the boyz in hkg hosted a meal at a great big 10k sft private house this past monday, smacked w/ full ocean view, fed by catered everything, sauced by dear-enough wines, and the guest was of the empire, a front-line warrior against gold manipulation
i was too focused on whatever i was drinking and discussing, and the lady who served snacks and food and drinks, but one of the nine boyz took notes, and i clip selected portions to append below
all in all it was a proper setting and subject for the rebellion base in freedom hong kong
i quote:
Manipulation to less effect than wished for by authorities, but to sufficient impact for all but truest believers
A group of us held a dinner for __________ of the _________ . The dinner lasted 2 hours, following which we listened and discussed issues for 2 hours.
CONCLUSION
Conclusion was ...
... Moreover, some of us concluded that though gold may be manipulated (as with many other prices and markets), gold has in fact done pretty well nonetheless. And though there is manipulation and backroom scheming with derivatives and gold swap agreements between banks as well as over-estimation of official gold reserves by many bodies (and practice of double counting), some of this can sometimes backfire and serve at times to smooth out gold moves.
… Ironically some of these institutions, though potentially trying to manipulate to their own ends, can also lose control of the process….and help the case for gold.
…At the end of the day, some of us felt that we did not mind the manipulation, because it gives us more time to accumulate [and balance portfolios?]… We do not want to see a Gold Standard in the capitalized case, and believe gold should be private, a matter of free choice absent of manipulation. (…and yet recognizing gold has seldom truly been free, given government needs)
GOLD BRIEF
A. Potentially the strongest currency
B. It has not counterparty at physical level (paper gold, derivatives, swaps have compromised it)
C. Gold can be a determinate of interest rates (therefore dangerous if free…)
D. Gold kept in check keeps government control of bond issuance and price alive
E. We are in an unparalleled debt and fiat money growth phase and no one has any idea how to solve the problems
ACTIVITIES
1. ...
2. The main impact of ______ is to delineate the hiding of documents and bank agreements, and to seek full disclosure
3. The main goal is to have gold as a free currency without counterparty risk (Gold has never been truly free we asked, why would it be now?)
4. The control of gold price setting is run out of the US… China and Russia woke up to this in last decade (which is also why their reserves have increased)
5. ____ has catalogued a number of interesting documents (including some following a successful case against the Fed for release of documents)
References to important documents
- Larry Summers Jun 88 en.wikipedia.org
- Kevin Warsh various episodes and later an op-ed in WSJ + other notes admitting some of previously denied
- Volcker limited disclosures (more in Japan press?)….other docs
- Peter Warburton piece gata.org
DISCUSSIONS
(i) Does it or does it not matter that Fed was not set up as government agency and is heavily influenced by member banks – particularly at FOMC level. The point is it does not matter if it acts as a govt agency, what matters is what comes out of FOMC…It is only the public that believes it is a public agency
(ii) Discussions on corporate governance failings of the Fed
(iii) ______ is ineffectual. At the end of the day he talks about ending the Fed, but his actions don’t support…
(iv) Long discussion of the Chinese book “Currency Wars” which is now up to Volume IV (vol II can be skipped as less interesting). Volume IV is how the US took global currency control away from the UK and built the dollar standard
MORE COMMENTS
MF: I know some of the “top” mining people around the world who are positive about gold and silver. They do not think that there is any manipulation.
JC: I can understand why mining people do not feel there is manipulation of the gold n silver market as they go about their biz of claiming, drilling, funding, and exploiting.
but for the folks who mine by their computers, sometimes, not always but at critical times, gold trades 'funny', 'odd', 'strange', and at other times, just plain 'weird', as in not as it should.
I am unsure who to hold accountable, and in my mind just a part of the market arena and exchange fabrique, and a consequence of paper derivatives of gold being exploited, and all 'fair game'. but if so, i feel there should be consequences to the players on the other side of the weirdness, as in when they are wrong, they should drop dead, and not have trades rescinded in their favor or their platform of evil-doings served up as must-bail-systemic-national-interest schemes.
JC: My answer is we are going to keep saving in physical, so please keep the price of gold under supervision
***
BA: … I have noticed a new phase in the manipulation, where governments have become a bit more heavy handed, and don't seem to care if they are obvious about the manipulation or not. They just want to keep the price down. ____ may have in some small way brought this on, since the manipulators have now been exposed, and what are you going to do about it anyway?
***
HB: ____ and its fore-runners (individuals who are now members) as well as sympathizers (e.g. ______) have been talking about manipulation in gold and silver markets effected through the COMEX futures market since at least 1997.
The narrative going something like this: the cartel is short-selling enormous amounts of futures contracts in order to suppress/prevent upward movement of prices. Now, apart from the glaringly obvious fact that this has completely failed to stop prices from going up - there is the fact that it is the same of the group of traders that was net long during the bull market since 2000 and net short during the preceding bear market.
In fact, during the bear market of the late 90's when gold was actually going down quite a bit, the 'commercials' (read: bullion banks) were almost consistently net long gold. The group of traders that was short during the bear market and long during the bull market are the big speculators.
How does this jibe with the notion that COMEX futures have been used for 'price suppression' during both the bear market and bull market eras?
It just doesn't make any sense - the same group of traders would have to have been net short during both eras in order to buttress this argument. Otherwise one would have to assert that they have somehow switched their official identities without anyone noticing, which is patently absurd. |
