Silver Breaks $36 In Over Night Trading

The drop in PM prices were not due to Bernanke's talking. It was due to a massive manipulatory raid by the bullion banks putting 50 million paper oz. of gold and 225 million paper oz. of silver into the market in less than 30 minutes. As supply sky-rocketed upwards, prices HAD to fall until more buyers could come in and stabilize the prices. Yes, the banks knew ALL ABOUT what Bernanke was about to say and timed their raid accordingly. Why wouldn't they? They OWN the Fed! They want to cover their naked shorts at the lowest possible price. Forcing prices lower helps them do that. It also supports the US dollar because as PM prices fall, the dollar tends to gain in strength. That this occurred at exactly 10 AM EST should not surprise any of us. This is the typical raid timing and we have seen this many times before, although not to this large an extent. Funny thing is, even this massive a raid could not push PM prices lower AND hold them there. Like beach balls held under water, they soon popped right back up. Not all of their losses were regained but they likely will be in another day or two. Let's just say that Monday will be a VERY interesting day in this regard.

Ed_B... I thought most markets were acted upon emotion. Like the stock market, good market data gives everyone the feel goods and the market goes up. If there is fear of problems (even without any data) it goes down.

I would have thought Bernenke saying "everything is fine" would cause PMs to drop.

That is, indeed, ONE of the many factors that determine the market at any given time. It is an eternal tug-of-war between the forces of fear and greed.



Yes, that happens. It also happens that the market will drop when data identical to that which made it go up occurs. A lot depends on whether or not the data seems credible at the time it becomes known.



It can have that effect but it doesn't HAVE to have it. There are literally thousands of data points that can and do affect the stock market at any given moment. There are also secondary effects from this that occur when various people interpret the magnitude of these data points. Of course, not everyone will agree as to what data is most meaningful at any given time, so reasonable people will see the situation differently and act in different ways that can affect the market. If news breaks that XYZ Corp. will not meet their earnings expectations, the stock price for XYZ Corp. could well drop substantially. Then, someone else will discover that XYZ Corp. has a new product in the wings that will be a BIG seller or maybe that they are now a good value play, shares are bought, and the share price is pushed up a little.



Yes, Bernanke can say that. But do we really believe him? That could well be the crux of the situation. As Fed chairmen go, Bernanke is very political, IMHO. Because of this, he is more likely to sugar-coat any situation that is less than ideal. A lot of people know this, so often discount such comments. We already know that the Fed and various government agencies calculate the inflation and unemployment numbers in ways that make them seem better than they really are. Using the pre-1995 method of calculation for these shows them to be not just higher than is now claimed but considerably higher. Knowing this causes people to consider Bernanke's comments as less than accurate. Still, he is the Chairman of the FOMC and therefore a powerful man in the US economy. That alone causes people to listen when he speaks. That can and does shape the market to some extent, along with many other things, of course.

Well if you want sources go to:
http://www.brotherjohnf.com
http://sgtreport.com/
youtube Peter Shiff, David Morgan, Ron Paul, Mike Maloney, Gerald Celente, Robert Kiosaqui and Bob Chapman!
There are others,youll have to find them!

Aww dangit! Wish I was in Cali for this!

I'm hearing from a variety of sources that the Feb. 29 hit resulted from JP Morgan dumping 15,000 contracts on the COMEX--a total of $2.5 billion. Whether that's the case or not, the drop was surely a massive cascade of stop orders, and nothing has changed fundamentally for gold or silver--particularly for gold and silver of the physical variety.

If I had the spare cash, I'd take this as a buying opportunity.

Some interesting commentary:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/411...intervention

Thanks, Pobox, that's part of the fun of using the Internet. I would hope that my comments help others as much as I have been helped over the years.

As to reading on the Internet, that is a terrific source of info but much depends on what kind of info you are looking for. For factual info on investing, I like the Investopedia web site. It is a neutral site in that is does not promote any particular point of view but it has loads of info on various investing techniques and a great many definitions that are quite helpful.

As alternative media sites, I also read the SGTReport and SHTFPlan web sites. These both have lots of info on them, including pointers to other web sites with additional info. Be a little cautious with them, though, as they tend to be very strongly opinionated. Not that this is inherently bad but it does mean you might want to use other sources to verify what you read on them and not just take them at face value.

As a long-time investor, it has been clear to me for the past 10-12 years that something was very wrong with the US economy and perhaps the world economy as well. The markets do not look or react in the same ways that they once did routinely.

These days, we have things like "flash crashes", "a jobless recovery", "high frequency trading", and metals prices that move independently of other commodities, often for little to no discernible reason.

What has happened, of course, is that Federal Reserve and government interference have so distorted the free market that it no longer looks or acts as it once did. Because of this, there is no way to make reasonable predictions about what it will do in the future. Without this ability, we cannot invest with any degree of assurance that we will get a reasonable return on our investment. This is why there are trillions of dollars sitting on the sidelines now, rather than being invested in stocks and bonds.

Thanks to the Fed, interest rates have been forced down to 0.25% and held there for a ridiculously long time. While this may be great for those who borrow and spend, it is terrible for those who save and invest. While it is true that business creates a lot of the wealth in this country, it is also true that it is savings that power growth in the economy. With interest rates forced artificially low, there is no longer any reason to save money that depreciates faster than it grows. Saving is a guaranteed loser as an investment.

Spending money on consumption is not what grows an economy. That is what I would call "false growth". Real growth occurs when money is invested in a business, property, commodity, or other enterprise that then allows more wealth to be created than it took to generate it.

We are often told that our economy depends upon consumers. This is not true because while consuming creates demand, it does nothing in terms of wealth creation. It is instead wealth dissipation. Our economy depends on savers funding growing, efficient, and productive industries and earning a decent rate of return on their money. Instead, interest rates are artificially low and the buying power of savers money is being systematically destroyed via inflation and by not being able to earn a decent rate of return in the market.

Another side effect of artificially low interest rates is that there is little interest in the proper allocation of capital. When the cost of borrowing money becomes significant, people and businesses are more careful with how they allocate this capital. It is too expensive for them not to be. With low rates, however, this is of much less concern.

In case anyone is wondering, the Fed's setting of interest rates has a LOT more to do with the fact that our government is deeply in debt and therefore cannot afford higher interest rates than it does with the effect of these low rates on American citizens.

While this game has been running for a while it is a game of futility and the only way to win such a game is not to play. Playing enslaves us to their rules. Owning physical gold and silver is our way of rejecting all of these paper games and putting our hard earned money into something that is real. It is also not subject to the predations of inflation.