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Press Manager
 United States
1420 Posts |
 The following is a commentary from APMEX APMEX Morning Gold & Silver Market Report -- 7/12/2011 by Ryan Schwimmer July 12, 2011 CONTAGION FEARS HOLD MARKETS HOSTAGE As the euro weakens against the dollar, the price of gold is mostly suppressed. This is the case this morning as gold is flat. However, when priced in the euro, gold is at an all-time high for the second day in a row. The fear that the debt crisis Greece is currently facing will spread to other weakened (and much larger) economies such as Italy and Spain is causing the euro to tumble. In fact, for the first time, leaders in the euro zone have acknowledged that default is a likely outcome for the situation in Greece. Until a meeting early this morning, default was excluded as an option. One finance minister described it as having more options. Contagion fears in Europe also fueled U.S. stock futures to decline sharply this morning. They have begun to recover, but only slightly. The chief economist at Sarasin in Zurich, Jan Poser, said recently that " A U.S. sovereign default is definitely the worst outcome imaginable for financial markets." He added that politicians are playing with fire regarding the debt ceiling, and that instead of hypocritical debate about government spending and whether to raise taxes, they should accept responsibility and work on a resolution. Getting a bit more into detail, he says that a "U.S. interest rate hike would put companies and consumers under pressure and trigger a global recession. Global banks ... would immediately become insolvent." At 8:00 am (CT) the APMEX precious metals spot prices were: Gold - $1,549.50 -- Down $0.70 on the day. Silver - $35.33 -- Down $0.43. Platinum - $1,724.00 -- Down $4.30. Palladium - $758.50 -- Down $11.00.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1450 Posts |
That last statement is exactly why inflation is about to explode! You cannot add a bunch of money to a system if you know you cannot control interest rates without having devastating effects. The end result is more dollars chasing goods(inflation)with no way to curb it. This is precisely why gold first,and then silver will climb rapidly soon. They are the ultimate store of wealth along with food,guns and ammo.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
Quote:
This is precisely why gold first,and then silver will climb rapidly soon. They are the ultimate store of wealth along with food,guns and ammo. Those are my main holdings  ,I also started investing in solar panels and 12V batteries |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
3670 Posts |
Gold down on the day, check again boys, as I just checked and it is up to $1569, and the other three are up as well....
It is about to blow by 1600, and the days of finding a 1/10th oz. of gold coin for less then 200 is fading fast....
Edited by Silverhawk74
07/12/2011 3:07 pm
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Forum Dad
United States
24164 Posts |
Quote:
check again boys It's the morning report. 8:00 AM |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
3670 Posts |
Never the less, it has swung big in the other direction in eight hours or so, and is that not an all time high for gold?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
I was trying to find the all time high against the dollar but didn't find it. I heard it was at an all time high against the euro.
GLD is not at a new high yet, but close.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
Just heard on "Fast Money" the all time high was $1577/oz.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4008 Posts |
You're dead on target, Hock... as usual. It is interesting that in US monetary history there was virtually no inflation at all between 1812 and 1912. Then, 1913 comes along and things start changing. The Fed finally managed to decouple US currency from gold and silver. From 1913 to 2011, we have lost about 98% of the dollar's value to inflation. Well, gee. What has changed in these past 98 years? Could it be that bad things happen when unbacked currency is printed without restraint? You betcha! If the Fed had ANY sense at all, they would very carefully match the US money supply to US productivity. This would require them to buy or sell US Treasury bonds as needed to either add or remove money from the US financial system as the economy either grows or shrinks. They can do this and have a number of times but not for this reason. Unfortunately, they are not controlling the supply of money in relation to our productivity, so we have inflation created by the massive over-supply of unbacked money. With inflation, our money buys less and less with time. The dollar and all other fiat currencies eventually suffer this consequence unless their quantity is matched to national productivity. Clearly, the dollar is not matched to our productivity and never has been. This is a HUGE problem and it is coming home to roost. When the dollar was backed by silver and gold, it was not necessary to match it to US productivity because that PM backing served as its own brake on the unbridled printing of money. A nation cannot "print" more gold or silver coins unless they have the gold and silver with which to do it. Waving a pen at a pile of dirt will NOT transmute it into silver or gold, no matter what incantations are spoken while waving that pen. Waving that same pen at the US Treasury's Bureau of Engraving, however, WILL cause LOTS of new currency to be printed. I heard on TV the other day that it costs approximately $0.04 to print a US $100 bill. As we all know, fiat money eventually returns to its intrinsic value, so use those $100s to buy Au and Ag with maybe some Pt and Pd to boot before they have the buying power of today's nickels. If you have an ounce of a PM, you will always have an ounce of PM. It does not magically shrink to only 0.86 ounce one day or slowly melt away to no value at all. Unbacked paper money does just that, however. The one hilarious thing about all this is that the bozos who are creating inflation are the very same ones who are telling us that we are wrong, that gold and silver money are an anachronism, and even suggesting that US currency should be backed by PMs is financially primitive or archaic. I bet that it is not easy to keep saying that with a straight face while sending their own personal wealth outside the US or into PMs in ZĂĽrich. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1450 Posts |
Go Thunder,my brother lives in northern Vermont,in a small cabin on 30 acres and has been off of the power grid for 5 years now. His system is both solar panels and a couple of small wind turbines. He also has a gas powered generator for emergencies but has only had to use it a couple of times in those 5 years. He heats with wood and has all high efficiency appliances with an "on-demand" hot water system. He is very comfortable and happy.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
Yeah I'd love to have a wind turbine or 2. They work at night too. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4008 Posts |
Being "off the grid" and very independent of others would be VERY cool. I envy those who can do this and make it work for them.
