"The suppression of truth has long been among the highest priorities for the upper echelons of power and authority. For a minority elite that clings to power by the manipulation of the masses using an omnipresent cocktail of lies, deception, mass-produced ignorance and ingrained propaganda, the destruction of truth is an essential method of control. It is a formula that has worked to unmitigated success for the elite throughout history, whether the shadows of power stretch from ancient pyramids, marble temples, castles, mansions or halls of governance. Those holding the levers of power and control understand, better than most, that the dissemination of truths to a blind majority could spell the end of their reign, for truth brings sight to the blind." … Manuel Valenzuela

Gold began to take off until the Gold Cartel showed up at work in London. At exactly 3 AM Eastern time (the usual), they prevented gold from taking out $908, and down she went. That was all she wrote.

Silver was weak all morning, in direct contrast to almost all other metals.

In the near future we will be finalizing the speakers and format for our upcoming "GATA Goes To Washington" conference. I think you will find the conference to be both stimulating and much fun. Here is a real surprise … in addition to many attendees from the US, we have registrations from the following countries thus far:

The Netherlands
China (Shanghai)
Portugal
Saudi Arabia
Malaysia
UK
Canada
Viet Nam (2) (Ho Chi Minh)
India
Spain
Switzerland
Portugal

Talk about how the world has gone upside down from days gone by. So far there are three attendees to the GATA conference from Communist countries, and STILL, the FREE financial market press refuses to even mention GATA, much less deal with all we have discovered and done over the years. And THIS after one of the top economic advisors for Russia’s President Putin, Andrey Bykov, attended Gold Rush 21 … who told me at its conclusion that it was the finest conference he ever attended (Gold is not far from doubling since Andrey said that).

Think about coming to our Washington conference if you can make it. There were a couple of people who might have attended Gold Rush 21, but they didn’t register because their gold/silver stocks were down at the time, producing a lessened wealth effect. As many of you know, the price of gold began to explode a couple days after GR 21, as did the gold/silver shares. Both of those invited potential attendees greatly regretted not attending, especially when they learned how special that conference was.

www.GoldRush21.com

www.GATA.org

The price of gold bottomed around $256 and took off after our GATA African Gold Summit in Durban, South Africa on May 10, 2001. That is a fact.

The price of gold blew out The Gold Cartel's long standing $6 Rule two days after Gold Rush 21 when it was $436 at the time (August 8 and 9 in 2005) and went bonkers in the ensuing 9 months. That is even a MUCH more important fact, as the dollar only fell from 89 to 87 during this incredible price surge.

Those are both documented FACTS.

GATA expects the impact of our March on Washington to be more effective than both of our other well received conferences combined! Do you want to be a part of history in the making?

As always, we at GATA encourage delegates bring their spouse and family, when possible, to attend our functions. In the event, your family does not wish to attend the conference we are in the midst of developing family programs offered from the Hyatt Crystal City during the day.

From our location at the Hyatt Crystal City, near the Ronald Reagan International Airport, you are ideally located for easy access to the entire DC area. Visit monuments and museums, take in a show or game, check out Old Town Alexandria or Pentagon City Shopping or tour historical sites, all just minutes away.

Please watch the www.GATA.org site for program offerings for you to choose from during the conference and booking information through the Hyatt Crystal City.

In addition we are offering, to encourage participation during the evening activities, we are offering a special rate of $150 for your spouse or partner to attend the Opening Reception and Friday Evening GATA Gala.

APRIL 17 (evening reception), 18 and 19 are the dates of the conference. APRIL is when the G-7 is expected to give their go ahead for the IMF to sell gold (only if approved by the US Congress. Now THIS for APRIL…

Hi Bill (a long time GATA member) --

And you thought the precious metals market was being managed !!!

Within the last week, I have been notified by a representative of my bank in Europe, one of the largest private European investment banks, that his bank as well as other European banks, are "under pressure" from their government to liquidate all stocks, bonds, and mutual funds held on account for their US clients (both US citizens and legal residents of the US) and to hold only cash assets on account for these customers. He said that he expects these actions to become effective as soon as April and was "forewarning" me and my wife of these actions for the purpose of our own investment planning.

What this tells me (and perhaps your sources or other GATA members across the Atlantic can confirm any knowledge of this impending action) is that the US has entered into an agreement with its EU allies to create massive liquidity from the non-cash assets of legally held European accounts of US Citizens, for the purchase of currency exchange to prop up the dollar.

