Tag: Central Banks

Central Banks Buy Most Gold in Decades

From Birch Gold Group

central banks gold

This week, Your News to Know brings you the most recent updates on gold and silver. Stories include: Central banks are buying gold in record numbers, silver to reclaim its “precious” status, and how China’s Lunar New Year will boost gold demand.

Central banks haven’t bought this much gold since 1971

With gold riding a nine-month high and posting gains for the fourth straight month, many analysts have focused on how the metal has outperformed virtually every other asset. Yet to Forbes contributor Frank Holmes, recent buying by central banks is perhaps the most sensational story related to the metal.

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The Central Bank War – Nobody Notices

Guest Post by Martin Armstrong

I understand this can get confusing because there are so many people who talk without any real-world experience. The Fed MUST raise rates to help the crisis in Pension funds. It raised the Fed Funds Rate (what banks charge each other) 25 basis points to 2.25-2.5%. While the Fed indicated there would be two more rate hikes in 2019, what has gone over everyone’s head is exactly what I have been warning about. We are witnessing indeed not a Currency War but a Central Bank War. Those people claim there is a Currency War because they focus only on trade. I do not see any actual counter-trend manipulation attempts as was the case with the G5 back in 1987 to manipulate any currency for trade purposes.

This is a brand new Central Bank War that nobody seems to get I suppose since I may be the only person who actually speaks to central banks outside the USA. All the various central banks and the IMF have been lobbying the Federal Reserve since 2014 pleading with it NOT to raise rates. I have stated many times that the rate hikes by the Fed have NOTHING to do with economic growth, inflation, or trying to stop a speculative bubble in stocks. We can see that GDP growth since the high back in 1978. That may come in the future when the stock market rallies, but not now.

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10 YEARS LATER – NO LESSONS LEARNED

“A variety of investors provided capital to financial companies, with which they made irresponsible loans and took excessive risks. These activities resulted in real losses, which have largely wiped out the shareholder equity of the companies. But behind that shareholder equity is bondholder money, and so much of it that neither depositors of the institution nor the public ever need to take a penny of losses. Citigroup, for example, has $2 trillion in assets, but also has $600 billion owed to its own bondholders. From an ethical perspective, the lenders who took the risk to finance the activities of these companies are the ones that should directly bear the cost of the losses.” – John Hussman – May 2009

This month marks the 10th anniversary of the Wall Street/Fed/Treasury created financial disaster of 2008/2009. What should have happened was an orderly liquidation of the criminal Wall Street banks who committed the greatest control fraud in world history and the disposition of their good assets to non-criminal banks who did not recklessly leverage their assets by 30 to 1, while fraudulently issuing worthless loans to deadbeats and criminals. But we know that did not happen.

You, the taxpayer, bailed the criminal bankers out and have been screwed for the last decade with negative real interest rates and stagnant real wages, while the Wall Street scum have raked in risk free billions in profits provided by their captured puppets at the Federal Reserve. The criminal CEOs and their executive teams of henchmen have rewarded themselves with billions in bonuses while risk averse grandmas “earn” .10% on their money market accounts while acquiring a taste for Fancy Feast savory salmon cat food.

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Central Banks Are Using The Trade War To Hide Their Direct Influence On Stocks

Hat tip Mary Christine

Guest Post by Brandon Smith

There has been a lot of confusion lately in the mainstream economic media as well as in independent media circles as to the behavior of stock markets in the wake of the recently initiated global trade war. In particular, stocks suffered one of the longest runs of negative days in their history in June, only to then spike just after Donald Trump “officially” began trade war tariffs in July. The expectation by many was that the headlines would cause an immediate and continued downturn in equities markets, but this was not the case. Many analysts have been left bewildered.

This is an issue I have touched on multiple times since the beginning of this year, and it is something I predicted long before Trump’s election in 2016. But it is obvious that the schizophrenic nature of stocks needs to be addressed in a very concise, no-holds-barred fashion, because there are still far too many people who are looking at all the wrong causes and correlations.

First, let’s be clear: stock markets are NOT tracking the news headlines. The past month should have proved this if there was any previous doubt.

