.jpg)
|
|
|
12.28.06 Trucking freight down 9% month over month ouch, that's gotta smart.
and then there's AGT, down 10% just
today. 12.28.06 Chile/Bolivia, Copper, and Water Trouble brewing. And six US Senators led by the Senate Majority Leader H. Reid (D-NV) arrived in Bolivia this morning for economic talks. Lucky coincidence, no? And some fools continue to fade Dr. Copper...
12.28.06 spent a few minutes on a website that detailed what people who sold their soul to satan asked for in exchange. some of them wanted dollar amounts less than what I make or lose in a couple swing trades and an ebay auction.
Now, you've got to figure that those losers are the same folks serving your food, serving on the school board, driving public transportation vehicles and otherwise conducting such activities (no intended slight to professionals in those devotions) that could have a direct impact on your life. Never met a larger batch of dopamine-derived folks in one location before.
Wish I could have those few minutes back...
12.28.06 PalladiumQuest I finally found a palladium men's
.900 ring
12.28.06 The problem with holding AEM is that I just found out gary kaltbaum is sweet on AEM. And that guy is wrong a lot (and has some nasty politics to boot).
12.26.06 Bought KGC @ 11.37 Bought MDG @ 27.10 Bought AEM @ 30.50 Bought back GG @27.5 (had sold on the 7th @ 29.5)
12.26.06 Probably shouldn't kill Saddam just yet, Maybe offer him a job would be a better bet. He was the only bloke in the last 50+ years that could run the country.
12.17.06 Nevada Copper. The concept, the realities, the companies... Just the concept is hot: finding millions of ounces of Cu-bearing ore in the ground, find qualified geologists to interpret the feasibility, find qualified engineers to develop the mine plan, find qualified salespeople to sheppard the marketing package through the social, environmental and political hoops, pay the right people, figure out how to tap Nevada's already strained and limited and increasingly desired power and water development and transmission infrastructure, find qualified engineers and construction teams and miners and plumbers and electricians and foreman and project managers and mechanics to build the roads, utilities, mine and mill, find qualified and legal operators, and convert the ore to metal product, bring the product to an increasingly erratic and uncertain market, and - not for the faint of heart - try to appease/please the regulators, community, investors, market, stockholder and your own increasingly scattered psyche.
Sure, sounds simple enough...
The reality is one medium producer has pulled it off, and done very well doing so, in the last few years: Quadra mining at the Robinson Mine. Robinson Mine is an old resource, mine and story. Quadra, much less so. Qua.to came to your attention via yours truly on or about 10.27.05 at about $4.50 or so. At that time we advised the Chinese were sniffing at the property. As a point in fact, they ChiComs did gain at least one of the three major delivery contracts available, per our sources. However, and this is quite fascinating, this year the ChiComs lost one of the three major delivery contracts available, and Qua.to instead now works with India to deliver her copper. Regarding short term price, looks like the selling is drying up and the neckline of the head and shoulders top had been pierced with some authority; I'd look for support around the 50dma once again Whole lot of people been calling for yet another cap and top in doctor copper over the last year and a half, and there is little stock on this end for the accuracy of a whole lot of people Thing is, the markets are so sketchy right now, anything could go on around the campfire.
Naturally, others both strongly want and need to get in this game. The latest to throw their hat into the bonfire is Astron Resources, who changed their name and MO and is now calling themselves (what else): Nevada Copper.
http://www.rgj.com/news/stories/html/2006/12/14/112553.php?sps=&sch=&sp1=leader-courier
Plenty of folks been through these parts. Not so far away is the Anaconda mine superfund cleanup we've been following herein since the site once again rose into the Nevada State super conscious. Guess its just time for another to add another log, and a few more come in from the cold seeing heat ('cuz there sure ain't enough light being sought these daze).
12.17.06 The cost of living in 2006: The 22-year 12 Day's of Christmas Index hits an all time high.
You've heard of the big mac index, how much it costs to buy a meal at any mcdonalds in the world serves as an indicator of the value (purchasing power) of both the host country currency and the value of the currency used to purchase the meal. The 12 days of Christmas index is an inflation gauge that measures labor and goods necessary to purchase the 12 categories compared to the year previous. Let's examine:
http://www.pncchristmaspriceindex.com/ and http://www.pncchristmaspriceindex.com/educators.htm
Of course, PNC bank - as party-line establishment as they come toes the federal line and determines that the 12-day index is only up year-over-year of 3.1 percent, almost exactly the published fairy-tale number (fittingly) promulgated by feds as the CPI.
Lets really work the numbers:
A partridge in a pear tree. Making a double top high this year? Perhaps the h5N1 virus has spooked players in the partridge future markets?
Two Turtle Doves Still at a twenty-two year low and flat-lined? Why hasn't the cost of doves caught up with partridges? Perhaps the whole dove industry is selling soft this year because peace doves are certainly not evidently in demand anywhere on this planet given the looming and active civil wars afflicting a moderate percentage of the world's recognized political countries. At any rate, soiled doves seem to be multiplying around my neighborhood now that wal-mart ain't hiring like they once did.
Three French Hens Given the inelasticity of the market, obviously a product of France's rigged market system.
Four Calling Birds Since these birds actually talk, and give some indication of their state of mind and general maintenance costs required to maintain, they have proven a real market - albeit one increasingly expensive and at 22-year highs.
Five Gold Rings Yeah right, those haven't appreciated any in value over the last year either (snicker). Gold is only near multi-year highs and the supposed cost of a ring is near the five year low. Guess they keep factoring in more chinese slave labor into the equation. Given the shape of things on this side of the globe they could add in the wages of US workers next year for a further decrease...
Six Geese a Laying. Well, if their product - the golden egg isn't widely sought - then the bird flu might keep the ganders' kin near all time highs.
Seven Swans a Swimming. Not much movement in this market. Maybe the closing of the last US Pink Flamingo producing company in Florida this year has something to do with it...
8 Maids a Milking. Man o' Man, I see those Merry Maid cars everywhere, so I don't get why this input has remained so hard over the last few years!?!?! And given the imputed labor rate of $41.21 hr. to 'milk' I'm not sure what union the Milking Maids have, but they're doing a fair pinch better than the merry maids I've seen.!
9 Ladies Dancing I suppose, naturally, that all depends on weather you go the lap-dance route where you think you are getting off on the cheap by using all those one-dollar bills but it all adds up on an hourly basis or wether you go the outcall-route using Cragslist and hire the 'ladies' on a contract basis.
10 Lords a Leaping Not sure who's looking for that type of action, but they keep paying more every year!
11 Pipers Piping More expensive every year, guess nobody plays the flute anymore. And the casinos sure don't hire much live music anymore, not that the Blue Men Group is really into flutes or anything.
12 Drummers drumming Hey, Little Drummer Boy is one of my favorite Christmas tunes for sure! Pah Rum pah rum pum in another bottle of rum, everybody's invited!!!
So much for the twelve daze of merry haze, now, lets take a look at what it costs to just light the Christmas tree:
Cost of power generally up 10% year over year (this on top of a very large increase in 2005). Cost of copper near all time highs (needed to distribute power from production plant to your home). Cost of tree: flat Cost of permit to chop tree: Up again/still. Cost of presents under the tree. Up; see above.
Sure, if you don't plan on celebrating you could save a few quid. Pass the rum...
12.14.06 The Mint passes new regulations against melting coins for their bullion content. The country slips even farther; value is now completely illegal.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/2006-12-14-melting-ban-usat_x.htm
12.10.06 The USA has the highest rate of incarceration, and the most numbers of people in prison, than any other nation on earth. (At least according to the U.S. Justice Department).
Land of the Free!
And little justice to be seen...
12.8.06 On Nevada Mercury The Idaho Report gives major Northern Nevada mining companies room to breathe.
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/12/07/features/mining_news/mining1.txt
Of note, one of the three companies mentioned in this report - Queenstake - also just released an announcement for a needed heavy equipment mechanic at the Jerritt Canyon Mine. This company could have spent money on hiring production staff (equipment operators and mechanics) or dumped more money into environmental mitigation/loss control/social responsibility marketing efforts. Today they get to hire a producer. Tomorrow, who knows. Remember, the Hg leads all other environmental loads under study, in advance of the Hg pollution credit trade currently under development. Establishing current sources and sinks nears equivalence to determining baseline supply and demand.
Though, how often will the national press present any of this for your consideration. Rather, the anti-resource extraction industry kicks it up again this weekend with the release of another chapter of the 'blood-diamond' saga...
First they need to straighten out the carbon tax/credit issue. Yes, every human will have a certain amount of carbon they can consume/emit - as benefits their standing/caste/general
importance on the karmic wheel of life, call it the bio-unit or the carbon
consumption unit. approval of the governing world authority and a newly/additional levied tax. This system will eventually spread - like the cancer she breeds - to all other metals (mercury is in the early fringe front) and will naturally become to encumber all use of resources: air, water, food, light and heat...
Plan on being planned...
12.8.06 On California and Nevada Water and Power
Precipitation Forecast The first major winter storm moving into central California. Large storm swells are predicted, though the tides in San Francisco bay at 17:00 last night were calmer than expected. The state is currently only at 35% of normal for the water year. We need the precipitation and the snow base both. But, the wind not need apply. The wind storm in Northern Nevada two weeks ago put large strain on distribution equipment throughout the state. Distribution repair crews were working double shifts, in some cases, the few days before Thanksgiving.
Geothermal Nevada Geothermal. Nice findings on the Blue Mountain property. Established geothermal property with new temperature hits at 361 degrees. (Nice!). They added 9.6 megawatts to the Nv. grid. in 06 and, are in the bankable feasibility study phase - scheduled for completion first quarter 07 (along with attendant 100million financing in second or third quarter) for a new 35 megawatt plant in fall 2007. Major contract with the Sierra Pacific Resources last year and deals with Ormat in the works and underway also...
Owens Valley Water Yesterday, for the first time in generations, Los Angeles Water and Power released water into the normal Owns Valley watercourse. Truly a watershed moment. Things are getting interesting. The new head of Los Angeles Municipal Water District comes off a fresh stint as a Watershed Coordinator (Prop 50 Bond monies). The very newly passed Prop. 84 monies will extend this program across the states. The Southern Nevada and California Water Players are currently rolling out massive marketing and spin campaigns. Partially as a result of the last election, mostly in anticipation of even bigger battles looming...
12.8.06 American Panic Psyche in December 2007
Google Amero...and see what you get... I received 580,000 hits on 11.28.06 and 856,000 hits on 12.8.06 . Triple what it was just few months ago. Also seeing a big increase: ‘shortage’, ‘civil war’, ‘illegal” and 'carbon credits'.
So, what shall the newby-boss-same-as-the-old-boss Democrats' first-introduced proposed legislation be?
How about: ‘Reinstate the draft’ though actually called “The Public Service and Happy Puppies for Everybody Act of 2007”.
Next up: Further destroy our economy, actually called “The Equitable and Fair Carbon Credit Act upon everybody who produced (and their children) but NOT because Arnold thought of it first in California and the supposedly worst hurricane season in 2007 absolutely failed to materialize as sensationalized by the press we own but because Saving the Planet from Global Shamanistic Science is good for our control over you Senate Bill"!
Then, right upon the heels of those amazing successes the: “Now that the Federal Reserve has finally succeeded in debasing and inflating the dollar out of any relevance whatsoever since their inceptions, the ‘Let’s go Amero’ Act of Patriot Day 2007”.
Topping off the banner year: “It’s only a Civil War if we Authorize It/Acting Badly Performance Act of November 4//11, 2007”.
Or, maybe they’ll give amnesty to the fastest growing segment of US Prison: illegal aliens with the “Amnesty for drug dealers, rapists, pimps, tomato pickers, those found with any measurable amount of a weed that grows feral in 49 states and nannies-outside-but-near-the-beltway Act of Cesar Chavez Day 2007”. (Hint: the wall isn’t to keep people out. See the Public Service and Amero Acts”).
Regarding the currently-being-formulated "The Equitable and Fair Carbon Credit ....".
Certainly, the formulations are already in place. Perhaps the draft bills are done and the inner-sales preview for those 'selected sales force' has already begun. Remember all the press presented when the badly acting George Shrubco, Inc. visited the republic of Georgia last May, 2005? Sure you do (if you thin long and hard on it).
Yesterday, the President of the Republic of Georgia began a visit to San Francisco, California. Did you hear of it? No way, because it wasn't reported in any of the print or internet outlets (as of this blog entry). In fact, the only way the mercury retort can report is b.c. we first hand witnessed the motorcade going through the city (Marina District) and interestingly enough, KGO let it slip on air (just once, a two second blurb buried in one of the 1000 per week traffic reports) who was in the motorcade.
Why is the president of the Republic of Georgia in San Francisco this week?
Well..... ever hear of the America Geophysical Union?
Their next annual conference begins Monday, in San Francisco. What do you think they'll be talking about?
Guess?
'Global Warming'.
Note their keynote topics and keynote speaker: "The honorable (snicker) Ally Gore".
http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm06/
What evolution has Ally Ghore been phishing/pouting/punching/pushing from his 12 car motorcade the last 18 months: 'Why global warming means you amerkins will have to get used to not having gas for your car and heat for you home during the next major election cycle'.
Yeah, and the unannounced appearance of heads of state from major foreign powers in San Francisco next week is just a major coincidence.
Wonder who else will appear around the table. No doubt Gorbachev has already hosted a teaparty on the Presidio.
