Forum: Edelmetalen » Goud en zilver Rockin & Rollin

[verwijderd] 22 februari 2006 20:48

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Marktstrateeg Chris Johnson constateerde ook een herstel van Wall Street, na twee moeilijke weken. "De laatste tijd is flink wat pessimisme opgebouwd, wat betekent dat veel beleggers even aan de zijlijn hebben gestaan. Nu lijkt het erop dat investeerders hun geld weer inzetten", zei hij tegen nieuwszender CNN.

staat op dft vandaag

[verwijderd] 23 februari 2006 11:10

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Gold output falling as demand rises
Rhona O'Connell www.mineweb.net/sections/gold_silver/...

LONDON (Mineweb.com) -- It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a gold bar is likely to want to buy more. He is equally likely, however, to be put off by high and volatile prices and may even sell in order to re-enter the market at a lower price.

Falling outright figures belie underlying strength
The fourth quarter of 2005 bore out this prideful and prejudicial wisdom, with physical gold jewellery and small bar purchases declining under profit taking. This was in itself a response to high and volatile prices, with the overall up trend in price driven in no small part by the increase in institutional investment demand. The latest figures from the World Gold council, compiled by independent house GFMS, show that fabrication and small bar demand in the fourth quarter of last year dropped by 15% against the previous quarter to register (among the countries covered) 943.0 tonnes, against 1,108.2 tonnes in the fourth quarter of the previous year. This bald figure, however, does not reflect the sentiment that drove the increase of 79 tonnes in ETF holdings during the quarter, nor the estimated additional 200 tonnes of further institutional demand.

The Council cautions that the talk of central bank gold buying may be premature, pointing to the long decision-making processes in most central banks. While the Council is aware that certain central banks are expressing new interest in gold, it does not expect immediate substantial purchases.

Meanwhile the potential for increased institutional investment could be massive. Institutions such as pension funds are listening to the arguments for gold, and indeed for other commodities but, rather like the central banks, have yet to put their toes in the water in any size. There is, therefore, a whole new constituency out there that has yet to be fully tapped.

For 2005 as a whole, identifiable investment demand was 600 tonnes, a 26% rise on the previous year. Jewellery demand rose by 5% in tonnage terms to 2,736 tonnes, while industrial demand grew by 2% to 419 tonnes (driven by a 4% increase in electronics). This gives an overall total of 3,754.3 tonnes, a 7% increase on 2004 levels. In value terms, all categories of demand registered double-digit increases and demand was thus strong enough to absorb a 15% increase in gold supply and a 9% increase in the price. ETFs and similar products were the stars in the firmament; these grew by 53% in tonnage terms and 67% in dollar terms. Inflows reached 203 tonnes in this sector of which StreetTRACKS accounted for 168 tonnes or 83%.

This year has begun in a similar pattern to the end of 2005, with price volatility enhancing institutional demand; the inflows into Exchange Traded Funds and similar products exceeded 100 tonnes in the firs six weeks of the year. This however is leading also to a cautious approach to jewellery purchase. In the longer term jewellery demand is expected to recover and to resume growth once the price has stabilised. This is underpinned by market research that shows sentiment towards gold remaining positive (which also goes some way to explaining a comparatively constrained scrap return last year, despite higher and volatile prices).

Supply reached 3,860 tonnes in 2005, reflecting reduced dehedging and higher central bank sales. Mine production was fractionally up against 2004, at 2,494 tonnes. Mining companies reduced the global hedge book by 138 tonnes; and as a result total mine supply reached 2,356 tonnes. Net central bank sales reached 663 t, 41% higher than the sales in 2004 due to the fact that the second Central Bank Gold Agreement (signed in September 2004) allowed for a 100 tonnes per annum increase in sales over the first CBGA. Furthermore there was no significant central bank buying last year, whereas Argentina bought 55 tonnes in 2004.

Scrap return, at 841 tonnes, was essentially unchanged from 2004. This reflects the fact that in the first half of the year it was well below 2004 levels while the second half of the year did generate an increase. Overall, gold holders are generally more ready to believe in the bull market story and not so quick to sell into perceived price strength. There was however a fair return out of Egypt, but this was more a question of distress selling.

Regional variations

In India, the world’s largest gold consumer, retail investment was up throughout the year, while jewellery demand varied. The net result was a 14% gain in jewellery demand overall after a very strong first half, a steady third quarter and falls in the fourth quarter, reflecting the fact that India is the market most sensitive to price volatility. What is of particular interest is that the recent rise in prices has meant that a good portion of natural buying has been deferred, especially in the wedding market by common consent of the families concerned. This means that there is a significant backlog of Indian demand waiting in the wings for prices to stabilise.

In China, K-gold is the main story. This is the 18-carat brand that has been developed under the auspices of the Council, with a lighter more modern touch to it than the traditional 24-carat chuk kam yellow gold - although this too was healthy, partly due to rising rural incomes. The investment element of demand meant that the rising price was not the deterrent to these purchasers that it was in some other areas. Jewellery demand in China grew by 8% over the year as a whole, while investment was up by 20%. but from a very low base as this area has only recently been liberalised. The Year of the Dog is an auspicious one for weddings (dogs are seen in the Chinese culture as bringers of good fortune) and this should benefit chuk kam purchases this year.

Japan has seen the emergence of new buyers of physical bar and coin among people in their 30s and 40s. Generally these are wealthy individuals diversifying profits made in, for example, the stock market. It remains to be seen whether they are holders or traders, but nonetheless this also reflects a growing awareness of gold as an investment class since in the past it has typically been the older generation that has bought bars and coins. The result was that as there was some selling back from these older holders as the price rose in the final quarter, the effect was ameliorated by fresh purchases from the younger elements.

In the United States, jewellery tonnage was very slightly higher; this marks the first time since 2001 that it has not fallen. Retail audit figures for the first three quarters of the year show a rise of 3.9% against 2.7% growth in the equivalent period of 2004. Jewellery buying in the fourth quarter was affected by the impact on spending of higher energy costs, although gold fared better than most forms of jewellery.

Europe remains disappointing –with notable adverse economic trends in Italy and a poor jewellery market in the UK. Higher quality jewellery is tending to outperform the mainstream products, however, which is a plus.

In the Middle East, jewellery demand was up 8% last year with the United Arab Emirates registering another record at 96 tonnes although this was tempered by the price rise at the end of the year. Sales in the first quarter will be affected by the deaths of Sheikh Makhtoum al Makhtoum, the Ruler of Dubai, and of the Emir o

[verwijderd] 25 februari 2006 19:41

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CASEY FILES: UNDERSTANDING NEVADA’S EMERGING GOLD PLAYS

If Nevada was a separate country, it would rank as the world’s #3 gold producer, with most of that production coming from the Carlin trend where over 50,000,000 ounces of gold have already been produced. There are, however, an increasing number of savvy explorers coming to the conclusion that the Cortez trend, which runs roughly parallel to and 50 miles southwest of the Carlin Trend, may host a resource as large, or even larger.

The following article by Louis James, senior editor of the International Speculator, provides a very useful overview of Nevada, the past, present and, more importantly for us as investors, the future.

The article is especially timely given legitimate concerns about governments in Latin America and elsewhere committing economic hari-kari by electing governments with clear socialist, anti-business leanings. By contrast, Nevada consistently ranks as one of the most geologically prospective and pro-mining jurisdictions in the world today. And it is only to the good that, being situated in the United States, Nevada gives us extra leverage to a falling U.S. dollar.

You’ll want to stash this article in some corner of your computer for further reference.

Doug Casey

Carlin Trend

The Carlin Trend is North America's most prolific gold-producing area and hosts the second-largest known gold resources in the world, after the Witwatersrand in South Africa. More than 107 million ounces of known proven and probable reserves occur on the Carlin Trend. And there may be up to 180 million ounces of resources, depending on what you include in the number.

The trend is a 40-mile-long, northwest to southeast zone of low-grade, epithermal deposits, discovered in 1961 by John Livermore and Alan Cope, geologists then working for Newmont. The mineralization was near surface (only 25 meters down), but so finely disseminated that all traces were microscopic. In the areas that proved economic, assays averaged 6.2 g/t gold. Newmont opened the original Carlin open pit mine in 1965, before the introduction of heap leaching. When that technology matured in the 1980s, production ramped up to where the Carlin Trend now accounts for over 35% of all U.S. gold output.