As you know, there was a lot of consternation on the part of European exporters when the Euro rose to USD$1.50 and genuine concern about the economic outlook for the EU's economy in the face of a US recession. This action could be meant as a "stop gap" measure to try to hold the dollar from sinking further into the abyss or to create the "appearance" of a strengthening dollar against the Euro. Short term, it may be gold unfriendly in that the PM market does, on occasion, move inversely with the dollar. This may be a cartel attempt at a new angle of attack on gold. The ECB is definitely concerned about gold rising too fast against their currency just as the Fed is here.

I am not at all surprised, were this action to proceed, that my government would stoop to such measures in such an unabashedly covert and underhanded manner. My immediate concern is what action to take, if any, to protect our financial assets in the wake of such news.

Yes, you are definitely right Bill.......there are no free markets anymore !!!

Respectfully,
S

***

None of us know if there will be IMF gold sales or not. We do know The Gold Cartel and friends threw this black cloud out to spook the market by holding the THREAT of massive sales over the market. This maneuver gave them cover to bomb gold, like they did last week, when the price should have skyrocketed, based on the financial market/commodity news, and ought to be staring at $1000 by now. The children threw another tantrum and did their desperate thing again.

What will come of all this potential IMF gold supply is up in air for the moment. Have to wait and see what comes down the pike. What is NOT up in the air is the growing worldwide demand for gold … demand which is going to blow The Gold Cartel out of the water no matter what they do in the short term.

Much was made by the pundits re slowing Indian demand for gold. This was documented for months on a daily basis in the MIDAS More gold goodies commentary. That news was no surprise to Café members. What was not highlighted by these same pundits was how other investment demand was so powerful that it could take gold to new highs, despite India’s disappearance.

As brought to your attention recently, investment demand by the VERY WEALTHY in the US took off late last year and in January especially. While the general investing public remains gold clueless, some of the BIG MONEY in the US has seen the light and are making their move into our arena.

Then there is the growing demand in China, which is going to grow by leaps and bounds in the years to come … as they have only been able to buy physical gold for a couple of years now. Voila:

www.chinaview.cn

BEIJING, Feb. 15 -- China surpassed the United States as the world's second-biggest retail gold market after India in 2007 by volume despite rocketing prices of the metal.

Total consumer demand in China's mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan reached 363.3 tons, up 23.5 percent from a year earlier, the World Gold Council said in a research report.

India had a gold demand of 773.6 tons last year, while the figure in the US sat at 278.1 tons.

Mainland gold demand, including jewelry and retail investment, topped 326 tons, up 26 percent from 2006, and the first time it surpassed the 300-ton level. Mainland gold-jewelry demand reached 302 tons in 2007, a year-on-year growth of 23.5 percent.

What makes the Chinese market stand out is the growing demand in the fourth quarter, when most other markets saw demand drop as costs soared.

Gold prices hit a three-decade high and topped more than US$900 an ounce on concerns over inflation, global economic uncertainty, the likelihood of an American recession and a weak US dollar.

In the fourth quarter, mainland gold demand rose 18 percent to 94.3 tons. In India gold demand tumbled 64 percent to 83.9 tons and in the US it fell 15 percent to 110.7 tons.

"It's a milestone for China's gold industry with demand surpassing the 300-ton level," an industry veteran said yesterday.

Concerns over domestic inflation and the volatile stock market also added to the investment drawing power of gold as a haven.

China's gold demand this year is again unlikely to be affected by rising prices as Chinese tend to buy at high prices in the hope of even further increases, World Gold Council veterans said in January.

Chinese gold demand was stagnant during the late 1990s and early 2000s but started going upward from 2003. China's gold sales volume stood at 207.6 tons in 2003, a 2.0 percent rise to end a five-year wane.

The gold-sale rise is also in line with the country's economic take-off.

China is expected to have a gold consumption of 600 tons in 2010, according to industry insiders.

The nation last year surpassed South Africa as the world's biggest gold-mining country.

(Source: Shanghai Daily)

***

Total Middle East gold consumption increases from 315.6 tonnes to 348.4 contributing to 10% increase

-END-

The precious metal rose more than 30 per cent last year amid safe-haven buying due to credit market turmoil and worries about the health of the US economy, which sent the dollar to record lows, as well as record high oil prices.

Spot gold hit a record high of $936.50 an ounce at the beginning of this month.

"Comparing the Middle East performance to the rest of the region... the high and volatile gold prices did not affect the gold market to the extreme as per the other regions," WGC managing director for Middle East, Turkey and Pakistan Moaz Barakat said.

Earlier this year the Middle East's largest gold consumer virtually stopped exporting scrap gold as jewellers take advantage of record-high prices.

Demand in the UAE also rose.