Not that the topic and game plan for discussion is of any doubt...
Next!.
12.7.06 The cost of remembering gets higher every year and the apparent return on investment continues to diminish.
RIP all Brothers on the USS Arizona.
12.7.06 Eleven killed in Iraq We get used to hearing that, or similar, headlines every day. Always we hope those numbers and faces remain nameless and shapeless to us. Unfortunately the buzzards came home to roost this week. My wife lost a childhood friend to an ambush in Anwar district.
12.7.06 Sold half my GG Today (@ 29.5) Has become overweighed in my portfolio (I held Wheaton River Mines [WHT] previously which was bought out by GG). Also a little trepidation on my part re: the very near short term price action; the volatility makes it look like GG wants to break lower. Should be able to get it cheaper, soon.
12.7.06 Sold ERF @ 45.84 Bought a month ago at 40. That's the way, so they say...
11.28.07 bernanke and greenspan both speaking publican today One to the National Italian American Foundation, and the other to a group with even less reason for existence.
11.28.07 The US housing market experiences the largest decline on record. Year over Year of 3.5 percent decline. Per the AP.
11.27.06 Nevada democrats blame the loss of their Gubernatorial candidate on the Southern Nevada Water Authority.
Reason being? The republican operatives played the carpetbagger card quite well. Their opponent, Dina Titus, still has not lost her Georgia drawl and the theme that she was a big city slicker trying to steal the state’s water from rural denizens played well. The Southern Nevada Water Authority has denied, for years, attempts to steal rural water, instead focusing on their efforts to ‘partner’ with the dumb country bumpkins for their Nevada lifeblood – water. Problem is, the Authority did make their intentions well known through outlets both official and otherwise. This considerably drove down the price of ranches, and their underlying and consumptive water rights, in Lincoln and White Pine counties. Once the ranchland prices looked like they hit their nadir, the authority and their proxies waltzed in and bought the ranches (for their water rights) on the cheap. The rural citizens awarded one of the authority chief poobah, Titus, with the defeat she deserved. Too bad the winner is even a bigger putz, as has been fully documented herein.
11.26.04 Had a great Thanksgiving. Definitely at too much, hate the gluttonous feeling since it rather defeats the purpose: giving thanks for staving off starving. The next day I cooked an elk roast, about 8 ounces worth. One of my dad’s friends gave him the roast and I put it too good use. The main decision was how I was going to cook it: bake, broil or simmer. I chose the slow cook method. Marinated overnight and simmered in the crock-pot on low for eight hours. The meal turned out wonderful. Maybe I'll post the recipe later (for subscribers). On Black Friday, went out at four in the morning to the new Best Buy store in Sparks. First time I ever went out early on Black Friday and thought it time to see if the strategy had any merit. After waiting in line for 50 minutes, in the dark 24 degree weather, I decided the strategy, in fact, had no merit. What happened is I was in line for the computer deals. Even though they were perhaps a couple hundred folks ahead of me in the line, I still thought I had a chance. After waiting a while the coffee van pulled into the lot and made a ripe killing. The store credit card hawkers moved down the line. Then individuals representing particular items that had been advertised in the newspaper moved down the line. It was at this time I asked one of the employees if they had any of the computers still available. They replied no, so I left. The next strategy is to pay off a homeless person in booze and dollars or my nephew in video games to stand in line next year at 11pm Thanksgiving Eve...
11.24.06 I am a Thankful Blogger
11.23.06 Decline in the USD begins new impulsive leg down The factor that determines gains in all other US markets is the value of the US Dollar. Today the USD broke long time technical support levels. Those less educated than you don't realize that the carnies and barkers spouting on about the new highs in the DOW refuse to note that in dollar terms, the Dow has actually returned less than 5% this year to date when valued in Euro, and is actually still down over 25% from the 2000 peak, again when valued in Euro. The Dow has performed similarly poor when priced in Swiss franc or Japanese Yen. Of course, the dramatic fall in 10-year TBill notes over the last several weeks (commensurate with the inverted yield curve) preceded and predicted this dollar weakness.
When valued in gold and/or silver (actual money), the Dow is down over 6% this year. Why is this? Interest rates, economic production, politics, and all the other canards are cover for the real story: 'Tis all a confidence game. Interest rates had plateaud in the US, and may need to come down to stifle a nasty correction in the real estate market in many US locales. On the other hand, other countries (Australia, Britain) are able to raise their rates. An environment of rising interest rates generally strengthen the underlying currency. However, the full basket of Bank of International Settlement Standard Drawing Rates is going down against both monetary metals, suggesting systemic risk has not abated; yet actually increasing.
11.22.06 Rest in Peace seven polish coal miners. Not an easy way to make a living...
11.21.06 The Marshall Mint and Museum in Virginia City is worth a visit This museum holds private collections featuring mineral collections, gold and ore specimens form the Comstock, Gold Hill and other northern Nevada and California mining districts.
The Marshall Mint also mints private issues of gold and silver coins and other exonumia and jewelry. Open by appointment between 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 96 C St (the main strip)., Virginia City. 775.847-0777 or 800-321-6374
Admission is by donation. Please support the remaining private gem and mining museums and curatorial exhibits of Nevada history. The Liberty Belle on highway 395 in s. Reno had a great collection that was auctioned off and broken up just last year. The Tonopah Station Casino collection of historic vintage and antique slot machines has been mostly broken up and no longer on display. There are fewer and fewer examples of examining our western heritage collections as costs go up, space and time become more dear, and the younger folks are not educated on the importance of their cultural heritage.
As far as gaming slots: We knew the payoffs on the slot machines we built. The ones sent to Atlantic City had the worst payout ratios of them all. Of course, this was before the ‘Indian Casinos” (really bankrolled by the same old new/old money). Bottom line: Craps is the best odds in the house. Bar none.
11.20.06 Rest in Peace Milton Friedman. Another one of the few who understood. The litany of the confused grows louder and younger...
11.20.06 So far... good timing on the Canadian Oil Trusts. The 'threat' to further tax at a later date is always a latent threat. Demonstrations of impinging doom provide buying opportunities. (I got mine 5% under my limit bid!)
11.11.06 Armistice Day Went to an estate sale and picked up a copy of General Pershing's summary of the plan that won World War I. A fascinating juxtaposition amidst the nightmare series of fubarious error that has to date defined the latest forays into Iraq and Afghanistan. Amazing how simple yet sound a plan we effected in Europe during the nineteen-teens for a decisive victory compared to the incredibly complicated failure menu we have served up over in the middle east.
11.9.06 Divorce, Republican Style The 'Compassionate Conservatives', the Conservatives, and the regular ol' folks that thought they had a chance at a better life see the Neo-Cons throw a monkey wrench into the works. The loss of confidence in the Neo-cons over the war crimes and other treasonous acts has resulted in their response: throwing the election. The administration could have easily saved the senate and a few seats in the house if they fired Rumsfield a couple weeks ago. The fact that they waited until the election results were in showed their true colors - complete destruction of our country is their only goal, and they're doing a fine job of it. Some hope for gridlock. Unfortunately, both sides will continue to work together to bring the destruction of our once fine Republic into a more rapid decent into a certain demise. The investigations of the war crimes will be a sham - though the crimes are certainly real enough. After significant bread and circus the teams will continue to ramrod shoddy legislation through the gullet. First on is the immigration 'reform', which shall certainly provide amnesty for all the illegals currently over on this side of the fence.
Then the social promises will follow, enticing those folks who have not had yet enough incentive to cross the border yet. Bringing millions of more folks currently living south of the border onto our tax rolls is the only way to 'grow' our way out of the crippling foreign debt we have accrued to finance the folly war and all the other social programs that the 'compassionatistas' have promised as far as the eye can see. Of course, there is another way...
The Chinese and Japanese will soon begin to take over private control of our best native publicly-traded companies, especially commodity producing firms. Given the amount of our fiat in their treasury, they can re-patriate debt into what's left of our production capacity, buying up the remaining producer firms on the cheap - as it was designed all along...
11.8.06 Mercury in Transit In front of the sun. Won’t happen again until 2016. More interesting is the timing of the next Venus transit in 2012.
11.8.06 US Elections I’d write ‘same old, same sold’ but in reality – it gets worse every election…
11.7.06 Voting is Easy Living with the results is not.
11.6.06 Nice time to buy an artificially de-valued Canadian Royalty Trust. I got mine (ERF at $40.0)
11.2.06 Gold had a nice breakout this week, technically. The fundamentals look neutral to me. Both of these are improved since my bearishness on gold on 8.12.06. In that analysis I was right on regarding oil and metals but completely underestimated the ability to move the Dow index at will, prior to an election. Also, the real estate bubble is deflating little faster than I had expected (hoped?) and therefore some of that money is rolling into presumably safe, secure, stodgy, dividend-paying stocks. Certainly not a ringing endorsement of the capital markets.
Looking as GS as proxy right now for the financial sector. Right on support and could go either way...
10.28.06 The Ballad of Casey Serin Another Chapter of Chasing the Dragon. A 24 year old man from Sacramento with bigger dreams. Went bankrupt trying the Carleton Sheets (and others) style by buying and flipping houses.
Too much, too fast, too greedy.
Microcosm, USA.
http://iamfacingforeclosure.com/
10.28.06 David M. Walker Finally an honest man emerges from the federal government cesspool. Walker, chief of the Government Accounting Office, is currently on a country-wide tour exploring the full depths of our financial quagmire. Iraq and Afghanistan provide soothing comic relief compared to the financial disaster lapping at our doorstep.
10.22.06 My Credit Card Lowered the minimum payment due by 50%! Now I can go tens of thousands in debt and not pay it back for the next 6,567 years! Time to leverage into the Dow 24,000! What a plan...
(When the credit firms have been reduced to the point they attempt extracting a profit from those folks who can actually pay off their card in full every month, you know the systemic risk asteroid has just entered their radar screen. 50,000 feet and closing in fast...)
10.18.06 The Smell of Fear ...in the housing market, is the only smell that masks the ubiquitous scent of greed.
10.13.06 Nevada Mining Month? Did a web search and couldn't find out anything about Nevada Mining Week this year. It typically is the last week of October, ending with Nevada Day. However, this year I could find NO information on Nevada Mining Week 2006. So, I called the Nv. Division of Minerals. Debby was very helpful. She covered her sources and called around and got back to me. Apparently the Governor is to busy to sign the proclamation this year, so no 'official' week. Therefore, Mercury deems October - Nevada Mining Month. Next year will begin Nevada Partial Mining Millennium. Better start working on the promo...
10.12.06 Gotta admit, They can keep the Dow high as long as they want to. Until they can't. Gotta love election hanky panky. Cheap gas too!
10.6.06 Very high level of puts on the general US equities (SPY etc.) today Some big money making big bets that the markets are headed much lower, soon.
9.29.06 Real Estate Market Sure has been an interesting two years in the RE market. In just the past three years I have watched home prices in our neighborhood rise by 150k, and now decline 75k.
Will be some nice deals out there in another 18 months or so…
I like how last months new home sales were reported as up 4.1%. That follows July’s new home sales reported as down 4.3% (which was further revised to down 7.5%). Amazing really, inventories are highest they have been since 1983 – all major homebuilders are suffering from excess inventory, and the new home sale figure is up 11.6% in one month!
I guess they need to make up something to report on MSNBC between the commercials…
9.28.06 Detainee House and Senate Vote Actual supporters of liberty and freedom lost another major fight yesterday. The house and senate agreed to let the POTUS lock up anyone they like, without proper trial by jury or any other requirement held in the Bill of Rights, define torture, use torture to the best of the administrations' judgment (and that judgment, or lack thereof, has been exceedingly an excruciatingly well established) .
I expect the populace will resoundingly approve of this new low in the American experiment - devolving quickly into an authoritarian nightmare, by once again voting for the same representatives of satan in the next general election come November.
9.25.06 Nice to see my Alma Mater, UC Davis Receive a grant from Barrick Gold
Corp, in the tune of a cool 1MillionUSD, to establish the Barrick McLaughlin
Natural Reserve. support and advance produce restoration and reclamation studies for the next 100 years. As UCD gains an even larger foothold and name recognition in the international economics arena. The US reclamation science will eventually become one of our proudest exports to the current large gold producing areas of today.
9.24.06 War On The Citizens Read the passage about the National Intelligence Assessment speaking to Iraq as a training ground for the next generation of Islamic radical terrorists, as if that wasn’t the plan all along…
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. authorities have arrested a New York man for broadcasting Hizbollah television station al-Manar, which has been designated a terrorist entity by the U.S. Treasury Department, prosecutors said on Thursday. Javed Iqbal, 42, was arrested on Wednesday because his Brooklyn-based company HDTV Ltd. was providing New York-area customers with the Hizbollah-operated channel, federal prosecutors said in a statement.
It did not say how long Iqbal's company had been providing satellite broadcasts of al-Manar, which the U.S. Treasury Department in March had designated as Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity, making it a crime to conduct business with al-Manar. Iqbal has been charged with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act
9.17.06 Status The war of northern aggression, the war on honest money, the war on drugs, the war on poverty, the war on terrorism are all chapters of the same book of The War on he American Model of the Democratic Republic.
Only fairly recently has the battle had to spill upon foreign shores. This current phase is not so much about supporting the hegemony of the us dollar as it is support of the war model.