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The 5 Steps To World Domination

Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

You don’t need an army to achieve World Domination; all you need is enough cheap credit to buy up everything that generates the highest value and/or income.

World Domination–it has a nice ring, doesn’t it? Here’s how to achieve it in 5 steps:

1. Turn everything into a commodity that can be traded on the global market: land, leases on land, options to purchase land, houses, buildings, rooms in slums, labor, tools, robots, water, water rights, mineral rights, rights to air routes, ships, aircraft, political power, shares in corporations, government bonds, municipal bonds, corporate bonds, student loans that have been bundled into debt-based instruments, the income from city parking meters, electricity, software, advertising, marketing, media, social media, food, energy, insurance, gold, metals, credit, interest-rate swaps and last but not least, financial instruments that control and/or pyramid all the real-world goods and assets that have been commoditized (i.e. almost everything).

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The Economic Collapse Began Long Ago

By Gerold

My forty-year old Godson was belly-aching about the lack of jobs. He whined it’s all the Boomers’ fault.

I tore a few strips off him. I asked him WTF am I wasting my time researching and writing these articles if he doesn’t read them. Since I had him cornered, I told him a few things he obviously didn’t want to hear.

We are in an economic depression. It was predicted in Strauss and Howe’s 1997 book “The Fourth Turning” [Link]  that occurs every four generations as a time of great turmoil. Their Generational Theory is a framework which explains where we are, how we got here and where we’re going. For more details see ‘Notes” at end.

This is a ‘Stealth Depression.’ The government is doing its utmost to hide it with fake statistics. Their ass media handmaidens are carrying their water telling us everything is wonderful. And, if my Godson believes the ass media, he deserves his fate.

At the bottom of this deception are fake inflation (CPI) statistics. They distort everything else because most economic data is ‘inflation adjusted.’ Consequently, when other economic data such as GDP growth is adjusted with fake inflation statistics, then those numbers are also distorted.

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5 Central Banks Hold the Global Economy in Their Hands

From Birch Gold Group

Following the 2008 crisis, the Federal Reserve wasn’t the only central bank to implement extreme measures in an effort to prop up an economy. In fact, the Fed’s example led other global central banks to do the same. As a result, the five largest central banks now hold the global economy in their hands.

What global central banks do next could impact our economic future for decades. Let’s examine why that’s the case, and how Americans could shield their savings…

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The Coming Central Bank Crisis

Guest Post by Martin Armstrong

I have warned that whenever a government creates a solution to any crisis, that solution becomes the next crisis. This is what I have called the Paradox of Solution.The unfolding of the exit of the central banks from the Quantitative Easing monetary policy will become a much more serious threat to the financial markets than anyone suspects. The Federal Reserve has already exited and begun to raise rates while also announcing it will NOT be reinvesting the money when the government debt they bought expires. The Federal Reserve is already shortening their balance sheet. Bills of $426 billion will be due at the Fed in 2018, and again about $357 billion a year later. So the Fed will not repurchase that debt. The US economy is absorbing this because US dollars are effectively the only real reserve currency in the world right now.

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Why Central Banks Are Buying Equities

Guest Post by Martin Armstrong

I wrote about that explaining that the central banks have been buying equities since 2014. The Swiss National Bank posted its latest 13-F holdings showing it has been buying equities at a stepped up pace during the first quarter 2017. Their total equity holdings have now reached $80.4 billion, up $17 billion from the $63.4 billion at the end of 2016.

The central banks are trapped. Lowering interest rates to virtually zero reduced their yield on reserves and they cannot sell off government securities. The only viable hedge is US treasuries in the bond world against the chaos of the Eurozone. That offers no diversification just more government debt. The ECB owns 40% of European government debt. The Swiss are buying US equities as a hedge against the Euro and political unrest. This is not manipulation. They lost a fortune trying to maintain the peg the franc with the Euro. They cannot use pegs, so the only alternative to just buying US Treasuries is private equities.

The central bankers understand what our model is warning about. As confidence continues to decline in governments, the central banks can go bankrupt UNLESS they too diversify out of government bonds.

