of Herr Bernanke, who is obviously going to provide enough liquidity to prevent another Lehman event if he can.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Benny Gooses the Beta with a Liquid Touch

This market is looking tired and the volume is drying up. But while the volume remains low it will likely keep drifting with an upward bias.

The SP Futures closed today at the July high which is remarkable.

First serious event will take it down hard. Strong support is at 1270 or so.

Don't feed the sharks. Wait for it.

Disney exceed earnings but missed the topline revenue. It is

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Funds

Panic On Wall Street As Anti-Insider Trading Bill Spreads Wider Net Over Information Peddling

Senator Chuck Grassley put a clause back into the Senate's anti-insider trader law that requires financial analysts who meet with Congressmen and their staffs to register their meetings.

The purpose of this clause is to bring transparency to the information peddling that represents a lucrative business for hedge funds and banks that trade on insider information from the Congressmen themselves.

US Seizes Iranian Assets Citing 'Deceptive Financial Practices'

These fellows in New York, Washington, and London hate to see any amateurs engaging in deceptive financial practices without an official license or the right markings.

When the Iranians get good enough to move past merely practicing deception into the big leagues of world class professional fraud, and start playing ball with the big boys maybe the Iranian central bank can sign up for the

MF Global Collapsed in the Face of a $310 Million Margin Call Made by 'Undisclosed Party'

The margin call was predicted here about day two as I recall. The question in my mind is the extent that JP Morgan and any of their other bankers and credit line holders played in this.

It will be interesting to see how this case progresses from the Giddens-Freeh bankruptcy team and into the hands of the regulators and Justice Department.

So far (for the past three years) the Obama

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - The Usual 3 AM NY Time Bear Raid

Gold was hit hard by a selling flurry around 3 AM Eastern Time, with most of the selling timed to events in London.

Check out the plunge in gold lease rates on 2 February in the last chart.

Silver proved to be more resilient.

If and when the metals brokers and their pyramid of leverage breaks, be careful about any holdings you may have that are mingled with theirs, otherwise your victory may

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Chart - Watch For a Divergence in VIX

Another light volume day saved the market from rolling over, which it seemed ready to do early on.

I think it is time now to take a maximally defensive position, which for me at least means hedged gold bullion positions and cash. The bullion hedge is to guard against a liquidation event as opposed to an equity correction.

If volumes stay light the wiseguys can keep lifting this up, burning

MF Global: 'Select Parties' Received the Customer Funds in the Last Week of Business

Hail to the Real Chief
It sure is taking them a long time to spit this one out, isn't it?   We stole your money, we own the system, and there is nothing you can do about it, you pipsqueaks, so just STFU and take what we choose to give you. 

Given the timing and the likely parties involved, these transfers, even when they do not involve the theft of customer funds, with the withholding of

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Funds - Sprott Places Gold Offering at Premium

Sprott Physical Gold Trust Announces Completion of Its Follow-on Offering of Trust Units
Feb 3, 2012

TORONTO, Feb. 3, 2012 /CNW/ - Sprott Physical Gold Trust (the "Trust") (NYSE: PHYS / TSX: PHY.U), a trust created to invest and hold substantially all of its assets in physical gold bullion and managed by Sprott Asset Management LP, today announced that it has completed its follow-on offering of

John Williams: US Unemployment Hits 22.5% in Alternate Estimate

Perhaps this chart will help explain the divergence that Charles Biderman of Trimtabs sees between the official unemployment numbers and the income tax data he has been tracking.

The difference amongst the three measures revolves around the treatment of workers who desire a real full time job, but have to either settle for a part time position and other forms of under-employment that may

SEC Allows Some of America's Biggest Wall St. Banks To Continually Flout the Law

The NY Times has discovered that the Banks that were rescued by the public have turned into serial fraud offenders. JP Morgan is near the top of their ranks, with Goldman Sachs and Bank of America not far behind.   Only Citigroup seems to have fallen out of favor.

This is not news to any of the regular patrons of the Cafe, but it is good to see the mainstream media taking notice. Perhaps they

Charles Biderman on the US Non-Farm Payrolls Report

I spend a great deal of time looking at the various government reports, and especially the Payrolls report as you know. I keep my own spreadsheets with their data, and measure various changes in the way in which they calculate the seasonal adjustment factors, imaginary jobs, and prior revisions.

If I wish to leave you with one takeway, it is that the current use of the monthly headline number

On the 70th Anniversary of the Munich Students Movement - The War is Lost - The Future of Europe

It is interesting to read this now, when Europe once again considers what its shape and its future will be. And the rest of the world as well.

This leaflet was written and distributed in January, 1943. Intelligent and open minded Germans could see the decline and fall coming, even while the Reich was intensifying its efforts to feed the hatred and delusion with its lies.

I was always struck

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

Bear raid on the metals intraday, with the message that piling into 'risk assets' like stocks and junk bonds was the thing to do because of the wonderful economic recovery.

Nothing has changed. The band just played a lively polka, and Josef and Magda led a cheer on the financial networks.

Keep an eye on Europe. That is where the rubber meets the road, or the truncheon meets the jaw, as they

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Flashbangs, Smoke and Mirrors

The markets took off after the 'great' Jobs Number came out.

