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Silver As The Canary In The Economic Mine (December 8, 2025)

Posted in Repurchase Agreement, Silver, Treasury, World's Reserve Currency on December 8, 2025 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “Something is up.”

J “The price.”

. . .

K “Its use as both an industrial metal and a precious metal positions it as a valuable and insightful barometer of economic events.”

J “The Chinese and the British have always liked the stuff as money. Industry also likes the metal. Semiconductors, EVs and other clean energy production require the real thing and cannot be papered over with paper deliveries.”

K “Someone with some insight believes that the supply of industrial silver metal may not meet the demand in the next year.”

. . .

K “De-dollarization is quietly moving forward. The dollar is slowly but measurably slipping as the world’s reserve currency while the U.S. Treasury Instruments are slipping as the world’s reserve asset.”

J “Everyone has reservations about the U.S. In a subtle way, the dollar as the ‘medium of exchange’ and the ‘unit of account’ and the UST as the ‘store of value’ are all threatened.”

K “The sale of gold and silver at Costco is a palpable reveal. Some fortunate little people are following the lead of the big banks and the central banks. The people realize they need something real as a store of value.”

. . .

K “The decision by the Biden Administration to steal Russian assets in contravention of every legal convention and every economic conviction was an economic and political nuclear bomb dropped on the world. The world realized what the world always suspected. The United States is the suspect. The United States cannot be trusted.”

J “Trust today is almost no longer even a theoretical construct.”

. . .

K “This thing known as the Japanese carry trade seems to be blowing up, but I do not understand all the implications.”

J “The thing known as the Repurchase trade seems to be blowing up, but I do not understand all the implications.”

. . .

K “Do you believe there was a power outage at the CME that interrupted trading?”

J “Not a chance. Things were getting out of control. So they pulled the plug. They pulled the power when they realized they were losing power.”

K “The plug may be pulled again.”

J “They are losing power.”

. . .

K “There sure are fractures and fissures in the economy.”

J “Stay tuned.”

. . .

[See“Model Collapse: The Entire Bubble Economy Is a Hallucination” By Charles Hugh Smith dated December 3, 2025 in “www.oftwominds.com.”]

[See the e-commentary at Too Much Dirt; Too Few Rugs. Repurchase Agreements (September 23, 2019) noting the trouble in the market for Repurchase Agreements in real time in September of 2019, Holographic Treasury Rates? The 500 Trillion Asset Steal? And Then The Great Taking? Oh, And Happy IRS Day! (April 14, 2025) venturing that the government could simply pretend and report that it found buyers for the Treasuries, “De-Dollarization” Is The Word Of The Week. And The Development Of the Year. (April 24, 2023) on a slow but growing transition, Not World War Tres. Again. The U.S. Declares War On Russia. Again. Oh, And Happy Thanksgiving! Again. (November 25, 2024), Portentous Developments In 2022? (January 23, 2023), Sanctions, Supply Chains And World War E (March 7, 2022) and World’s Reserve Currency War I = Cold War 2.0 = WW III (?) (September 8, 2014).]

Bumper stickers of the week:

Dragon < Eagle > Bruin; Dragon + Bruin > Eagle; Eagle + Bruin > Dragon

“To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal.” Henry Kissinger

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Happy Birthday U.S. PetroDollar: The Golden Anniversary Of Shedding Gold (August 16, 2021)

Posted in Banks and Banking System, Gold, Gold Standard, Money, Silver, Silver Standard on August 16, 2021 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “Fifty years ago yesterday, our friend Tricky Dick decided the country could no longer afford to back the greenback with Au and instead developed a plan to backstop it with Fe and Pb.”

J “Precious metals all three.”

. . .

K “Nixon had no choice. Fiscal and monetary irresponsibility got the country into a mess. The solution precipitated even more grossly irresponsible fiscal and monetary policy.

. . .

J “Oil is the oxygen for the economy.”

. . .

K “The idea is among the craftiest in the history of humankind. Inform another country that your country will provide protection if it sells black oxygen in a new magical unit called the PetroDollar. If you don’t agree, we will kill you. If others do not agree, we will kill them.”

J “They were not demanding protection money, they were demanding that everyone use their money to obtain protection. No one has been able to refuse the offer to date. To date. Anyone who tried was killed. The ultimate international carrot and stick.”

. . .

K “No other commodity or idea or thing has been as universally accepted if not cherished across time and space as precious metals particularly gold. Try to find a country or culture or collective that has not given precious metals at least a serious look-see.”

J “A precious metals standard is still problematic.”

. . .