Granted, nobody wants to talk about this yet in public. This is NOT manipulation – this is cover your ass time. We have been recommending this trade to institutions for the past 5 years.

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The Coming Crisis in Central Banking

Guest Post by Martin Armstrong

Federal Reserve 1951 Accord

The question of when will central banks fail is a popular one that comes in. Suffice it to say, the turmoil will hit Europe first. While so many people blame the Fed for all sorts of things, you must realize that Roosevelt usurped the Fed during the Great Depression and imposed a single interest rate administered from Washington. It was during April 1942, when the Department of the Treasury requested the Federal Reserve formally to commit to maintaining a low interest-rate peg of 3/8% on short-term Treasury bills.

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HILLARY: DECEIT, DEBT, DELUSIONS (PART TWO)

In Part One of this article I addressed the deceit of Hillary Clinton and politicians of all stripes as they promise goodies they can never pay for, in order to buy votes and expand their power and control over our lives.

I created the chart below for an article I wrote in 2011 when the national debt stood at $14.8 trillion, with my projection of its growth over the next eight years. I predicted the national debt would reach $20 trillion in 2016 and was ridiculed by arrogant Keynesians who guaranteed their “stimulus” (aka pork) would supercharge the economy and result in huge tax inflows and drastically reduced deficits. As of today, the national debt stands at $19.7 trillion and is poised to reach $20 trillion by the time “The Hope & Change Savior” leaves office on January 20, 2017. I guess I wasn’t really a crazed pessimist after all. I guarantee the debt will reach $25 trillion by the end of the next presidential term, unless the Ponzi scheme collapses into financial depression and World War 3 (a strong probability).

The total disregard for the most perilous issue confronting the nation by politicians of all stripes is a national disgrace, proving beyond a doubt the elite ruling class has no conscience, no sense of morality, and no loyalty to the common people or future generations. The sociopaths who act as if they are in control addressed the 2008 global debt meltdown by adding tens of trillions in new debt to an already unsustainable system, setting the world on a course towards total financial collapse and world war.

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HALFWAY UPDATE

Half the year is over and all you will hear on CNBC and the rest of the captured corporate media is about the ongoing bull market in stocks. You won’t hear about the real bull market. Stocks haven’t gone anywhere in the last 20 months. Their QE created bull market ended in October 2014 when the liquidity spigot was shut off.

Even in this rigged market, with the Fed directly buying through their intermediaries, corporations buying back hundreds of billions of their own stock, and HFT machines programmed to buy by the Wall Street cabal, stocks have barely made any gains in the first six months.

The real bull market, which shall not be mentioned, is revealing the failure of central bankers around the world to debase their way to prosperity. If every country in the world attempts to debase their currency at the same time, there can be only one winner – precious metals. Look who’s winning YTD:

  • Silver – up 48%
  • Gold – up 27%
  • S&P 500 – up 4%
  • Dow – up 4%
  • Nasdaq – down 3%

All shall be revealed in the fullness of time. Gold and silver are revealing the failure of the Fed and their establishment puppeteers in their quest to sustain an unsustainable economic system.

 


SHOULD YOU BELIEVE THE VAMPIRE SQUID?

I find it fascinating the mainstream corporate media and Wall Street shysters spend SO MUCH time talking down gold and spending an inordinate amount of electronic ink trying to convince the masses that only nutjobs would buy it. I believe less than 2% of people have gold in their investment portfolio, so why the endless articles bashing it?

Newsletter hawkers like Martin Armstrong take every opportunity to shit on gold as an investment. I wonder if he was shitting on it from 2001 through 2011? We don’t know, because he was in prison for investment fraud during most of that time. Fatass Barry Ritholtz is in the same boat. He’s nothing but a failed lawyer pretending to be an investment guru. He’s gleeful when gold falls. It’s because he completely missed a 10 year bull market.

The suppression of gold prices through the paper market since 2011 by the Fed and their Wall Street bank co-conspirators has thus far been successful, but it is fraying at the edges as China continues to accumulate physical gold and pushing the ponzi scheme towards its inevitable conclusion. Soaring gold prices tells the masses central bankers are a fraud, that’s why they are desperate to keep the price capped.