In 1994, mining companies began moving underground to exploit the higher-grade ore down dip from existing open pits. These deeper deposits have been discovered at Rossi, Dee, Meikle, Gold Bug, Rodeo, Deep Post, Deep Star, Turf, Four Corners, West Leeville, Hardie Footwall, Deep Carlin, Mike, Rain, Tess and Rain Extension. Taken together, these recent underground discoveries contain a total of 42 million ounces of announced gold reserves, at an average grade of 10.8 g/t. Large quantities of additional unannounced gold resources are now drill indicated on the Carlin Trend.

Cortez Trend

The Cortez Trend is in the same area of Nevada and is similar in size to the Carlin Trend, but is displaced about 50 miles southwest. It includes the Pipeline Mine Complex (12 million ounces) to the north and the Gold Bar Mine (1 million ounces) to the south.

At a meeting of the Geological Society of Nevada in mid-2004, a representative of the CJV—the Placer Dome/Kennecott Cortez Joint Venture—announced that they had intercepted 1.5 ounces of gold per ton (over 46 g/t) over an interval of 400+ feet. Some reports have it at almost 2 ounces per tonne—a staggeringly rich intercept. Current Proven and Probable reserves at Cortez/Cortez Hills, as announced by joint venture operator Placer Dome (now part of Barrick Gold, ABX) stand at 10 million ounces, with another 10.1 million ounces in resources). The CJV has now approved mine construction. Since the much-discussed CJV announcement at the Geological Society of Nevada meeting, the Cortez Trend has become one of the most active prospecting areas in Nevada. The expectation—or hope—that the Cortez Trend is now an opportunity like the Carlin Trend was in the 1960s is clearly the driving force in the area.

But is this hope realistic?

Comparison

The Eureka-Battle Mountain region of Nevada has two layers of sedimentary rock: the “Upper Plate” and “Lower Plate”. The Upper Plate does not typically host higher-grade gold mineralization, but can contain indications of higher grades in Lower Plate rocks that have “leaked” upwards. Lower Plate mineralization (Silurian-age Roberts Mountains formation) correlates with the major gold deposits of the Carlin Trend, where a great deal of surface erosion and other geological activity has brought Lower Plate blocks ("horst blocks") within range of open pit mining in some places. "Carlin-style" deposits contain disseminated gold mineralization, usually structurally controlled (meaning, along fault lines, etc.). Mineralization may be predominantly oxides, sulphides, refractory or carbonaceous sulphides.

Cortez Trend deposits are replacements or disseminations in calcareous sediments and limestone strata, also in Lower Plate rock. As on the Carlin Trend, one of the keys to discovery is finding Lower Plate rocks that have been exposed in or through "windows" where the Upper Plate has been eroded.

The largest and highest-grade discoveries along the Carlin Trend are associated with major faults. These are very old faults, as are the Cortez faults, though there is considerable disagreement among geologists on numerous issues relating to these faults. Consulting geophysicist Hans Rasmussen, who once worked with Newmont on the Carlin Trend, believes there is a strong possibility that the Cortez Structural corridor system may be both older and bigger than the Carlin fault system. Being older is good: that allows more time for more geological events to occur. The reasoning is long and technical, but the bottom line is that if Rasmussen is right, the Cortez Trend could prove to be not only as big as Carlin, but bigger.

If Cortez is so big, why wasn’t it discovered earlier? Well, one consequence of the geological events that formed the trend is that they also buried it, making it harder to find and more difficult to prove. But that is exactly what numerous majors and juniors are working on, so time will tell soon enough.

How to Play

In the latter half of 2005, Rob McEwen, former CEO of Goldcorp, has made a lot of waves in the area by buying major positions in a number of Cortez Trend junior explorers. This included U.S. Gold (OTC:USGL), White Knight Resources (V.WKR), Tone Resources (V.TNS), Nevada Pacific Gold (V.NPG) and Coral Gold (V.CGR). These companies have all seen substantial increases in share price in the months since then, partly because, as he revealed to us when we interviewed him for the January edition of our International Speculator newsletter, McEwen hopes to amalgamate these companies into a single company with a land package and an exploration budget like that of a major, but with the fast-moving exploration culture of a junior.

If you are looking to play the Cortez, one could speculate on any one or all of these stocks heading higher if McEwen is successful. Or one could look for companies with land near those McEwen already has an interest in, hoping he’ll buy in and send the stocks higher. Or, one could just do the homework necessary to determine which companies have the most prospective projects in the region and buy them on the hope of “getting rich on process.” Buying any junior mining stock is always a risky proposition,

[verwijderd] 1 maart 2006 09:00

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Investors drive gold Gareth Tredway '28-FEB-06

JOHANNESBURG (Mineweb.com) -- Investors are expected to add another 45.2 million ounces of gold to their portfolios this year, as global uncertainties continue to fuel the largest bull market in gold history, according to CPM’s 2006 Gold Yearbook released on Tuesday.

“As a result of this wave of demand, investors today are estimated to hold around 1.1 billion ounces of gold, more than is held by the central banks,” says the yearbook.

Last year 46.7 million ounces were purchased, making 43% of the total market. “Definitely since World War Two, it would be the third largest year for investor buying, surpassed only by the 50.2 million ounces bought in 2003, and the 46.8 million ounces bought in 1967.”

Central banks are expected to sell less gold this year, with CPM’s projection at 13 million ounces compared to 20.3 million ounces last year. But the consultancy reckons that most of the gold that the banks wanted to
sell has been sold and that average sales will drop even more.“As a result, gold sales are expected to drop to around five million ounces
per year or so at some point in the future.”

The higher prices will however cause a drop in fabrication demand of about 1.6% in 2006 to 81.3 million ounces, and the drop could be greater if higher prices persist.

“Some jewellery manufacturers and suppliers are suggesting that gold use in jewellery could decline 5% - 8% if prices remain high, while other market observers are speaking of the potential for double-digit declines.”

The higher gold prices will also trigger a major expansion in mine production for years ahead, according to CPM. Mine production is expected to rise by 6.1% to 66.8 million ounces this year, with total gold supply expected up 4.1% at 113.5 million ounces.

“The effects of the higher gold prices since 2002 are now being seen in gold mine production, with dozens of major mine developments programs now underway in numerous countries around the world, and expenditures for gold exploration surpassing the previous peak of 1997.”

Between 1999 to 2004 mine production declined 9.6% to 62.1 million ounces.

While major gold producing countries have shown a declining gold production curve for some time now, CPM says new ounces announced far outweigh production from mines that are expected to close.

“There are major mine development programs representing more than 14.8 million ounces of increased output capacity which have been announced and are in various stages of development, slated to come into production between 2006 and 2011.”

[verwijderd] 1 maart 2006 19:05

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quote:
Gung Ho schreef:
“As a result of this wave of demand, investors today are estimated to hold around 1.1 billion ounces of gold, more than is held by the central banks,” says the yearbook.

Zit gelukkig nog onder de 4 billion ounces (sommige berichten zeggen 3 billion ounces) die op deze planeet te winnen zijn (als ik tenminste berichten mag geloven dat alle goud in de wereld in een kubus van 19 meter past.)
Ik zie het daar nog wel flink bovenuit gaan.
-pcrs

[verwijderd] 2 maart 2006 12:21

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Gold Bugs vs. Gartman By John Partridge
Globe and Mail, Toronto

www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story...
01/BNStory/Business/home

They agreed that the price of gold will continue to rise.

But as for how far, how fast and why, forget it.

On these and many other issues, two leading gold bugs and a well-
known U.S. investment newsletter publisher begged to differ, as they
matched wits in Toronto Wednesday during a televised debate.

The gold bugs were John Embry, precious metals specialist and chief
investment strategist at Sprott Asset Management in Toronto, and
ally Bill Murphy of Dallas, chairman of the Gold Anti-Trust Action
Committee. Both believe the metal's price has for years been
manipulated by a cartel of central banks, dominated by the U.S.
Federal Reserve Board, that have used their extensive gold reserves
to suppress the price in an effort to prop up the value of their
currencies. They contend the central banks now retain far less gold
than the 31,000 tonnes they claim to have.

They also figure that the price of gold, which has risen more than
120 percent in the past five years -- and closed in New York
yesterday at US$565.80 an ounce, for April delivery, up $1.90 -- is
going to hit $1,000 or $2,000 and more in fairly short order because
supply will not keep up with investor demand.

"I basically think that paper money has a distinct problem and that
gold will reassert itself for a considerable period of time," Mr.
Embry said. "So, yeah, I'm really bullish on gold. I can see $1,000
gold quite easily."

