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can't the price manipulation go on forever?

I'm sure atleast 90% of the people on these boards are invested in precious metals or else you wouldn't be here and atleast 75% of of those people believe there is some kind of price manipulation in precious metals. Now I don't know what to believe though I am leaning more towards a manipulation is occurring. I know the topic is on alot of peoples minds especially with the recent price drops so hopefully I can get some strong opinions and evidence of what is going on.

So my questions for you guys are...

1. What evidence is there that strong manipulation has been occurring in the past and and is currently occurring right now?
2. What evidence is there that strong manipulation can't go on forever or atleast another decade or more?
3. Is the manipulation illegal and how have the offenders been able to get away with it?
4. If the strong manipulation was to end very soon (few years or less) what do you guys think is a realistic price range the metals will reach before leveling off?

Comments

  • ebaytraderebaytrader Posts: 3,312 ✭✭✭


    << <i>

    So my questions for you guys are...

    1. What evidence is there that strong manipulation has been occurring in the past and and is currently occurring right now?
    2. What evidence is there that strong manipulation can't go on forever or atleast another decade or more?
    3. Is the manipulation illegal and how have the offenders been able to get away with it?
    4. If the strong manipulation was to end very soon (few years or less) what do you guys think is a realistic price range the metals will reach before leveling off? >>



    1. There is no evidence of manipulation. These are two separate markets.
    2. Someone with strong $ will arbitrage the price differential and bring the two markets closer.
    3. See answer #1
    4. The physical market price will out. Gold is a 3-way trade within currency arbitrage (carry trade). Silver is both sentiment and supply/demand driven. I see prices drifting down with an R win and drifting upward with a D win in November.



  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭
    1. What evidence is there that strong manipulation has been occurring in the past and and is currently occurring right now?
    2. What evidence is there that strong manipulation can't go on forever or atleast another decade or more?
    3. Is the manipulation illegal and how have the offenders been able to get away with it?
    4. If the strong manipulation was to end very soon (few years or less) what do you guys think is a realistic price range the metals will reach before leveling off?


    1. Read the Gata site. There is significant evidence, much of it presented to Congress. The fact that the average price of morning gold on the NY Comex runs 1-2% lower than anywhere else in the world over several years speaks of timed selling. Graphs confirm this. Without continual manipulation (ie sell offs) this could never occur on its own.

    2. Manipulation can go on for as long as the banksters can create money with no ramifications.

    3. Probably illegal. If the Chiefs of the US Treasury, FED, SEC, and most major banks are in agreement, they can get away with it since they ultimately control the govt. The ESF is authorized by law to buy and sell into the markets anything they ilke (ie manipulation). They likely have a wide umbrella of associates.

    4. $1500 is for certain imo. $2000-$3000 seems likely. $3000-$6000 possible. Gold will reach highs that will baffle 99.99% of the people. Just like stocks did in the 1990's. Gold will go as high as the general stock market will go low.

    roadrunner


    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold


  • << <i>
    1. There is no evidence of manipulation. These are two separate markets.
    2. Someone with strong $ will arbitrage the price differential and bring the two markets closer.
    3. See answer #1
    4. The physical market price will out. Gold is a 3-way trade within currency arbitrage (carry trade). Silver is both sentiment and supply/demand driven. I see prices drifting down with an R win and drifting upward with a D win in November. >>



    I can't begin to tell you how wrong you are on every count. I can't say anymore specifically on certain points due to the new "rules".

    There is more evidence of manipulation than not by wide, wide margin.

    Sorry, try again. Read more and get a better understanding of the background behind recent events.




    << <i>
    I'm sure atleast 90% of the people on these boards are invested in precious metals or else you wouldn't be here and atleast 75% of of those people believe there is some kind of price manipulation in precious metals. Now I don't know what to believe though I am leaning more towards a manipulation is occurring. >>




    You're on the right track. Just stick with the metals. Supply and demand will once again drive them upward, particularly in silver. Never invest in paper silver, you will only be damaging your own interests. Look to history in 1980 to see what happened to those folks.