With zero and negative interest rates throughout the world, gold should be skyrocketing. It is showing signs of calling the central banker bluff. Jesse’s comments below should be heeded. The stock market dead cat bounce and the holiday manipulation of gold down $30 will fail. If there is a lesson from the Big Short, do the opposite of what Goldman says to do.


Chart of the Day

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts – Goldman Says Have No Fear and Buy Our Paper

 

Goldman analyst Jeffrey Currie came out this morning with a ‘sell gold’ recommendation for Ma and Pa Muppet.

I was fortunate enough to hear his explanation for this in his own words on Bloomberg TV, which had touted his gold call about every fifteen minutes all day.

The net summary of Mr. Currie’s forecast is that Goldman’s economists think that there ought to be no fear in the financial paper markets, since there is an historically low chance of a recession, less than fifteen percent, and he sees no real possibility of negative interest rates.

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DERANGED CENTRAL BANKERS BLOWING UP THE WORLD

It is now self-evident to any sentient being (excludes CNBC shills, Wall Street shyster economists, and Keynesian loving politicians) the mountainous level of unpayable global debt is about to crash down like an avalanche upon hundreds of millions of willfully ignorant citizens who trusted their politician leaders and the central bankers who created the debt out of thin air. McKinsey produced a report last year showing the world had added $57 trillion of debt between 2008 and the 2nd quarter of 2014, with global debt to GDP reaching 286%.

The global economy has only deteriorated since mid-2014, with politicians and central bankers accelerating the issuance of debt. These deranged psychopaths have added in excess of $70 trillion of debt in the last eight years, a 50% increase. With $142 trillion of global debt enough to collapse the global economy in 2008, only a lunatic would implement a “solution” that increased global debt to $212 trillion over the next seven years thinking that would solve a problem created by too much debt.

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“The Market Knows It’s Over” Jim Rogers Warns “We’re All Going To Suffer”

Submitted by Mac Slavo via SHTFPlan.com,

Back in the 1970’s as recession gripped the world for a decade, stocks stagnated and commodities crashed, investor Jim Rogers made a fortune. His understanding of markets, capital flows and timing is legendary.

As crisis struck in late 2008, he did it again, often recommending gold and silver to those looking for wealth preservation strategies – move that would have paid of multi-fold when precious metals hit all time highs in 2011. He warned that the crash would lead to massive job losses, dependence on government bailouts, and unprecedented central bank printing on a global scale.

Now, Rogers says that investors around the world are realizing that the jig is up. Stocks are over bloated and central banks will have little choice but to take action again. But this time, says Rogers in his latest interview with CrushTheStreet.com, there will be no stopping it and people all over the world are going to feel the pain, including in China and the United States.

We’re all going to suffer… I can think of very few places that won’t suffer. But most people are going to suffer the next time around.

 

 

Central banks will panic. They will do whatever they can to save the markets.

 

It’s artificial… it won’t work… there comes a time when no matter how much money you have, the market has more money.

 

…

 

I don’t know if they’ll even call it QE (Quantitative Easing) in the future… who knows what they’ll call it to disguise it… they’re going to try whatever they can… printing more money or lowering interest rates or buying more assets… but unfortunately, no matter how much P.R. or whitewashing they use, the market knows this is over and we’re not going to play this game anymore.

The entire world is about to get hammered and the average person on the street is the one who will pay the price, as is usually the case.

We can expect more losses in markets, more losses in jobs and more losses to freedom as governments and central banks point the finger at everyone but themselves.


WILL THE LAW OF SUPPLY & DEMAND EVER MATTER AGAIN?

The charts below reveal a dramatic decrease in physical gold on hand in the U.S. to back up all the paper derivatives floating out there. The physical gold has flowed from West to East over the last few years. The price of gold has been driven to 5 year lows through the use of paper derivatives, as the physical supply isn’t keeping up with the demand by any stretch of the imagination. 

The question is how long can this go on? In a real market, constrained supply and huge demand means higher prices. Higher prices would reveal the fallacy of central banks having everything under control. Can bankers manipulate derivatives forever to keep the price of gold from reaching its true fair value?

Historic Registered Low