Friday 1 March 2013

Sequestration.



Baltic Dry Index. 757  +12

LIR Gold Target by 2019: $30,000.  Revised due to QE programs.

"All of the government's monetary, economic and political power, as well as its extensive propaganda machinery, will be enlisted in a constant battle to drive down the price of gold - but in the absence of any fundamental change in the nation's monetary, fiscal, and economic direction, simply regard any major retreat in the price of gold as an unexpected buying opportunity."

Irwin A. Schiff

Will sequestration do for the US economy? Since the cuts amount to only 85 billion spread over seven months in an economy of over 16 trillion, my guess is that any impact will be unnoticeable, except to those directly impacted by a cut. But perception is everything, and America’s two warring political parties seem determined to hype America into a new recession. Sounds like another job for “the monetizer,” helicopter Ben Bernocchio.  We come a long way from what once was called capitalism in the textbooks before August 15, 1971 and the Great Nixonian Error of fiat money. Stay long physical precious metals. When this great error ends, most fiat money will end up worthless.

"Were we to be directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want bread."

Thomas Jefferson

U.S. stares down start of steep "automatic" budget cuts

WASHINGTON | Fri Mar 1, 2013 1:05am EST
(Reuters) - The U.S. government hurtled on Friday toward making deep spending cuts that threaten to hinder the nation's economic recovery, after Republicans and Democrats failed to agree on an alternative deficit-reduction plan.

Locked in during a bout of deficit-reduction fever in 2011, the time-released "automatic" cuts can only be halted by agreement between Republican lawmakers and the White House.

That has proved elusive so far.

Both sides still hope the other will either be blamed by voters for the cuts or cave in before the worst effects - like air traffic chaos or furloughs for tens of thousands of federal employees - start to bite in the coming weeks.

Barring any breakthroughs in the next few hours, the cuts will begin to come into force at some time before midnight on Friday night. The full brunt of the belt tightening, known in Washington as "sequestration," will take effect over seven months so it is not clear if there will be an immediate disruption to public services.
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While America wobbles and frets over sequestration, the latest data from China shows it slowing again. Two of the giant locomotives of global economic growth are underperforming, while a third the EU isn’t performing at all and acting as a brake.

China February factory growth fizzles as demand wanes

BEIJING | Fri Mar 1, 2013 2:32am EST
(Reuters) - China's factory growth cooled to multi-month lows in February as domestic demand dipped, weighing on firms already hit by slack foreign sales and underlining the patchiness of the country's economic recovery.

But the bigger-than-expected retreat in two purchasing managers' indexes (PMIs) on Friday does not signal China's economy is slipping into another slowdown, analysts said. Instead, they show China's recovery this year would be mild, as widely expected.

Separate data from China's bank regulator that showed banks weathered their worst economic downturn in 13 years last year without any rise in bad debt ratios could further assuage investors worried about the health of the world's No. 2 economy.

An official PMI from the National Bureau of Statistics eased to 50.1 after seasonal adjustments in February, the weakest reading in five months and just above the 50-point level demarcating growth from contraction on a monthly basis. January's reading was 50.4.

A second PMI issued by HSBC fell to a four-month low of 50.4 after seasonal adjustments, off January's two-year high of 52.3 and in line with a flash reading in late February.

"Today's data point to a stabilization of economic activity in coming months, not a strong recovery in growth," said Jian Chang, a Barclays analyst.
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Spain's economy shrinks 1.4pc in 2012 as Bankia posts biggest ever loss

Spain's ongoing recession was confirmed on Thursday after official figures showed that the economy shrank by 1.4pc in 2012.

The eurozone's fourth largest economy contracted for the seventh straight quarter in the final three months of 2012, shrinking by 0.8pc as the recession worsened by more than previously estimated

Output shrank by 4.7pc, due to a fall in domestic demand, while exports grew by 2.8pc over the quarter, Spain's National Statistics Institute said on Thursday. Economists had expected output to decline by 0.7pc in the three months to the end of December.

“The key numbers are consistent with very weak survey data,” Guillaume Menuet, senior economist at Citigroup, told Bloomberg. “It is about time the real economy numbers match the challenged picture which has become the mark of many countries across Europe including Spain in the last three to six months as across-the-board austerity damages growth.”

----Separately, nationalised lender Bankia posted record losses of €19.2bn (£16.6bn) in 2012, the biggest ever recorded by a Spanish company.

The figure was just above the €18bn the banking group had been granted in bail-out funds. A statement said the bank and its parent group BFA booked provisions of €26.8bn in 2012.