The concurrent subjugation of the bill of rights is a highly advantageous bonus, in that the assault was victorious through the flanks and not through a messy frontal assault.
9.13.06 Air America went bankrupt. No big surprise there. Too bad NPS doesn't have to compete in the market place. Klose, the NPR CEO cut his teeth pushing the party line and propaganda with Voice of America, Radio Free EuropeTV Marti, etc.) Guess he hasn't really changed his stripes too much. Some member stations receive up to 20% funding through the government corporation, Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Moreover, NPR and the NPR Foundation are under common control - namely, the control of Herman who just also happens to manage JP Morgan.
Big Money. Big Government. Big Programs. Big Brother.
9.11.06 Believe it if you need to...
9.7.06 Operator of US Polling Firm Convicted on Conspiracy Charge The majority of those semi-useful idiots who claim conspiracy is impossible, because nobody can keep a secret, forget three things: 1. Many indictments and convictions are for Conspiracy, not actions. 2. For every one indicted, numerous evade inept law enforcement, successfully bribe such, or simply evade detection. 3. The masses simply don't have the time, ability or inclination to keep tabs on what is really going on around them. Nobody needs to keep a secret when the common Jane and Joe ignore the bloated elephant carcass rotting in the middle of their living room.
From Connecticut Post: 9.7.06
"Tracy Costin, 46, of Madison, admitted to U.S. District Judge Janet C. Hall that she participated in a conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Costin, who owned and operated DataUSA, a survey and polling firm with offices in West Haven and Guilford, faces up to five years in prison when she is sentenced Nov. 30."
Note, I conducted door-to-door surveys and data collection for six different outfits, including the US Census, between 1985 and 2000. This conspiracy charge is hardly a pimple on the dead elephant's ass. The Commerce department essentially lies to the field staff, regularly, and makes up demographic data to suit the current political winds. Just one man's experience. But experience it is, not conspiracy...
9.2.06 Went long a smidgen of Du Jour Enterprises Gas and Uranium properties. As in the gold sector, producing mining companies have been buying up junior explorers with potential productive properties since the major producers have spent very little money on exploration during the energy and commodity bear that lasted 20 years and just ended a couple short years ago.
Hard to tell how good an entry point this is based on price and volume, but I'm hoping the fundamentals and seasonals help the potential swing trade term into a nice hold.
8.31.06 Let myself wander into this analogy – life as a journey. Some might feel that life is a journey up the mountain and back down the mountain, over and over again, or up other hills, through the valley, and then again up other mountains.. Going up the peak is difficult and presents challenges and growth. At the top of the hill, the Arete, things look magnificent – the view and our position within the landscape command respect, and we master over our own domain. The path down the hillside also presents challenges and the decline from strength. The path again grades rocky and steep – the knees ache and the load becomes heavier with every switchback.
Some folks might speculate that life much more resembles a path along the road. One route is more enjoyable, slow, easy, and represents the good, the satisfying the quality experience we all seek to have and then grasp to remember as “The Good Old Days” from fuzzier vantage points in the future when reality darkens a bit. The road along the path represents the more difficult, hectic, fast paced lifestyle we must struggle on to get ahead, stay even, or just-not-fall-too-behind- on. Work, struggle, false starts and stop and go, and inevitably – an accident. That sound of destruction amid one dark and dire moment. The accidents crush steel against fragile skin and bone, wreaking grief, suffering and death.
The two tracks continue indefinitely into the horizon. There is always some aspect of our life that is going well; where we are sated, happy and respected. So too, another challenge along the road always jumps in front of us, unexpected, perplexing, vexing and causes twists and turns we wish never appeared. Always we struggle with some part of our life that needs improvement at best, or careens out of control, in the wrong gear, going the wrong way. The good and the bad happen simultaneously on different stretches of the road and the path next to each other.
Then, allow me to present a third analogy and the one that rings true this last day of August 2006. Life is the journey along a:
Ppath/River/ROAD/Lane.Highway.ScenicByWay.Narrowpass/Trail/raiL/sidewalk/two-track. The path’s surface, makeup and constitution constantly changes and undulates, as does the scenery and the weather and our company and our pace and our direction and our goal and our weariness and our enjoyment of such.
Yet one thing remains constant – the mechanics. One foot moves in front of the other, even when you are walking backwards. Even when you are going up-hill or down-hill. Even when you are gaining speed, or losing speed. Even when you laugh at the scenery or cry with the rain. Still, one foot is on the ground and one foot is not – moving ahead- searching- leading –seeking – hesitant - sure- looking for the next piece of path to claim, as ones own position in the universe (if even for a partial second) - that place between where we were and where we are going known as the present: here and now. One foot knows, one foot doubts. One foot feels, one foot flails. One foot stays, one foot searches, One foot rises, one foot falls. One foot leads, one foot follows. One foot enjoys the here and now, one foot breaches tomorrow.
Yet, every once in a while, something entirely different intrudes our mechanical and steady gait.
And we jump…
8.12.06 Market Sell Signals!
Things don't look so hot for equity market, so I am immediately going 20% cash (10% money market and 10% 6 month and 1-year CDs) and will be prepared to increase the cash position. I am willing to take a sure 3-4% vs the risk I see staying in the equities for the next 12-18 months.
1. Fundamentals
The widening yield curve (3 month T-bill vs 10 year Note) shows that liquidity has been drying up since the beginning of July. This may revert for the next few months, but there certainly doesn't appear to be any large source of money entering the equity markets. Some had postulated that a softening housing market would allow more funds to enter the equities, but they forgot to figure that the folks must get their money out first. The real estate days on market has increased incredibly in the last 10 months, so folks don't have the cash they hoped to cash out with. For that matter, the money on margin from low fed funds rates and the home-equity-line of credit acting as automatic teller machine has effectively taken out that supply of margin money. At best, the money supply treads water for the next quarter.
Interest Rate Pause Ben Benanke. Let's face it, he had no chance whatsoever correcting Greenspan's Nero-esque behavior. Bernanke is a likely candidate to get heart-attacked before his natural demise.
In mid-July, when 'Helicopter Benny' Bernanke was trying out his vocal cords on the new fed bully pulpit in front of actual people, the paper markets panicked and folks fled to the existing exits, some flying straight into the bond market. The yield on the 10year TIPS results had a tradable drop. Results: bid coverage down the porcelain throne and a drop in almost 30 basis points. Nobody wanted the gruel served that day. Bid coverage firmed up much more last week, following the pause in rate increases.
So, where exactly are those dealers afraid of the 'wage inflation' the Fed keeps rambling on (dramatizing) about?
Short term (since May), bonds and dollar rose off a double bottom, and have jut recently filled the upside gap. What portends for the short term future? Does the TIPS action today provide any indication of tomorrow, or just 2016?
Look at that ugly yield curve. Get the automatic external defibrillator out boys... http://www.treas.gov/offices/domestic-finance/debt-management/interest-rate/yield_historical.shtml
30-yr tails off, despite their earlier efforts to prop up the newborn as the next contender (har)! Although, as posted in May, all yields are up with the curious exceptions of both the 1 month and the 30 year. How can they simultaneously be going down? The shadow knows.
(hint, the 30 yr really just turned; re-introduced this year after many years absent, it found external support, but hasn't lasted..
The US dollar actually had a very strong week. Technically, it will meet resistance soon at 85.75, the 50 DMA. If the dollar cannot bullishly pierce that resistance, the buck may head to last summer's double bottom off 83.6
Corporate Earnings Reports Growth rate for corporate earnings is up almost 16%. Incredible really. Too incredible. What do you think they'll do for an encore in the third quarter - sprout wings?
Annual Performance: Year to Date Dow: Up 3.5% Nasdaq: Down 6.7% S&P up 1.5%.
Another below-average year performance for your investments, and another above-average year for the forces working against your purchasing power.
Election Rally Rally for who? The incumbents and their track record? The administration's stellar foreign policy record? The oppositions ability to actually propose something resembling actual difference of opinion? Let 'em all go ala Lieberman.
2. Seasonals and Technicals
Major Indices The Dow Jones Utilities Index (^DJU) has spikes up in the last four weeks, as is to be expected with the pause in interest rate hikes. The DJU should trade like a bond. Bonds have not, for over two years now, believed that there is any wage pressure in the pipeline. This is just one reason why the30yr bond has not moved
up despite 17 consecutive hikes in the short term fed funds rate.
Look at the double top in the ^DJT Dow Jones Transport Index. Not good. Even worse is the last six week performance, in a free-fall and down 20%! Even worse than that, there is no correlation with the ^DJI Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI). So you know the Plunge Protection Team (Working Group) is propping up the DJI for the newscasters to read on their 10minute 'finance' segment for all we wage-slaves to hear on our morning and evening commutes. The reality is, this negative divergence between the DJI and the DJT is very bearish. The 200-day moving average (DMA) support only provided the briefest respite on the DJT plummet. The DJI, even given the obvious support, still looks it will again penetrate through the 50 day to the downside. Meanwhile the 50 day average itself, which already bearishly pierced through the 100 day support, now is testing the 200-day support. I suppose we will get a 2 day or so rally, and then the 50 will pierce the 200 and the DJI will now begin its freefall. The DJI 200DMA has been in an uptrend for 36 months now, a great run - a nice cyclical bull in this secular bear, and now it looks over.
Interesting, the Nasdaq, which has performed the worse this year of all the major US indices, is closer to support - the bottom of the trend line that has held since October.
Oil Entering the seasonally weak period. However, that certainly wasn't the case last year. It can't go wrong two years in a row, can it? The supply chain just doesn't seem to be what it once was - the gravy train greasing all of our wheels. Decline in oil - especially gasoline prices, will supply some liquidity that the market seems to be calling for. Decreases in oil price could prove a bright point. Of course, plenty of analysts have been calling for lower oil prices for a solid year now, and none of them have been right for more than three weeks in a row. Also, natural gas has been gettin' uppity, again.
Metals The metals are moving out of the bearish summer blah period and entering the bullish period of the year. However, the stocks -especially gold - are not confirming (see recent posts on GLE for just one example), not conforming, and providing yet another negative divergence from the underlying commodity prices, which have done very well in the same 4-6 week period that I've been looking at. The seasonals support another nice bounce in metals, but I am not as sure this time around. So, gold is iffy - perhaps stays rangebound for the next couple weeks. After that, gold should again start performing. Copper and silver have continued strong. The base metal have actually outperformed the precious metals recently.
The HUI put in a large head and shoulders formation and now looks to trade off that pattern down through the higher rail of support that had formed the top of the andrew's pitchform/trend channel that held since April of this year. Has been a nice run at any rate and the gravity is getting stronger as the HUI approaches the 50 day EMA support once again. This 50 has held steady all year. Price action contained within a very nice symmetrical triangle must break out one way or another. However, I am not nearly so confident on the gold stocks. Of course, the four and eight year gold market cycles still provide great support, and the secular bull is probably note even half over (year seven of 16). An alternate take: gold trades down into options expiry, trading along the bottom of the triangle and then breaks through to the upside, setting up a nice leg up. Maybe 40% chance of this bullish play.
I am much more positive on silver. Note my new long silver position at 10.95 from July 27; we hit 12.37 this week before the sell-off in the last couple daze.
3. News
Hezbollah Wins The markets do not like the news. The defeat for the Israeli army is their first, and that changes the entire dynamic in the middle east, not very stable in the last 3-years anyway. A loss for the Israeli army is a loss for the US policy, standing in the world, dollar and market.
The strong retails sales figures (for july, up 1.4%) reflected the government economist penchant for dreaming up numbers out of thin air, nothing more. Take a look at the S&P Retail Index [^RLX] and tell me that the three year party isn't over and the guests are stumbling along now trying to find their way to a safe place to sleep it off for a few quarters. If the retails figures announced on the 11th actually held any water, that would actually be worse than the standard mistating/restating/bury the story on the back of page 126 cycle that the government figures typically receive. The reason: strong retail sales amongst a turn down of the index is yet another bearish divergence.
Terror Plot The market sold off on the news that the terror plot was broken up. Obviously, the market didn't believe this particular dog and pony show. Neither do I. They 'improve' security when the event happens, and they 'improve' security when there is a 'near-miss' event. So, when do they lower security and return to the freedom of movement actually demanded by free men and women? Guess there is no plan for that. Not many free men or women left for that matter anyway.
Just as likely, the airplane drama was a false flag and the real event will happen in a month or two...
And Iraq? The generals last week broke last year's story about the continuing low grade civil war now in its second year. Guess the same pre-war intelligence about the yellow cake and other WMD forgot to notice that Iraq was pieced together by the british using three distinctly separate ethnic and political groups. These groups were held together by the threat of a gun leveled by an autocrat. Now that the autocrat has been replaced by several hundred thousand guns yielded by the mini-crats, thangs are, um - a little less than stable? Perhaps the reason the utility stocks are strengthening in this country is that everybody now realizes we haven't built anything resembling an infrastructure in Iraq, and perhaps there's a chance to spend some time and money on our own crumbling infrastructure back here.
Yep, supposedly those crazy saudis took down our towers and 3,000 innocents on 911. So what did we do? Kill another 2,600 of our men and women, (and at least keeping another 125,000 off the unemployment rolls) And kill or maim another couple hundred thousand Iraqi civilians who would rather just get up in the morning and go to work. And destroy Iraq's infrastructure and promise to go another 50 years in hock to the chinese and japanese to pay for it all. Yep, we really showed them - eh?