[See “WTF Happened In 1971?” for some thought provoking ideas on what happened in and after 1971.]

[See the e-commentary at “One World Currency? (January 8, 2018)”, ““Bitcoin”, “Ethereum” . . . “Blockchain Technology” Say What? (July 3, 2017)”, “The Mandibles, FRNs, SDRs, IMF, G20, WTD! (September 5, 2016)”, “World’s Reserve Currency War I = Cold War 2.0 = WW III (?) (September 8, 2014)” and “The Legacy Of “Easy Al” And Easy Money (October 15, 2007)”.]

Bumper sticker of the week:

No Baby On Board Feel Free To Ram Me

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The Casino: The House Always Wins! Oh, And Happy Groundhog Day! (February 1, 2021)

Posted in Cryptocurrency, Currency, Money, Silver, Wall Street on February 1, 2021 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “The little guys flashed their electronic pitch forks and played the same game as the big guys and gamed the game. They can try to out game the system with GameStop, but the games will not stop.”

J “The game today is to destroy successful enterprises and to bleed wounded businesses. Productive undertakings are destroyed and delivered to the undertaker. Uncreative destruction, I call it. Nothing is created; everything is destroyed.”

. . .

K “Most silver futures contracts have a provision allowing them not to deliver physical product and instead to settle in dollars. The paper contracts only require the delivery of fiat paper currency.”

J “Anyone seeking to long the shorts may get the short end of the stick. However, some day, when the world is forced to deal with five hundred claims on each one ounce of physical silver, some folks will be sorely disappointed.”

. . .

K “The rules will be rewritten and construed to protect the powerful and well-connected. In the final analysis, the little guys are doomed to lose.”

J “No matter how things stay the same, they stay the same. Groundhog Day all over again.”

. . .

[See “GameStop Shares: Dark Pools Owned by Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, UBS, et al, Have Made Tens of Thousands of Trades” and other articles in “Wall Street On Parade” dated January 28, 2021 by Pam Martens and Russ Martens who were the recipients of the “Fifth Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (October 12, 2020)” for their pioneering and sustained contributions.]

[See the e-commentary at “On Revolution (March 15, 2010)” discussing the extreme dissatisfaction and complete inability of any person to do anything within the current political and economic racket about the obscene inequality in society and a week later “On The Digital Revolution (March 22, 2010)” proposing that any change will involve and require digital transfers. Bitcoin is back in the headlines again and discussed in the e-commentary at ““Bitcoin”, “Ethereum” . . . “Blockchain Technology” Say What? (July 3, 2017)” and is another response to and verdict on unlimited money printing.]

Bumper stickers of the week:

The House always wins!

Happy Groundhog Day!

“When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.” Frédéric Bastiat

Due to unprecedented demand on physical silver products, we [APMEX] are unable to accept any additional orders on a large number of products, until global markets open Sunday evening.

Update: Due to unprecedented silver demand, SD Bullion is unable to accept any additional orders until the market opens Sunday evening.

For some background on just how unprecedented this weekend’s action in silver markets is, Tyler Wall, the CEO of SD Bullion writes the following:

In the 24 hours proceeding Friday market close, SD Bullion sold nearly 10x the number of silver ounces that we normally would sell in an entire weekend leading to Sunday market open.

In a normal market, we normally can find at least one supplier/source willing to sell some ounces over the weekend if we exceed our long position (the number of ounces we predict we will sell over the weekend).

However, everyone we talk to is afraid of a gap up at Sunday night market open.

This is about ready to get really interesting as there was very little inventory left from suppliers/mints going into Friday close.

Our direct AP supplier informed us after close on Friday that the “US Mint will be on allocation for the remainder of Type 1” (Current Silver Eagle Design).

Our sales for the month of January exceeded any one month last year during the heart of the pandemic. It was an all-time record month in our company history.

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Fourth Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (October 14, 2019)

Posted in Awards / Incentives, Economics, Economics Nobel, Gold, Nobel Prize, Noble Prize in Eco-nomics, Petrodollar, Silver on October 14, 2019 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “An award acknowledging and celebrating the work of someone on the planet who really knows something about eco-nomics. Eco-nomics is about making and sharing; e-con-omics is about taking and stealing.”

J “The Noble Prize in Eco-nomics is a delightful and playful replacement for the discredited and misnamed ‘Nobel’ Prize in Voodoo E-con-omics. And I get it. You get what you reward. You need to reward what you want to get. Who gets it this year?”

K “The recipients of the fourth annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics are . . . Professors Mark Skidmore and Laurence J. Kotlikoff who have contributed immensely and with little credit to an undertaking that tracks and analyzes federal expenditures and properly and honestly accounts for them in reconstructed books.”