"In essence, there's a major short position out there because the
central banks don't have the gold they had," Mr. Murphy said. "They
have about half of it. The rest has been used to suppress the price
and now that demand is kicking in, the price is taking off." And
that short position, he added, will at some point have to be
covered, which will drive gold prices rapidly skyward.

Their opponent in the debate, hosted by Report on Business
Television, was Dennis Gartman, editor and publisher of The Gartman
Letter, a daily investment commentary published from Suffolk, Va. He
would not forecast a specific price for gold but allowed that he
could perhaps see it hitting $1,000 an ounce maybe 20 years from
now, but certainly not in the next two years -- and he dismissed the
cartel and conspiracy theories as a waste of time.

"Quite honestly, I couldn't care less," Mr. Gartman declared. "It is
not important to me if there has been a manipulation to keep the
price of gold down, because the price of gold has been going up.
Whether they have deceptively kept it down is inconsequential to
those of us who trade in it. The trend is up and is continuing to be."

In Mr. Gartman's view, the key driver of stronger gold prices,
especially in the past year, is that what he described as "second-
and third-tier" European central banks have been buying it to
diversify their reserves, which for years had been concentrated in
U.S. dollars and, more recently, in euros.

Gold hit a record high of $872 an ounce in January 1980. To match
that in today's dollars, the price would have to top $2,100.

Also Wednesday, Bank of Nova Scotia said that investors have driven
the price of gold up so sharply that for now they have also run the
most important traditional buyers, jewellery makers, out of the
market.

Gold has climbed from $500 since the beginning of last December, but
although this is usually a period of heavy jewellery demand, most of
the upward pressure has come from professional and retail investors
buying exchange-traded hold funds, according to a quarterly report
by the bank's ScotiaMocatta Precious Metals division. "Contrasting
buoyant investment demand, jewellers and manufacturers from the
jewellery-centric markets of India and the Middle East continue to
report lacklustre trading conditions with buyers sidelined by high
prices," the report said.

In an interview following the debate, Mr. Murphy described this
as "sticker shock," and said the jewellers' absence will be only
temporary. "Because there is such a supply-demand deficit, the
sticker shock will end and at some point they will be forced to go back in," he said.

There were plenty of other issues on which the gold bugs and the
publisher disagreed during the debate.

Mr. Embry, for instance, said he figures the U.S. economy is in far
worse shape than official statistics suggest and, indeed, that the
United States is "unfortunately" heading for a depression that
will "destroy" the value of its currency.

Not Mr. Gartman. In his view, the economy is in fact "much stronger
than the data would show us," and he does not see a depression in
the cards, at least not in his lifetime.

[verwijderd] 3 maart 2006 07:58

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Silver Bulls Rejoice as Mexican Miners Strike
By Jon A. Nones 02 Mar 2006 at 05:39 PM
www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?r...

St. LOUIS (ResourceInvestor.com) -- Strike hits the Mexico mining industry and many silver bugs are jumping for joy. The silver price spiked today over 4% to breach the psychological $10 barrier, hitting a 22-year high of $10.23 on NYMEX. Is silver really this illiquid or were there other factors at play today?

According to MarketWatch, traders were upbeat about the prospects for a silver exchanged-traded fund. However, Christine Hudacko, advisor at Barclays Global Investors, confirmed with RI that there was no new movement of iShares Silver Trust at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Jason Hommel, Editor of Silver Stock Report, said silver is indeed this illiquid and the strike in Mexico played a substantial role in today’s spike.

Unrest in the industry has been building since the explosion at Grupo Mexico’s coal mine in northern Mexico that killed 65 men last week. But late last night, union workers closed the world’s no. 1 refined silver producer Penoles' Fresnillo silver mine after tens of thousands of Mexican miners and metal workers joined a nationwide strike.

And Penoles produces an average of 80 million ounces of silver per year, the company said.

According to Hommel, the whole market produces roughly 600-650 million ounces of silver a year. The Silver Institute reported that Mexico accounted for almost 100 million ounces each in 2004, roughly 16% of about 615 million total silver ounces.

Source: The Silver Institute

“But we don’t know exactly [the amount] because there are a lot of independent miners that might not report” their production, added Hommel.

However, by using the numbers above, we can estimate that the Penoles refinery processes 80% or more of all the silver mined in Mexico.

“If 10% of the silver production gets halted, that’s going to have a huge impact on the market,” said Hommel.

Furthermore, it also unclear of how much silver is actually in the marketplace.

Todd Stein & Steven McIntyre of The Texas Hedge Report estimated late last year that “250 million ounces is roughly one-third of the world's supply of above ground silver.”

David Morgan, independent precious metals analyst and author of “The Morgan Report,” previously told RI that the amount of existing .999 fine silver bullion is probably less than 500 million ounces total.

Silver analyst Ted Butler said last summer that “130 million ounces … just about equals the total known world silver bullion inventory.”

And, Jeffrey Christian of CPM Group recently calculated only 75 to 100 million ounces of silver currently in bank vaults.

So with such discrepancy, it is very hard to determine who is right and how much silver is actually out there. What we do know is that Mexico was the world’s leading silver producer in 2004, according to the Silver Institute.

“We’re already in a deficit,” he said. “So if we have this strike and investor interest on top of it...”

You get the picture.

But compared to the market reaction if and when Barclays’ silver ETF gets SEC approval, Hommel said “this spike today is not even close to what you’re going to see.”

According to Hommel, silver used to move up and down $10 daily back when it was $50 in the 1980s.

“We’re going to see these types of movements again,” Hommel told RI.

Today’s Metal Prices

Source: TheBullionDesk.com

April silver climbed 41.8 cents, or 4.3%, to close at $10.208 an ounce today on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Hommel said that silver was following gold to some extent today as well. Gold futures broke the $570 mark again today, closing at $570.40, up $4.60.

Copper tacked on 3.2 cents to close at $2.2675 a pound extending gains after climbing almost 6 cents on Wednesday.

Grupo Mexico, the world's No. 3 copper producer, said its Cananea and La Caridad copper mines were closed for a second day by the strike.

La Caridad and Cananea between them produced close to 320,000 tonnes of copper in 2005, according to Reuters.

The June palladium contract jumped $3.05 an ounce to end at $303 and April platinum rose $3 to end at $1,054.80 an ounce.

© Copyright 2006, Resource Investor.
Printed via the AbsolPublisher content management system.

[verwijderd] 4 maart 2006 08:46

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SILVER ZOOM IGNORED

Todd Stein & Steven McIntyre
The Texas Hedge Report
March 2, 2006
Courtesy of www.texashedge.com

So after a quarter of a century, silver finally returned to double-digits. While we aren't fans of following day-to-day moves, the recent zoom past the $10/oz mark is noteworthy. It seems that the precious metals community is anticipating the launch of the silver ETF - so perhaps this is what is causing the grey dog to bark. Maybe that's the case, but we certainly don't think that abnormal amounts bullion are being gobbled up by Barclays in anticipation of the ETF's launch. Nor do we think that the public is suddenly hoarding silver.

What is interesting to us is that the mainstream media and average investor have no idea what is going on. CNBC has a ticker in the morning that includes some commodity prices, but silver remains absent. Web sites such as MSN and Yahoo spit out headlines about Google, retail sales, and oil - it is only on rare occasion that gold is mentioned and that is when the price breaks $400/oz or $500/oz. Even the commodities sections of major financial web sites seem to ignore silver. For example, we can find nothing about the recent strike at Peñoles, the second largest mining company in Mexico. Compare this to a hypothetical strike at Exxon, which would make top headlines.

A little more than twenty six years ago, when the silver market was being cornered, the general public started to wake up. At the very top, there were news stories about average people taking their silverware in to be melted. While we are not anticipating a repeat of early 1980, it is logical to think that the bull market will not end until we see the public paying attention to what is going on.

The combination of miner unrest in Mexico, increasingly radical leaders being elected in Latin America, and the silver ETF is adding more fuel to the already bullish fire of silver supply/demand. As with any asset that has had a huge run in a short period of time, a meaningful correction could occur at any moment to shake out the weak hands and momentum players, but we think that continued annual supply deficits of silver will not go unnoticed by the mainstream investing public for long. Oh, and we haven't even mentioned the ticking time bomb that is the U.S. Dollar and how its looming decline will almost certainly add a great deal of investment demand to gold and silver at a time when silver supply and inventories are very limited.