Bankia was formed in 2010 by merging seven savings banks. Back then it was one of Spain's top financial entities and heralded as the solution to the country's banking problems following the collapse of the once-booming real estate sector in 2008.
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We end for the week with something for the lighter side, pardon the pun. Think you have problems with the winter electricity bill, try Berlin’s new much delayed fire unsafe international airport.

Burning Around the Clock: Berlin Airport Can't Turn Lights Off

Forget about the problems with the complicated fire safety equipment. Not even the lights can be switched off at Berlin's troublesome new airport.

It has been a bleak winter in Berlin -- the bleakest ever, in fact, at least in the 62 years since records on sunshine duration began in 1951. On average, measuring stations in Germany recorded a mere 96 hours of sunshine in the three-month period between the beginning of December and the end of February.

There is, however, at least one place in Germany where brightness is the rule rather than the exception. At the problem-plagued construction site that will eventually become the Berlin International Airport, the terminal lights burn around the clock. And the reason is not to prevent workers there from succumbing to the winter blues. Rather, technical difficulties at the ultra-modern airport -- which will ultimately cost close to €4.3 billion -- mean that the lights can't be switched off.

"It has to do with the fact that we haven't progressed far enough with our lighting system that we can control it," Horst Amann, airport technical director, said on Wednesday during a rare public appearance.

That isn't the only technical hang-up at the airport, of course. Originally scheduled to begin operations in October 2011, its opening was unexpectedly delayed due to concerns about safety equipment -- before being delayed again last May. Since then, however, myriad problems, construction shortcomings, design errors and technical glitches have been found. Not to mention concerns that the building might be too small.
Currently, there is no opening date scheduled, though Amann said on Wednesday that he plans to set a date by the end of this year. "I will only name a date when I can take responsibility for it," he said.

There is much to be done before then. Recent reports have highlighted the vast and complicated problems that the terminal -- originally designed as one of the most technologically advanced airports in the world -- has encountered during construction. Currently, walls and ceilings are being torn open to inspect cables, ventilation and structural details. Some have even suggested that the entire building might have to be demolished and rebuilt, though Amann said that is "complete nonsense" on Wednesday.
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"If ever there was an area in which to do the exact opposite of that which government and the media urge you to do, that area is the purchasing of gold."

Robert Ringer

At the Comex silver depositories Thursday final figures were: Registered 38.80 Moz, Eligible 124.03 Moz, Total 162.83 Moz.  


Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally doubled over. 

Today a warning of an upcoming 2013 stock market crash. But caution, this indicator seems to operate several months in advance. Getting out early is the name of the game in our new game of central bank rigged markets. It’s better to have cash than crushing unrepayable debt.

Feb. 28, 2013, 7:43 a.m. EST

Danger as stock-market ‘Greedometer’ flashes red

Commentary: Key indicators look ominous for the market

----Last week I got an email from Jeff Seymour, a former engineer turned money manager.
For the last seven years he’s been studying the math behind a stock market crash. (There’s more to it than that, but that’s the elevator summary). He figured that if you looked at the right indicators, you ought to have a good chance of knowing what was coming. You should, at least, get an edge.

What were the indicators which were flashing red in 1999-2000, just before the collapse, he wondered? What were they showing in 2006-7?

Seymour’s conclusion: There are nine indicators you need to watch. Just nine.

They range from the Volatility Index or “VIX,” a measure in the options market, to the Weekly Leading Index (WLI) of the Economic Cycle Research Institute (ECRI), to the amount of stock that insiders are dumping on the market.

He put them all together in a doomsday machine he calls “the Greedometer.” It tells you just how dangerously complacent and carefree the market has become at any moment. See the Greedometer.

These Greedometer indicators flashed red in early September 2000. If you read the signs — as some of my wiser sources did — you got out before the crash and saved half your money.

They flashed red again in May of 2007.

-----They flashed red again in April 2011, just before the market fell another 20%.

Let’s cut to the case. The Greedometer is flashing red again.

Bright red. Last week it was up to 7900. The maximum possible reading is 8000.
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Greedometer Newsletter February 27 2013: WOW!


Have a great weekend everyone.

"No other commodity enjoys as much universal acceptability and marketability as gold."

Hans F. Sennholz

The monthly Coppock Indicators finished February:
DJIA: +111 Up. NASDAQ: +129 Up. SP500: +148 Up.  All three indexes are giving the same signal since January, up, but surprisingly February’s  move in all three was weak, suggesting that the indicators are topping out. Will sequestration turn March into a down month?

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