If GATA is right and they find out so much gold is gone, America might become a 3rd world country overnight as its credit will be destroyed. Yikes. Give me the blue pill!

Greed, evil, corrupt, power, polotician connections, CYA...looking out for only no. 1..fear ?? Any or any combo or all ??

Spread, there's a great book called "The Creature From Jekyll Island", that talks about the creation of the Federal Reserve. Basically the premise is that 7 financial firms along with Nelson Aldrich created the Federal Reserve and manipulate the economy with it. 2 of those banks are Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan. Basically these 2 "boys" can do whatever they want because "daddy" Fed will always be there to bail them out, either in plain sight or in secret. TARP was in plain sight, AIG was in secret (most of the bailout money to AIG went back to Goldman Sachs).

True Darrell, and I do not remember where that money went. But of those 7 firms I mentioned, 4 of them are not American. I'd have to look up the names. But what is a fact is that the Federal Reserve has shareholders, and that they are financial institutions. Each year the Fed takes in all money from taxes and everywhere else, then distributes 97% to the treasury. But where does the 3% go? And why would an entity that is responsible for controlling a nations money supply and it's interest rates be allowed to have shareholders? That is a major conflict of interest.

Well part of my point is that they are inviting oversight that they really don't want; and if the political institutions disintegrate enough they may be candidates for being lined up against a wall.

The prevailing theory (some would call it conspiracy theory) is that recessions and booms are artificially created to maximize profits and eliminate competition. That was the original intent behind the creation of the Fed in 1913. The idea was that the Fed would loosen lending controls, which would prompt all banks to start giving out loans to everyone and become highly leveraged. Then a few years down the road those lending controls are tightened, tightening consumer pocketbooks and creating defaults on those loans. A bank becomes insolvent and is quickly scooped up for pennies on the dollar by one of the bigger ones. But the clever big banks would keep the name on the door, giving the illusion of free market competition. Good examples of this are Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual, both of which were bought out by JP Morgan. But the name on the doors are still the same.

off course, its being manipulated, for years, & years, and years....where have you been?

Having said that - get used to it!!!!

The fed (& associated govt types, but mainly the fed) has manipualtion of gold in their genes...what would you do, if your charter said - maintain a ......level of inflation, by controlling money supply. You would look to knock your main competitiuon - gold. Ocassionally, things get outa hand...ask Arthu Miller (or soon, Uncle Ben)

They dont invite oversight, bcos (as Nicloson put it) - the politicians cant handle the truth - gone is the illusion of prosperity, if you have to do all the hard liftin by yourself.

Several fascinating books on the fed - one of them tracing the origin of the Fed activities to Willian Penn - that dastardly prime minister of UK, who always used to get elected, due to a sudden surge of good times just before elections (money supply/easy money, anyone).

Marxidon, I'll let the experts on here answer the question on how much gold one should hold in their portfolio. There really is no standard amount. I know Stansberry has recently recommended you put 25% into metals like gold and silver. That may not be the norm, but everyone's predicting $2,000 an ounce gold, so that may be why the percentage is so high. I think the bigger question is, how should that percentage be diversified (gold miners, silver miners, ETFs, etc).

As far as the 15% tax, I went back and checked on it, and it applies to Canadian Trusts. An example would be Petyo Energy Trust (PEY-UN.TO). I don't know if it applies to other Canadian stocks, but I do know they plan on eliminating the 15% tax on return as of January 2011. Pink sheet stocks are totally different and there is no extra tax beyond what Uncle Sam charges. But you can also buy Canadian Trusts on the pink sheets. Peyto's pink sheet ticker would be (PEYUF.PK), but it is highly illiquid, and the price discrepancy I believe has to do with the exchange rate. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

