S&P Under Attack from the Government

Posted by Ray on August 8, 2011 under Main | Be the First to Comment

I had made a prediction last year, found HERE, that US Treasuries would be put on negative watch by Fitch and downgraded to junk by China. Well, I was wrong as it was S&P who made the call and actually did downgrade the US to AA+ which is still a joke as the government will never be able to actually repay much of the $14T it has outstanding without just printing money, which IS a form of default. China is now saber rattling about the US dollar again, but this time they are serious, I think at least, asking for a new reserve currency and I think they will get what they want as other countries have raised the same concerns.

The US deserved to be downgraded and we should be downgraded much further than AA+ as we will not get serious about debt reduction. To prove my point all we have to do is look at how the debate is structured. The politicians are all talking about annual deficits and NOT the outstanding debt load. They do all sorts of double talk to make sure the average person only believes we have a trillion or o in outstanding debt, but that trillion is just the annual deficit and no one talks about the big number of $14T in outstanding current liabilities. S&P gets it and that is why they are the first one to downgrade the US.

When the downgrade happened the Treasury Department acted quickly calling the move unjustified, political, terrible lapse of judgment, S&P made a mistake, and these are the same people who rated junk bonds AAA to begin with. While it is easy to criticize S&P for their prior actions, but relative to its sovereign debt ratings those arguments hold no water and anyone with a stitch of unbiased rationale realizes that the US is indeed in big trouble and we do not deserve a AAA rating. The worst part about this downgrade is the fact that the government is now baring down on S&P about this downgrade.

It was just announced that the Senate Banking Committee will be looking into the downgrade. While we do not know if hearings will happen or not the person close to the matter did say all options are on the table. I was under the impression that Congress wanted independent ratings agencies along with an independent Federal Reserve. Silly me I guess as the minute a ratings agency does the right thing they try to crush it with Senate investigations, but the Federal Reserve can monetize trillions in US debt without Congress blinking an eye, unreal.

What Congress is saying is be independent as long as you do what we say and want and if you decide to think for yourself, well, we will hunt you down and skin you alive. The government is acting very much like the old Soviet Union and is sending a message, not matter what we do keep us rated AAA. How can a ratings agency offer an independent review of a security if the government demands that it gets what it wants regardless of what the facts are? It is insane to think that the ratings agencies will remain independent if Congress has investigations if the US is downgraded. Frankly, this is extortion, blackmail or a combination of the two since the government is the one who issues S&P with its ratings license. Will S&P lose its license over this? I do not know, but it is possible and shameful if that is what happens.

As an American you should be angry over the downgrade, but not at S&P. You should be angry at the people who rubberstamps every bill that comes along wasting billions of dollars. You should be angry at their inability to work with each other and address the seriously obvious structural issues that will consume immense amounts of capital in the coming years. You should be angry that the Senate wants to investigate S&P while saying other quasi government agencies are left alone even though they are part of the problem. You should be angry that Alan Greenspan, Mishkin, Bernanke and every other clown out there says the US will never default because we can print our own money to pay the debt, devaluation IS a default.

You should NOT be mad at S&P and you should demand that Congress work on real problems because their lack of dealing with those problems is exactly why S&P downgraded them to begin with. We are not showing the world that we are capable of fixing any real problems. What we are showing the world is that if we do not get our way we will simply create problems were none exists and threaten the “trouble maker” with depriving them of their livelihood or by throwing them in jail. Way to go America.

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Are precious metals being manipulated?

Posted by Ray on March 30, 2010 under Main | Be the First to Comment

I am what some would lovingly, or not lovingly, call a gold bug, but I find that term somewhat offensive. I simply believe in precious metals based on supply, demand and the Federal Reserve’s horrible track record of continually printing money. Essentially, if precious metals guard against inflation and the Fed tries to keep inflation at +2-3% a year it just makes sense to have some money in precious metals under normal circumstances, but add in a little financial crisis and demand far exceeding actual supply and metals are a sure thing, in my opinion.

Ever since I first decided to research gold and silver, those were the first metals I ever bought, I found countless threads and blog posts about the price being manipulated by the Fed and major banks. I figured that most of this was just rhetoric by my fellow bugs, but after awhile it started to make sense. Of course, there was never any real proof, just USGA reports showing the U.S. exporting way more gold than it imported and COMEX inventory reports showing far more metal being traded than could ever be delivered. There was also some obscure Federal Reserve minutes, from the 1970’s, talking about selling gold on the open market to suppress the price. Finally, there was Greenspan saying that the Fed was ready to sell as much gold as it could to drive the price down, which makes sense since gold did poorly in the 1990’s while money supply grew at an unprecedented rate.

It was all very interesting, but there was no actual proof. Sure, we had GATA with their data points and going to the CFTC to lodge complaints, but nothing ever was done. It finally appears that the rumors and conspiracy theories may have been right after all. Last week GATA dropped a bomb on the public by announcing it had a whistleblower that proves JP Morgan and other banks are suppressing the price of gold and silver.

Andrew Maguire, the whistleblower or Exhibit A, sent a few emails to the CFTC shortly before the non-farm payroll data was released a couple months ago. Mr. Maguire clearly outlined, 2 days in advance, that JP Morgan (JPM) was shorting silver in the thinly traded after hours market driving the price down. He told the CFTC that there were 2 possible outcomes, the payroll numbers would be good and silver would go down or the payroll numbers would be bad (which is bullish for metals) and the price of silver would go down. Sure enough, 2 days later, the price plummeted and Mr. Maguire traded emails again to ensure the regulator received them, he did.

It appears that an investigation is being started which would be the first manipulation investigation since the Hunt brothers 3 decades ago. What is striking is that one of the largest banks in the world has been implicated in what could turn out to be the manipulation case of the century, if the claims are true, and no media source has picked it up. I even brought it to a reporter friend of mine for a lead, after days of not hearing anything, not even from CNBC, but nothing yet. If this is true there are large implications for the precious metals market and it is very bullish.

I always figured that if the price was being suppressed, more sellers than buyers, eventually the gig would be up because you cannot sell more than you have forever. Eventually someone will want their metal along the way which means the banks would have to deliver and buy it in the open market. If that happened the price would go through the roof, but, again, this was all speculation until the whistleblower came forward. Somehow, I know this might be hard to believe, I am sure the CFTC will find no wrong doing anywhere and everything will continue back to the way it was, dysfunctional, but if the allegations are true prices will surely rise rapidly.

It is crazy to think that silver, especially silver, would be trading so low considering it is rarely recycled and silver is used in everything from the common mirror to your cell phone. By all accounts most of the easy silver has already been mined and new mines are just coming online now, but they take a long time to get into full production. Let us not forget that silver is usually mined s a secondary metal to begin with, usually gold or copper is the primary metal being looked for. I have seen some estimates that silver reserves will be depleted in 5 years, but no one really knows and that is an aggressive figure to say the least. What I do know is that silver is in high demand, above ground reserves are declining and governments used to be net sellers of the metal, but now are net buyers of it, all of this is very bullish. My point being is prices are cheap and regardless of whether these accusations are true or not one should hold some precious metals in their portfolio, silver being a core holding.

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