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Gold/Mining/Energy : Gold Price Monitor -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Crimson Ghost who wrote (41400)	9/28/1999 7:30:00 PM
From: long-gone	Respond to of 116762

whole gold community is deeply divided on it. Kaplan may be right, but then when one looks at insider buying of major mining companies????

To: Crimson Ghost who wrote (41400)	9/28/1999 7:37:00 PM
From: P P Bravo	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116762

[B] NY Precious Metals Review: Dec gold up $26.2, 9.2%, on EU Updated 9/28/1999 16:05 EDT By Melanie Lovatt and Daniel Naccarato, Bridge News New York--Sep 28--COMEX Dec gold futures made yet more spectacular gains today, settling up a roaring $26.20, 9.2%, at $310 per ounce after hitting a 11/2 year high of $329. Gains were still tied to news the EU will cap gold sales and restrict lending, but the 0930 ET over-the-counter options expiry helped. Options grantors were also frantically covering as prices jumped, said traders. * * * "It's not over yet--it's absolute panic," said Leonard Kaplan, chief bullion dealer at LFG Bullion Services. He said that buying had come from all sides such as "retail, hedge funds, and banks." He predicted that the move is "not yet over" and pointed out that gold had stormed through "every resistance level." He said that many gold market players were no longer quoting lease rates, and said that they had jumped over LIBOR. He noted that spreads are widening. "There's going to be blood in the streets--the risks are too big here," he warned. On COMEX, nearly 100 traders swarmed around the gold trading pit as the 1430ET close approached, shouting their final position as the last minutes in the trading session ticked by. A few more people rushed in as the trading bell rang to indicate there was 1 minute left in the trading session. Traders were standing 4 deep in a circle around the trading pit amid a massive tangle of phone lines. Most traders remained in the pit after th e closing horn sounded and then gradually dispersed a few minutes later. One broker said that today's over-the-counter option expiry "made up the better part of the picture." He noted that it helped gold establish itself above the important $300 per ounce level. Traders said that this morning one large NY dealer covered about 12,000 lots of gold, which was also probably options related business. Traders said that after today's price rally, some options grantors are probably in serious trouble. "Market makers who've nothing better to do than grant options and watch the value deteriorate are now seeing it come back and(hurt them)," said one broker. Traders said that there had been large options positions clustered at the $285 per ounce level and that spot gold was pushed over that price. One noted that that option-related hedging was triggering short-covering and further fresh buying. Kaplan noted that while the option-related activity was playing a part in today's gold rally, it was still basically being driven by a knee-jerk reaction to the weekend news that the EU and Swiss Central banks will cap their gold sales and limit their leasing activities. If gold can hold onto its gains for the remaining few days of September it will have made the largest monthly gain since 1980. Bill O'Neill, analyst at Merrill Lynch said that gold saw "frenetic options activity," today, noting that some of the grantors "probably took it on thechin." However, he too noted that the EU news was the overriding positive in the market. "It was the most bullish piece of news in five years," he commented. The restriction the EU and Swiss banks are imposing on lending is the key to the rally, he said. Gold lending has been one, if not the biggest, culprit in keeping gold prices under downwards pressure. Some analysts have estimated that gold lending has increased as much as 700 tonnes per year over the past few years, although the exact dimensions of the lending market are hard to pin down because there is no publicly available data. Meanwhile, Kaplan noted that bullion banks and dealers were scared. "This started a couple of weeks ago with the lease rate increase. People are lending long and borrowing short," he said. He said that panic was ensuing because many grantors of call options didn't even bother hedging their risk. "Now you've got the market rallying, option volatilities are through the roof," he said. "The fear is palpable--they now have to hedge $325 and $350 calls that they threw in the desk drawer," he said. Kaplan expects the rally to continue and suggests the price could rally another $30 on Wednesday. Gold's spectacular climb pushed up currencies of gold mining countries, such as the South African rand and Australian and Canadian dollar. It also siphoned money out of bonds and stocks and there were rumors swirling in the market that giant hedge funds were liquidating stocks and bond positions to cover big short gold positions. Gold's rally today was markedly different from Monday's jump because it occurred during the US trading--on Monday it was mostly already over, it hit its highest levels in the overnight NYMEX Access session and during the open outcry COMEX trade, profit-taking was already trickling into the market. Meanwhile, gold's jump also pushed up prices of the rest of the precious metals complex, leading to fantastic gains in silver, platinum and palladium. Traders said that gold's impetus forced the other metals through multiple resistance levels. Dec silver settled up 41.5c at $5.77 per ounce after jumping to a 1 1/2year high of $5.95.

To: Crimson Ghost who wrote (41400)	9/28/1999 9:37:00 PM
From: goldsnow	Respond to of 116762

``Wall Street had a wide trading range overnight and there was a lot of volatility and that is always a negative for our market,' said Dickons analyst Michael Heffernan. The soaring gold price, often a barometer for inflation concerns, was one of the reasons cited for a sharp sell off on Wall Street on Tuesday. However, short covering trimmed the losses in the final hour. But on the base metals complex, gold's seven-day rally was taken as an optimistic sign that pulled most prices higher, in particular, the price of copper. biz.yahoo.com

To: Crimson Ghost who wrote (41400)	9/28/1999 11:03:00 PM
From: Rarebird	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 116762

< The divergence today between bullion and gold stocks was unprecedented > The fact that the XAU could not close above 88 signifies a key short term bearish reversal. However, if the XAU can hold at 77, then we can expect another leg up. PS I took some profits today.