All foreign stocks with-hold 15% from dividends when paid to U.S. investors....
As to earlier questions about gold....We keep plowing the same road on this....But there are enough differences of opinion to account for it; So, if no one particularly minds, I'll harness the mules again. Mind...This is just my opinion....
First...Gold bullion doesn't earn you a thing....However, it is a store of value, and buys the same amount of goods as it did in the days of Marcus Aurelius...Or, from 1803 to 2003, 1 oz.of gold
lost 2% of purchasing power, while from 1933 to 2003, the USD lost 97% of its' purchasing power.
The price increases or decreases are in relation to 1 oz. of gold's purchasing power expressed in the currency of choice....Just as any other commodity (Oil, gas coal iron ore, etc.).
Gold has an inherrant leverage, so when considering how much to have as a % of your portfolio, or net worth (Your choice), keep in mind a little goes a long way. Maybe a 10 to 1 leverage factor...
So...I'd say 10% to 15%, as a conservative amount....I've seen one very reputable investor claim 50% cash, and 50% gold...Yikes!!! (He may turn out to be smarter than all of us...And yet...7 Aces, is a lot of Aces). But it's up to you 20%,?...25%, 30%??
Secondly, If you are buying for long-term safety...Buy collectible coins in gold,or silver (Foreign coins carry less premium than US coins); Bullion coins in gold or silver (Premiums outrageous),
Or Central Fund of Canada, and Gold Trust of Canada...CEF, and GTU respectively. The premium on either, doesn't bother me...5%, 10%,...(15% would probably frost my nanny, but I'm buying for safety.
not to make a fast buck)....
I would buy the etf's like GLD etc. only if I am a trader...And the 2X long gold only as a day trader.
Those etf's may or may not have bullion or IOU's....Also, I'd buy individual gold or silver stocks.
Mostly the HUI Index non-leveraged mining stocks....Not GDX....I love it....But the Hedge funds, like
Greenlight, do too...Hedge funds have loaded up on etf's, and GDX...They'll ruin you, sooner or later.
Silver is a better buy now, though it can be more volitile...Trader, or not....Rebalance, or take profits prudently...If, the etf's, or miners pull back...You've got some cash profits to buy back in.
As to CEF, and GTU...Don't sell, just add on pull backs...
Howard Ruff told someone recently that Swiss Francs are backed by gold....They are not...
And Switzerland loaned money to Eastern Europe, and UBS of course got nailed in the sub-primes
and is the Swiss stock markets biggest member....The only good currency in Europe is the Norwegian Krona.

Finally...I've chosen to pull back quite a bit from here.....Most of the active threads are political; Not investment.....
Maybe these rants are theraputic...I don't know...But as granddaddy would say...All this "Doesn't butter no parsnips"
I don't have the time for 16 pages of ...Whatever it is...You all are too smart to be wasting your time complaining....Go kick somebody's dog, and get on with it (Never ever kick your own dog).
Keep sharing ideas for surviving and prospering in these times...That's your job!

destry, I think there is a way (don't know exactly how) to block Categories your not interested in. That might clean up some of the clutter.

Gold’s rise is solid as it’s had a consistent y-o-y gain since 2001. It was one of the few investments that ended 2008 with a gain and if it ends 2009 above $880, this will be the 9th consecutive yearly gain & that’s impressive!

Gold has not been as volatile as silver. Silver rose more, but also fell more. For example, gold is up around 8% this year while silver is up 34%. But last year gold gained 5.5% while silver lost 27%. Over the years, gold outperformed silver during the 1970s and 1980s, but this mega trend changed in 1990. Gold was much weaker than silver from 1990-97. This basically continued until last year when gold strongly outperformed silver due to the crisis.

Interestingly, gold is now starting to weaken again against silver. In other words, silver is no longer being held down by the crisis. It’s behaving more like a commodity and that is a good economic sign. My bet is on silver.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/141227-will-a-silver-bullet-finally-kill-the-metal-manipulators?source=yahoo

Informative article on silver manipulation via Bullion ETF's. Silver is down the last few days, it may be time to load up the truck.

Destry, I'm not sure I fully understand your answer. If silver's value is in relation to gold, shouldn't it be trading closer to $60 per ounce? And why has the ratio widened so much? The spread seems too wide to me to hold, and since gold is unlikely to drop, silver seems a better play. Silver also has many more industrial uses, which makes it a far more useful metal. If the lead article on this thread is right and 2 companies are keeping silver low, once the bulls jump in there is no limit to where silver could end up.

Regarding the Seeking Alpha article Patches provided (Casey had a link to this too).... what does everyone think about the theory of the silver/gold manipulation from the EFTs? Does that make sense that the EFTs are sucking up the dollars that would otherwise be going to direct bullion purchases, and b/c the EFT does not purchase 100% of actual physical bullion, it keeps the prices lower than if EFTs were not used, but rather folks would have purchased 100% bullion outright. An earlier article, from the same, stated there is no regular audit of the physical inventory for the bullion the EFT is suppose to have in storage, and no guarantee to the shareholders.