-END-

And now it appears that India is coming back in the market too, as reported in this column late last week. The mainstream gold pundits have been reporting old news re India. What they failed to explain to their readers is that the bullion dealers over there have run down their inventories and must enter the market again to satisfy demand.

This is no surprise. When the gold price rallies like it did, the sophisticated Indian buyers get "sticker shock" and back away. They then wait for dips and come back in. Sometimes the dips are not to their liking, but they have to come back in anyway … after they become accustomed to a certain price level, like around $900 and below, as is the case at the moment.

To sum up this drift (headline anyway):

Robin Bromby | February 18, 2008 SOMETIMES it pays to take a step back and look at the big picture - especially now that so many sectors are being knocked about. With property companies and banks being in the news for all the wrong reasons, investors can apparently still look to the resources sector for assurance.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23229198-18261,00.html-END-

A picture is worth a thousand words, as they say. To give you some idea of the depth of The Gold Cartel’s blatant childish fit they threw last week, we only need regard the following charts:

Weekly dollar chart
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/US/WWeekly CRB chart
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/RC/WWeekly platinum chart
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/PL/WWeekly gold chart
http://futures.tradingcharts.com/chart/GD/WSHEESH! ... as SARGE, my editor, would say.

Indian ex-duty premiums: AM $3.44, PM (61c), with world gold at $905.70 and $905.60. Above, and somewhat below, legal import point. The rupee started steady, but subsequently softened to close at $1=R39.775. The stock market slipped by 0.37%. A few minutes before the Indian bullion market formally closed, world gold spiked up abruptly by some $3: it may be that as a consequence the PM premiums were understated.

Attached is a note by the sagacious Chris Wood, of CSLA, pointing out that something very odd is happening in the US banking system:

“For the first time since the data began the series on banks’ non-borrowed reserves has gone negative, falling to minus US$19bn in the fortnight to 13 February…The banks are…,GREED & fear guesses, increasingly giving the Fed the garbage collateral nobody else wants to take…The reality is that “structured finance”, by offering a combination of illusory guarantees and liquidity, has produced a monster. This is going to be the instrument of the most colossal wealth destruction and certainly higher than the current US$400bn guesstimates…GREED & fear would assume that the financial situation is probably just as critically extended in Europe."

***

CARTEL CAPITULATION WATCH

US economy stuff:

"FACED with tightening credit and a slowing economy, America’s consumers are being forced to scale back their purchases, but high prices of necessities are keeping their overall purchases rising at a reasonably strong rate.

The retail sales report for January showed overall retail sales that were stronger than many economists had expected, and was well received by the stock market on Wednesday, the day it was released. In total, retail sales are running more than 4 percent over the level of a year ago, an increase that is above the overall inflation rate and much stronger than the sales were when the last recession began in early 2001.

But the overall change is misleading. One reason for its strength is that prices of necessities are up sharply over the past year, meaning that those items consume more and more of the household budget, leaving less for other things.

Over all, Americans are spending about 13 percent more on food and energy now than a year ago. The figures, as are all the figures shown in the charts accompanying this article, are based on three-month moving averages of seasonally adjusted figures, and compare this year with last year."

New York Times, Floyd Norris, Feb 16, 2008

***Bill H:

To all:

this past week saw less visible volatility to the public eye. The stock indices which "Joe and Jane public" watch saw less volatility. However there was tremendous volatility in commodities, such as the grains and energy complex. The big story was the credit complex. The ARM [auction rate municipal] market saw some rates go as high as 20 %. This because of the uncertainty with MBIA, AMBAC, and the other insurers, plus the big brokers backed away and did not support this market once the bids dried up. These brokers in the past would step up to smooth out any poor or failed auctions. They are afraid to/and don't have the capital to lend the support now needed. Imagine 20% rates on tax free municipal bonds! I thought the Fed just cut rates! The bond insurers have until next Friday to come up with a plan, or face ratings downgrades. What is happening in the credit markets now is "our collective worst nightmare" and "mathematically expected and assured". Virtually all foms of debt have been impacted by this credit crunch. Once a credit based economy experiences a "lack of faith" the end is near since more credit is needed just to sustain life. We have seen the entire debt complex from commercial paper and ARM munis, to credit card and auto loan securities, to home equity and all forms of mortgage loan securities, to AAA Munis, all the way to the most exotic forms of derivatives, freeze up/blow up/implode.

What we have not seen yet to any large degree is a major convulsion in the US Treasury markets. THIS IS NEXT! The federal deficit is set to explode with receipts cratering, and expenditures exploding because business is contracting. This fiscal trainwreck will happen while the Fed lowers and lowers rates, and pumps and pumps more money into the system which further debases the Dollar. We are watching desperate measures being used to buy time, and obscure bankruptcies from public view.