March 2, 2006
Todd Stein & Steven McIntyre
Texas Hedge Report

Todd Stein & Steven McIntyre are internationally known analysts and editors of The Texas Hedge Report, a market newsletter that highlights under and overvalued securities in the equity, bond, currency, and commodity markets

For more information, go to www.texashedge.com

[verwijderd] 6 maart 2006 09:56

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Beste Gung Ho

De afgelopen weken heb ik me verdiept in onfrisse praktijken van mijnbouwbedrijven mbt kinderarbeid. (zie ook draadje: "Mijnbouw en Kindslaven")

Graag zou ik ook van u hierover iets horen. Heeft u een mening, die u kwijt wilt, over dit onderwerp en is het u bekend of er uberhaupt bedrijven zijn die in de praktijk volgens bepaalde etische codes werken?

groet,
Honky Tonk Girl

[verwijderd] 6 maart 2006 11:23

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Beste HTG,
Ik vind de toonzetting van je draadje verkeerd ik kan me niet voorstellen dat feitelijk iemand daar voor zou zijn.Ik heb echter geen enkel bewijs kunnen vinden dat beursgenoteerde bedrijven uit de mining sector zich daar mee bezig zouden houden. Hetgeen mij praktisch gezien alleen al zo goed als onmogelijk lijkt. Ik denk dat indien de NGO's ook maar ook een bedrijf hadden weten te vinden de rapen goed gaar zouden zijn. Iets anders is natuurlijk wat er wereldwijd op het illegale gebied overigens niet aleen qua mining gebeurd in politiek totaal instabiele gebieden. Goud en diamant zijn ook daar dan natuurlijk direct geld waard en net als in oorlog is alles geoorloofd om je doel te bereiken. Ik geloof dat kinderarbeid of hoe je ook wilt noemen structureel onderdeel uitmaakt van politieke instabiliteit en zolang daar niets aan wordt gedaan blijf je situaties houden dat de mens probeert te overleven en daar worden op zeker geen westerse schoonheidsprijzen mee gewonnen. Het is dan natuurlijk voorspelbaar dat normale bedrijven snel afhaken in dergelijke gebieden waar alleen het recht van de sterkste of gewelddadigste geldt. Om met een dergelijke stelling niet meer in mijnbedrijven te beleggen lijkt mij bijzonder kort door de bocht en ik vraag mij af of men hier wel enig weet weet heeft van wat er qua productie/verwerking/logistiek van bv electronica buiten Europa/US allemaal wel gebeurd waar wel degelijk westerse beursgenoteerde bedrijven direct/indirect betrokken zijn. De door HTG aangehaalde voorbeelden gingen bv over illegale diamantwinning in gebieden waar kinderen voor het gemak niet alleen hun AK47's volop gebruiken maar ook tegenstanders martelen en hun geslachtsdelen afsnijden. De illegalen ook miners jong en oud in bv zuid amerika zijn juist tov de lokale indianenbevolking in hun beschermde reservaten rucksichtlos en moorddadig. Ik vrees met grote vreze dat zoals helaas altijd met illegale praktijken van welke orde dan ook altijd misstanden gepaard blijven gaan. Het is niet anders. We zullen zien. Succes.
GH

quote:
honky tonk girl schreef:
Beste Gung HoDe afgelopen weken heb ik me verdiept in onfrisse praktijken van mijnbouwbedrijven mbt kinderarbeid. (zie ook draadje: "Mijnbouw en Kindslaven")Graag zou ik ook van u hierover iets horen. Heeft u een mening, die u kwijt wilt, over dit onderwerp en is het u bekend of er uberhaupt bedrijven zijn die in de praktijk volgens bepaalde etische codes werken?groet,
Honky Tonk Girl

Silver ETF Ironies y Tom Szabo 04 Mar 2006 www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?r...

SAN JOSE (SILVERAXIS.com) -- There has been much discussion about the proposed silver ETF, the Barclays iShares Silver Trust. As usual with anything silver, there is plenty of irony, confusion and baseless speculation. Hopefully this commentary will, to some extent, help change the sorry state of affairs.

Let's first look at a few fun (boring) facts about the proposed silver ETF. Silver investors should consider keeping these points in the back of their minds.

Gains from the silver ETF will be taxed at the "collectibles" rate of 28% vs. the long-term capital gains rate of 15% (or less). This means ETF investors should consider using tax deferred accounts such as IRAs to the extent possible. There are other bothersome tax implications of owning shares in the silver ETF including the fact that the trust must constantly sell silver to pay its expenses, which is treated as a taxable sale at the 28% rate. Meanwhile, trust expenses can only be deducted as miscellaneous itemized deductions subject to a 2% adjusted gross income threshold. While this will be a minor annoyance for many ETF investors, I mention it simply because the complication is not necessarily applicable to the alternative, physical bullion held in your own possession.
As just mentioned, expenses of the ETF such as the 0.5% annual sponsor fee are paid by selling silver from the trust. This means that each ETF share will represent incrementally less than 10 ounces of silver over time. The minimal deduction of 0.5% per year may not seem all that bad, but there could be one-time charges on top of that due to errors, losses, litigation or other unexpected but possible events. Assuming minimal expenses, an ETF share will be worth around 9.5 ounces of silver in 10 years and about 9 ounces in 20 years. Put another way, the ETF will underperform the physical metal by at least 0.5% per year. The alternative of course is to purchase silver bullion directly, which means paying a hefty spread both when buying and selling. But there is no guarantee that such spreads won't be common with the silver ETF, especially during volatile trading in the spot market. In fact, I expect that at times there will be rather wide bid/ask spreads along with significant divergence from spot rates as compared to GLD, the main gold ETF.
Some people speculate the silver ETF will need to buy 130 million ounces of silver before the shares are allowed to trade. This appears to be utter nonsense since the Form S-1 registration statement clearly explains that only 1.5 million ounces will be purchased initially. Additional silver will supposedly be acquired only as actual investor demand for the ETF grows. However, read down below why 130 million ounces may need to be accumulated anyway before the SEC will approve the ETF. Depending on the SEC's views and what stockpiles of silver may or may not be available, this has unpredictable implications for the future price of silver, at least in the next few months and years.
The fact that the silver ETF's custodian is JPMorgan Chase should not be viewed as a case of the fox guarding the henhouse, or as Jason Hommel puts it, a "mouse in charge of the cheese". The custodian and any sub-custodians, should they do something improper in violation of the custodial agreement, are subject to civil liability. More importantly, custodial management can be held criminally liable. Being a custodian is serious business and not the place to look for fault with the silver or gold ETFs. Although mistakes and fraud are always possible, the likelihood of it is remote. The simple fact is that there are no cost effective alternatives to allocated storage in London bullion vaults unless you happen to be Central Fund of Canada with a 40 year banking relationship. People like James Turk, founder of goldmoney, have in the past disagreed with this conclusion, but it is telling that to this day all his clients' gold and silver are held in LBMA clearing member vaults in London (just like the ETFs) instead of North America or some other place where physical redemption would be more practical. So yes, ETF silver will be held in London under standard bullion custodial arrangements. There is no other choice.
It is incorrect to claim that the silver ETF will create net new jobs as a result of higher silver prices and that therefore the Silver Users' Association (SUA) has its story backwards. Don't get me wrong, I believe the point the SUA is trying to make about job losses in the silver industry is not only stupid but entirely irrelevant to the SEC's approval of the silver ETF. Nevertheless, it is important to remain practical, objective and truthful about the consequences of higher silver prices. And one of these consequences might be the severe curtailment of decorative silver fabrication in the U.S. (jewelry, tableware, silver plating, etc.) Decorative use of silver, which exce

[verwijderd] 6 maart 2006 11:57

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[quote=Gung Ho]
Beste HTG,
Ik vind de toonzetting van je draadje verkeerd ik kan me niet voorstellen dat feitelijk iemand daar voor zou zijn.Ik heb echter geen enkel bewijs kunnen vinden dat beursgenoteerde bedrijven uit de mining sector zich daar mee bezig zouden houden. Hetgeen mij praktisch gezien alleen al zo goed als onmogelijk lijkt. Ik denk dat indien de NGO's ook maar ook een bedrijf hadden weten te vinden de rapen goed gaar zouden zijn."

Okay..........
De toonzetting had inderdaad anders gekund; mijn eerste bericht hieromtrent was gepost vrij snel na het lezen van veel materiaal omtrent uitbuiting van kinderen en het vergiftigen van land en watergebieden, vandaar.......

In ieder geval bedankt voor uw bijdrage! Ik heb mijn standpunt is nog niet uitgekristalliseerd en ik ga me verder verdiepen in de praktijken van edelmetaalmijnbouw opdat de "korte bocht" wat ruimer genomen kan worden.