J “Solid work. Crafting a book that chronicles and corrects the government crooks’ collective efforts to cook the books.”

. . .

J “They shined a bright light on government accounting and may have prompted the Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board (FASAB) to shift government accounting further into the shadows. Late last year, the FASAB unleashed the ‘Statement of Federal Financing Accounting Standards 56 (Standard 56)’ that replaced laxly enforced government accounting and reporting standards with official obfuscation and concealment of government financing and spending.”

K “Catherin Austin Fitts and the Solari staff [Michele Ferri and Jonathan Lurie of The Law Offices of Lurie and Ferri] prepared a spell-binding and best-selling document “FASAB Statement 56: Understanding New Government Financial Accounting Loopholes” that provides a comprehensive explanation of the history, amendments and consequences of the changes to FASAB Statement 56. Everyone should leave a copy in the bathroom for light reading.”

J “The upshot is that the government is now officially no longer accountable to the public.”

. . .

[See the “Intergenerational Financial Obligations Reform Act” (INFORM Act), “Has Our Government Spent $21 Trillion Of Our Money Without Telling Us?” in “Forbes” by Laurence Kotlikoff and Mark Skidmore dated December 8, 2017, “The Tyranny of Economists How can they be so wrong, so often, and yet still exert so much influence on government policy?” in “The New Republic” by Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein dated September 30, 2019, the book titled “The Nobel Factor: The Prize in Economics, Social Democracy, and the Market Turn” by Avner Offer and Gabriel Söderberg and “Heretics welcome! Economics needs a new Reformation” in “The Guardian” by Larry Elliott dated December 17, 2017.]

[See the e-commentary at “Third Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (October 8, 2018)”, “Second Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (October 9, 2017)”, “First Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (October 10, 2016)”, “Announcing The First Annual Noble Prize In Eco-nomics (May 2, 2016)”, “Award Deadlines (Livelines?) (July 25, 2016)”, “From e-con-omics to eco-nomics? (August 1, 2011)”, and “Skip the Nobel in Economics (October 6, 2009)”.]

Bumper stickers of the week:

The United States of Anger backed its currency with Au (until August 15, 1971) and transacted in part in Ag (until July 23, 1965) and now backs its concoction d.b.a. the PetroDollar with Fe and Pb by bombing any country and killing any person who demurs to the US hegemony.

Boycott banks; support credit unions

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The China-Russia Affair: Advancing The Petro-Yuan; Dictating The Future (March 26, 2018)

Posted in AIIB, China, CIPS, Cryptocurrency, Currency, Cyberactivities, Gold, Guns, INE, International Finance, International Monetary Fund, Money, Russia, SDR - Special Drawing Rights, Second Amendment, Silver, Special Drawing Rights (SDR), Sports, SWIFT, World's Reserve Currency on March 26, 2018 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “In the past, the United States played and promoted with some skill the tension and animosity between China and Russia. The United States has behaved so abysmally and monstrously that even the Chinese and the Russians are flirting with each other.”

J “The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Yet nations do not have enemies or friends, only interests. They have allied to advance their common interests in confronting a common enemy.”

K “When the United States drives the Chinese and Russians to embrace and play well together, the U.S. is in trouble.”

J “The U.S. has proudly and defiantly positioned itself to be the world’s worst enemy.”

. . .

J “The National Security Strategy document signed by President Trumpi on December 18 unwisely exacerbates the U.S. and China-Russia divide and further alienates the U.S. from the world.”

K “China is launching its crude oil futures contract today at the Shanghai International Energy Exchange (INE). China and Russia have been swiftly designing and perfecting a system described as the China Interbank Payment System (CIPS) to send and receive information about and to reconcile financial transactions. The system will circumvent and ultimately undermine the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) controlled by the U.S.”

J “They are also establishing the Petro-Yuan to replace the Petro-Dollar to facilitate transactions facilitated by the CIPS and to make investments funded by the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). That allows the Chinese and Russians, at the time of their choosing, to dump U.S. Treasuries and equities and buy up and demand the physical delivery of all gold and silver. The Big Jolt will shift the geopolitical tectonic plates in a short time.”

K “The U.S. will respond by dropping every bomb in its arsenal all at once everywhere and assassinating any leaders who challenge its hegemony.”

. . .

K “The Chinese are building the One Belt One Road Initiative and uniting countries and continents, but the U.S. has a hard time tightening its economic belt and fixing one road.”

. . .