Just as the Israeli air raids in Baalbeck caused damage to the ancient Roman temple of Bacchus, and the US mucked up much of the cradle of civilization between the Tigris and the Euphrates, the clear aim of the war drones one: waging anarchy against our civilization.
So, I don't know how many points the dow will go up or down in the next few weeks. But I do suspect the next 2,000 points will be in the down direction.
So, here's hoping I'm wrong. Nobody wishes that more than I...
8.11.06 Kovels changes their website and says I need a new password. I never heard of that before, looks like they lost this browser.
8.10.06 Glencairn Gold AMEX:GLE reports nice results Turns a profit, cost per ounce of gold is down and price realized per ounce is up. Still, the overall market is not being kind to any good news at the current time.
^DJI Dow Jones Industrial Average ^DJT Dow Jones Transport Index
8.2.06 glencairn GLE:AMEX Breaks out.
Through the 50DEMA, OBV bounces, through previous gap resistance, on large volume, etc. Look with your own eyes…
8.2.06 Silver: Negative divergence btw Physical and Paper (or wholesale and retail)
Although the wholesale (futures and spot) markets show strong silver demand based upon recent (two week) increase in POS, the price realized for physical at the last consumer point of sale end of the retail market has not reflected this action. I base this on weak figures realized for junk silver at auctions over the same period (ebay et. al.).
(we have not sold gold over the same period, so do not have that piece of analysis available)
7.29.06 Went to the Fremont Coin Show on Saturday The venue is the Elks club. Although the space is rather small, the hall maintains the bonus of maintaining an active bar and grill. Since the floor is pretty packed, you have trouble moving around the narrow and crowded aisles. This may provide the appearance that more people are there than the numbers would verify.
I found not only the crowd but the dealers were an older crowd that attended this show (compared to the Vallejo, Santa Clara, and San Jose shows earlier this year). Several talked about retirement. There were not as many young numismatist that you find at a larger show. One, benefit of a smaller show is that the display cases set up by the host coin club form a more prominent portion of the bourse and garner more attention then they might at a larger hall, deserved imho.
7.27.06 Went long silver at 10.95. See what happens...
7.27.06 Price of gold in USD is up 50% in last 52 weeks, give or take.
That performance is an aberration, improbable, and generally not supposed to happen. All in all, just a sign - showing the way and lighting the path where further events yet shall unfold.
Other signs: Dow Transports not participating in this rally - negative divergence.
Yesterday at the courthouse, auction for houses in default. Nobody showed up at the auction. Five of the seven were pulled b.c. owners declared bankruptcy.
Our current man on the mound - Stagflation - is just the middle inning reliever. A solid workhorse. A consummate and proven journeyman known to have enough in the tank to burn up a few innings. He's just getting warmed up, really, and will throw some nasty sliders and curves toward poor ol' baffled mr. market and especially Joe and Jane wage-earner.
The setup man is yet to come.
And the closer...
7.20.2006 The proposed bill to 'Remove the darned penny from circulation' Actually has a much deeper and more damaging purpose: To put the US Mint and other US Department of Treasury Operations (Bureau of Engraving and Printing) under the control of a private corporation, the Federal Reserve. The pol introducing this 'legislation', Jim Kolbe of AZ, is committing treason. No other description of this activity need apply (for a rapidly shrinking job pool) .
7.16.06 Our bankrupt national corporation Professor Laurence Kotlikoff speaks the mind of the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis.
Essentially, he pointed out that the USA, inc. is bankrupt; and proves it. Of course, this was the goal and benchmark of the Federal Reserve when it was established in 1913. Mission Accomplished!
7.16.06 Housing Market Index
Represents the beating that housing builders have taken in the market and the brutality that new home sales people have taken in the field. One major western homebuilder sold 40 homes in their market so far this year, after selling over 220 this same period last year.
Here is a graphic representation: http://bullandbearwise.com/HousingMarketIndChart.asp
7.13.06 Bonds get a shot in the arm.
Today: as the markets panic and folks flee to the exist, some fly straight into the bond market. The yield has a tradeable drop even as the 10year TIPS results come out today. Results: bid coverage down the porcelain throne and a drop in almost 30 basis points. Nobody wanted the gruel served today.
So, where exactly are those dealers afraid of the 'wage inflation' the Fed keeps rambling on (dramatizing) about!
Short term (since May), bonds and dollar rose off a double bottom, and have jut recently filled the upside gap. What portends for the short term future? Does the TIPS action today provide any indication of tomorrow, or just 2016?
Look at that ugly yield curve. Get the automatic external defibrillator out boys...
http://www.treas.gov/offices/domestic-finance/debt-management/interest-rate/yield_historical.shtml
30-yr tails off, despite their earlier efforts to prop up the newborn as the next contender (har)! Although, as posted in May, all yields are up with the curious exceptions of both the 1 month and the 30 year. How can they simultaneously be going down? The shadow knows.
(hint, the 30 yr really just turned; re-introduced this year after many years absent, it found external support, but hasn't lasted.
toil trouble paper bubble...
7.8.06 Today's headlines?
Some 'less developed' countries have enormous raw material resources which will earn for them billions of dollars of foreign exchange reserves over the next decade. Several Arab oil producing countries will earn more money than they can usefully employ for their own development. These countries will certainly have the potential for moving billions of dollars from one money market to another for economic or political reasons.
Oil as a Weapon
What it all adds up to is that there is a sellers market for oil and, at this time in history, oil producing states are in a very strong bargaining position with the west, whose dependency on Middle East oil is growing daily. If the West is concerned about the extent of Arab oil producing states with respect to how they will use their money, it is understandable in the light of vitriolic anti-American press which keeps talking about using 'oil as a weapon' in the battle against imperialism.
* A noteworthy sidebar from the same publication: "The Committee of Twenty, an IMF ground established to work out the reform of the international monetary system, has only one Arab member. The Arab states feel they are under-represented."
Today's headlines?
Nope, from: The International Monetary Crisis. Committee on Finance, US Senate. Russell B. Long. Chair. May 1973.US Govt. Printing Office.
7.7.06 Should the penny be removed from commerce?
well, A one ounce gold American Eagle has a denomination of $50 whereas the market value is roughly $630.
Is this a problem?
Um, yep.
But don't take my word for it...
Let's see what Charles Jenkinson had to say about the general subject in A Treatise on Coins of the Realm:
"A difficulty then existed, and continues to exist, which must necessarily be removed, before any plan can be adopted for the improvement of the silver I have already observed, that silver and gold, in reference to each other, are estimated at Your Majesty's mint at a different value or price, than these metals are generally sold for at market. As long as this difference subsists, both of these metals will not be brought, in a sufficient quantity to the mint to be coined: that mineral will only be brought which is estimated at the lowest value with reference to the other: and Coins of both metal cannot be sent into circulation at the same time, without exposing the public to the traffic of one sort of coin against the other; by which the traders in money would make a considerable profit, to the great detriment of Your Majesty's subjects. And this mischievous practice, and the frauds committed in carrying it on, are the more to be apprehended in this country, where the Mint is free: - that is: where every one has the right to bring gold or silver to the mine to be converted into coin; not at the charge of the person who so brings it, but of the public: for, ...the charge of coining Gold and Silver has been born by the public; and, contrary to the practice of most other countries, no seignorage has been taken. To prevent this evil, it is necessary to determine, whether there must be a standard, or superior Coin, made of one metal only; and whether the coins of other metals must not be made, and take their value, with reference to this standard Coin, and become subservient to it; - and, in such case, of what metal this standard Coin, to which the pre-eminence and preference are to be given, should be made."
Now, substitute copper for silver (or metal - such as it is, for paper notes) and talk about removing the modern cent from circulation...
In the 1950's, Japan introduced aluminum coinage into circulation for the first time in her history.
Source: Coins through the Ages. Laurence Brown. Bonanza Books. New York. 1961
A better solution, but politically unpalatable, is for the US to call a spade a spade and devalue the US 'dollar' (the Federal Reserve Note) by one significant digit. At one point a (large) cent could buy a loaf of bread. A loaf of bread nowadays is $3. So, . knock off two digits from the dollar, and that FRN would be worth what a post 1982 cent is worth today - one cent. Although, you would still need 3.5 cents to buy the loaf of bread, look at it this way, now the loaf comes with slices so it is 'value added', part of the productivity daydream nightmare that has allowed flawed logic to devalue the dollar some 97%.
The marketplace last devalued paper relative to metal in 1964 and 1965. According to Burton Hobson in International Guide to Coin Colleting, [First Edition. New American Library. New York. 1966]:
"..we had a coin shortage so severe that commercial banks at one point were forced to offer a few cents' premium for every dollar's worth of coins turned in, so that payrolls could be met and change made to the penny."
At some point the Red Note FRN will circulate outside the country at some discount, or premium to, the domestically traded greenback. We may as well position ourselves for this eventuality and influence its due course to whatever degree possible.
7.7.06 Don't take my word for it:
The Silver Dollar Epitaph Born - 1794 Died - 1935 Buried - 1964
- William L. Graham Jr.
The Silver Crisis. Hickory Press. Lake Forest. Il. 1964. 134 pages. Softcover.
"At the end of February, 1933, just before we went off the gold standard, there were in the United States a little over 8 Billion Dollars of money (aside from that held in the US Treasury). Of this sum about two-and a third billion dollars consisted of gold coins and gold certificates."
- Edwin W. Kemmerer. Kemmerer on Money. John Winston Company. Chicago. 1933. Hardcover. 197 pages. With the following inscription: -Dedicated to the Memory of Grover Cleveland: A fearless and valiant champion of sound money. No wonder Cleveland is seldom mentioned in the top five presidential rankings...
"The evil effects of such decline (silver and gold against available commercial monetary expanse) were enormously increased by the shortsighted, crafty manipulation of currency by the european rulers. ..and by the inability of the age to understand, or even to perceive, the hidden working of two metals see-sawing against each other -acting as levers against each cutting each others throats. The discovery of America corrected the fall of prices and saved europe, but it left her rulers as deadly ignorant as before of the workings of bi-metalism to give a name to what they had not even perceived as a phenomenon, much less system."
The History of Currency: 1252-1896. W.A. Shaw.
7.7.06 Why did Nevada's water engineer retire last month? Maybe, because a whole new round of depositions and lawsuits is just beginning.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/2006/jul/07/566676994.html
7.7.06 To bad there is no helium, gold, or oil in N. Korea
Besides, their role serves a great purpose. Ask him what it is: Lil'Kim@aol.com
7.5.06 Death of Kenny Lay - Enron According to script - dead man tell no tales. First by suicide and the next by heart attack. Justice the american way! Of course, his death after a conviction but before appeal process negates the conviction and therefore his estate remains intact. Hence, his heirs have the most to gain by his timely death.
Have you seen his body? They showed a picture of al Zarqawi, now didn't they.
counterintelligence psy-ops already on the ball. Nice timing. It takes time to develop a website (take our work for it). Probably started development on the site the same time the work order for the hit was put in.
http://www.kenlayisalive.org/
7.4.06 What used to be one of my favorite holidaze - Independence Day now gets me depressed...
6.30.06 GLE Glencairn @.66 5 Day trade = 15%+. If you're into that sort of thing...
'specially since the money came out of MRB after the 8 day 13% thingy.
Swing that sector round and round. One go up and 1 go down. Traders fade and faders call Nambla the clown.
http://www.kitcomm.com/comments/gold/2006q2/2006_06/1060623.132850.mercuryee.htm
6.30.06 Went to the local smut emporium today (bank of america)
took all the half-dollars the merchant desk and all other tellers had = six in total two were 1968s.
1965-1970 Kennedy Half Designer: Gilroy Roberts (obverse); Frank Gasparro (reverse) Weight (grams): 11.5 Weight (grains): 178 Size: 30.6 mm Composition: 40% silver, 60% copper Total Silver Content (oz.): 0.1480
when they ask why i want half dollars, i tell 'em that i use 'e, for poker chips. They just don't know which game im playing them... a. pokerino b. make the teller search every single drawer in the bank on a friday rush hour (theirs, not mine) for six lousy coins, costing them at least the price of admission and all those fees they frag and tag every time they've tried to slam my account over the years (about a dozen). c. silver mining the easy way
6.30.06 Bill Jones, former California Secretary of State and a California Central Valley Farmer for decades pushes his company Pacific Ethanol, Inc. (PEIX) as both Founder and Chairman of the Board. Also doesn't hurt that he can appear with the Arnold as he pushes for sustainable development, energy independence and infrastructure re-generation in one fell swoop speech.
6.30.06 Teck Cominco hiring at the Pogo mine in Alaska.
guess they aren't too worried about the cleanup case going against them at lake roosevelt.
6.23.06 nice to walk through the bourse with a jingle in the vest pocket and have a little cash over the weekend. have a feeling monday will bring a little surprise...
6.23.06 usually when i walk away from the craps table with a nice profit from the pass line i leave a couple wild proposition bets on the table one for me and one for my friends.
vem.v gle
your roll...
6.23.06 sold the trading position in MRB 13% in 8 trading days. works for me and those without the patience to wait another 15 months for another double... now i gata watch that dirty wash rule. spin.rinse.repeat. cackle.act.retreat infantry.armor.fleet.
For those that don't understand why I would sell short time here while holding core position:
my 8 day trade met target. around roof of mouth 8 times. 6.23.06 sold half position in KMG Up 33% just today on 10x volume over buyout news. The other half position is now free.
