Baltic Dry Index. 500 +13 Brent Crude 40.14
LIR Gold Target in 2019: $30,000. Revised due to QE programs.
Brexit odds checker. http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/eu-referendum/referendum-on-eu-membership-result
Brexit Quote of the Day.
Cameron:
He is not only dull himself, he is the cause of dullness in others.
With
apologies to Samuel Johnson.
Today
gold. Something’s afoot in dodgy old London. The gold market has long been
manipulated and rigged by the central banksters, who see gold, real money,
money that’s free from debt unlike the central banksters fiat money
substitutes, as a threat to their monopoly on fiat money, communist money,
something for nothing money. They routinely slam the gold price down via paper
gold sales in the futures markets. But lately the central banksters have lost
control. The global public has been a
consistent buyer of physical gold, much of it in the form of bullion coins.
Physical gold has been draining away from the west and getting squirreled away
in the east. India was the main culprit in the past, but last decade China
joined the party along with Russia and some of Asia’s “Stans.” The west is
rumoured to be heavily short physical gold bullion, relying instead on paper
gold via the futures markets to cover the risk.
When
rigged fiat money systems fail, as they always do eventually through bankster
greed and widespread fraud and criminality, fiat money revulsion is the result,
and the public hankers for a return to metallic money, something that’s fungible,
with intrinsic value, and a is a reliable store of value.
But
London, where almost half the world’s gold trades each year, has long been the
home of the “unallocated” gold scam. The buyer purchases “gold” from a London
Bullion Dealer, but the dealer doesn’t allocate specific marked bullion bars to
the “trade.” The buyer thinks he owns gold and is saving on most of the storage
costs. In reality the buyer bought a pig in a poke. The gold is only as good as
the bullion brokers ability to stay solvent and find real bullion gold in the
market should the buyer ever decide to want to take delivery.
I
think that in the next financial “Lehman” crisis, one that will take down the
Great Nixonian Error of fiat money, the Great London Unallocated Gold Scam,
will blow up badly. There simply won’t be enough bullion available to meet the
demand from those who think that they already own gold. Worse, in the next
great financial crisis, not all of the bullion players will stay solvent. The
great central bankster Ponzi houses, aka central banks, won’t have anything but paper gold to bail
them out, which won’t work.
And
so we arrive at today’s gold article oozing snake oil. London sees the problem
but doesn’t yet see the answer. Stay long fully paid up gold and silver held
outside of the financial system, where it might get “Corzined,” i.e.
hypothecated until it’s all gone, as insurance against the “next Lehman.”
A large Bank is exactly the place where a vain and shallow person
in authority, if he be a man of gravity and method, as such men often are, may
do infinite evil in no long time, and before he is detected. If he is lucky
enough to begin at a time of expansion in trade, he is nearly sure not to be
found out till the time of contraction has arrived, and then very large figures
will be required to reckon the evil he has done.Walter Bagehot. Lombard Street. 1873
Gold Market Hub Set for Overhaul as Regulators Step Up Scrutiny
April 6, 2016
There’s a competition brewing to figure out how the world’s largest
gold-trading hub can get bigger and better.
Much of the $5 trillion in transactions cleared every year in London is
done by telephone or in electronic chat rooms and are the same kind of
one-on-one deals that gave birth to the marketplace three centuries ago. But
traders and bankers say the system may not provide enough transparency to
satisfy regulators or attract new business at a time when more gold is being
bought and sold in New York and Shanghai.
That’s why the main participant group, the London Bullion Market
Association, is evaluating bids to create a trading and reporting platform. At
the same time, a different plan is being developed by the World Gold
Council, a mining industry group that is working with the London Metal Exchange
to come up with new futures contracts, said two people with direct knowledge of
the venture. The proposals, if successful, would alter the way gold is bought
and sold in the city.
“It’s a pretty big moment for London, and it’s time to choose,”
said Mark O’Byrne, a director in Dublin at brokerage GoldCore Ltd.
“Everybody wants to bring more players to the table, but there is a risk that
through the failure to work together, liquidity is diluted and the market
weakened.”
At stake is the largest market for spot and forward contracts, with 4.62
billion ounces cleared among London market makers last year that amounted to
almost half of such transactions globally, commodity researcher CPM Group
estimates. And the metal is seeing renewed popularity with investors who have
added to holdings of the metal after three straight years of losses. Prices
rallied 16 percent this year through March, the biggest quarterly gain in
almost three decades.