Good Luck,
HTG

[verwijderd] 7 maart 2006 08:35

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Gold Prices May Reach $2,000 by 2010, U.S. Gold's McEwen Says
March 6 (Bloomberg) -- Gold prices may reach $2,000 an ounce by 2010 on demand for an alternative to currencies, U.S. Gold Corp. Chief Executive Officer Robert McEwen said.

``You have much more money than there is gold, and as people see their currencies falling relative to gold, they're going to be saying `Maybe I should have some of this','' McEwen, the former CEO of Goldcorp Inc., said today after a presentation at a mining conference in Toronto. ``And you have an industry that's consolidated, so you have less product and more buying.''

McEwen is betting he will find a large gold deposit in Nevada between properties owned by Barrick Gold Corp. and Newmont Mining Corp. U.S. Gold yesterday made hostile bids for four exploration companies near its Tonkin Springs property in Nevada's Cortez Hills Trend region. Gold reached a 25-year high last month of $579.50 on Feb. 2. The metal rose to a record $873 in January 1980.

``There's the opportunity to create the premiere exploration company in Nevada by having a large land package with good liquid trading and a large exploration program,'' McEwen,55, said. U.S. Gold is based in Lakewood, Colorado.

U.S. Gold's site would encompass a 36 square-mile area near the Cortez Hills property to be acquired by Barrick after completing a $10.1 billion takeover of Placer Dome Inc. Mining companies are buying rivals as new reserves become more difficult to find.

``I think we have a really good shot, and multiple shots, of finding another Cortez Hills discovery,'' McEwen said.

U.S. Gold is offering to buy White Night Resources Ltd., Nevada Pacific Gold Ltd., Coral Gold Resources Ltd. and Tone Resources Ltd. for a combined $266.7 million in stock. U.S. Gold, which raised $75 million last month from investors, plans to spend $30 million in the next two years to explore for gold on Tonkin Springs.

Shares of U.S. Gold rose 59 cents, or 10 percent, to $6.24 over the counter. They have gained 81 percent this year.

McEwen stepped down as Goldcorp CEO a year ago after the mining company combined with Wheaton River Minerals Ltd. Ian Telfer, Wheaton's CEO, took over the combined company.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Doug Alexander in Toronto at dalexander3@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: March 6, 2006 17:50 EST

[verwijderd] 10 maart 2006 08:07

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Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Alan Greenspan confessed to the gold price suppression scheme while he was chairman of the Federal Reserve.He gave his famous testimony to Congress on July 24, 1998: "Central banks stand ready to lease gold in increasing quantities should the price rise."

www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/test...

The European Central Bank confessed to the gold price suppression scheme when it entered the Washington Agreement on Gold on September 26, 1999. The bank'smembers acknowledged that they had gotten together to regulate the gold price through gold sales and leasing:

www.ecb.int/press/pr/date/1999/html/p...

Barrick Gold confessed to the gold price suppression
scheme in U.S. District Court in New Orleans on
February 28, 2003, when it filed a motion to dismiss
Blanchard & Co.'s anti-trust lawsuit charging that
Barrick was doing exactly what its motion admitted.
The motion said that in borrowing gold from central
banks and selling it, Barrick had become the agent
of the central banks in the gold market, and, as the
agent of the central banks, shared their sovereign
immunity and thus could not be sued:

www.lemetropolecafe.com/img2003/memof...

The Reserve Bank of Australia confessed to the gold
price suppression scheme in its annual report for
2003. "Foreign currency reserve assets and gold,"
the RBA's report said, "are held primarily to support intervention in the foreign exchange market. In investing these assets, priority is therefore given to liquidity and security, in order to ensure that the assets are always available for their intended policy purposes."

www.rba.gov.au/PublicationsAndResearc...

And now the Bank for International Settlements, the
central bank of the central banks, has confessed to
the gold price suppression scheme.

The confession of the BIS came last June in a fairly candid speech by the head of the bank's monetary and economic department, William R. White, to central bankers and academics gathered at the BIS' fourth annual conference, held in Basel, Switzerland.The speech was provided to GATA this week.White's speech was titled "Past and Future of Central Bank Cooperation" and he said in part:

"The intermediate objectives of central bank cooperation are more varied.

"First, better joint decisions, in the relatively rare circumstances where such coordinated action is called for.
"Second, a clear understanding of the policy issues as they affect central banks. Hopefully this would reflect common beliefs, but even a clear understanding of differences of views can sometimes be useful.
"Third, the development of robust and effective networks of contacts.

"Fourth, the efficient international dissemination of both ideas and information that can improve national policy making.

"And last, the provision of international credits and joint efforts to influence asset prices (especially gold and foreign exchange) in circumstances where this might be thought useful."

That is, central banks collaborate -- and since they do so in secret, it may be said that they conspire -- to rig the gold and currency markets.

To use White's word, the central banks collaborate
"especially" to rig the gold and currency markets.

Thankfully White did not accuse those who read his
speech of being "conspiracy nuts." We still have
Dennis Gartman, Tim Wood, and a few others for
that, even if their band is rapidly diminishing.

Interestingly, among those listed as having attended the BIS conference on central bank cooperation and presumably in the audience for White's speech was Edwin M. Truman, a senior fellow at the Institute for International Economics and a former Federal Reserve official who, as assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury Department, kept a close eye on the delegation GATA sent to visit members of Congress in Washington in May 2000 and who was in charge of denying to everyone then that
the U.S. government had anything to do with a
scheme to suppress the gold price. Truman seems to have survived any shock that White's speech may have caused him:

www.iie.com/publications/author_bio.c...

White's speech confessing to the gold price
suppression scheme on behalf of the BIS is
appended. You can find the entire proceedings
of the BIS conference at the Internet link
included in the speech. It looks like the bankers
had a much nicer time of it than the people who
try to make their living wresting real money from
the earth.

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.

Fourth Annual BIS Conference
Past and Future of Central Bank Cooperation
Basel, Switzerland, June 27-29, 2005

Past and Future of Central Bank Cooperation / Opening Remarks

By William R. White
Economic Adviser
and Head of Monetary and Economic Department
Bank for International Settlements, Basel, Switzerland

www.bis.org/publ/bppdf/bispap27.pdf

Let me begin this meeting by welcoming all of you, both central
bankers and academics, to this conference on the "Past and Future of
Central Bank Cooperation."

This is the fourth in a series of annual conferences, all of which
have been based on the premise that these two communities have a
great deal to learn from each other. In particular, we feel that the
central bankers, who are on the firing line of public policy, have
some comparative advantage in identifying the issues that need
analysis. The academics, in turn, have a similar advantage with
respect to analytical tools, rigour, and sometimes, quite simply,
the time to do the thinking required.

In this spirit, participation in the conference this year does mark
a further step forward. Whereas in the past we primarily invited
academic economists and economic historians, this year we have
extended the writ to a number of political scientists interested in
political and other processes, and the development of institutions
to support such processes. I am pleased about this, in part because
I have felt for a long time (and I think there is evidence to back
this up) that the multidisciplinary approach often leads to big
breakthroughs in terms of understanding. But, more particularly, I
am also pleased because it responds to a specific concern that I
have had for many years here at the BIS. Namely, that, as we were
trying over the years to make the BIS more relevant and useful to
the global community, we were relying too much on the views of
economists, like myself, with no real training in such
organisational matters. As I mentioned to Ethan Kapstein a number of
years ago, I thought we needed help and this conference might be the
first step down that path.

As to the choice of the particular topic for this conference, it was
in a way a "no-brainer" given that this year marks the 75th
anniversary of the founding of the BIS. Since the BIS has been in
the central bank cooperation business since its start, the idea of a
conference to look back at past successes and failures, and what we
could learn from them, had an obvious appeal. Looking forward, there
was also a sense that changes in the structure of international
financial markets had likely made the issue of international
cooperation among central ba

[verwijderd] 10 maart 2006 08:19

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Looking forward, there was also a sense that changes in the structure of international financial markets had likely made the issue of international
cooperation among central banks of even greater interest than in the past.

On the one hand, it could be argued that virtually everything has an international flavour in today's "globalised" world. This might imply even more work for central banks and regulatory agencies to resolve problems of mutual interest. On the other hand, however, with deregulated markets playing a bigger role than ever and floating exchange rates increasingly the rule, one could also argue that the need for international cooperation has now been much reduced.