You had three chances to get in (4.13.05, 4.4.05, 10.22.04), how many do you need to book the profit?
No need to thank me now great grandchildren...
6.23.06 American Scene started showcasing Vena Resources Almost 4% pop on 10k shares, about $5k in trade.
6.16.06 Right about here I like titanium.
6.16.06 Poor Kennedy Not only did JF Kennedy get offed over his introduction of the US note, backed by silver, to replace the Federal Reserve Not, the re-introduction of the Silver Dollar ( 1964 Peace Dollar ) upset the wrong people. US mint actually produced the 64 Dollar, supposedly destroying them all. Congress, owned by all the right people, followed up with the coinage act of 1965 and accelerated the debasement we enjoy today. fwiw. 6.16.06 Yes silver bars will sink in sandy soil The depth/time depends on many factors. Metal flakes, however will rise ( as do glass and porcelain ) . Before digging to find your bars, please consider some electromagnetic work such as a plain old metal detector with the right coils and discrimination. Should that fail, consider a more robust version, EM61 ( time domain ) . Failing those, ground penetrating radar could provide some help, depending on several factors. Given shallow groundwater, refraction is probably out of bound.
6.16.06 Sacrilege Wrigley field goes wireless...
6.15.06 Walker Paiute Tribe caves! Allows DOE to -study- putting in railway across their nation to service Yucca Mountain nu-ku-lar suppository.
big story told by nobody.
what were once oral traditions sustaining and nourishing generations multitudinal now can't get carried by the fourth-rate blogs...
6.14.06 Western Treasurers moving around Ca Treasurer running against Arnold. Nv Treasurer likely to head economic development, after the election.
6.13.05 Northern Nevada Power infrastructure The new power plant at Tracy currently has a CTC of 450M; will run a cool half billion dollars by switch-flipping time. Meanwhile, the operators and management haven't had a contract for about a year now.
6.13.06 Libertarian National Convention July 1,2 in Portland, Ore.
6.13.06 Met a woman whose husband is running a logging business in Libby. He left the Lone Tree Mine (newmont - winnemucca) b.c. the Libby forestry gig was going great guns (even though Lone Tree is now in reclamation, he had other opportunities with NEM locally. Go figure...
6.13.06 Folks are getting nervous in downtown Reno, Not the sniper - the condominium projects. Clooney's wet dream project for 3,500 units in downtown vegas had the plug pulled. Right now in Reno there are no fewer than 4 major condominium projects underway at four former mid-tier casinos: flamingo hilton, sundowner, comstock, and showboat. A grand loss of six craps tables and for what?
6.13.06 One lousy sniper in downtown Reno and they shut down the court system for the day.
When the plane crashed on the strip in '85 they never shut down the airport.
Too bad they don't shut down the state legislature gang of 63 passes another insane piece of tripe.
Some thought the swat team mobilization caused traffic gridlock but mercury sayeth the perpetual downtown construction (this years version includes sierra, virginia and first. They made a big boo-boo routing mill into a one-way street while closing down third. This will cost productivity in the long run.).
The alleged sniper owns a downtown jewelry store. They used to sell some bullion here and there. Guess the place is in receivership. That block once had about seven places to buy bullion. Now down to two...
6.13.06 Yep, I'm buying a snifter of gold stocks today First time the little
bull/gambler/fire sign in me steps up in a while within our fair sector. the sanitary sewer force main, fundamentals intact, and my core position is still up over 300% allowing a very wide mental stop on this little batch of cream over porridge ..bl.bla..blah...
6.9.06 On the passing of Wayne Hage (RIP) The sagebrush soldiers mourn the loss of a leader. Nice write up here:
http://www.sierratimes.com/06/06/08/waynehage.htm
I would attend the ceremony myself 'cept for some personal biz saturday near pyramid lake that requires my attention.
Anyone who has not curried the pleasure of visiting the monitor valley, toiyabe, arc dome and environs may struggle with landing a grasp on what it means to understand what is worth preserving, what is worth using, what is worth passing on, and what is worth fighting for...
6.9.06 nem and abx come together, again to fund Northern Nv education.
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/06/08/news/local_news/news1.txt
In January 04 I mentioned that the same two companies had come together to fund a MBA chair. Last year I told you about their mimical entry into the Nv power generation business. This year I told you about the identical forays into the Nv land development business. They're making very similar moves, in preparation of merging cultures, in preparation of merging companies.
6.9.06 Casino chips are supposedly the fastest growing segment of exonumia
6.9.06 E*trade messed up my tax form 5498, again. Second time in three years. When I called the initial phone serf miffedly stated that I simply could fix it on line. So, I asked her to show me how whereupon she immediately transferred me to her supervisor who yet again had to transfer me to another department to verify their error. Watch them closely, they usually lie - often after their own errors.
The good thing about e*trade messing up so often is that it forces me to pay more attention to my trading follow through. Similar to golf and other sports of clubs. And therefore I tend to think of the trade and visualize the consequences (fixing their errors, once again) before I trade; hence reducing my trading. This keeps me from overtrading, a dangerous hobby, especially in this market. Which in turn lets me go outside and enjoy the burgeoning summer. Have fun!
6.8.06 Occasionally I feed genuinely bad for the anti-miners. Their scripts provoke images of a 20-year old eastern US state school junior wearing a 'che' shirt at the cafe roma, sipping on NON-SHADE GROWN latte, madly typing in the mac notebook (full of precious metal components).
egad, imagine if the dirty gold contingency somehow found a writer that passed earth science 101.
what fun we could have.
6.7.06 Received this chain mail from an unlikely source today (anti gold) Subject: keeping waters clean in Chile: Valle de San Felix
In the Valle de San Felix, the purest water in Chile runs from 2 rivers, fed by 2 glaciers. Water is a most precious resource, and wars will be fought for it. Indigenous farmers use the water, there is no unemployment, and they provide the second largest source of income for the area.
Under the glaciers has found a huge deposit of gold, silver and other minerals. To get at these, it would be necessary to break, to destroy the glaciers - something never conceived of in the history of the world - and to make 2 huge holes, each as big as a whole mountain, one for extraction and one for the mine's rubbish tip.
The project is called PASCUA LAMA. The company is called Barrick Gold. The operation is planned by a multi-national company, one of whose members is George Bush Senior. The Chilean Government has approved the project to start this year, 2006. The only reason it hasn't started yet is because the farmers have got a temporary stay of execution. If they destroy the glaciers, they will not just destroy the source of especially pure water, but they will permanently contaminate the 2 rivers so they will never again be fit for human or animal consumption because of the use of cyanide and sulphuric acid in the extraction process.
Every last gram of gold will go abroad to the multinational company and not one will be left with the people whose land it is. They will only be left with the poisoned water and the resulting illnesses. The farmers have been fighting a long time for their land, but have been forbidden to make a TV appeal by a ban from the Ministry of the Interior.
Their only hope now of putting brakes on this project is to get help from international justice. The world must know what is happening in Chile. The only place to start changing the world is from here.
6.7.06 Whiners Bunch of folks holding gold complaining that the wheels are coming off the handcart. Look back to December 04 when gold fell 10%, and then went up almost 60% in 15 months. Lotta whiners crying then too, when they could've bought between 460 and 410. You ever heard one of them say: boy, i sure was a wanker back then pitchin a fit into my root beer. but i cowgirled up and bought a few ounces and turned 50% profit in 14 months.
Nope, NOT ONE!
How 'bout the time the same wankers got their knickers wrapped up in the agitator during april 04 when gold corrected a lousy 15% or so. Same exact thing. Don't yer bitchin self circa april 04 wished you had the balz to buy a couple shiny ones circa POG 377 touching that sweet old trendline?
Hindsight is 20/20, so take some of mine: I am currently looking back at today's action from Sept 7th 2007 and tellin' your 15month older self: don't you wish you salted away a few nuggets when gold briefly shadow kissed $620?
6.6.06 Comex and LBMA Looking at reported actions on the COMEX, appears there aren't enough fools in the circus stands anymore who will lay down hard cash on the billet for the COMEX "promise to deliver". Paper burns. 6.3.06 Sign of the housing boom ending? Class Action Suit against Ameriquest for ‘predatory lending’; fabrication of borrower income: $325M (only the second largest US mortgage settlement. Largest was against Household Intl.)
Sign of short term peak in POO
Calls for –excess profits - tax
6.3.06 Goldman Sachs names new CEO The little princess, Blankfein, started as a gold trader in 1981. Note the date! (he oversaw a 19-year orderly commodity decline. lucky timing on his part?)
5.28.06 Talk Radio Show: Status of our State The host had been talking about purchase of counterfeit handbags and other accessories, primary the type serving as decotage on young women who shop the streets in front of former sweat shops in Manhattan, as all the new schwag emanates in asia. All the women queried said they would buy counterfeit goods, assuming the quality was similar to the actual merchandise, given the chance. Why not, you could spend only 5% on the counterfeit compared to the real thing, the logic went. None of the women queried stated they had not purchased counterfeit goods at some point in the past.
Then the caller comes on the line. The host queried had she bought counterfeit goods in the past. The caller replied that , naturally, she had seen fit to save 90-95% off retail price off actual intellectual property since it suited her finances.
Then the call got rather interesting, you see the caller had raised a complaint against her doctors. She had shopped around for a 'medical procedure' and had gotten quotes for about $5,550 -8,000 for the procedure (breast job?). Finding the price of not having procedure outweighing the cost of having the procedure, she underwent the operation knowing in advance that her medical insurer would not cover the procedure.
Then, the caller receives a notice of payment from her insurance company. Seems that the insurance company did, in fact, cover a portion of the procedure. Most interesting, the doctor office billed the insurance company for almost 17K, more than double the original quote for $5,550 -8,000 the procedure would have cost if the woman paid for it out of her own pocket.
Now, none of us should be overly surprised on this account given the known level of fraud and waste in the medical and insurance industries today.
However, the call increased the interest factor when the caller went on to state how she called the insurance company and explained that the doctor office engaged in fraud with the insurance company. And what do you think the insurance reps told her?
"Why do you care?"
That's right, no only did the insurance company reps not care about just another example of fraud and waste in the system, nor were they interested in pursing this criminal conduct and fraud against their company, buy they chided the caller for even getting involved in their little piece of the world and potentially rocking the boat.
The caller was beside herself with anger and planed on whistle-blowing against both the doctors office and insurance company.
However, my sense is she was just disappointed that she couldn't figure out a way to have some of the gravy ladles her way.
Apparently, the mores today state that its fine for the customer to engage in fraud when the customer gets a cut of the action (counterfeit), but when the customer is an unknowing part of the equation - suddenly the moral justice issue holds sway.
5.27.06 American Financial Literacy Type the following into yahoo and see the results:
"Virginia Company History": 411 hits "American Idol Winner": 705,000 hits
Any questions?
5.26.06 Mining occasionally proves a hazardous occupation. Though success stories carry water. One year anniversary of nine american miners in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
http://www.peacocksgalore.com/quecreekminerescue/index.html
5.25.06 The issue of biodiesel and methanol Has now, like so many issues, been construed and disfigured into a battle - driven by corporate money and weal politician, exemplified by two positions with geographic bias. The biodiesel faction, though originating in the US midwest, now has major support and impetus in the western US, especially northern California. The main proponents of biodiesel are us citizens looking to make a better living for themselves. The main methanol proponents: Cargill, Monsanto and Archer Daniels-Midland. They fund a series of billboards across Missouri and Kansas (I was there last week) that show on one side - Joe farmer with his soy crops in the background and on the other side of the billboard a Saudi Sheik. The tagline caption is "Who would you rather buy gas from?".
To bad Joe farmer doesn't realize that Cargill, Monsanto and Archer Daniels-Midland get their cut first, and the american farming family gets stuck with the genetically modified detritus via adhesion contract...
5.14.06 @ Stu Taylor Boy, he is spreading his wings. Usually rather straight-laced. Last week his show had some guy talking about prophecy and this week was about the US going south quickly and how to acquire some gold and silver.
5.14.06 Q: How much does gold cost today? A: Depends
Today, in Firenze (Florence), Italy, at a nice little store called Torrini on the main plaza across from the Duomo, gold will cost you the following:
Gold florins:
- Quarter Florin, newly minted, 12mm diam., 0.83 grams 0.999 gold. A repro of the florin coin minted in 1252. Cost is 108 Euros each.
- Gold Florin, newly minted, 18mm diam., 3.5 grams 0.999 gold. A repro of the 1252 coin. Cost is 285 Euros. Since my last visit to this shop in 2002, the price of gold in USD has just about tripled while the value of the dollar against the euro is down about 25%.
(during her day, Firenze minted up to 400K florins per annum)
Today, in Northern Nevada and California, I will sell you an ounce of gold for $2,350 USD. Why? Because that is what it will cost me three and a half years from today when a whole lot of folks will want to buy my gold. Just planning ahead... 5.13.06 Miners greatest fear: administrative costs skyrocket fuel, water, environment, social responsibility costs can be planned and scheduled and modeled.
fear cannot.
How much should management set aside from this years budget to manage fear: Missing dynamite
*some* of this dynamite has already showed up.
http://www.bigbeargrizzly.net/articles/2006/05/10/news/aaaexplosives.txt
Dore bars that have tripled in price = triple the tease for a miner to drop highgrade ore in a specific zone, to be 'retrieved' at a later date.
Security (closed circuit tv) to monitor workers so that the dore bars don't walk away.