    "Lenin is certainly right. There is no subtler or more severe means of overturning the existing basis of society(destroy capitalism) than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and it does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."
    John Marnard Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace, 1920, page 235ff
  • ebaytraderebaytrader Posts: 3,312 ✭✭✭


    << <i>

    << <i>
    1. There is no evidence of manipulation. These are two separate markets.
    2. Someone with strong $ will arbitrage the price differential and bring the two markets closer.
    3. See answer #1
    4. The physical market price will out. Gold is a 3-way trade within currency arbitrage (carry trade). Silver is both sentiment and supply/demand driven. I see prices drifting down with an R win and drifting upward with a D win in November. >>



    I can't begin to tell you how wrong you are on every count. I can't say anymore specifically on certain points due to the new "rules".

    There is more evidence of manipulation than not by wide, wide margin.

    Sorry, try again. Read more and get a better understanding of the background behind recent events. >>







    image


  • konsolekonsole Posts: 788 ✭✭✭
    So if the major players in this game have strong interests in keeping the prices down and there's nothing stopping them from doing so, then were are people finding the desire to invest in metals? Has the governments/banks etc. ability to manipulate the price decreased drastically recently or do they still have enough at their disposal to continue doing this well into the future? Sounds like what should happen can very easily never happen.
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Always get a kick out of the "laughing" face replies when no other cogent thoughts can be presented. image

    roadrunner
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold


  • << <i>So if the major players in this game have strong interests in keeping the prices down and there's nothing stopping them from doing so, then were are people finding the desire to invest in metals? Has the governments/banks etc. ability to manipulate the price decreased drastically recently or do they still have enough at their disposal to continue doing this well into the future? Sounds like what should happen can very easily never happen. >>



    There are only so many bullets in the arsenal.

    You can bet they pulled out every trick, legal or otherwise, when the Hunt brothers legally used the market to outfox them.

    Even still, it didn't work, did it? It took Congress breaking laws and changing laws retroactively to help out their buddies on Wall Street to stop the Hunts.

    Today we actually do have a supply issue, not the artificial one that was created then.

    So, those boys used a large amount of their available weapons earlier this summer, in time they won't have the abilities to do such things.

    SLV is our enemy and so I'd suggest that we tell everone NOT to give them anymore of our money. Stick with the physical and we'll all be better off even sooner.

    You see, if spot rises to where it should be and even spikes after that, SLV is going to be s**t out of luck and belly up when people either want their money or their metal. SLV sells paper and doesn't have the physical to allow their sheep err, investors, to cash out at much higher prices.

    When SLV was formed, they took quite a bit of the investment silver off the market and it drove prices up around 20%, since then, it isn't in their interest to see metals seek their actual value. However, I don't believe they can stop the inevitable. We are already seeing a decoupling from spot and actual demand prices. Paper and physical are already separating and we can see for ourselves that physical is the more valuable.



    "Lenin is certainly right. There is no subtler or more severe means of overturning the existing basis of society(destroy capitalism) than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and it does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."
    John Marnard Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace, 1920, page 235ff
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Think about it for a minute. Would the banking powers to be have allowed metal ETF's if their operations were not in their own best interests? They would have fought tooth and nail to keep a gold and silver ETF from forming from the get go....unless they had a major hand in influencing them. They wouldn't be allowed to exist otherwise. Easier to monitor the sheeple if the fox is already in the hen house.

    roadrunner
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold
  • cohodkcohodk Posts: 18,554 ✭✭✭✭✭
    You see, if spot rises to where it should be and even spikes after that, SLV is going to be s**t out of luck and belly up when people either want their money or their metal. SLV sells paper and doesn't have the physical to allow their sheep err, investors, to cash out at much higher prices

    Where should spot be?

    I have had absolutely no problem buying and selling SLV at prices much better than I could ever hope to acheive selling the physical.

    If people want their money then they are taking money out of the silver market. SLV will sell physical and the price of both SLV and physical will drop. Simple supply/demand.

    If SLV investors actually wanted to buy physical then they would not buy SLV. So they will not want to convert their shares to physical.