In a nutshell, if central banks are focused on domestic price stability, and if domestic financial stability is assured by adequate governance and regulatory standards (albeit likely to be
internationally negotiated), what further role is there for international cooperation? Moreover, it could also be posited that the narrower domestic mandate of central banks will further reduce
the scope for international central bank cooperation as well.

Before turning briefly to an assessment of past efforts and likely future challenges, it is perhaps worth spending a minute on what is meant by central bank cooperation.

I think that the terminology developed for domestic monetary policy might have some uses here; namely, the ultimate objectives, the intermediate bjectives and the operational instruments. The ultimate objectives have always been monetary and financial
stability, though clearly the focus of attention has often shifted over the years.

The intermediate objectives of central bank cooperation are more varied.

First, better joint decisions, in the relatively rare circumstances where such coordinated action is called for.

Second, a clear understanding of the policy issues as they affect central banks. Hopefully this would reflect common beliefs, but even a clear understanding of differences of views can sometimes be useful.

Third, the development of robust and effective networks of contacts.

Fourth, the efficient international dissemination of both ideas and information that can improve national policymaking.

And last, the provision of international credits and joint efforts to influence asset prices (especially gold and foreign exchange) in circumstances where this might be thought useful.

Talking about the instruments of central bank cooperation brings us more directly to the services which the BIS has provided to the international central banking community over the years.

First, I would note the various meetings of central bankers and regulators which take place in the "Basel community," if not necessarily in Basel. These now number over 300 a year and involve
governors as well as all types of specialists (IT experts, auditors, security experts, economists, etc.) within the central banks.

Second, there is research and policy analysis directed to international issues. This conference is a good example of the genre.

Third, there is data and information, most notably on international bank lending, cross-border securities markets, and derivatives markets.

And finally, there are the BIS banking services to central banks, which have allowed us to maintain the share of global foreign exchange reserves deposited at the BIS at around 6 percent of the
global total. Managing this money gives us a particular insight into how global financial markets actually work.

Well, if that is what central bank cooperation is all about, has it done any good?

Since I have been in the cooperation business for over 20 years now, the last 11 at the BIS, it would be strange if I did not say yes. The fact that our partners in cooperation keep coming back, in ever-increasing numbers and asking for ever more diverse products, also points in the same direction. And by the standards of other forums for international cooperation, the efforts of central banks also look pretty good.

Consider, for example, the issue of collective action clauses in international bond contracts to facilitate agreement among creditors in case of default. These were first suggested by a G-10 central bank working group in 1995 (also by Eichengreen and Portes), advocated by the G-10 deputies in 1996, endorsed by the G-10 ministers and governors in 1997, overtaken by the work of the Willard Group in 1998 and 1999, subsequently forgotten about, and ultimately introduced on a geographically widespread basis only dating from 2003, and only partially in terms of content.

Clearly, international cooperation is not always an easy game to play, so even the relatively modest achievements of the central bank community must be viewed positively. And I would like to believe that the contribution of the BIS to this process -- a small staff focused on customer service and the capacity to see two sides of an argument -- has also been a useful one.

Yet, for completeness, it must also be noted that central bank cooperation may not always have been used to good effect. Some have argued that the efforts made here in Basel to paper over the cracks in the Bretton Woods system served not so much to buy needed time but as a means to postpone needed and much more fundamental policy adjustments. My own personal involvement with bridge loans, directed via the BIS to many emerging-market countries in the 1980s and early 1990s, led me to conclude that some of the later ones should never have been made in the first place. Increasingly, they were show rather than substance and threatened to undermine the credibility of other, more substantial forms of liquidity support.

Looking ahead, a number of policy challenges might call for more intensive international cooperation, including among central banks.
The first and biggest has to do with widening external imbalances. These could catalyse an international crisis at some point, with otentially disruptive movements in both exchange rates and the
prices of financial assets. At the textbook level, it is reasonably clear what all the major players should do to reduce these risks. However, it is equally clear that many of them face other constraints as well, not least political resistance to following the required course of action. In this environment, it does not seem silly to suggest that a cooperative response might be required.

A second challenge for central bank cooperation will be to find ways to better integrate their cooperative efforts with those of regulators and supervisors in the pursuit of international financial stability. Central bankers are increasingly aware that injections of liquidity to support financial stability may lead to excessive increases in asset prices as well as moral hazard. Regulators are also increasingly aware that their domestic efforts also have a macroeconomic dimension. These are conceptual advances.

Nevertheless, the cross-border aspects of crisis prevention and crisis management need still greater attention. In particular, how a large, complex and globally active financial firm might be wound
down while keeping its vital functions intact remains a puzzle at best.

And a third challenge has to do with regional central bank cooperation and how this fits into the broader framework of global cooperation.

The BIS was instrumental in helping Europeans prepare themselves for monetary union. Tod

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The BIS was instrumental in helping Europeans prepare themselves for
monetary union. Today similar interests are being expressed in the
Gulf, parts of Africa, and Central America. In Asia a framework for
greater monetary cooperation seems gradually to be taking shape,
underpinned by increasing trade integration. Everywhere in the
emerging markets there is a keen interest in learning about central
banking issues from those more experienced with liberalised economic
and financial systems.

To conclude, whether looking back or forward, a number of
interesting questions pertaining to central bank cooperation remain
unanswered. I have every confidence that the presentations and the
subsequent discussions will move us a long way toward rectifying
that situation. May I take this opportunity to thank all those who
have prepared papers, to thank the discussants, and to encourage all
members of the audience to participate actively. As I said at the
beginning, we all have a lot to learn from each other. So speak up.

[verwijderd] 14 maart 2006 12:31

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GFMS Disputes CPM Group's Silver Stats

By Jon A. Nones
10 Mar 2006 at 12:58 PM EST

St. LOUIS (ResourceInvestor.com) -- Now that the public comment period has ended at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for Barclays’ proposed silver ETF, many analysts are busy putting in their two cents. Some say it will pass, some say it won’t, some say it should, some say it shouldn’t. Yet, only a few analysts have made light of CPM Group’s letter to SEC in January concerning silver stock inventories. Herein is a look at the letter and a response from a “London gold market research company.”

On January 31, Jeffrey Christian of CPM Group had a meeting with Brian Trackman, Rahman Harrison and Florence Harmon of the SEC to discuss “the effects that approval of the Barclay's Silver Shares proposal would have on the commodities pricing of silver bullion.” One day before, CPM group submitted the following letter.

“One of the misunderstandings common in the silver market is that there are hundreds of millions of ounces of silver in inventories in London and Zurich. There is not nearly that much. There may be between 75 and 100 million ounces in these bank vaults as of early 2006,” the letter begins.

This number excludes the silver purchased by Berkshire Hathaway in 1988 - estimated to total between 100 and 129 million ounces still held today, according to the letter.

Jeffrey Christian of CPM Group told Resource Investor that the market has about 500 million ounces of silver total. After confirming the amounts mentioned above, Christian estimated there to be roughly 130 million ounces of silver held by Comex. So by using these calculations, it would appear that “silver is in fact rather tight,” said Christian.

The letter also notes that “a misunderstanding about how much silver exists in London and Zurich bank vaults developed in 1995 when a London gold market research company began research on silver.”

According to the letter, the research company asked London banks how much silver was in their books instead of how much silver was in their vaults. The bankers then submitted the numbers in their books, leading the company to conclude that there were “enormous amounts of silver” in London bank vaults.

“It is not clear whether this research company ever became aware of its error and the origins of this inaccurate information, but for whatever reason the company has chosen not to correct its data, and has based future estimates on changes from this initial estimate,” according to the letter.

Source: World Silver Survey 2005

So, RI contacted the London-based gold market research company GFMS concerning their research on the silver market in response to the letter.

“Our survey of stocks in European dealers' is, and has always been, conducted on the basis of the quantity of silver bullion physically contained in the vaults operated by participants in the survey,” said Philip Klapwijk, Chairman of GFMS.

According to the company’s World Silver Survey 2005, there was approximately 617 million ounces of silver bullion in the market in 2004.

The survey breaks down the numbers to equal 332 million ounces of silver with European dealers, 104 million ounces with Comex, 164 million ounces in government holdings and 17 million ounces with others representing Tocom, Chicago Board of Trade and Japanese trade stocks.

Source: World Silver Survey 2005

According to the report, total identifiable bullion fell by 85.2 million ounces in 2004. However, GFMS notes in the study that there are many private owners that hold unidentifiable stocks. And it is possible “that much of the bullion that was held by identifiable sources found its way into non-identifiable stock.”