K “The U.S. could do a whole lot more to slow or stop the wholesale theft of intellectual property by China.”

J “His company was uneasy about filling the order from China for just a single unit. Three years later, they discovered that an entire plant is producing dozens of them daily.”

K “Now they do not even need to reverse engineer a product. Just hack the computer and download the plans.”

J “When Chinese technology was used to commandeer an American drone, I knew the situation was bleak.”

. . .

J “A few weeks ago, someone on a lunch break called into a radio call-in show and questioned the genius of the U.S. strategy.”

K “At some point, everyone will be calling in and asking why the prices at Walmart are suddenly what they were at Nordstroms the previous month.”

. . .

J “The rest of the world may accept or be forced to accept a gold-backed currency for some time. However, after securing control, the Sino-Russian Alliance will be free to impose a fiat cryptocurrency using something much more sophisticated than the rudimentary blockchain technology and perhaps a refined version of the Hashgraph technology.”

K “But will the U.S. have enough bombs to drop on the rest of the world?”

. . .

K “The Chinese and the Russians were playing chess and the U.S. was playing checkers; now the Sino-Russian Alliance is playing weiqi and Trumpi is playing tiddlywinks.”

J “Trumpi is playing with himself and playing with our futures. And they are playing doubles while the U.S. is playing singles.”

. . .

[See “China plans to break petrodollar stranglehold” in “Asia Times” by Pepe Escobar dated December 21, 2017 and “The World Will Not Mourn The Decline of U.S. Hegemony” in “Truthdig” by Paul Street dated February 20, 2018.]

[See the e-commentary titled “World’s Reserve Currency War I = Cold War 2.0 = WW III (?) (September 8, 2014)”, “AIIB: China: 1; U.S.A. 0? (April 6, 2015)”, “The Mandibles, FRNs, SDRs, IMF, G20, WTD! (September 5, 2016)”, “USA + FRN/PD — > IMF + SDR — > NDB + UMU? The “Universal Monetary Unit” . . . Coming To a Planet Near You (January 2, 2017)” and “One World Currency? (January 8, 2018)”.]

Bumper stickers of the week:

Panda < Eagle > Bruin; Panda + Bruin > Eagle

CIPS > SWIFT; AIIB > World Bank; INE > Brent + WTI; Petro-Yuan > Petro-Dollar: [ergo] -> Panda + Bruin > Eagle. Game, Set, Match. Fin.

Currency Wars -> Trade Wars -> War Wars

America First -> American Last

Some signs at the “March For Our Lives” March on March 24:

Orange lies matter

Owner for reform

The scariest part of school should be a pop quiz

More 4.0 Less 5.56

We call BS

Hold handguns

When I grow up, I want to be alive

If I am killed by a gun, don’t bury me, just dump my body on the Capitol steps

Bullets are not school supplies

Enough / Bastante

My life is worth more than your guns

No more silence End gun violence

Arm me with books not bullets

Need test to drive Why not to shoot?

Protect kids not guns

Moms demand attention

Am I next?

Gun owner for gun control

No Rational Argument

21st century technology, 18^th century laws

Too old to create change, step aside and we’ll do it

Never again

Some tweet We march

NRA Modern Day Mafia

Mental health not personal wealth

Respect our existence or expect our resistance

Thoughts Prayers Action

My students are more important than your guns

Enough is Enough

Mothers Against the NRA

#NeverAgain

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“Bitcoin”, “Ethereum” . . . “Blockchain Technology” Say What? (July 3, 2017)

Posted in Currency, Gold, Gold Standard, Money, Silver, Silver Standard on July 3, 2017 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “‘I shoulda’ is my middle name. My first and last name, really. ‘I Really Shoulda, Jr.’ Some years ago, someone at the monthly Tuesday night ‘Bitcoin Boosters’ meeting offered me some Bitcoin for $30. I could have and should have exchanged paper fiat for electronic fiat.”

J “A day late and a Bitcoin short, as they say. I have the brains of the scarecrow and the courage of the lion. I asked myself ‘Why not’ and could not discern any reason why not to take a small risk and then did not take a small risk.”

K “Fiat for fiat; faith for faith; dust for dust; ashes for ashes.”

. . .

K “Those who mine for and invest in gold and silver and other precious metals are undermined by those who can manipulate the price of physical gold and silver and other precious metals via paper and electronic trades. Bitcoin, Ethereum and the like seem to be the refuge for some because they are purported by their proponents not to be as susceptible to manipulation. But are they?”

J “Are they real? I do not know why the stuff could not be hacked or extinguished if the site goes dark.”