    When SLV was formed, they took quite a bit of the investment silver off the market and it drove prices up around 20%, since then, it isn't in their interest to see metals seek their actual value. However, I don't believe they can stop the inevitable. We are already seeing a decoupling from spot and actual demand prices. Paper and physical are already separating and we can see for ourselves that physical is the more valuable.



    Why would they not want to see silver rise?

    There was a tremendous decoupling between spot and demand prices in 1980. Didnt spot hit near $50, yet if you went to sell your physical you were lucky to get $40? I bet many wish SLV was created then so they could sell for much higher prices.

    SLV trades at roughly a 1% discount to spot which is statistically insignificant and certainly much less than trying to sell to a dealer with much less hassle. In fact, during this recent selloff, the low of SLV was $12.61 vs $12.31 for physical. There are many, many closed end mutual funds that trade at discounts or premium to net asset value that can often exceed 15-20%. This dousnt make them good or bad funds. It just represents actual demand for the fund.
    Excuses are tools of the ignorant

    Knowledge is the enemy of fear

  • People who have lost money in any investment always look for someone to blame. Their broker should have warned them that the hot stock they invested in was about to crater. The mutual fund manager should have known that sentiment was turning against small caps. But maybe it's as simple as accepting that investing involves risk and sometimes the market turns against your position.

    There is no conspiracy to manipulate the price of gold IMO. All commodities have collapsed because they rose to bubble levels. Look at the charts and it's obvious (in hindsight), just like it was with the NASDAQ in '99. And like the tech bubble we sometimes let emotion direct our investments. Commodities may resume their rise in a few months but for now, they've had their day. Why do we need to imagine invisible puppeteers manipulating markets?
  • Wow, you are very naive.

    I would suggest you don't spit into the wind.
  • Why do we need to imagine invisible puppeteers manipulating markets?


    The invisible hand per Adam Smith is quite real.

    Markets are not free when only 2-3 players hold a majority of a position.

    I'm a chartist from way back, so I know that when a market is controlled by 2-3 large, unidentified (by law) companies with the ability to create money from Fractional Reserve lending, I know that its time to throw out any charting in this area.

    There is no reason in the world why you can't have the converse of an orderly market when the conditions to allow it are in place. You might as well wipe your a$$ with any chart you are using because paper and physical have decoupled. There is no orderly market. Again, what we have is the opposite of that.

    I would suggest you do some reading beyond just showing up and spitting up that 9th grade pap.

  • What you fail to understand is that the SLV and GLD ETFs are but a "middle-man" interpretation of the COMEX and other Future Exchanges.

    The ETFs are NOT where the manipulation is taking place. Far from it.

    Go buy some Gold at KITCO tonight:

    "IMPORTANT NEW NOTICE: Demand for bullion products has increased significantly in recent days. As a result, we may experience delays in supply and possibly delays in processing and shipping by our vaults. We apologize for this inconvenience and will do everything in our power to service your orders as quickly as possible. While cancellation fees still apply, prices are guaranteed regardless of the length of the delay. We remain committed to providing you the best service no matter what market conditions prevail."

    I see no shortage of Gold or Silver if you go out and buy a share on an ETF. You know what, You never will!

    WHEN Physical COMMODITY Prices DECOUPLES FROM its representative PAPER (or Fiat), MARKETS ARE NO LONGER ORDERLY OR REFLECTIVE relative to any ETF that purports its price to represent a real market’s supply and demand actions!


  • << <i>Why do we need to imagine invisible puppeteers manipulating markets?


    The invisible hand per Adam Smith is quite real.

    Markets are not free when only 2-3 players hold a majority of a position.

    I'm a chartist from way back, so I know that when a market is controlled by 2-3 large, unidentified (by law) companies with the ability to create money from Fractional Reserve lending, I know that its time to throw out any charting in this area.

    There is no reason in the world why you can't have the converse of an orderly market when the conditions to allow it are in place. You might as well wipe your a$$ with any chart you are using because paper and physical have decoupled. There is no orderly market. Again, what we have is the opposite of that.