My step-sister lives in Northern Calif. on a 40 acre plot and has a wind-powered water pump and tank for her water supply. She also has solar panels and 12v batteries to feed the few small appliances she has. She has a lot of trees on her property and cuts them very selectively to provide fuel for her wood stove. She plants 2-3 new trees for every one she cuts, so her harvesting is sustainable. She plants a large garden each year, so only has to buy a few things at the food store... sugar, salt, flour, and spices mostly.
She's pretty independent too but at age 62 we worry about her getting injured by a chain saw, ax, or a fall. With no one around to help her, she could be in real trouble. :-/
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
Just to totally derail this thread, here's one reason for having a backup off-grid system. I quote from this link: http://www.survival-spot.com/surviv...ulse-attack/ Tin foil hat warning Quote:
First: Another brief note about severe solar storms (and similar natural events), and then I'll get back to nuclear EMP. Solar storms would primarily affect the power grid, and are not likely to harm things like computers. Also, solar storms would only disrupt communications temporarily, and would not be likely to cause direct harm to communications equipment (except for satellites). An extremely large solar storm, though, could induce geomagnetic currents that would destroy a substantial fraction of the large transformers on the power grid (possibly over much of the world). If this happened, electric power loss due to a large solar storm would be out for a period of years and possibly decades. Unlike nuclear EMP, such a solar storm is an eventual inevitability.
The last solar storm that could have caused this level of damage happened in 1859, before the power grid was in place (although in 1921 a large solar storm, of briefer duration than the 1859 event, occurred which affected only a small area of the planet). The power grid has only been in place for a tiny fraction of one percent of human history, and a really large solar storm (of the size and duration of the 1859 event) has not happened in that time. There is a general assumption that any solar event that is similar to, or larger than, the 1859 solar superstorm will simply never happen again, although there is no justification for such an assumption -- in fact, we know that this assumption is false. There is a good possibility that such a solar storm will happen in this century. If it happens in the current situation without spares for our large transformers, a large part of the power grid (including 70 to 100 percent of the United States power grid) will be down for years.
A 2008 study by Metatech found that the time required to obtain a replacement for any one of the 370 or so largest transformers in the United States was 3 years. In a solar superstorm that affects vulnerable areas of the entire world, delivery times could easily be much longer. The United States, which has no capability to manufacture those transformers, will be at the end of a very long waiting line. Edited by GoThunder
07/14/2011 1:35 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4008 Posts |
I agree, GoThunder, that either of those events could be devastating. I do not agree that a solar storm would only affect the power system. It could very easily affect every single electrical device that was connected to that power system and operating at the time that the storm hits. Many of the power system controls and switches are digital these days and are VERY susceptible to induced power currents and surges. For this reason, I have installed good quality Tripp-Lite power line surge protectors on all of my computers and other electronic devices. I don't know if this will be sufficient protection but it should be pretty good. It is about the best I can do, in any case. EMP is another whole issue and is the #1 way that terrorists or an enemy nation could successfully attack the US and do incredible damage. Launching a few short-range missiles from freighters off our coast to create an EMP burst would be sufficient to knock out every digital device in this country... including those that control the flows of electricity, water, sewage, traffic, GPS nav, and many other things. Imagine waking up one morning and discovering that not a single unarmored digital device in the US is functioning. No planes, cars, ships, trucks, or trains are moving. No traffic signals work. There is no electricity or water. Stores have canned and dry goods but anything fresh or in need of refrigeration will spoil after a few days. They cannot get resupplied after their stock sells out. No banks or other computerized businesses can conduct any business. The stock market is off-line. Phones, telegraph, radio, and TV are all off-line. Hospitals can barely function. You can't get gasoline or diesel because the pumps have no power. Law enforcement and the military would be much less effective. This would be like instantly being thrown back 150 years into the past. Since the US population of 300+ million cannot be supported by an 1860 style agricultural and transport system, tens of millions would perish from disease and starvation. It would be a completely ghastly scenario but it would also be one that is not beyond consideration and implementation by sophisticated terrorists and their nation state allies who are not friendly towards the USA.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
Edited by GoThunder
07/15/2011 10:51 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
511 Posts |
Accumulate all the precious metals - gold, silver. copper-coated lead, brass and stainless and blued steel. Don't forget polymers (Glocks and other pistols).
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Replies: 18 / Views: 2,803 |
Posted 07/12/2011 3:01 pm