Since the Fed cut rate 1.25% ALL Treasuries with a maturity longer than 3 years have risen in rate and fallen in price. Not drastically yet, but rates have risen. We are watching the last haven of US debt start to bend. So far this has been in somewhat slow motion. We could be very close to Treasuries convulsing. Foreigners have funded US deficits since 1980. If foreign capital decides that either the Dollar is too risky of a currency, or that the US Treasury is not the "AAA" credit that it once was, we go directly into implosion mode without passing go or collecting $200. I assure you, things will speed up! Our entire system is predicated on credit. Bad things are already beginning to happen across the the whole economic spectrum. Can you imagine what things will be like if Uncle Sam gets shut out of the credit markets? EVERYTHING will change!

This is another way of saying foreigners won't accept $s. Not buying Treasuries, or even selling Treasuries would be a function of not wanting Dollars. The results will be disastrous. We will be forced for the first time in x number of years to actually live within our means. This poses a big problem because the US no longer produces much in the way of real goods. Less than 1 in 10 jobs now are in the manufacturing sector. In the last 10 to 15 years the US has spent nearly all of its accumulated capital ie[fat], sent more than half of its manufacturing overseas ie[muscle], ruined the world's reserve currency ie[blood], and bankrupted the greatest empire of all time. None of us made this situation what it is, everyone of us needs to do what is necessary to protect ourselves and loved ones. Regards, Bill H.

Over in the UK…

Hi Bill,
I imagine this story is true. So no private sector solution could be found. Not great news when you think how long they have tried. Also, it emphasizes how hard it will be to rescue bigger banks.

BEST WISHES,
Bob
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7249575.stm

Hi Bill,
I hope you are having a good weekend.

This link takes you to a website about a new book, just published in the UK, about the massive lack of accuracy in newspaper stories. I think the book is well worth reading and whilst it does not cover any real financial reporting stories in any depth, it makes it easy to understand how the gold cartel get away without any real scrutiny from any newspaper or TV. The book is mainly about the UK press, but it does show convincingly, in my opinion, that the modern journalist has little time and little support from his employers to write accurate and properly researched stories.
http://www.flatearthnews.net/home
Best wishes,
Bo

Nerves on edge as lender results beckon

By Peter Thal Larsen Sun Feb 17, 12:35 PM ET

If the stock market is to be believed, Britain's biggest banks are severely damaged. After more than six months of market turmoil - which culminated on Sunday in the nationalisation of Northern Rock - investors are braced for the worst when the country's largest lenders start reporting results this week...

In Iran:

Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Iran, holder of the world's second- largest oil and gas reserves, opened an exchange for crude and petrochemicals as the government encourages private investment in the energy sector.

Trading began today in petroleum products such as light polyethylene, a plastic used for packaging. The Tehran-based Iran Mercantile Exchange is using ``spot' rather than futures trading, requiring immediate payment and delivery of the physical product…

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=amcLG_E_EuyI&refer=home-END-

Adrian from Moscow:

Bill,
Here is a real-time example of how a fiat currency implodes due to letting the printing presses run 24/7.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g2RPSaqb
qphRrvYYIaUsAV27LZwD8UQVTO06Even the American BLS hedonic massaging would not do much for the Zimbabweans…

QUOTE

In early October, the state central statistical office gave official inflation at just below 8,000 percent. It then suspended its monthly updates on inflation because there was not enough in the shortage-stricken shops to calculate a regular basket of goods.

END

Zimbabwe inflation has now exceeded 66,000% per year. It now holds the dubious honor of having the highest inflation of any country in the world. Voltaire has been proved correct again - "Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value ---- zero."
Cheers
Adrian

TOCOMGood Evening All:
On February 15^th the seven big gold shorts reduced their net short position by 660 contracts to 72,919 contracts.

STDJ increased their net short position by 345 contracts to 30,101 contracts.

http://www.tocom.or.jp/souba/gold/torikumi.htmlIn silver they added 60 contracts to their net short position bringing it to 709 contracts (60kg deliverable equivalent).

http://www.tocom.or.jp/souba/silver/torikumi.htmlBest Wishes,
Scott

Something to think about:

Hi,
I found an article in Kitco headlines

http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?from=rss_Business%
20Report&fArticleId=4256504

Gold, silver and the shares remain THE historic investment opportunity of a lifetime!

GATA BE IN IT TO WIN IT!

MIDAS

-- Posted Monday, 18 February 2008 | Digg This Article