    I would suggest you do some reading beyond just showing up and spitting up that 9th grade pap. >>




    So you have no idea who these mystery players are, but you're certain they're there? Sounds like you're the one who's naive. Present some solid evidence that a market is being manipulated instead of flinging insults, and maybe you'll have some credibility. And if you think that Adam Smith's "invisible hand" referred to a few players manipulating the markets, I would suggest YOU do some reading. You might start with "The Wealth of Nations", if you're going to use it to try to support your opinion.

  • jmski52jmski52 Posts: 22,308 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Why do we need to imagine invisible puppeteers manipulating markets?

    Why doesn't CFTC allow public identification of the largest 8 naked shorts in the silver market? Or the names of the 2 or 3 large banks who dominated the short positions in the most recent COT report? Why the secrecy? Whose interest does that serve?

    What bank needs to accumulate hundreds of thousands of ounces into a short position? For what reason? Hedging against future production price decreases? A bank? What bank is in the silver production business?

    Why can the Feds disallow large short positions in the largest 19 investment banking houses who have huge unsupported positions in derivatives (which aren't worth squat)? Is the reason that they are "too big to fail" is because the regulators and their favorite congressmen themselves have an interest in the outcome?

    There is no transparency in the silver market. The regulators job is to insure orderly and fair markets, and the best way to insure this is to make all trading data public, open to scruitiny by investors. Since they aren't doing that, one must presume that the regulators are not doing their jobs, and that they really DON'T want to insure orderly and open markets. That screams "manipulation".

    Thus, the question becomes - how to best navigate the silver market with a probable shortage looming and with obvious manipulation taking place?

    1) Don't buy on margin.
    2) Take delivery of physical metal and buy for the long haul.
    3) Buy in increments; Sell in increments.
    4) Don't utilize SLV as a longterm position in silver.



    Q: Are You Printing Money? Bernanke: Not Literally

    I knew it would happen.
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,303 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Great post jmski52. While naked short selling is against the law in any market, the govt had to come out and ensure no one was naked short selling the 19 largest bank stocks to help recover their prices before the shorts drove them all to bankruptcy. Yet no such help was offered anywhere else where collusion exists to keep prices down. Their game plan is quite clear.

    You might start with "The Wealth of Nations", if you're going to use it to try to support your opinion.

    What wealth? The nation is technically insolvent. Maybe our congress needs a primer on legitimate wealth building vice the "Credit of Nations."

    The name of those 2-3 banks shorting gold and/or silver will eventually come up. We can discuss it further then. But you probably won't have to look much further than GS, JPM, HSBC, Merrill, Wachovia, or Citigroup to find your culprits.

    roadrunner
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold


  • << <i>dac076,

    I've read it twice.

    Who? = HSCB and JP Morgan.

    I have no need to prove to you what is obvious to seasoned traders. I can tell that you probably believe the Federal Reserve Bank is owned by the US Govt. That said, begin your home work here, the test is on Friday. Bring (3) #2 Pencils - >>



    You do need to prove it (even though you're a "seasoned trader"), if you're going to make allegations of illegal conspiracies.

    As for the link you provided, did you read all the way to this part?

    "One final note. JPMorgan and HSBC are obviously huge individual players in the gold and silver markets and that includes the COMEX. The Call Reports prove, I believe, without a shadow of a doubt that these two U.S. banks constitute a significant portion, and probably the outright majority, of commercial short positions (both gross and net) in COMEX gold and silver futures. That might get the conspiracy-minded among us to start hootin’ and hollerin’, but I do want to point out that JPMorgan and HSBC have a much larger book of forward gold and silver contracts than they do COMEX gold and silver contracts. As a result, it is impossible to conclude with any degree of certainty that the COMEX gold and silver short positions are not in fact hedges of forward gold and silver long positions. Unless, of course, we have an agenda and a propensity to jump to conclusions."


    There are many commodities listed in the CFTC report besides gold and silver, and they aren't even the largest positions. And it seems to me that shorting an overheated commodities market would have been the right call.

    Look, you can believe what you want to believe, and I don't want to argue back and forth about it. But without facts, it's just speculation. I admit that I'm stating my opinion, but you and a few others here are presenting yours as if it is fact. I could be wrong, but it comes across as bitterness at a market that's gone against your trades.



