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To: Cactus Jack who wrote (49361)	4/2/2002 1:57:35 PM
From: Jim Willie CB	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 65232

glad to see you weigh in, JP, esp on gold if gold explodes, it wont be mild compared to late 1970's... annual production supply is much smaller demand is much bigger India and China are now participants and Japanese are desperately on a nonstop buying binge 800 gold peak in 1980 is now constant dollared to 1600 but now has a critical additional difference since 1995 gold has been suppressed, with heavy damage done to mining industry many shutdowns, many partial cutbacks, some consolidation it would take (from what I read) between 6-18 months to bring marginal mines into production a shortage crisis is EXACTLY what I expect such crises do not sit around and wait for production to catch up "no paper price would be adequate to fetch new silver" that is what I read but still my two central buy signals are powerful near zero real rate of return on shorterm bonds this leads bonholders into gold as investment and gold mining hedged firms are now buying on world market what incredible irony !!! hedging is a double-edged sword it finances with subsidy all mines operating at a loss so future sales at higher prices are inhibited it shows poor management decisionmaking later, when gold reverses, these fools are buyers incredible, GOLD MINING FIRMS ARE BUYERS OF GOLD the bull signals are deafening loud but most are lost on the tone-deaf tech-obsessed public gold over 2000 silver over 150 expect it sounds nuts but how about Naz 5000 ??? how about 10-yr TNote yield under 4.8% in 1998, each sounded worse than ludicrous / jim

To: Cactus Jack who wrote (49361)	4/2/2002 8:41:06 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 65232

Lawsuit to Widen Enron Allegations By Kevin Drawbaugh Tuesday April 2, 5:12 pm Eastern Time WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Insider trading allegations against top Enron Corp. (ENRNQ - news) officers will be greatly expanded in a lawsuit amendment scheduled to be unveiled on Monday, lawyers close to the case said on Tuesday. The lawsuit will allege, for instance, that former Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay sold large amounts of Enron shares after learning in August of accounting problems that eventually destroyed the former energy trading giant, they said. ``The numbers are huge, a lot bigger than what was initially documented,'' said one attorney who asked not to be named. Kelly Kimberly, spokeswoman for Lay, who resigned as Enron chairman and chief executive in January, said, ``Mr. Lay firmly denies any allegations of insider trading.'' Houston-based Enron collapsed last fall and filed the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history on Dec. 2, wiping out thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in investor equity. As the Enron scandal continues to swirl around its former auditor, accounting giant Andersen, lawyers said Enron itself and its former leaders would regain the spotlight next week when the amended complaint is set to be filed in Houston. Insider selling by former and current Enron managers has been alleged before, but the amended complaint by the University of California Board of Regents will detail trading over time periods more recent than earlier described. ``The Lay stuff will be pretty awful,'' said another attorney close to the case who requested anonymity. Determining whether Lay and others unloaded Enron shares based on damning inside knowledge hidden from the public, or whether they were only executing routine asset sales permitted under law, will be crucial to the outcome of the Enron case. ``The inside trading aspect of this is a very important part of this whole shebang,'' said Henry Hu, professor of banking and finance law at the University of Texas in Austin. Senior Enron managers have been accused by an internal inquiry set up by the board of getting rich while manipulating the company's results and deceiving investors through an intricate web of off-the-books partnerships that hid losses. Insider trading is one of several aspects of the far-reaching Enron affair under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Justice Department and Congress. CALIFORNIA COMPLAINT Dozens of lawsuits brought against Enron officers by shareholders seeking to recoup losses have been merged with the California Regents as lead plaintiff, advised by prominent class action law firm Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach. The Regents, which lost $145 million in the Enron debacle, plan to unveil a massive consolidated complaint on Monday naming Enron officers and other, new defendants. In an earlier court filing compiled by Milberg, Lay was alleged to have sold about 1.8 million shares of Enron stock for about $101.3 million between February 1999 and July 2001. Others accused of insider sales over a similar period included former Enron President Jeffrey Skilling, directors, former Chief Financial Officer Andrew Fastow and Clifford Baxter, the ex-Enron officer who committed suicide in January. A spokeswoman for Skilling declined to comment. Attorneys for other former executives could not be reached. Altogether, the December complaint said, 29 Enron insiders sold shares from January 1999 to mid-2001 worth $1.1 billion. Enron's stock peaked at $90.56 per share in August 2000 on the New York Stock Exchange, then began a dizzying decline that picked up speed last fall. On Tuesday, booted from the Big Board, it was near 24 cents a share in the Pink Sheets market. By late summer of 2001, congressional investigators have shown that top Enron officers had been made aware of the accounting problems that would eventually destroy the company. For example, Sherron Watkins, an Enron vice president, met with Lay on Aug. 22 -- with Enron shares trading at $35 to $45 per share -- and alerted him to problems with the books. FILLING IN THE BLANKS But a clear picture of stock sales by executives after mid-2001 has not been available. The amended complaint will help fill in the blanks, lawyers said. Some Enron insiders have defended their sales of shares as they lost value through 2001 as permissible under SEC-approved, arms-length asset sales programs. Lay's spokeswoman confirmed press reports of six weeks ago that Lay sold shares in the weeks following his August meeting with Watkins, where she warned him that Enron was in danger of collapsing ``in a wave of accounting scandals.'' Kimberly said Lay sold the shares to raise cash to pay back personal loans, not because he lacked faith in Enron's future. As late as Sept. 26, Lay was recommending Enron workers buy the stock. On that day, with the company on the brink of disaster and the stock price at $25, Lay told employees it was ``an incredible bargain'' on a company intranet chat site. Three weeks later, Enron reported its first quarterly loss in four years, took $1 billion in charges on weak businesses and wrote down shareholder's equity by $1.2 billion, triggering a crisis in investor confidence from which it never recovered.