I provided some significant intraday commentary here, and have added to it at the end of day as well, including a response to the Labor Participation Rate issue and an actual comparison of the pre and post revision numbers.

The bottom line is that looking at month over month changes like this is ludicrous, and almost always in

Another Look at What 'Worked' in the Great Depression

Here is a fairly simple picture of some of the major metrics during the Great Depression.  Too simple yes, but it tracks most of the major indicators.

Hoover followed a policy of 'deleveraging,' that is, allowing for the economy to liquidate its prior excesses without changing much else. The Fed did respond to this crisis by expanding the monetary base fairly significantly as you can see.

The Non-Farm Payrolls Report: Air Brushing History - Nominal Work Force for Nominal GDP

Back in Stalinist Russia, they had whole departments of people that were responsible for rewriting history and documents in order to support the latest Party lines.

When a particular person fell out of favor, for example, they not only altered the documents, but even went so far as to air brush them out of important historical photographs.

Today the US reported a remarkably high Non-Farm

Byron Dorgan and Bill Moyers: Making the Banks Play By the Rules

There was a lot of money thrown around Washington in the 1990's to make this happen, and the effort was shephered by a number of prominent financiers, regulators and politicians. Prominent among them are Phil Gramm, Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, and Sandy Weill. And of course a willing President in Bill Clinton.

And the sad, sad truth is that nothing has really changed. The

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Clawing Up the Wall of Worry One Brick at a Time

Gold and silver continued to claw their way higher through tough resistance.

When I hear the spokesmodels on financial television talking about the need for austerity and 'tough love' for the rest, I always listen carefully to see if I can hear one word about reform, and the curtailing of the financial sector imbalances, excesses, and fraud that actually brought the world economy to where it

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Benign VIX - Goat Rodeo

"My concern is that an improbably large number of things will have to go right in order to avoid a major decline in stock market value in the months ahead. We presently estimate that the S&P 500 is likely to achieve a 10-year total return (nominal) of only about 4.7% annually, which reduces the likelihood that further gains will be durable even if they persist for a while longer. In the context

In Honor of the 70th Anniversary of the Munich Students Movement - Die Weiße Rose - 2nd Leaflet

Someone asked me, why bring this up now?  Why remind ourselves of things better forgotten? Why be gloomy or sad, and burden our beautiful minds?

First, because it is after all, the 70th anniversary of an heroic event, a moment when several people laid down their lives for their fellow men and for the truth. And what we remember makes us who we are, makes us the people we wish to be, whether

Commodity Wars: Why Just Trade Milk When You Can Buy the Cow (Cheaply)?

As you may recall, I was speaking about the Currency War long before it became a recognized issue. From my analysis of history and the major monetary trends it seemed inevitable even in 1999, and events shortly after that confirmed it.

Those who see what is going on behind the scenes are securing supplies of key commodities and hard assets. And this is not limited to the large national banks

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts

"When a man takes an oath, he's holding his very self in his own hands, like water. And if he opens his fingers then, he needn't hope to find himself again."

Thomas More, A Man For All Seasons

The metals are right up against key resistance, and the bear are trying to make a goal line stand.

I have shorts back on the stocks after today's rally. I am balancing those with some metals longs.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Facebook Cometh, Some Day

A bounce higher broke the four day downtrend in equities. But they are still moving in a fairly narrow range and on light volumes.

Facebook is the big tickle du jour. See the intraday comments on that topic as well as the role of risk in the markets, the Commodity Wars, and MF Global.

Bubble Watch: The Facebook IPO Is Rumoured to Be Coming Out

Morgan Stanley is taking the lead.

Will it be NAS: FB or NYS: FB?

The filing is said to be coming this afternoon.

If it does come out at $100 Billion I think it is more than fully valued. You would have to go back to the tech bubble for growth comps in that range.

And Facebook is certainly no Google or Apple.

But it is a mistake to underestimate the greed and gullibility of people

It's All About Controlling the Risk... and the Fear That Leads to Destruction

Capitalism contains the impulse for self-destruction in the aversion to risk and the desire to control it. Risk is uncertainty, and uncertainty can engender fear.

By obsessing with what one fears, one brings about their eventual demise. I have seen this repeated in human institutions over and over again, both in direct experience and in the study of history.

We fear that freedom will be

Commodity Wars: JP Morgan Stockpiling Inventory to Influence Prices, the Flow of Goods, and Rents

"We are witnessing the death of abundance and the borning of austerity, for what may be a long, long time."

Bill Gross

Crony capitalists are never interested in the risk and rigor of 'free markets,' only in the surety of monopolies and obtaining a license from the authorities for extracting rents from them. They alternately create artificial abundance and scarcity to influence prices, with

MF Global: Oops, They DID Find the Money After All As We Had Said, But...

You have to read this latest news item with a discerning eye, and in the context of what has gone on so far including the piece the other day from the Wall Street mouthpiece that the money simply 'vaporized.'

It is a variation of the spin. No the money is not vaporized, but its complicated. There are lots of possibilities just too complicated to explain to the public, and you have to be