Other Security Costs: Security guards
I know of a western US power plant that hired a security card, female, 78 years old, undergoing chemo. Nice lady by all accounts.
Yes, management can claim they hired additional security guards. keeps her out of the bingo hall so its a win-win
Guards to look over the fuel supply, mining equipment, dynamite, pencils pens and toilet paper and the other guards.
GSS states in their annual report that illegal miners are one of their risk factors beyond control. They are in a tough position b.c. they cannot confront the locals with a security attache and tell everyone to go home to their huts and enjoy the oil press set up for the village. The poor want to remove the gold from the ground, just as does GSS. Who can tell them it is not their right? The Ghanian government is also powerless in this regard, for many of the same reasons. The gold mining article on yahoo last hour showed a homemade hydraulic plume, made and operated by these *illegal* poor miners as representing the 'dirty gold' industry. They yahoo page forgot to present the mulitmillion dollar sulfide refractory process plants and other infrastructure. Asymmetric warfare on just one more front, and the managers of the multimillion dollar plant are the ones worried.
5.12.06 Going out of town next week for a few days Switching 30% to cash. Most indices are overbought and flashing moderate sell signals. the old adage sell in may and go away deserves respect. the Feb. 13th gold/stock buy has been outstanding. The end of April sell looks weaker, and a couple weeks later, than I expected. even though the gold metal/stock indices could run up through early august, i think it prudent here to sell 25% and see if the impulsive first wave down generates in the next two weeks. although gold has strong support around 615 and may continue up through august to old 1980 highs of 850 before selling off, the seasonals predict a minor correction in the gold stocks.
The Dow is at heavy resistance, the S&P has been relatively week and held up the the govt. if the Dow does not break higher through 2000 levels SOON on large volume, i see it weaker here. Nobody went broke taking a profit. the dollar is due for a retracement up, so cash is not a bad place to be for a few weeks (especially since you are out of town) until the markets provide more direction.
5.12.06 Both GSS and GBN and a whole lotta other companies will find most their problems over the next few years will result from labor and personnel issues.
Energy and water and social and environmental issues are already, to at least some degree, priced into the markets.
That's the line not written that I read in the recent GBN and GSS reports (both companies I've had for years) and other mewlings dangling on the thread.
Try to quantify the risks of future labor violence on a growing scale. The value on commodities skyrocketing has a mirror chart in the value of human life.
With GSS, Ghana has shown no mettle to stop the 'illegal' mining on the trend. What can they do, build enough prisons for poor folks trying to feed their families. When the violence starts, then what?
A postal worker can conduct his or her own emotional risk quotient for getting shot at work by a co-worker, and determine the paycheck is greater than the risk.
How will the miner - or any other laborer - quantify the risk involved with traveling to work, and getting shot at by those that want his chalk mark as a cog on the wheel.
Many folks will do anything to keep their jobs - short term - including sabotage. Long term - it doesn't matter to the laborers, only the paycheck counts for now. Please provide five examples where somebody on this planet can demonstrate long term thinking...
Plenty of folks got their wish for higher gold. An illustrative study as shining example teaching the lesson:
Be Careful What You Ask For...
Its just too hard getting metals out of the ground. And what is already above ground, ain't enough to go around
Today the sun may shine in Ghana or SA or NV.
Tomorrow may look like Bolivia or Venezuela or Russia.
Building the shaft to extract the ore is easier than extracting the profit from the shaft.
IF you still own it.
They call it a concentrator because your problems thicken up there.
5.8.2006 Vallejo, California Coin Show Price of gold: 710 when paid by the ounce. 1/10 eagles for 77 each. Not all that much gold available (Gaudens, etc). Price of silver: 14 with strong interest. Higher interest in foreign coins, tokens, and currency. Coins are expensive. 30 dealer bourse; smaller dealer mostly all from within a 100 mile radius. Perhaps 1/4 have brick and mortar storefronts. 2/3rds of the dealer I asked said they were having a good show. Though I wonder because 1) the weather was too nice after a long and wet California spring and 2) Inventory was THIN. Fresh quality material not hitting the bourse. However there was more than one individual trying to realize some value from what their parents purchased from coinvault or the Franklin mint over the years. Those crestfallen faces when they hear the actual value of their inheritance only spurs my resolve.
I like the small shows, a good chance to interact with folks and share knowledge.
5.6.2006 Housing Lennar: starting to balk on their deal w/ the city of Oakland. Toll Brothers: already historic default rates up another 15% Centex: started laying off in western district last month
Two more years of worry, then two years of panic…
5.5.06 So, YOU think gold is going up compared to everything else? So does this guy. Here’s his offer:
100% nominal performance = 100% return 200% nominal performance =100% return 12% downside Three years performance contract. 25K minimum investment
So, if you put in 50k, and gold goes from 675 to 1350, you get 100 K back after three years. If POG goes to 2,000, you still get (only) 100k back. If gold goes down to 300, you only lose 6k.
For 100 page disclosure, email Ed.handley@wachoviasec.com
So, what do you call this offer? A small car exercise down and in /vanilla european option with guaranteed premium kicker/sweetner? OR, a LEAP Single Payment Option ?
What is the best hedge strategy here? Maybe finance the delta with covered call options?
Thoughts?
(no, I aint going for it, entertainment porpoises only)
5.1.06 Bolivia nationalizes their natural gas industry
Bolivia: Action, result, and reaction Action: programs implemented as documented in –confessions of an economic hitman- Result – FRN debt ball Reaction – nationalization
Stir, rinse, and repeat
4.28.06 Nevada gold and silver production down again (2005 results) Just like last year...
Personally, I am not convinced that china has overtaken the US as the worlds third largest producer. had that been the case, the chinese govt. would not have sent representatives to scout nevada junior producers...
4.27.06 american - north and south -lands with the gold are stolen lands
article about the dirty little secret in american mining - the land was stolen
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2099-2142374.html
this author butchered a few angles, but did a pretty decent job.
It has been almost exactly one year since Mary Dann passed away.
(see my posts from April 24, 23 2005)
what the author, and nobody else realizes...
A greater theft continues
nevada stopped allodial land patents june 2005
none of the 'mining reporters' picked up this little tidbit.
NOT ONE!
guess they got tony snow for a role model...
of course, type in allodial patent in the search engines and u soon realize maybe a few dozen people left in the country even understand the concept of owning your own land w/o subservience as liege to the tax crown...
4.26.06 April 26, Tax Freedom Day (US). Three more days of slavery added to this year's docket compared to last. That's right. Every minute of every day you worked this year to date went to Federal taxes in support of such wonderful endeavors as subsidies for international corporations, instigating civil war in iraq, and otherwise borrowing against your great grandchildren's future. Of course, this date is an average. If you are not an international corporation receiving government subsidies, you will have to work into May. Oh, don't forget to add state and local taxes, and the several hundred licenses and user fees that you'll pay on day to day purchases. (i.e. those tax offset fees you see on your phone bill are actually used by the phone company to pay their tax bill). Feel better now?
4.20.06 Centennial of 1906 Earthquake yesterday The central planers tried to peal the bells at exactly 100 years to the minute of the quake. Dumbnuts failed to note that with the introduction of daylight savings in 1918, they were one hour off.
National Indoctrination Radio ran a special on the San Francisco's Mint Role during and immediately after the earthquake. Interesting piece (did not know the mint had an interior water production well, a fair oddity in the city of San Francisco). The establishment mouthpiece is getting nervous, however. The piece saw occasion to badmouth gold and silver trice during the 5 minute segment. They even blamed the panic of 1857 on the sinking of the SS Central America. Though not explicitly stated, they implied via cadence, that the Civil War could have been prevented had the depth of this 'gold induced depression not been so severe'.
The NPR researchers prove an embarrassment to themselves, only reason they know about the SS Central America is b.c. the infomercials of the last few months giving newbies dreams unfurled.
The S.F. Mine coordinated all the charity collections and dissemination. Since the mint was the only bldg south of market with water, and one of the few buildings still standing ( about 1/3 of S.F. is built on fill, but not the mint ), it became the center of social life - neigh, mere survival, for a number of weeks.
No doubt the perceived threat to coinage production built into the financial panic that deepened into 1907.
Can you imagine, people afraid the govt. might not be able to print enough dollars?
different world...
4.20.06 Bought ITRO today Been watching this stock for about five years, first time in. Blood in the streets and all that. Either they go under, or I make money. How many companies do you own that produce silver bullion bars. Someday, they'll ship those off as a special dividend.
Bought BOL yesterday. MOT failed breakout, Yhoo brokeout .
4.14.06 The only people who would benefit by peace in the Mideast Are poor people. I.e., it ain't gonna happen.
4.11.06 The US Government decides to bring back the 30 year bond!
Anybody care to venture a guess why?
Because they need a metric for the 50 year mortgage, and the market isn't quite yet ready for the 50 year bond!
The Fed had spoken on their policy desire to achieve the high end of neutrality, presumably around here at the 5% Fed discount level. However, both the 10 and 30 year bonds don't believe fed is done raising rates (one quarter pause doesn't count). Looking here for an impulsive first I up (higher yields) in the 30 year into 2009. Perhaps consider shorting bonds via futures market or bond funds (TLT ETF) b.c. the higher yields and higher metal and commodity prices do no reflect higher inflationary pressures (as the talking heads are now squawking on about) but instead, the high likelihood that the USD will now penetrate multi-year support and explore new lows for another penultimate search on the way to its actual and intrinsic value - zero.
4.11.06 Sold 2/3 position in
AGT yesterday @ .84.
And
then I asked why did they ask? In
this particular case, the post builds entirely on the fundamentals since the
original question to my post was ‘WHY” did I buy the stock.
That
just it, there is no anonymity. If I posted the penny amount and the number of
shares, those with Level II quotes and
4.10.06 In 2003 California, the Gold Rush state adopted the United State’ toughest restrictions on open-pit metallic mining. The regulations
require mining companies to refill new open-pit metal mines when they're
depleted and flatten mine waste piles back t
4.9.06 Rio Tinto builds upon its recent successes and now enters the land development
biz.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060406/oquirrh_bench.html?.v=2
only two copper mines extant in Utah...
Perhaps Rio Tinto looked at Lennars
venture into large scale brownfield development on the west coast and saw they
themselves had
Pretty much the problem that developed outside the old anaconda copper mine outside Yerington, Nv.
In this situation, now the Desert Research Institute wants in on the action. Fascinating; a good move by the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection. Cede lead regulatory oversight authority to the Fed EPA, let them screw it up huge, and then benefit by securing federal dollars to show the extent of the problem. Good chess.
http://rgj.com/news/stories/html/2006/04/06/110587.php?sps=rgj.com&sch=MVN&sp1=Mason+Valley+News&sp2=MasonValleyNews&sp3=MasonValleyNews&sp5=MasonValleyNews.com&sp6=news&sp7=local_news&jsmultitag=news.rgj.com/yerington
So, Rio Tinto may figure that they are going to be faced with land covenants by the Utah Department of Environmental Quality regarding cleanup operations on their Utah mining properties. The best way to implement these controls may very well be housing development by their own hand!
smart.
In fact, Newmont may be courting the same scenario. Read the below and realize why they are interested in removing certain CERCLA liabilities and requirements from third party land remediation, reclamation and restoration. Nevada is growing rapidly. The large miners already built the roads, and utilities, and hold the land and the water rights...and have the experience with surveying, and land development and infrastructure building...
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/04/09/features/mining_news/mining1.txt
make sense now?
4.9.06 Creation of a dollar slave
John Perkins lays it all out for you ears:
http://www.radio4all.net/index.php?op=download&program_id=10465&file_id=19131&nav=&
Gotta wonder why he hasn't been suicided yet...
4.4.06 Flooding in Central Valley of California Will lead to higher food prices.
Lets watch the I-Bond get devalued next month, only to have higher gasoline and food prices drive it back up in November.
4.4.06 Why Paper is Better Than Silver 98 years ago you could have bought this post card for 2 cents and mailed it for another cent. You would have received 7 cents in change back for your barber dime. That same barber time, in circulated condition is worth 1 dollar bulk; maybe up to $6-7 in very fine. The postcard is now worth over $100. EBAY: 6267116736
4.4.06 US Mining Industry aggregate sales and profit
figures released today.
4.1.06 Why would the Iraqis want a government? Government hasn't done much for the folks in this nation.
Why, I remember when the government
said they wuz gonna offer aid to and rebuild the fine city of NOLA.
Now, I don't remember but I've been
told, the government and peoples far and wide said they wuz gonna help san
francisco rebuild after that nasty ol' earthquake in '06.
The earthquake triggered financial tremors throughout the US and Europe.
The Great San Francisco Earthquake
and subsequent effect upon the western US economy and the following rebuilding
effort created a new financial reality that challenged the previous financial
picture established following the panic of 1896. The funds necessary to pay
insurance claims impacted the sterling pound exchange rate, removed liquidity
from international markets ( at the time Tonopah silver and Goldfield Gold were just
entering markets en masse ) , and swung the US economy into recession.
4.1.06 Santa Clara Coin Show. 'Twas a REAL treat to view the Pan Am
finest known gold set ( MS67 all, one w/ star designating extraordinary eye
appeal ) . Too bad I blew all my dough on the entrance fee ( even with the coupon ) .