But gold, one of the world’s most-traded commodities and a reserve asset
for most of the world’s central banks, has come under greater scrutiny. Markets
lacking the transparency of traditional exchanges are getting more attention
from regulators after banks were found to have conspired to rig a global
benchmark for interest rates during the financial crisis. At the same time,
London’s dominance is being challenged by other venues, with new pricing
benchmarks for gold in Shanghai and expanded trading in New York.
The LBMA’s plans to modernize over-the-counter trading include the building of an online hub where trades between two parties -- without an intermediary exchange -- can be posted and stored in a database. This would allow for more in-depth trade reporting, something the LBMA says would allow for greater transparency, including the publication of a forward price curve.
The association hopes its proposal will affirm the size and liquidity of the market for gold, which may help convince regulators that the precious metal poses less risk for banks to hold than assets trading in smaller, less-liquid markets.
More
In
everyone loves a scandal news, more on the “Panama Papers.” Everyone who was
anyone seems to have been at it, hiding money offshore, but of course, only for
all the right reasons.
From Kubrick to Cowell: Panama Papers expose offshore dealings of the stars
In current political climate, offshore companies of celebrities including X Factor boss and late film-maker raise questions
Wednesday 6 April 2016 13.58 BST
There is nothing illegal about moving money offshore. To begin with, during
the 1970s it was a way of moving cash around at a time of widespread currency
controls across Europe.Buying and selling dollars, for instance, was much easier for banks if the trades were done offshore. If you lived in a country where a corrupt or predatory government might seize your assets, then moving your wealth offshore to protect it also made sense.
But the offshore industry has evolved substantially since then. And the secrecy surrounding it has become increasingly unpalatable for world leaders, who have been calling for more transparency. David Cameron and Barack Obama chief among them.
The US president said on Tuesday that “global tax avoidance generally is a huge problem”, adding: “The problem is that a lot of this stuff is legal, not illegal.” Cameron has also criticised complex offshore structures, saying they are “not fair and not right”. The UK prime minister is due to hold an international conference on tax avoidance next month.
The Panama Papers reveal the names of many wealthy and well-known individuals who have had offshore dealings through companies provided by Mossack Fonseca, the law firm at the centre of the leak. That does not mean they have done anything wrong.
But in the current political climate it raises legitimate questions about why they have done so, what benefit they were hoping for, and whether they will continue to use such vehicles in light of our disclosures.
There is nothing to suggest that any of those named below sheltered, or sought to shelter, money or assets offshore to avoid tax or for any unlawful purpose.
More
We
close for the day with shipping news and an update on alternative energy.
Mitsui shipping throwing in the towel, has a silver lining for some, though
that silver lining might be fleeting, pardon the weak pun. “Clean energy’s”
time has just about arrived.
Baltic Dry Index Continues to Soar on Surging Capesize Rates
Tuesday April 5, 2016
Buoyed by higher Capesize rates, the Baltic Dry Index (BDI)
rose a further 21 points Monday to reach 471,
the joint highest single day gain of the year following
a similar 21 point jump last Friday to make it a gain
of 57 points (13.8 percent) over the
last three sessions.Average TC spot rates in the Capesize segment Monday grew by $499 to reach average daily earnings of $3,512 per day.
Both Panamax and Supramax segments were also up Monday, reaching earnings of $4,497 per day (+$22) and $5,004 per day (+$23), respectively.
The BDI's continued positive movement came following news on Thursday that Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. (MOL), under a major restructing plan, will be eliminating 10 percent of their Capesize fleet and closing down the company's Singapore dry bulk shipping unit.
Commenting on the decision MOL stated "the Company deemed it necessary to conduct an urgent review of its business models due to the prolonged sluggish dry bulker market, and decided to implement a major scale-down of the fleet to minimise its market exposure by free vessels, dissolve MOLBC, and transfer its business operations from Singapore to Tokyo."
MOL says it will reduce its surplus dry bulk tonnage through the cancellation of charter-in contract and selling some ships, gleaning a 10 percent reduction in its Capesize fleet.
On Friday, industry experts told
market participants not to be fooled by the surge, warning against placing
too much optimism on there being a meaningful recovery.
Shipping's $12 Billion Iceberg
By David
Fickling Apr 5, 2016 6:32 AM GST
Here's reason to hope that spring has arrived for the global
sea freight industry: The Baltic Dry Index, a measure of shipping
costs, is up 62 percent from its record-low reading of 290 on Feb. 11, and just
two points below its year-high of 473 on Jan. 4.
That sounds like good news until you consider how far the index has
fallen: The benchmark averaged 1,100 in the five years through 2015, and
4,406 in the five years before that.
After the
Crash
Still, the improvement's a sign that the demand side of the dry bulk
shipping industry may be past its nadir. China's Lunar New Year is always
a weak period for the commodities carried on such ships, including iron ore,
coal, and grains.