  • What wealth? The nation is technically insolvent. Maybe our congress needs a primer on legitimate wealthy building vice the "Credit of Nations."

    On that we can all agree!
  • Look Here, please


    "These facts speak for themselves. Here are the facts. As of July 1, 2008, two U.S. banks were short 6,199 contracts of COMEX silver (30,995,000 ounces). As of August 5, 2008, two U.S. banks were short 33,805 contracts of COMEX silver (169,025,000 ounces), an increase of more than five-fold. This is the largest such position by U.S. banks I can find in the data, ever. Between July 14 and August 15th, the price of COMEX silver declined from a peak high of $19.55 (basis September) to a low of $12.22 for a decline of 38%.

    For gold, 3 U.S. banks held a short position of 7,787 contracts (778,700 ounces) in July, and 3 U.S. banks held a short position of 86,398 contracts (8,639,800 ounces) in August, an eleven-fold increase and coinciding with a gold price decline of more than $150 per ounce. As was the case with silver, this is the largest short position ever by US banks in the data listed on the CFTC’s site. This was put on as one massive position just before the market collapsed in price.

    This data suggests other questions should be answered by banking regulators, the CFTC, or by those analysts who still doubt this market is rigged. Is there a connection between 2 U.S. banks selling an additional 27,606 silver futures contracts (138 million ounces) in a month, followed shortly thereafter by a severe decline in the price of silver? That’s equal to 20% of annual world mine production or the entire COMEX warehouse stockpile, the second largest inventory in the world. How could the concentrated sale of such quantities in such a short time not influence the price?

    Is there a connection between 3 U.S. banks selling an additional 78,611 gold futures contracts (7,861,100 ounces) in a month, followed shortly by a severe price decline in gold? That’s equal to 10% of annual world production and amounts to more than $7 billion worth of gold futures being sold by 3 U.S. banks in a month. How can this extraordinary concentrated trading size not be manipulative?

    Because prices fell so sharply after the short sales were taken (with the appropriate dirty tricks as I have previously explained) holders of known physical silver in the world suffered a decline in value of more than $2.5 billion and long COMEX silver futures holders suffered a similar $2.5 billion decline in the value of their contracts. In gold, because the dollar value held is much greater than silver, investor losses were much greater, on the order of hundreds of billions of dollars on their physical holdings. Declines in the value of mining shares adds many billions more. Was this loss of value caused by the concentrated short selling of 2 or 3 U.S. banks?

    What real legitimate business do 2 or 3 U.S. banks suddenly have for selling short such quantities of speculative instruments over a brief time period? Do we want banks to be engaging in this type of activity? If the manipulation was not successful, would U.S. taxpayers be called on to bail out yet another bank speculation gone bad?

    Do the traders who lost money in the recent price collapse of silver have a reason to believe that their money is now in the pockets of these two or three U.S. banks? If so, do they have recourse?

    The data in the Bank Participation report is so clear and compelling that it is hard to conclude anything but manipulation. It is beyond credulity to conclude other than two or three banks caused one of the most severe price collapses in precious metals history. The CFTC has a lot to answer for as the regulatory agency responsible for preventing this type of blatant manipulation."


    That is some pretty compelling evidence that the PM Markets are being gamed.

    If you are so convinced that no manipulation takes place in Finacial Markets unless it is done before your eyes, you can not be helped.

    I'll say a prayer for you anyway image
  • cohodkcohodk Posts: 18,554 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Look, you can believe what you want to believe, and I don't want to argue back and forth about it. But without facts, it's just speculation. I admit that I'm stating my opinion, but you and a few others here are presenting yours as if it is fact. I could be wrong, but it comes across as bitterness at a market that's gone against your trades

    Probably better said than I could do. I shoulda got a communications degree.image
    Excuses are tools of the ignorant

    Knowledge is the enemy of fear

  • I could be wrong, but it comes across as bitterness at a market that's gone against your trades.

    For the record, you are wrong.

    My posts are on one topic; the fact that you could say the PM prices have not been manipulated, despite the evidence I showed you and what has been presented for weeks on this board by a host of others, since its start. It is nothing more then that...
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