In addition, Klapwijk told RI that the ‘there are no stocks left’ crowd should look at silver leasing rates, the percentage owed to the lender by the borrower.

Source: World Silver Survey 2005

The annual average lease rates in 2004 varied sharply, according to the survey. The average three-month rate fell by just over 60% to a very weak 0.10%, while the six-month rate remained flat at 0.41% and yet the 12-month average rate rose to 0.92%.

However, GFMS notes that “even this rate is still low historically.”

“In 2005 as a whole, three-month silver leasing rates averaged a little under 0.5% - hardly indicative of a shortage!” Klapwijk said.

Leasing rates have risen of late due to heavy borrowing on expectations that the ETF could indirectly cause a substantial spike in rates, admitted Klapwijk. Also, over a longer period of time, rates have firmed somewhat as bullion stocks are not as abundant as they once used to be. But, this reduction in stocks needs to be put in perspective, he said.

Source: World Silver Survey 2005

“Compare that to platinum where bullion stocks really are very tight, with this tightness reflected in persistently very high borrowing costs - not just in the occasional spike in rates,” added Klapwijk.

Christian said his comments in the letter were not meant to incriminate a specific company, but mainly used to make a point “that the market is incredibly opaque.”

“I’m basically a free market person,” he said. “If investors want to buy physical silver and Barclays’ want to give the market this product, then I’m all for it.” However, the market “needs to have some breaks and regulations,” he concluded.

Klapwijk reiterated that stocks remain well in excess of the levels claimed by certain analysts.

“The ‘we’re running out of silver’ crowd needs a reality check,” Klapwijk said.

May silver fell 1 cent to close at $9.96 an ounce on Friday, 2.7% below last Friday's close of $10.235.

[verwijderd] 14 maart 2006 16:31

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More silver vehicles; London and Dubai
Rhona O'Connell
'10-MAR-06 15:28'

LONDON (Mineweb.com) -- While the market awaits the decision of the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) about the acceptability of a Silver Exchange Traded (ETF), two other developments in the silver market warrant some attention. These are the proposed launch of a silver Exchange Traded Commodity on the London Stock Exchange and the introduction of silver futures trading on the Dubai Gold & Commodities Exchange.

The London ETC is due to be launched in April by ETF Securities, run by Australian Graham Tuckwell, who was behind the Gold Bullion ETF on the Australian Stock Exchange, the first gold-backed ETF to be listed. It is not proposed, however, to back this fund with any physical metal (and so this fund is unlikely to be responsible for the borrowing in the silver market that has taken the implied 12-month lease rate to 4% in recent weeks).

This new instrument is expected to mirror the existing Gold bullion Securities and Oil Securities already listed on the London Stock exchange and which have attracted US$1 billion in assets. These are described by ETF Securities as “secure open-ended exchange-traded securities that accurately track the relevant underlying commodity price”.

The fund is expected to buy silver-backed securities from a third party rather than the physical metal and so it would differ from the gold ETFs that are physically backed by allocated metal. This means that, while it would not take silver off the market, similarly liquidity would not be as deep, pro rata, as the gold ETFs or the potential iShares silver ETF in New York since it would only reflect the amount of metal held by the counterparty.

What it would be interesting to know is the identity of the counterpart. To date this has not been made public and until more is known then the jury must remain out on the prospects for this instrument.

Meanwhile in Dubai, where gold trading has picked up to more than two tonnes of gold per day, the Dubai Gold and Commodity Exchange is to launch a silver contract. The contract size will be 1,000 ounces of silver of 99.9% fineness, deliverable at the DGCX approved vaults in the United Arab Emirates. Since the gold contract was launched on November 22ndh last year, the Exchange has traded over 30 tonnes of metal and volume is increasing steadily. The silver contract is expected in May and the Exchange is looking to develop a daily volume in the region of 20,000 contracts (equivalent to 622 tonnes) by thee end of the year. This may sound a lot, but the silver contract on COMEX has recently traded more over 100 million ounces per day. That is equivalent to more than one year’s fabrication demand and so a target of 20 million ounces in Dubai, while ambitious, is not totally unrealistic. The futures contract will be followed by options.

The Dubai Exchange has announced its good delivery standard for silver bars and so far seven international refiners have been approved for Good Delivery accreditation. These include Johnson Matthey from Salt Lake City, Matsuda Kangyo co Ltd., Sumitomo Metal Mining and Tanaka KK from Japan, with Metalor Technologies SA and PAMP SA in Switzerland and the Rand Refinery of South Africa. To qualify for listing, refineries must meet the following criteria:
A tangible net worth of not less then the equivalent of US$10 million
An annual refining production of not less than 30 tonnes of silver in the form of one kilo bars or larger
The DMCC must be satisfied that the organisation is. fit with proper systems covering administration and record keeping requirements.

The bars must be of minimum weight of one kilogramme , minimum fineness 999.0 parts per thousand, bearing the following marks: serial number; assay stamp of refiner; fineness to either three or four significant figures; date of manufacture (this is optional) and weight in either troy ounces or kilogrammes. Each applicant must also supply a letter from each of these categories: a) central banks, local regulatory authorities or well-known commercial banks that are acquainted with the refinery’s business; and b) recognised exchanges and markets on which the refinery’s bars have been traded or well-known industrial users or bullion banks that have consumed the refinery’s bars.

The Dubai authorities pride themselves on their rigorous requirements in order to provide service of the highest order; clearly the silver contract is going to be as closely monitored as is gold.

In the United States, meanwhile, the NYMEX authorities have increased the margins on the silver contract on COMEX. Clearing and non-clearing members will now have to pay a margin of $2,500 (up from $2,250), while customers; margins have been raised from $3,375 from $3,038. Whether this will dampen the market’s recent fervour is not yet clear, but after recent frenetic activity a period of calm would be merited.

[verwijderd] 16 maart 2006 12:28

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Another Step Closer to the Breakout
goldmoney.com/en/commentary.php#current

Gold closed in New York yesterday afternoon at $553.10, while silver finished the day at $10.287. It is the highest closing price for silver since October 14, 1983.

Here's an amazing fact. There have been 5,626 trading days since October 14, 1983. Do you know how many days silver has closed at or above $10 during that period? 30% of the time? 10%? Or perhaps just 5%?

The answer is 10 days, or just 0.18% of the time. And 6 of those 10 days have taken place so far this month! Clearly, the market is giving us an important message, and it looks to me like a very bullish one. The $10 level is evolving from being a barrier to a floor, i.e., from overhead resistance to underlying support. The same thing has already happened to gold.

On April 9, 1981 gold closed below $500 and barely traded above that level again, until recently. In the 6,261 trading days since April 9, 1981, gold has closed in New York at or above $500 only 69 times, every one of which has occurred since gold broke above $500 on December 1, 2005!

I've been saying since December that I do not believe gold will go back below $500 - ever. It may seem like an outrageous statement, unless you lived through and remember the 1970's. Once gold went through $50 in May 1972, it never looked back. Adjusting for inflation, other types of debasement to the dollar since then, and given the precarious financial condition prevailing in the US today as the world's largest debtor nation compared to its status back then as the world's largest creditor nation, gold today is cheaper and better value at $500 than when it climbed above $50 for the first time. So all I'm really saying is that history is about to repeat - only the nominal price levels we attach to an ounce of gold are different.

Will $10 soon be seen as a solid support level for silver just as $500 has become a floor that provides support for gold?

I'm not quite ready to say that silver will never trade again below $10, given that it is notoriously volatile. However, silver is fundamentally cheap and undervalued just like gold. So for now all that I can say is that I will not be surprised if silver never goes back below $10.

As a word of warning, no one - not me, not your broker, nor your next door neighbor - knows the future. So of course only time will tell whether history repeats with gold, and whether silver continues to climb higher into double-digits. But regardless of what may come, there are two important realities that everyone should be considering.

On an inflation-adjusted basis, gold and silver still look pretty cheap. It takes $1,122 today to match the purchasing power of $500 when gold traded at that level in April 1981. It takes $19.84 today to match the purchasing power of $10 when silver traded at that level in October 1983.
The problems with the US dollar in particular and the international monetary scene in general are getting worse, not better.
Consequently, diversifying some of your liquidity by holding gold and/or silver is looking increasingly prudent. This message is becoming better understood around the world, which explains why gold - so far at least - is holding above $500. And it may in time prove to be the reason that silver holds above $10, as people exchange their inflating currencies for sound money, i.e., gold and silver.

Right now gold and silver are on the verge of an important break-out. Look at the following chart of the gold/silver ratio.