In four out of the past five years, February was the weakest month for
Chinese iron ore imports, a trade that increasingly dominates the
sector. Even at a time when China's economy is looking frailer, sparks in
the country's industrial machine carry enough of a kick to keep the
boats afloat.
If shipping only had a demand side, this would be cause for celebration.
Unfortunately, there's a supply side too -- and it's a horror show. Thanks
to the ongoing need to replace aging ships and the long tail of orders placed
in more profitable times, the world's dry bulk shipping fleet is still growing
despite losses that should be causing shipowners to throttle back.Number of dry bulk carriers in service 9,484
About 2.8 million deadweight tons have been added to the fleet since December alone -- equivalent to about one new Capesize bulk carrier every five days. Thanks to those super low iron ore prices, scrap is cheap, making it less attractive to clear the oversupply by demolishing ships. About 163 dry bulkers have been taken to the scrap yard so far this year, according to IHS Global, but there are still 9,484 in service.
More
Wind and Solar Are Crushing Fossil Fuels
Record clean energy investment outpaces gas and coal 2 to 1.
April 6,
2016 — 10:00 AM BST
Wind and solar have grown seemingly unstoppable.
While two years of crashing prices for oil, natural gas, and coal
triggered dramatic downsizing in those industries, renewables have
been thriving. Clean energy investment broke new records in 2015 and
is now seeing twice as much global funding as fossil fuels.
One reason is that renewable energy is becoming ever cheaper
to produce. Recent solar and wind auctions in Mexico and Morocco ended with
winning bids from companies that promised to produce electricity
at the cheapest rate, from any source, anywhere in the world, said Michael Liebreich,
chairman of the advisory board for Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF).
"We're in a low-cost-of-oil environment for the foreseeable
future," Liebreich said during his keynote address at the BNEF Summit
in New York on Tuesday. "Did that stop renewable energy investment?
Not at all."
More
Any
sudden event which creates a great demand for actual cash may cause, and will
tend to cause, a panic in a country where cash is much economised, and where
debts payable on demand are large. In such a country an immense credit rests on
a small cash reserve, and an unexpected and large diminution of that reserve
may easily break up and shatter very much, if not the whole, of that credit.
Walter Bagehot. Lombard Street. 1873
Replace “cash, debts, and credit” in the above quote with “gold” and you get a pretty
good idea of London’s dilemma. Oh what a tangled web we weave …..
At
the Comex silver depositories Wednesday final figures were: Registered 32.45 Moz, Eligible 122.99 Moz, Total 155.44 Moz.
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally
doubled over.
Today, more on the Germany v IMF fight over Greece’s
next bailout, that promises to make the Greeks join the Syrian refugees try to
flee northwards from Greece. But has paymaster Merkel met her match in the
IMF’s Lagarde?
Greece: Endgame for the IMF-EU Feud over Greece's Debt
Greece hasn't been saved just yet, and the conflict
between the International Monetary Fund and Europe is once again intensifying.
Greece's former minister of finance Yanis Varoufakis expects a showdown
between the IMF and Germany.
April 03, 2016 – 12:42 PM
Though talks are now taking place mostly behind the scenes, negotiations
over another bailout program for Greece have not come to an end. On Saturday,
Wikileaks published the transcript of an internal International Monetary Fund
(IMF) phone conference.
A discussion between high-ranking IMF officials reveals the bitter
divide between the lenders and how they're still far from reaching a
sustainable solution for the financial crisis in Greece. Yanis Varoufakis,
Greece's former minister of finance, sees parallels to the situation one year
ago, when he was negotiating a credit line with the IMF, the European
Commission and Euro zone member states. In an op-ed for SPIEGEL ONLINE, he
describes his fears of a showdown between Greece and its lenders this summer.
The feud between the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and the European side of Greece's troika of creditors is
old news. However, Wikileaks' publication
of a dialogue between key IMF players suggests that we are approaching
something of a hazardous endgame.
Ever since the first Greek 'bailout' program was signed, in
May 2010, the IMF has been violating its own "primary directive": the
obligation not to fund insolvent governments. As a result, the IMF's leadership
has been facing a revolt from its staff members who demand an exit strategy
arguing that, if the EU continues to obstruct the debt relief necessary to
restore the solvency of the Greek government, the IMF should leave the Greek
program.
Five years on, this IMF-EU impasse continues, causing a one-third collapse of Greek GDP and fuelling hopelessness to a degree that has made real reform harder than ever.
