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

To: lorne who wrote (69327)	5/17/2001 7:55:01 AM
From: long-gone	Respond to of 116756

<<" Do you want to hear something that will surprise you? The S&P Gold & Precious Metals Mining Index is up 26% in the past 13 weeks! ">> 73% in last 30 weeks as of yesterday!

To: lorne who wrote (69327)	5/17/2001 8:51:42 AM
From: Rarebird	Respond to of 116756

The "Greenspan Put" refers to the conviction on Wall Street that the markets are perfectly safe because the Fed will do whatever is necessary with interest rates and liquidity injections to keep them safe. It was born after that 1996 "irrational exuberance" speech when the Fed did NOTHING to curb the overly speculative nature of U.S. stock markets. Just the opposite. Now, in a speech given just hours after the surprise ECB decision to lower rates, Greenspan has warned the U.S. banking system about the overly speculative nature of their lending practices. He has done this before, and not followed through, but this time, I think he is serious. I think Greenspan is warning that the fantastic levels of credit creation, aided and abetted by the Fed over the past three years, are about to be severely curtailed. Why? Because Greenspan needed to promise the Europeans this in order to get them to cut their rates. Why did he need Europe to cut their rates? Because he had to cut rates on May 15, and he needed the precedent of an ECB rate cut FIRST. Why did Greenspan have to cut? The state of the U.S. economy, which shows NO signs of a turnaround despite the huge rally on U.S. stock markets. Obviously, Wall Street is betting that it WILL turn around. But Greenspan and the Fed know that the best that can be hoped for is to slow the decline. Greenspan has seen the evidence that Wall Street and Main Street is ignoring. Credit creation has been proceeding at a pace that is quite simply unsustainable. Consider the M-3: In the EIGHT years 1990-1997, M-3 rose by $1.343 TRILLION - or $168 Billion per year on average. In the THREE years 1998-2000, M-3 rose by $1.736 TRILLION - or $579 Billion per year on average. Since 1997, M-3 has been accelerating at 245% of its average increase of the previous eight years. The Fed made interest rates lie during the series of rate rises between June 1999 and May 2000 by accelerating their credit expansion activities to neutralize the higher rates. This year, rates have already negated (and then some) the 1999-2000 rises while credit expansion has accelerated further. If sustained for a full year, the rise in M-3 so far in 2001 would result in an increase of $900 Billion! This would be an increase of 318.8% on the average yearly increase over 1990-1997. In the present economic environment, each individual needs to pose a few questions(amongst many others) to themselves: Got Gold? Got Guns? Got Guts? Got Gold Stocks? PS The Question is the Answer