More grist for the mill….this time from WSJ

Investment bubbles usually begin as legitimate bull markets, and I wouldn't be surprised if gold were next.
First, there's a serious investment case. Central banks are flooding the world economy with liquidity. That's a peril to all paper currencies. Anything scarce and valuable, such as precious metals, ought to benefit. Gold is also coming off a very low floor from 10 years ago.
And it's captured investors' imaginations. Boston is the home of many of the biggest mutual fund companies in America -- including Fidelity, Putnam, MFS and Wellington -- but one of the busiest places around the financial district right now is J.J. Teaparty, a well-known shop dealing in bullion and rare coins. All day, a steady stream of customers stop in to buy gold and silver bars and coins. A number of local mutual fund managers -- "stocks for the long run" notwithstanding -- have been seen sneaking off during their lunch hours to do the same.
Gold may be a great bet at these levels. But people should be aware of the risks of buying bullion -- either through an exchange-traded fund, or directly.
To say this metal is volatile is an understatement. Since the start of 2008, the price of gold has swung between $1000 and around $700 (it's currently at $965). This is a safe haven? When the stock market does this, it's on the front page.
And while U.S. and other Western investors are jumping aboard the golden caravan, many in Asia -- who rode it all the way from $260 an ounce -- are quietly disembarking. The World Gold Council, an industry body, reports that Asian investors were actually net sellers during the first quarter, while westerners bought heavily and sent prices soaring.
Ordinary U.S. investors, on average, aren't timing this market too well. Money flows into, and out of, exchange-traded bullions funds like GLD, and are tracked monthly by Financial Research Corp., an analytics company. Comparing them to gold prices over the past year is disheartening.
Gold spiked well above $900 an ounce in July 2008 and again this February and March. Those, of course, were the months when bullion funds reported by far their biggest net inflows. Yet when gold slumped, as it did last October and November and again in April, so did fund sales.
Rarely does anyone discuss the biggest problem with gold -- no one actually knows what this metal is really worth. After all, it generates no income. All the gains come from capital appreciation. And that, of course, is a gamble.
Don't believe me? Try this: What will an ounce of gold sell for in 2038? Are you confident it will sell for more than $3,500? Yes? No? Maybe?
I don't know either, and I'm skeptical of anyone who insists they do know. Anyone buying gold today is basically betting on it.
Today you can buy zero-coupon Treasurys guaranteed to turn $965 into $3,500 by then. That's an annual return of about 4.6%. If you're buying gold, which has no guarantees, you are gambling that it will do a lot better.
(Of course you may hope to sell long before then. But if you want to make a profit, you will still have to find someone else willing to bet gold will be higher than $3,500 by 2038)
While the public has become excited about bullion, shares in mining companies have been left behind. Sales of mutual funds that buy gold-mining shares have been anemic. Both the big and small companies look reasonably cheap compared to their product. A basket of them ought to give many of the benefits of bullion with fewer risks.

Patches
The question really is...Why isn't gold trading at it's proper historical level(Adjusted for inflation)
of $600/ounce....We know , or would suspect we know why...And it's not an objective; But rather a "Subjective" value. Fear, apprehension, safe haven...None quantifieable.
I haven't done it...However, use gold at $600/ounce on your calculation for the ideal price of silver.
See what you get....I know that historically gold should be worth $600/ounce (Actually $556/ounce...But why borrow trouble)....Iknow that attempts are made to equate it to so many barrels of oil...That's been a false equation, since Richard Nixon desolved the Bretton Woods agreement.
The price of silver, has a closer correlation to a basket of base metals, than to gold...I think.

I believe GTU holds (verified) gold bullion.

That's true Patches....Everbank has been around awhile...They've a good reputation.
There is another outfit (Google "Run to Gold". You'll find reference to it) where you can buy gold bullion by the gram value and have a checking account based upon the gold gram weight value of your account..."MyGold"?? Something like that.

CEF has horrible technicals over at the Dorsey Website - 2 out of 5. This particular stock underperforming the averages in the sector but in an uptrend. Bear confirmed. Showing short term strength as it has hit a double top. Currently overbought by 32%.

GTU is a confirmed bear with a double bottom that broke support, 0 out of 5 technicals. Weekly momentum just turned positive however underperforming the averages in the sector. Stock in a downtrend trading below resistance. Showing short term strength but long term weakness.

Don't shoot the messenger.

Heck, fix the doubt, buy some of each,...ha, ha, ha..Must be the gold bug in me, oil bug, gas bug, bio bug, or maybe I'm just gambling.

I don't think you're overly cautious.

"They audit and send a verification email about your account daily."

Why can't you view your account online? I'd be very suspicious.