Back in February 2015, when I first met Poul Thomsen (the IMF's European chief) in a Paris hotel, a fortnight after assuming Greece's finance ministry, he appeared even keener than I was to press for a debt write off: "At a minimum", he told me "€54 billion of Greece's debt left over from the first 'bailout' should be written off immediately in exchange for serious reforms."
This was music to my ears, and made me keen to discuss what he meant by "serious reforms". It was a discussion that never got formally off the ground as Germany's finance minister vetoed all discussion on debt relief, debt swaps (which were my compromise proposal), indeed any significant change to the failed program.
What new light does the leaked dialogue between Thomsen and Delia Velculescu (the IMF's Greek mission chief) throw on this saga? It reveals the following state-of-play, as assessed by the IMF:
----To recap, the Wikileaks
revelations unveil an attrition war between a reasonably numerate villain (the
IMF) and a chronic procrastinator (Berlin). We also know that the IMF is
seriously considering bringing things to a head next July by dangling Greece
once more over the abyss, exactly as in July 2015. Except that this time the
purpose is to force the hand not of Alexis Tsipras, whose fresh acquiescence
the IMF considers in the bag, but of the German Chancellor.
Will Christine Lagarde (the IMF's Managing Director with ambitions of a
European political comeback) toe the line of her underlings? How will
Chancellor Merkel react to the publication of these conversations? Might the
protagonists' strategies change now that we have had a glimpse of them?
While pondering these questions, I cannot stem the torrent of sadness
from the thought that last year, during our Athens Spring, Greece had weapons
against the troika's organised incompetence that I was, alas, not allowed to
use. The result is a Europe more deeply immersed in disrepute and a Greek
people watching from the sidelines an ugly brawl darkening their already bleak
future.
More
Brexit
Quote of the week.
Cameron:
The gods too are fond of a joke.
With
apologies to Aristotle
Solar & Related Update.
With events
happening fast in the development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this
new section. Updates as they get reported. Is converting sunlight to usable
cheap AC or DC energy mankind’s future from the 21st century
onwards? DC? A quantum computer next?
A step towards new, faster-charging, and safer batteries
Date:
April 5, 2016
Source:
Department of Energy, Office of Science
Summary:
Researchers found a simple solution to the limited durability in aluminum-ion
batteries – an electrode composed of graphite. In this work, the internal gaps
in the foam allowed faster motion of the ions inside the negative electrode
that enhance the rate of charging.
Researchers found a simple solution to the limited durability in
aluminum-ion batteries -- an electrode composed of graphite, which is made of
sheets or a foam of carbon atoms. In this research, the internal gaps in the
foam allowed faster motion of the ions inside the negative electrode that
enhance the rate of charging. Also, the electrodes are connected by a safe salt
that is liquid at room temperature, rather than a flammable liquid as in
conventional lithium-ion batteries.
This research provides a new approach to enable fast-charging, bendable,
and durable aluminum-ion batteries and could lead to more affordable, safer
batteries. Promising applications include electronics that are bendable and
charge in less than one minute as well as grid-scale batteries that demand
materials deliver power at the rated levels after being repeatedly charged and
discharged.
Grid-scale energy storage to manage our electricity supply would benefit
from batteries that can withstand repeated cycling of discharging and charging.
Current lithium-ion batteries have lifetimes of only 1,000-3,000 cycles. Now a
team of researchers from Stanford University, Taiwan, and China have made a
research prototype of an inexpensive, safe aluminum-ion battery that can
withstand 7,500 cycles. In the aluminum-ion battery, one electrode is made from
affordable aluminum, and the other is composed of carbon in the form of
graphite.
A safe salt that is a liquid at room temperature (called an ionic salt)
connects the two electrodes. Previous electrodes in aluminum batteries
significantly degraded following charge-discharge cycling. The long-lasting
performance of this new battery is a result of the stability of the new
graphite electrode. Also, this aluminum battery is safer because the ionic salt
is not flammable like the liquid used in conventional lithium-ion batteries.
Impressively, this aluminum battery prototype did not release large amounts of
energy uncontrollably when a researcher drilled a hole through it. Based on a
"pouch cell" research prototype, the aluminum battery demonstrated
sufficient stored energy for common applications such as charging a cellphone
and lighting.
This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of
Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences (novel carbon materials development
and electrical characterization); Ministry of Economic Affairs and Ministry of
Education in Taiwan; Stanford University; Industrial Technology Research
Institute of Taiwan; National Natural Science Foundation of China; China
Scholarship Council; and the Hunan University Fund.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/04/160405175659.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmatter_energy%2Fgraphene+%28Graphene+News+--+ScienceDaily%29
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished March
DJIA: 17685.09 -18 Down. NASDAQ: 4869.85 +33 Down. SP500: 2059.74 -22 Down.
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