The ratio closed in New York yesterday afternoon at 53.8, the fourth day in a row it has closed below 55, the level highlighted in these alerts to be a critical support point. As we can see on the above chart, the ratio is breaking down from the uptrend channel. That means silver is leading as expected, but where's gold?

So far it's lagging. It has not yet confirmed silver's new high by breaking into new high ground above $572.50.

Will gold confirm? Will it break above $572.50 and join silver in new high ground? Or will both metals swoon from here and prove me wrong? Well, as I am so fond of saying, only time will tell.

___________________________________________

Published by GoldMoney
Copyright © 2006. All rights reserved.
Edited by James Turk, alert@goldmoney.com

[verwijderd] 17 maart 2006 07:56

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Wait for the break-out Gareth Tredway

JOHANNESBURG (Mineweb.com) -- Experts are calling more upside in the gold price, short term, as the metal seems to have consolidated at the $550/oz level and appears ready to set some new 25-year records.

Jeffrey Christian, head of the CPM Group, a New York based precious metals consultancy, is one of those expecting a near term jump in the yellow metal.

“We are going into the April Comex gold and Nymex platinum delivery period and you have a high open interest in both of those contracts right now which suggests to us that we could see $580 or even higher between now and early April,” said Christian at the offices of South African based institutional brokerage, Noah Financial on Thursday morning.

Futures contracts, traded on the New York Commodities Exchange (Comex) are an agreement to buy or sell a commodity at a specific price and date. The delivery date is the day the metal is transferred from buyer to seller or that the contract is paid out.

Christian says it is usually in the five-month period between December and April, that commodities tend to peak at new highs.

“One of the reasons why prices tend to peak in that period is because there is a very strong seasonality to precious metals and copper prices and that seasonality grows on fabrication demand trends and investment demand trends.”

Christian describes the upcoming peak as seasonal and not cyclical, implying even higher prices in the future.

However, do not get over-excited just yet. The price could fall before it gets there, according to Christian.

“We think the price is going to fall off and move into a consolidation phase second and third quarters (2006) and then possibly rise to new peaks in December and April next year,” says Christian.

And while he talks of a price between $580/oz and $600/oz coming up, he says the eventual cyclical peak is not as clear and will be driven by investor demand rather than jewellery demand.

“Where those peaks are and how graciously the markets get to them will depend on currency market developments, stock markets, interest rates, international politics and domestic politics,” he says.

It is for gold’s safe-haven appeal that others are seeing future upside in the price. Uncertainty over what Iran is up to in its uranium enrichment programme is just one of the recent headline events leaving investors uneasy.

“These issues are not going to go away quickly and hence we expect to see gold prices average $555 per ounce in 2006, rising to $575 average in 2007,” said Helen Henton, Head of Commodity Research at Standard Chartered Bank in a note on Monday.

Christian agrees that geopolitical events are still pushing the gold price. “The factors that have been stimulating higher gold prices and have been stimulating higher investment demand for gold, primarily have not changed,” he says, “They may have gotten better and we may have seen that investors have moderated their bullishness, but we have not really seen a sea change in the economic and political environment.”

GFMS, the London based precious metals consultancy also released its quarterly newsletter, looking at the outlook for gold investment.

In the note, Philip Klapwijk, GFMS’s chairman, says that the current bull rally is driven by a variety of motives, which can all be summarised under the traditional headings of “greed” or “fear.” He adds that we are still some way off of the peak.

“There is increasing media coverage of gold’s performance, with anecdotal evidence that this is beginning to encourage ordinary investors to look at gold,” says Klapwijk, “Of course once the retail bandwagon really starts to roll this would indicate that the rally is entering its final phase, although that point is still some way off.”

Christian described a typical global scene that would signal the top of the gold price’s bull run: “If peace broke out in the world and a lot of the problems in financial markets were resolved, corporate earnings were very strong, stock markets start rising higher and interest rates stabilise then we can say, maybe we have seen it (the peak).”

[verwijderd] 17 maart 2006 09:43

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Beste Gung Ho

Enige tijd terug gaf u mij het advies mijn "huiswerk" (zie citaat GH) goed te doen. Ik probeer dit te doen en surfend kwam ik op de site terecht van de Amerikaanse "Securities and Exchange Commission".

Ik heb daar een lijvig verslag van- en over Northwestern Mineral Ventures doorgenomen. De meest in het oog springende en voor het bedrijf meest negatieve bevindingen zet ik hieronder op een rij. Ik wil u vragen deze bevindingen te bekijken en graag hoor ik van van u of ik deze feiten juist heb geinterpreteerd.

citaat Gung Ho:
"Mijn persoonlijke voorkeur gaat echter met name uit naar die mijnen die snel of binnen 1 a 2 jaar gaan produceren en liefst gelijktijdig ook nog aan exploratie doen. (...) Al met al altijd goed je huiswerk doen."

Extract rapport SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION; (Northwestern.)

"page 4
WE HAVE NO ONGOING MINING OPERATIONS, NONE OF OUR MINERAL PROPERTIES
CONTAIN A KNOWN COMMERCIALLY MINEABLE MINERAL DEPOSIT, WE HAVE NEVER RECEIVED ANY REVENUES FROM MINING OPERATIONS, AND OUR CHANCES OF REACHING THE DEVELOPMENT STAGE ON ANY OF OUR PROPERTIES IS REMOTE.
(...)
WE WILL NEED TO RAISE SUBSTANTIAL FUNDING IN ORDER TO CARRY OUT OUR
ACTIVITIES. With limited cash resources, it will be necessary in the near and over the long term to raise substantial funds to maintain existing property interests, acquire, explore, and if warranted, develop mineral properties. Our auditors have expressed substantial doubt as to our ability to continue as a going concern. There is no assurance that we will be able to raise the necessary funds on acceptable terms, or at all.
(...)
The Company is authorized to issue an unlimited number of Common Shares, with no par value."
(einde citaat)

De kans dat er in de nabije toekomst niets te gelde kan worden gemaakt is levensgroot aanwezig met alle gevolgen voor verwatering van shares vandien. Maar..... is dit niet een gevaar dat inherent is aan het investeren in juniors?

Kortom, is het niet zo dat de significante risico's die je neemt door te investeren in een junior als Northwestern eigenlijk risico's zijn die in het algemeen gelden voor alle juniors? Komt het er in de kern van de zaak niet op neer dat je slechts dient te kijken naar factoren zoals opbouw van het portfolio, de mogelijkeid tot het tot een goed einde brengen van opgezette projecten en kwaliteit van het managementteam om vervolgens tot een beslissing te komen of je al dan niet je geld wil toevertrouwen aan zo'n bedrijf?

Een laatste vraag: In het rapport van de SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION staat een bijzonder negatief rapport aangaande de toekomstige verwachtingen op een goede afloop voor de projecten van Northwestern. Is het in het algemeen zo dat deze commissie de naakte feiten zonder franje op een rijtje krijgt?!

Ik realiseer me dat ik u de afgelopen tijd regelmatig heb bestookt met mijn vragen. In de toekomst zal ik het iets rustiger aan doen.

In ieder geval hartelijk dank voor de te nemen moeite,
groet,
Honky Tonk Girl

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Ablynx	43	13.356
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ABO-Group	1	22
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Accell Group	151	4.132
Accentis	2	267
Accsys Technologies	23	10.795
ACCSYS TECHNOLOGIES PLC	218	11.686
Ackermans & van Haaren	1	192
Adecco	1	1
ADMA Biologics	1	34
Adomos	1	126

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Aedifica	3	925
Aegon	3.258	322.988
AFC Ajax	538	7.088
Affimed NV	2	6.300
ageas	5.844	109.897
Agfa-Gevaert	14	2.061
Ahold	3.538	74.343
Air France - KLM	1.025	35.241
AIRBUS	1	12
Airspray	511	1.258
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Alpha Pro Tech	1	17
Alphabet Inc.	1	408
Altice	106	51.198
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AM	228	684
Amarin Corporation	1	133
Amerikaanse aandelen	3.837	243.579
AMG	971	134.069
AMS	3	73
Amsterdam Commodities	305	6.740
AMT Holding	199	7.047
Anavex Life Sciences Corp	2	491
Antonov	22.632	153.605
Aperam	92	15.029
Apollo Alternative Assets	1	17
Apple	5	384
Arcadis	252	8.789
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Archos	1	1
Arcona Property Fund	1	286
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Athlon Group	121	176
Atrium European Real Estate	2	199
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Avantium	32	13.728
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