3.26.06 The large hispanic demonstration in L.A. serves as a wonderful pilot project for Haliburton/KeloggBrownRoot to conduct some calculations on mass and immediate internment operations following their award of the contract to provide internment camp services for the US Government
3.25.06 Friggin' Etrade They took five weeks to deposit my last Roth IRA deposit. No doubt when they multiply this by thousand of individuals, times thousands of dollars per transaction, they are making a decent little side trade by keeping the interest they make on MY money by not depositing it in a timely manner.
3.21.06 Lowest Low Tide I've ever seen on the San Francisco Bay
3.15.06 Now you too can be your own central banker. Courtesy of Zopa.com and Prosper.com
3.12.06 Milosevic gets suicided before he tells too many tales and points the long finger of collusion.
The pinnacle yet simultaneous closing chapter of the clinton foreign policy.
3.12.06 Secretary of the Interior
The Secretary of the United States Department of the Interior promulgates mining and mineral policy. As such, s/he exerts significant influence upon the extraction industry operations both domestically and internationally. The position governs the majority of federally held lands and establishes policy for management of those lands. The majority of US precious metal production carves a niche from amongst these lands, in between the minefields of public perception and government policy. Moreover, the SOI resides as seventh in line of presidential succession, further exemplifying the gravitas underlying the position.
Gale Norton, an early Libertarian Party activist, did a fine job as SOI given the circumstances. Note that her undersecretary, understandably, is a crook embroiled in problems not insignificant. Previous to her current mantle, Ms. Norton provided lead counsel for a particular law firm that represented one NL industries. Note that NL took a MAJOR hit last week regarding the asbestos liability issue. Hence, I wouldn't be too surprised if she jumped back into that role, at least in auxiliary fashion. She's jumping a sinking ship, not early enough to avoid tarnishing, but maybe early enough to avoid full corrosion. (via acid gas and sacrificial anode tests).
fyi, next SOI Douglas Wheeler?
3.11.06 Free gold and jewels?
Metal and jewel acquisition requires labor; of the head heart or mind. One way or another.
http://www.atreasurestrove.com/Public/Home/index.cfm
3.5.06 The Las Vegas Sun, dutifully taking orders to de-populate the counties of Elko and White Pine, in order to further confiscate her water, takes a series of pot-shots at Nevada Mining.
Just as the rags fail to use reporters schooled in cursory economics to write finance articles, the bottom of the barrel humanities students lacking any basis in environmental science write (sic) the mining (sic) articles.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/2006/mar/05/566616056.html
Of course, the attack on industry in the rural counties is really just part of a multi-pronged attack, as I have been documenting for the last few years. The environmental briefs funded by out of county (and increasingly out of state) interests form the column attacking the rural industry need for power and water. Here is just one recent example regarding an offense, reportedly to protect endemic species via takings purported by ranching, yet curiously meted against Barrick water rights and dewatering plans:
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/03/04/news/local_news/news2.txt
3.1.06 Just Trading Hope you lightened up in GPXM today around .40. Another double courtesy o' yours truly (in just 10 weeks). Sell half on the two bagger; you'll often get a chance to re-enter later. And if not, your shares are free anyway so quit yer bitchin and find another stock to buy. what, all the other eight stox in the little index are yukky? boo hoo, go find another acorn.
Potential nice entry points in LRCZ, ESLR, ENER, CSTR. All short term. Watch 'em close. This choppy volatile action in the major market may be marking a medium term top. Caught a reeel nice entry in NT lately, but didn't have time to mention here. Doesn't matter where the sources or your profit derive if they all buy the same piece of gold.
3.1.06 All the dumbo experts cant figure out the divergence between gold stock indices and POG. Some of dem fools think this means the resources stox are topping. Hello, NEM? NEM and her 8 sisters ARE NOT THE MARKET. Here is JUST A LITTLE SLICE the resource stock market:
2.26.06 Shoshone Nation sues the USCORPORATION at the United Nations for property theft.
Many of the mining operations discussed hereabouts reside within Shoshone lands.
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/02/25/news/local_news/news1.txt
May i provide just a wee bit background along a sample angle axis as previously tangentially dangled on this subject:
2.26.06 Why are the Shoshone Upset? (and the boom castle built on heaving sands)
The merits of Shoshone case notwithstanding...
(am interested but far from an expert in North American Tribal Anthropology. At some point the Shoshone separated into what are generally regarded as Eastern and Western Shoshone. Really, any determination of standing must require period of significance. For my purposes, conversation on western mining issues produces a period of significance beginning with the first western structure building/adobe work on the western north american seaboard. That is, the establishment of adobe walls at El Presidio de San Francisco presents, in my mind, the first example of western mining by a western [european] power on the north american continent. Yes, I consider adobe-making a type of mining. Note that many state commerce departments consider aggregate work within the mining sector.
Sure, the Aztecs mined - but they weren't western. The Russians built a fort in California before the spanish, but it wasn't adobe. Both el Reál Presidio de San Diego and El Real Presidio de San Carlos de Monterey predate the SF Presidio, but they were still wood construction until use of adobe in 1777. The chinese and pacific islanders left artifacts on the western seaboard, but none related to mining. The spanish built St. Augustine many years before, but that is not western. An on and on.
All historical divisions and definitions are arbitrary until we agree on them.
In sum, since the shoshone split before 1777, my reference refers to the nations post-split; specifically to the western tribes.)
...let us opine on perhaps one frustration - the incompetence and outright criminality of those state and federal representatives that are charged with hearing Shoshone complaints and addressing their issues.
Let's further sort the search and examine just one little officer in one little office - the Nv State Controller.
The current state controller, Kathy Augustine, is the first official in state history to be impeached and convicted for malfeasance in office. Trying to build on that stellar record, she is now running for state Treasurer.
http://news.rgj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060226/NEWS04/602260375/1002
Thankfully, her status as pariah serves to remind the old motto "there is no honor amongst thieves" and the corporal public servants attempt all measures to direct the circling buzzards off their rotting flesh onto another target. That is, even the thieves guild parody known as the Nv Republican Party now wrestles in the green jello over the best solution to distance themselves from an even greater embarrassment -the state controller.
As if that wasn't enough, now she suffers the grievous loss of face and grace (and money) by investing in mortgage paper proffered by U.S Realty and Nevada Matters, a NV corporation. Of course, she wasn't alone in her choice of investments as other elected enforcers of state law have also fronted money to US Realty/Nevada Matters, an alleged drug production, transportation, distribution and laundering operation. Yes, those individuals entrusted by the public to enforce the bizarro Nv state drug laws were actually funding at lease one drug ring. (Ever known anybody who spent 2 years in a maximum security prison for possession of any measurable amount of marijuana? Well, I have. Thankfully things have changed, thanks in no miniscule measure to our combined vigilance over past two decades).
http://news.rgj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060226/NEWS/602260386/1002
Nevada Matters positioned itself in the limelight of the current Nevada housing boom via the access of one Eddie Floyd, the radio host of Nevada Matters realty show that has run on Nevada's oldest and most prestigious AM radio real estate frequency, KOH, for years. Many a time has mercury landed a looong am band radio seek - spinning the dial through multiple revolutions - on 780 mhz while hugging the parched pavement of US 6 through Nye county into another Great Basin Sunrise. The Nevada Matters show provided large visibility on Nevada real estate matters through the last several boom years. Everyone had become a real estate maven. Alas the flagship took a broadside hit from unknown source and now lurches and lumbers on splintered keel timbers. The desert ship forging passage through the basin properties now sinks under her own weight, and the following armada now floats directionless - heave to - on the breaks. Was the entire real estate boom built on quicksands of 'alleged' illegal profits and excess printing press paving the M3 with fiat blizzard?
This culture of corruption runs up and down the line.
Ever hear the story about the judicial department shutting down the ability of Department of Interior solicitors to receive or send email for the past half decade because of gross incompetence and fraud at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, as determined by a federal judge?
True story, just a couple years ago; and ongoing...
The only outstanding question, does this cancer reside as pervasive today compared to those years when US Army settled the Shoshone land issues with the barrel of the gun? At least the gun provided an immediate vignette versus the never-ending morass presented today by the USCorporation legal system listing into international waters...
2.25.06 GoldCorps pays a dividend AND rises over 3% on the day
2.25.06 Are the runup in uranium prices really a pre-cursor of the new generation in nuclear power plants? Or is the price increase simply related to all the other commodity increases?
The Nuclear Energy Institute dumps millions more into Yucca Mountain dump campaign. Its gotta happen one of these decades, no?
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/lv-other/2006/feb/25/566678828.html
2.17.06 Home Economic Chemistry ( and more on vinegar ) 2.17.06 Water Furnaces These systems can get real complex.
Knew one system where they had a shallow pool. the bottom was painted black. the water in the shallow pool would heat up and flow through the house, keeping it warm in winter. during the summer they would keep water in the white-bottomed pool. this water piped through the house would keep the place cool in summer. plus, if you really wanted to cool down. you would swim in the pool.
The best home system water furnaces will incorporate, reutilize and direct all potable, gray and black waters. Essentially co-mingling the water and waste utilities with the heat and power utilities. To a degree, water treatment and power generation plants also use these systems.
That stock I been toutin' n' trading round these parts, ORA, develops Nv hydrothermal power and builds water furnaces on a large scale. At one of their field plants, their next door neighbor is ConAgra. They are the R/D outfit of the firm running bench scale tests using hydrothermal water furnace greenhouse systems.
2.17.06 Water Chemistry. Adding vinegar will change the water
chemistry due to addition of acetic acid and improve the efficacy of
hypochlorite treatment. Any acid will work, but acetic is preferred
because others, such as HCl will produce chlorine gas ? an odorless colorless
toxic gas ( actually, more likely hydrazine but keeping it simple here ) . The
best way to detect chlorine gas leak is with a spray bottle full of ammonia.
2.17.06 how the mainstream fools think you should by commodities
investtalk conference this weekend
topic: how to buy gold
2.17.06 New drilling record
Production begets supply
http://www.elkodaily.com/articles/2006/02/16/features/mining_news/mining2.txt
hopefully the results also set a new record
2.17.06 ORA Come to pappa. Love it when things work according to plan.
May I present to all sundry gathered here today the union of the 50 DMA and lower Bollinger plan for your consideration.
http://www.kitcomm.com/comments/gold/2006q1/2006_02/1060203.142349.mercuryee.htm
2.13.06 Gold stocks showing a moderately strong buy right here (Feb 13th, 2006), but may also produce
2.11.06 Strategic Mercury Stockpile, or Toxic Dump?
The Walker river basin, including Walker lake, pushes her boson into the forefront of environmental battle grounds. Everyone has a stake in this negotiation. Walker Lake is one of the last remnants of Ancient Lahontan Lake, which at one time covered most of the great basin. The Great Basin means that no water flows out toward the sea, but instead ends at one of the remaining few basin lakes (Walker, Pyramid, Lahontan) or deposits into dry lake beds, wet for only a few weeks a year. The water in these basins suffers from high salinity and metals concentrations, as the evaporation leaves these materials behind with nowhere to go. Therefore this water provides not only a scarce resource, but a troubled one. Local water treatment plants have struggled with the new arsenic standard for drinking water, this geographic basin provides a forefront of technical and regulatory developments on the arsenic treatment challenge.
The Walker Paiute tribe, government agencies including the Department of Defense and Bureau of Land Management, County governments, the State department of Environmental Protection (at a recent American Water Works Association conference I attended, Allen Biaggi - NV Conservation and Natural Resources Department head, included these issues challenging Walker Lake into his keynote speech) , farmers and ranchers, miners, business, water districts, wildlife and fish, and environmentalists all demand a piece of this small, and ever shrinking pie. This basin and the battles therein will drive western water law for the next 50 years.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/lv-other/2006/feb/04/566611101.html
2.10.06 AIG coughs up a lousy Billion and a half big deal, we all know the insurance companies are crooked and will gleefully rape a widow and an orphan for a buck fifty.
Meanwhile, the real criminals at choicepoint point at the lackey numbers runner. Willful dissemination of an individuals financial file isnt treated lightly around these here parts.
Average identify theft victim spends 300 hours clearing the file. After dutiful global citizens such as choicepoint thieve us all, we will joyously pump the vein whilst they inject the biometric RFID...
2.10.06 The Snake and the BLM
Remember this story Ive been
following for you? ----------
2.2.06 A non-improvised explosive device
muck it up...
http://www.smallminedevelopment.com/video.html
2.2.06 The fallen ABX comrade Remember kiddies, Fall Protection standards require a Competent Person. IF you cant find one inside the company, look harder.
MSHA will only redouble their efforts based upon this weeks events in W. Va.
whats your life worth? A fine?
Apparently ABX has money to burn, so place your bets accordingly; your money or your life.
(another nice article, Adella)
2.2.06 Sold half grubstake in Ormat (ORA). Another nice day made it a no trouble double - time to take back the ante and let her ride. Not sure it will continue short term given overall market, energy sector, and natural resource mutual funds of late. Getting a little conservative here and raising some cash, even if there is some more longer term upside (ala Qua.to earlier this week).
The confirmation: Nov 12, 2005 post.
The setup: Apr 4, 2005 post. Sold CSTR Sure enough it provided a great sell there (though I was a couple pennies too early)’ provided a great entry on that little double bottom within 5% below the 50DMA for another nice coupla buck$. Not sure whats it gonna do here, so raisin a lil cash.
Not all the fish in the ocean are dead yet.
See Oct. 28, 2005 post.