K “This thing called ‘Blockchain technology’ is another newfangled nebulous technological construct that surely intrudes on our privacy and invades our pocketbooks.”

J “They say that you can store your Bitcoins in an ‘electronic wallet’ of some sort. From my perspective, if it is not in your hand or if it is not land, it is not real.”

. . .

J “A percolating battle is quietly raging between and among Bitcoin, Ethereum and the other crypto-currencies that is akin to the videotape format wars that raged years ago.”

K “Betamax versus VHS. Will the best one win? Who do we want to win?”

. . .

K “The government tracks all the transactions and shortly will tax all the transactions.”

J “The government views the stuff as a commodity not as a currency. The government taxes any exchange of a commodity by demanding payment in its own currency.”

K “The government will attack any viable challenge that thwarts or could thwart the monopoly of the coin of the realm.”

. . .

K “I do not mind losing $30. But do I want to gamble $3000?”

J “Dollars or Bitcoin?”

. . .

K “Hard come, easy go.”

J “Hard come, easy go.”

. . .

K “As they say: ‘You’ve got to know when to hold’em, know when to fold’em, Know when to walk away, know when to run.’”

J “If you had anted up your two bits and purchased a Bit, would you know when to walk away?”

K “I am confident that I would later lament that ‘I shoulda’ sold it before it dropped precipitously in price . . . and of course before I unloaded it.”

J “Run.”

. . .

[Listen to the interview “‘One Nation Under Gold’ Explores America’s Obsession With One Precious Metal” with James Ledbetter on “Fresh Air” with Dave Davies substituting for the legendary and celebrated Terry Gross on June 26, 2017. Contrast the author’s criticism of a gold standard with the defense of and justification for a gold standard in “Jim Grant Explains the Gold Standard” by James Grant on the “Mises Wire” on June 27, 2017.]

[See the e-commentary at “Money” and other related topics.]

Bumper stickers of the week:

I hack charities

“Fiat” is “faith” without the “h”; “life” is “lie” with an “f.”

Fiat for fiat; faith for faith; dust for dust; ashes for ashes.

A day late and a Bitcoin short.

“You’ve got to know when to hold’em, know when to fold’em, Know when to walk away, know when to run. You never count your money when you’re sittin’ at the table,
There’ll be time enough for countin’ when the dealin’s done.” “The Gambler” written by Don Schlitz and sung by Kenny Rogers.

Hard come, easy go.

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The Third Amendment: Finding A Safe Haven And A Refuge For The Elements (May 10, 2017)

Posted in Constitution, Fiat Currency, Gold, Gold Standard, Martial Law, Privacy, Republican Federal Judge Syndrome, Second Amendment, Silver, Silver Standard, Third Amendment, War on May 8, 2017 by e-commentary.org

. . .

K “It was placed third ahead of the right to be free of unreasonable search and seizure, the right to a trial by jury and the right not to be subject to cruel and unusual punishment, among others. Protecting against the threat was a greater concern and anxiety that these other concerns and anxieties.”

J “And yet one hundred out of ninety-nine Americans cannot identify it. Even at tony cocktail parties. It is the Privacy Provision.”

. . .

K “As I recall, it says: ‘No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law’ or something like that. Congress has not formally declared war for decades, yet the government is at war with most of the world all the time and will be at war with most of the world until the final collapse of the American Empire.”

J “The Constitutional benchmark in time of war allows for regulation ‘prescribed by law’ that provides an open-ended ability to oppress the people. The government can send in the police and contend that they are not even soldiers, even though the police are militarized and soldier-surrogates in the soft martial law that has been in place for the last dozen plus years.”

K “And the Republican federal judges suffering from ‘Republican Federal Judge Syndrome’ will allow the government to do anything it wants to and call if deference.”

. . .

K “Survey the literature. No one even questions that the government will confiscate gold and likely silver when the stuff begins to compete with the fraudulent fiat currency foisted on the public by the government.”

J “The government will not stop there. The Empire will confiscate all the elements – Au, Ag and Fe and Pb.”

K “The Second Amendment may provide some limited protection for guns and perhaps for ammo. The Third Amendment needs to be expanded to protect gold and silver from government confiscation.”

J “The right to keep and exchange precious metals shall not be abridged.”

. . .

J “The Founding Fathers did not have to contend with a fraudulent fiat currency.”

K “That is why I contend that the Third Amendment prohibition against quartering troops in one’s house should be expanded to include a prohibition against the government restricting the use of ‘Washington quarters’ of the citizen’s choosing in one’s house and in exchanges with other citizens so inclined.”