2.2.06 Ever see a federal/national or state revenue tax stamp on bullion? I've seen tax stamps backed by gold-backed currency. Ive seen tax stamps on gold bonds, and gold mining stocks. But Ive never seen one on bullion.
Interesting, the Revenue Act of 1932 provided an excise tax on silver bullion. (repealed in 1939?)
Some states (RI) specifically call out exceptions/exemptions for bullion in their excise tax statutes.
Anybody?
2.2.06 David Hall of Aurizon Mines on Invested Central News Hour today. First time every they have interviewed a gold mine chief executive. Mr. Hall $240US cash, $325US fully amortized.
1.30.06 Let out in the housing bubble luckily, enough air ( fiat ) remains
to cushion the deflation of the bubble in an engineered takedown. The meniscus
of the bubble maintains integrity through hydrostatic pressure applied by the
hundreds of thousand of households absolutely dependent upon a strong housing
market.
1.26.06 tenke fungurume how come nobody talks about this copper deposit anymore? Is, or is it not, the worlds largest.Phelps Dodge: will they or won’t they. And if not them, who. How will they succeed where so many others have tried over the decades…
1.22.06 The greenspan Legacy
1.20.06 Imagine an Organization of American States without the USA. Could happen. About 8 elections in S/C America that have/will happen in a roughly six month stretch. Many of the front runners decidedly leaning left. Couple weeks ago it was Bolivia. This week Chile elected their president from the Socialist party. Other elections showing some very similar undercurrents. Why not a unified S. America to balance the United Mexican States of America cartel?
Will oil and other commodities trade on a two tier system in the future? That is, will there be one domestic price and another price for trade outside the cartel of states? Yes, mercury sayeth. And around that time, the currency of those countries will also schizm. Each bloc will have one currency value that trades within the bloc, and one currency value for trading abroad. Even thought there will be two values, the currency will still remain unified, for a short while. That is, the dollar bill or other unit of currency will look the same no matter where, and in how many amounts, it is shipped.
The de facto division in value, however, will unsettle whatever organic market that remain and as the facade crumbles each bloc will be forced to print two different versions of their currency. When this happens simultaneously, in three large geopolitical blocs on our planet, the playing field will prove so chaotic and uneven, that the citizens will clamor for one unified world currency. Following sufficient doses of foment from the internationalists, of course.
1.20.06 The market sell off that wasn't Generally, everything had been 25% overvalued. Dow, Gold, Nikkei, Budweiser, Rand, copper, small papal figurines, currencies of all stripes and flavors. Since everything was 25% overrated, that meant that everything was equal in its own way. And this last week the market simply had to digest this. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.
1.20.06 Bechtel slashes jobs at Yucca Mountain and employees slash back.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/lv-other/2006/jan/20/519996429.html
Guess they want to continue that paycheck one way or another. Perhaps a product of the hiring process which favors a certain psychological profile. Everyday: more rats and less cheese.
1.20.06 Metal Scarcity Yahoo Headline: January 20, 2006: Earth's Limited Supply of Metals Raises Concern Oakland Tribune Headline: January 17, 2006: They're no fools, Mining interests step up hunt as gold prices rise, Higher prices encourage exploration Shining Prospect, Mining companies have gleam in their eyes.
Keywords for the next ten years: Scarcity and Hoarding Gouging and Price Equity
Ever see someone throw away a pre-1982 penny because 'it wasn't worth anything?'
That penny, at the time of production, cost more to produce than the net present value of the USdollar, or the ability to locate, claim, mine, permit, process, smelt, convey and transport, stamp, mint, and distribute a one-cent piece.
Bottom Line The Dollar is way overvalued and the penny is way undervalued
1.19.06 Collectors Universe, Inc. [CLCT] the parent co. of PCGS, one of the top-tier third-party coin grading companies, took a digger today.
Interesting info here.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060119/lath066.html?.v=37
for instance, coin grading was down, but paper grading is up!
remember the mantra, paper is the new gold...
1.19.06 Why the terror rating should have matured a hue today... no, not CIA agent Usama's most recent coming out party, but Google angling for a better price from the feds for their database...
1.10.06 The highest level of Treasury
Auctions in 10 years, about $100 US Billion, scheduled for the next month.
1.2.06 Why The Federal Reserve Must
Stop Reporting M3
1.19.06 The Chinese are looking for copper in Nevada, and The Americans are looking for copper in Chile.
Will Chile put a royalty on copper mining?
http://www.bnamericas.com/content_syndication/bsantiago/bstgo_sector.xsql?Tx_idioma=I&id_sector=7
1.15.05 For the wayward who tried to link Harry Reid to Abramoff, Lots of heat but no light. The real deal is that Reid is safe for five more years, but by sticking mud to his statue, the Nv. democratic machine could sustain some damage. Nv was a battle ground state in 2004 and will continue to serve as a socio-political windvane for years to come, as is expected by out nations fastest growing state (per capita) over the last 15 years. Specifically, Jimmy Carters son, Jack, may use his Vegas base for an entry into national politics by running against Ensign-R. That is one of the next mudslinging/green jello fest of any particular note in the state (notwithstanding the three circus rings who would like to be governor).
1.15.06 Persia/Iran and The Republic of the United States of America/USA I was looking through stacks of old paper and perused a LOOK magazine article from 1954 with an article about Iranian-American relations and an interview with the Shah. Interesting. Not sure which country is in a steeper socio-economic descent, but they have a head start over us. We had an Iranian exchange student live with us when I was young, learned quite a bit from him. He graduated to another school but kept in touch. Then the revolution, and we never heard from him again. Always wondered why...
1.15.06 San Jose Coin Show Rained HEAVY Sat. morning on my way there. That, and the football playoffs likely kept some folks away by deterring both the walker by on the street and whoever had to dry on the hydroplane-prone interstate 680/580. Dealers reported a rather light turnout, as was obvious on the bourse, but curiously reported having a decent show. Not sure if the security was beefed up given the FUN reports, but the uniformed cops I saw probably averaged an age of 53...still 20 years younger than you average dealer. Though was nice to see a younger crowd working the tables along side their grandparents. As for the security, perhaps the private security firms were more numerous and equipped. Lots of common gold, morgans, and plastic. Personally, thought the inventory rather low and did not see the public selling. Mercury sayeth Plastic and Coins are too expensive, buy Paper. So I did. Not sure VAMs and Toners got the momojo anymore. Stay tuned for Santa Clara.
re coins expensive? When I started this blog in early 2000 I suggested we all sell the nasdaq, buy bullion, then coins, then gold stocks, in that order. in 99/00 coins were cheap b.c. like gold (silver, stocks, etc.) nobody wanted them and we were at an obvious supercycle low. i saw the change off the supercycle low in bullion prices and lull in coins driven by the need for money to find a home out of the tech stox combined with the burgeoning state quarter program and introduction of 50 million casual state quarter collectors would add blood+money+interest into a renaissance of coin collecting/investing and prices. this has happened. now coins are expensive, so i stopped buying coins and have begun buying art and paper collectibles. for the last couple years, actually, i've been noting that paper collectibles look like a decent buy, in comparison. scripophily interest and prices are at a 5 or 6 year low and beginning to turn up. interest in rare books, heck ANY books or reading is probably at a 500 year low.
plastic expensive = third party grading services (slabs, plastic) are overrated, over-hyped and overpriced. dont buy plastic, buy precious metals.
just this last week i posted that rare books look like a buy. regarding Nikkon's announcement this last week to drop all buy TWO of its non-digital camera lines, i suggested sniping the lenses and re-selling a few years at a healthy profit. after all, the change in photography, and kodak/canon buying less silver hasn't exactly effected the silver bullion market, now has it?
momojo = momo+mojo = money and momentum and got my mojo working VAM = coin die varieties, especially morgan dollars Toner = toned (esp. rainbow coins). toners and VAMs have had a very nice run in the past couple years, i sense a potential sector rotation may be afoot.
1.13.06 Prologue For those that ARE planning to attend
the San Jose Coin show Epilogue See my post from April 9, 2004.
Nobody wishes I were wrong more than i. the mercury/cassandra curse. Nobody
believes my future predictions, and then they turn out worse than I envisioned .
1.13.06 Gnus you could lose Or pay off the blues Is it just me, or did volume AND price basically bottom the nanosecond i posted this...
12.18.05 IAG to list on the NYSE This supports stock performance b.c. now ETF-linked funds must purchase the security.
1.13.06 Remember when? Remember the Price Of Gold runup before IRAQ SNAFU II, when gold escalated commensurate with the rhetoric preceding open military action? Remember all those fools who postulated that upon actual open military action, the POG would plummet to 360? Remember how wrong they were? Remember the POG runup before IRAN SNAFU I....
1.13.06 Some postulate that a strong run by the micro-caps in a sector portends an end to the bull run,
1.10.06 New escapades
Two new experiences today. First, I fought the system today and won. First time ever that I contested a ticket. Had the case dismissed. I was worried that I would make my 8:45 am court appearance on time since I had been sleeping in rather late theses days, given the late time I have been going to bed, based almost entirely upon my daughter's schedule, mood and behavior (the women run my life). Got up in time, but the traffic was terrible, since it was the first full week of the new year and everybody was back into the grind, and the fog was very thick. I passed four accidents on the way to court.
When I did arrive (eight minutes early) I didn’t see the officer, and was optimistic that he wouldn’t show up. If the officer doesn’t show, the case is dismissed. My early court time may have worked in my favor since the traffic may have held up the officer from appearing. Of course, the court got started 20 minutes late. I had to wait through 5 or 6 other defenses. Most of these people were extremely disorganized and never had the foresight to prepare and type of written cogent defense. Two people did alright for themselves, but all 6 lost their case, though they did have their sentence ameliorated somewhat.
After about 1.5 hours, the six or seven of us all had our cases dismissed, because the officers did not show up. My suspicion is that they knew in advance that the officer would not show, but made us wait to the end of the session to pay for our insolence, - the mere fact we chose to fight the leviathan. Basically, I think the officer’s superior with the city police department told him not to appear, since I had already indicated that I was fighting the ticket, and more importantly that I knew what I was doing. In the end, I was actually a little letdown that I did not have the opportunity to directly present my case. But, the results were what I wanted.
My other new experience – a drive through dairy. The extra cost for the convenience was worth not having to spend the time in line at the store. For the first time in years, I am now putting the premium on time over cost.
1.7.06 Establishing value of a mining company
Figuring out reserves, shares outstanding, market cap, and Price of Gold
are the EASY determinations.
RESERVES are easy to calculate b.c. they are vetted and determined and defined and refined and reported at numerous steps.
First, the code established the term 'Valuable Mineral Deposit'
the regulations were silent on what
this meant, so the case law came up with the prudent man rule which determined
how reasonable it would be to expend additional LABOR on a claim.
Soooo, where can I find the
regulations and standards for reporting COSTS?
1.7.05 Happy Day. I just procured the oft-absconded 2005 California vehicle code.
Gata catch up on a few of my favorite paragraphs.
only cost 6$. last time it only cost 3$. some would say that's inflation.
not i, the value added is beyond compare, probably more than twice as thick...
1.7.05 Someone thought the US Postal Service is a monopoly Just b.c. it is actually one of the very few services required of the US Govt.
On the postal monopoly, there is none.
you can send a letter via UPS. but it will cost what it really costs to mail it. about 12$. thats why they focus on the non-letter mail. let the taxpayers foot the bill to send a single stamp envelope from arctic circle alaska to BFE wyoming for 0.39 scrip.
now DHL makes their big move.
Today I received TWO DHL mailers. Sealed. Delivery required. (I didn't sign anything. They just left them on my doorstep) Since anything mailed to your address is legally yours, i opened one. Guess what it contained? Yep, you guessed it. Credit card with the PIN and back three numbers.
Wonder what the other one contains?
and people blame others for credit fraud.
who would let that happen to themselves? unsolicited code with the skeleton key enclosed. almost as sensical as posting your password.
Ever wonder why all the scams are always delivered DHL, UPS, FedEx, courier?
paper is the new gold...
1.7.06 ARCO changes its mind. (or mine?) Or one of the $350/hr folks actually read something and comprehended a significant percentage.
many of the tailings piles and other
assets in Nevada that have been abandoned, only to see a resurgent interest are
not virgin territory. they have a past along their future.
Got Asbestos?
The ones who first sold it called it
chrysolite.
(ARCO balks at portion of Annaconda mine cleanup)
http://rgj.com/news/stories/html/2006/01/05/109799.php?sps=rgj.com&sch=MVN&sp1=rgj.com&sp2=MasonValleyNews&sp3=MasonValleyNews&sp5=MasonValleyNews.com&sp6=news&sp7=local_news&jsmultitag=news.rgj.com/yerington
1.6.06 Quality Paper is the New Gold I've been burning various types and weighing the ash. And have come to this conclusion: Rare Books sector is a buy.
Everything you type is keylogged. Everything you say is recorded.
What you write. Remains Silent. Orders to Kill. Are written orders...
1.3.06 For the 12 miners rescued in the West Virginia Coal mine incident, and their one brother who did not make it:
13 miner family hearts darken by the hour
The bituminous dream Inside an adit-strewn seam Keeps the air a touch more pure
From the hearth Into the earth Another day beneath
The sun blows black As burdens stack And the lights flicker weak
May every name Who’ve carved the same Enter a lighter shaft
may the golden haze cure darker hues, and softly brighten those family days
|
Home Inventory US Coins Reference Links Blog Finance Paper Metals Mining