J “Quarters, dimes and dollars are under assault and attack by the government. They are the only means to maintain some privacy and freedom in exchanges.”

K “The Third Amendment may offer the most promise for providing some constitutional protection for privacy and freedom broadly defined.”

. . .

K “On the other head, the Third Amendment is undergirded by the fiction that the house is one’s castle and should not be invaded by the state. Vesting the Third Amendment with what we deeply believe is important may be an inappropriate bypass of direct Congressional action.”

J “Bypassing direct Congressional action does not seem inappropriate to me. Congress will pass the law to confiscate precious metals and not pass any law to protect private possession of property such as possession of precious metals.”

. . .

K “And talking about quarters, . . . that’s my two bits.”

J “And that is my dos centavos.”

. . .

[See the essay by Gordon S. Wood on “The Third Amendment” published by the National Constitution Center.]

[See the e-commentary at “Preserve Cash; Preserve (Some) Privacy (May 4, 2015)”, “The Paradox Of The Republican Federal Judge: Republican Federal Judge Syndrome (September 23, 2013)” and “Boycott Facebook? (August 2, 2010)” that suggests an extension of the Third Amendment to protect against invasions of privacy.]

Bumper sticker of the week:

“No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.”

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Musings On Silver (November 21, 2016)

Posted in Banks and Banking System, Gold, Gold Standard, Money, Silver, Silver Standard on November 21, 2016 by e-commentary.org

. . .

_ “First place among the losers?”

_ “Dismissed as the ‘also-ran’ of precious metals?”

_ “Chump change or chump’s change?”

. . .

_ “I view gold as the farm and silver as the crops and the animals. You do not sell the farm. You do buy, sell and exchange the crops and the animals.”

_ “So gold is the store of value and silver is the medium of exchange. But what is the unit of account – hectares or hogs . . . or flashy pretentious paper with no real underlying value other than faith that is often misplaced by the populace?”

. . .

_ “The historic price relationship between gold and silver is way out of kilter. Gold should be priced lower or silver should be priced higher. If you account for the cost of production, gold is not priced too low and cannot be priced much lower without impacting the supply which will . . . drive up the price and further distort the price and the historic price relationship. Ergo, silver should be priced much higher.”

_ “Everything is out of kilter. Like so many other ostensible markets, we are dealing with rigged rackets. Both prices are held artificially low by the powers that control price and sell paper precious metals. But the prices cannot be held low forever.”

_ “Mr. Supply and Ms. Demand are not in the game.”

_ “Except to the extent that if a miner cannot make any money from mining, the miner will not mine.”

. . .

_ “Gold is for kings and silver is for royalty.”

. . .

_ “And there are some pure silver mines, yet silver is usually a byproduct of other mining for gold and copper. The economics are intertwined and interdependent.”

. . .

_ “Someone said that roughly seventy percent of gold is used in jewelry and roughly seventy percent of silver is used in electronics and other commercial uses.”

_ “Silver was once used in large quantities for analog photography.”

_ “Many digital devices use a speck of silver. Those specks add up to a peck.”

. . .

_ “She reported back to her students that during her field trip to China fifteen years earlier, some shopkeepers exchanged her pre-1965 Washington silver quarters for two dollars and fifty cents in credit for her purchases in the shop that day. Think about it, on average, the Chinese shopkeepers offered the tenfold premium without even a prod or a prompting. They are in the know and they know it.”

_ “The Chinese shop keepers’ take on the pre-1965 two bits is revealing. They will take them in exchange for twenty bits worth of products.”

. . .

_ “That Series 1935 A silver certificate framed in the den is from a Hong Kong shopkeeper who swiftly slipped the certificate with the lapis lazuli Treasury seal in among the other unpretentious camo-colored Federal Reserve Notes she dealt and dropped in front of me. She appeared to be sloughing it off on someone who might not notice the outlier dealt to him. I pulled it out of the stack, stared at it and could hear its story and feel its history.”

. . .

_ “And silver is shinier than gold.”

_ “Describing a silver salmon as ‘dime bright’ invokes and evokes a clear image.”

. . .

[See the e-commentary at “The Silver Standard: The Value Of (Sort Of) Real Money (July 15, 2013)”, “Is The Gold Standard Really The Gold Standard? (January 18, 2010)”, “The Gold Standard Revisited (August 15, 2015)”, “‘Fiat Gold’ / Fool’s Gold (May 2, 2011)”, and “The Mandibles, FRNs, SDRs, IMF, G20, WTD! (September 5, 2016).”]

[JFK – May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963]

Bumper stickers of the week:

Silence is golden; gold is silent

What is the gold standard again?

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The Mandibles, FRNs, SDRs, IMF, G20, WTD! (September 5, 2016)

Posted in Book Reference, Collapse, Courts, Debt/Deficits, Dollar - World's Reserve Currency, Federal Reserve, Gold, Gold Standard, Guns, INFORM Act, International Finance, International Monetary Fund, Journalism, Money, Newspapers, Petrodollar, Press/Media, SDR - Special Drawing Rights, Silver, Silver Standard, Special Drawing Rights (SDR), World's Reserve Currency on September 5, 2016 by e-commentary.org

. . .

X “Some of the folks at the G20 Summit may kick around the future composition of the ‘Special Drawing Rights’ that is emerging as the new world’s reserve currency. The International Monetary Fund formally sets the composition of the SDRs, yet the major players gathered in China yesterday to discuss such matters. A thing is now being described as a right.”

Z “Sounds like they are creating a right to reach first for your gun.”

X “Or they are sketching a new picture of the economic future based on rights rather than on power and circumstance.”

Z “Or someone special who has been allowed to have the only gun in the great currency gunfight now must play well with others who are suitably armed.”

X “Or the one with the big gun is now being disarmed.”

. . .

X “Felicitous publication really.”

Z “Timely, even. The times they are changin’ the way we will make change in the near future.”

X “In The Mandibles, Lionel Shriver adopts Keynes’ term ‘Bancor’ rather than the new age term ‘SDR’ to describe supplementary foreign exchange reserve assets. As the U.S. Petrodollar slips as the world’s reserve currency and then as the dominant component of the SDR/Bancor, the United States people will slip to second-world status in the world.”

Z “The way I describe it, when the Petrodollar is no longer the big dog, the United States is no longer the leader of the pack.”

X “Prices will increase and perhaps double in short order before more structural disorder devolves. Our McMansions still will sport baroque brushed nickel bathroom fixtures in the multiple bathrooms, yet in due course the water coursing through the corroding pipes will be increasingly intermittent and decreasingly safe.”

Z “Many of us have those problems now while everything appears to be dory hunky.”

. . .

X “Her description of the human consequences is very plausible, yet her explanation for the underlying causes is only partially complete. Contemporary economic doctrine is exposed as voodoo and a specious secular religion that rationalizes those in power acquiring and retaining wealth. The entitlement Ponzi scheme receives appropriate blame. The pernicious involvement of the Federal Reserve is alluded to obliquely, yet the entrenched corruption and incompetence in every quarter are not addressed.”

Z “She does not describe the institutions that are failing systematically and simultaneously. Congress, courts, executives and executive agencies, bureaucrats, universities, news outlets, parents, preachers, prophets, you name it. At some time, a fragile, fractured, fissured and fundamentally weak system of manipulation and intervention will fail with consequence.”

X “She does observe that the traditional news fashioners are defunct.”

. . .

X “‘The Chip’ is first described in an e-commentary titled ‘Monitoring The Masses: The Card And The Chip’ published on January 12, 2015. She further develops the human impact of implanting ‘The Chip’ to control and corral the masses. ‘The Chip’ is so much more efficient and effective than the corn chip and football at sating the populace.”

Z “‘The Chip’ is an electronic lobotomy that is more powerful, pervasive and perverse than fear or drugs. Technology saves us. I think that is what one would conclude. Surely.”

. . .

X “An empire cannot continue to mimeograph a fiat currency and force it on the rest of the world at great cost and consequence to the rest of the world without the rest of the world demurring at some point.”

Z “And the rest of the world is becoming restive.”

X “They are issuing SDR-denominated bonds.”

Z “And they are selling oil without even acknowledging the Petrodollar.”

. . .

X “In her novel, the U.S. government confiscates gold and disregards even basic civil liberties while confiscating the yellow stuff.”

Z “Survey the universe of commentary on the subject and you discover that no one has ever even questioned that the government will confiscate gold when the stuff competes with the fake stuff.”

X “The people of the United State of Nevada who seceded from the dysfunctional disunion agree that it is ‘dumb’ and ‘arbitrary,’ but they base their currency the ‘Continental’ on the gold standard.”

Z “She does not see that the government would have eliminated cash of any kind years or decades earlier.”

X “That is one of the harbingers of great danger. When the government outlaws or confiscates Au, Ag, Fe, Pb, or even worthless fiat cash, the end of civil rights and civil liberties is near.”

Z “Or here.”

. .

[See the e-commentary at “Monitoring The Masses: The Card And The Chip (January 12, 2015)”, “Brave 1984 Farm: The Best Of All Possible Worlds (March 19, 2012)” and the e-commentary on the institutional distractions in our society at “Foot Longs and Football (September 2, 2013).”]

Bumper stickers of the week:

G20 > G7; SDR > FRN; World > USA

In the intermediate run, a Kleptocracy is unsustainable.

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The Gold Standard Revisited (August 15, 2016)

Posted in Book Reference, Dollar - World's Reserve Currency, Gold, Gold Standard, Money, Nobel Prize, Noble Prize, Petrodollar, SDR - Special Drawing Rights, Silver, Silver Standard on August 15, 2016 by e-commentary.org

. . .

M “You may be right.”

G “I don’t want to be right. But you just cannot trust the government.”

M “It will never seem reasonable, but it is rational. We must do something to restrain human nature and government excess.”

. . .

G “Gold is an element. Gold is a commodity. Gold is a currency if folks act as if it is a currency. Gold is what you make it. The vote is coming in. The Swiss not so much but who knows what to make about the election. Those who vote in favor of the dollar or the pound and against gold as a currency may soon be . . . pounding sand.”

. . .

G “As I recall, Keynes proclaimed that the gold standard, not gold per se, is a ‘barbarous relic.’ ‘Barbarian’ means ‘foreign.’ For example, ‘Barbara’ is a ‘foreign woman.’ So that might suggest that the gold standard, or at least gold, is popular in foreign countries. And it is. One point four billion Chinese and one point three billion Indians relish the element. The Russians embrace it with both paws.”

M “Seems that Au is A1 in the world today.”

. . .

M “Tying human activity to an element such as Au seems so . . . confining. And elemental. Yet without something tethering human greed, ‘printing money’ is a temptation too great. If he had known about it, Bill Shakespeare would have written about it.”

G “You cannot trust the government. And yet the great irony is that the government is not printing money. The government has ceded power to the Federal Reserve which sounds like the government and yet is a private business that owes its allegiance to the banks and advances the welfare of the those in the stock market racket.”

. . .

M “Keynes criticized the gold standard because it was a direct threat to his ego and his identity and his desire to make unbridled decisions. That is the hallmark of what passed for the elite.”

G “No one in power wants to be restrained by a standard. Some standard is better than no standard.”

. . .

G “The rule of law is a civilizing relic yet not one in currency today. Even with more rules and laws on the books than ever in the history of humankind, the rule of law simply does not apply to those in power. The law is no restraint.”

. . .

G “The Nobel gang rewards those who shill for the fiat system and the central banks. If the Nobel gang gave awards for those who ask probing questions about the viability and consequences of fiat currency and unrestrained debt, there would be more folks asking probing questions about the viability and consequences of fiat currency and unrestrained debt.”

M “Perhaps the new Noble Prize in Eco-nomics can be awarded to those few individuals who ask probing questions and provide trenchant answers.”

. . .

[See the previous great gold standard debate in the e-commentary at “Is The Gold Standard Really The Gold Standard? (January 18, 2010)”, a discussion of the silver standard at “The Silver Standard: The Value Of (Sort Of) Real Money (July 15, 2013)” and the observation in “The U.S. And Saudi Arabia: Not Playing Well With Others (Each Other) (July 11, 2016)” that President Nixon decided unilaterally to cancel the direct international convertibility of the United States dollar to gold today.]

Bumper stickers of the week:

“In truth, the gold standard is already a barbarous relic.” John M. Keynes, A Tract on Monetary Reform (1924).

“Real gold is not afraid of the fire of a red furnace.” Chinese proverb

“There are three hundred economists in the world who are against gold, and they think that gold is a barbarous relic – and they might be right. Unfortunately, there are three billion inhabitants of the world who believe in gold.” Attributed to János Fekete

In every country, culture and civilization through space and across time, gold is the one thing and the only thing that has been cherished by everyone everywhere at all times.

Eco-nomic SAT Question: Which statement does not fit: 1) resources are finite, 2) water is finite, 3) gold is finite or 4) money printing is infinite?

The Gold Standard may just be the Gold Standard or at least a standard.

The G20 Leaders Summit is in Hangzhou, China this September 4 and 5.

Convention between the United States and Great Britain (for Canada) for the Protection of Migratory Birds, also called the Migratory Bird Treaty, was signed on August 16, 1916.

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Archive for the Silver Category

[See“Model Collapse: The Entire Bubble Economy Is a Hallucination” By Charles Hugh Smith dated December 3, 2025 in “www.oftwominds.com.”]

Bumper stickers of the week:

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