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Reason.com: ’6 Reasons Why States Should Continue to Oppose ObamaCare’
Michael F. Cannon
Drawing from my white paper “50 Vetoes: How States Can Stop the Obama Health Law,” Reason’s Peter Suderman highlights six reasons why states should refuse to implement any part of ObamaCare. Here are two:
3. Refusing to create an exchange potentially protects a state’s businesses from the law’s employer mandate.Obamacare fines any business with 50 or more employees that does not offer health coverage of sufficient value—as determined by the federal government—$2,000 per employee (exempting the first 30 workers). The employer penalties, however, are triggered by the existence of the law’s subsidies for private health insurance. And as Cannon notes, the text of Obamacare specifically states that those subsidies are only available in states that choose to create their own exchanges. The IRS has issued a rule allowing for subsidies in states that reject the exchanges, but a lawsuit is already under way to challenge it.
4. States also have the power to protect as many as 12 million people from the law’s individual mandate—the “tax” it charges individuals for not carrying health insurance. Obamacare requires that nearly everyone maintain health coverage or pay a penalty—a “tax,” according to the Supreme Court’s decision upholding the law last year. But Obamacare also exempts individuals who would have to pay more than 8 percent of their household income for their share of their health insurance premiums. So if states bow out of the exchanges, and as a result the law’s private insurance subsidies are no longer available, then the mandate will no longer apply to the low and middle income individuals who would have to pay more than 8 percent of their income to get health insurance. Cannon estimates that if all 50 states were to decline to create exchanges, a little more than 12 million low and middle-income individuals would be exempt from the law’s mandate.
View full post on Cato @ Liberty
The Sovereign Debt Bubble Will Continue To Expand Until – BANG – The System Implodes
Why are so many politicians around the world declaring that the debt crisis is “over” when debt to GDP ratios all over the planet continue to skyrocket? The global economy has never seen anything like the sovereign debt bubble that we are experiencing today. The United States, Japan, and nearly every major nation in Europe are absolutely drowning in debt. We have heard a lot about “austerity” over in Europe in recent years, but debt to GDP ratios continue to rise in Greece, Spain, Italy, Ireland and Portugal. In general, most economists consider a debt to GDP ratio of 100% to be a “danger level”, and most of the economies of the western world have either already surpassed that level or are rapidly approaching it. Of course the biggest debt offender of all in many ways is the United States. The U.S. debt to GDP ratio has risen from 66.6 percent to 103 percent since 2007, and the U.S. government accumulated more new debt during Barack Obama’s first term than it did under the first 42 U.S. presidents combined. This insane sovereign debt bubble will continue to expand until a day of reckoning arrives and the system implodes. Nobody knows exactly when that moment will be reached, but without a doubt it is coming.
But if you listen to the mainstream media in the United States, you would be tempted to think that this giant bubble of debt is not much of a concern at all. For example, in a recent article in the Washington Post entitled “The case for deficit optimism“, Ezra Klein wrote the following…
“Here’s a secret: For all the sound and fury, Washington’s actually making real progress on debt.”
How many times have we heard that before?
About a decade ago, government officials were projecting that we would be swimming in gigantic government surpluses by now.
Instead, we are running trillion dollar deficits.
But right now there is a lot of optimism about the economy. The stock market recently hit a 5 year high and the business community is loving all of the false prosperity that all of this debt is buying us.
Even Warren Buffett does not really seem concerned about the exploding U.S. government debt. He recently made the following statement…
“It is not a good thing to have it going up in relation to GDP. That should be stabilized. But the debt itself is not a problem.”
Oh really?
A debt of 16 trillion dollars “is not a problem”?
Perhaps we should all run our finances that way.
Why don’t we all go out and open up 20 different credit cards, run them all up to the max, and then tell the credit card companies that we can’t pay them back but that it “is not a problem”.
Of course real life does not work that way.
The truth is that government debt is becoming a monstrous problem all over the globe. Just check out how debt to GDP ratios all over the planet have grown over the past five years…
United States
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 66.6 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 103 percent
United Kingdom
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 43.4 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 85.0 percent
France
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 63.7 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 86 percent
Germany
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 67.6 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 80.5 percent
Spain
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 39.6 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 69.3 percent
Ireland
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 24.8 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 106.4 percent
Portugal
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 63.9 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 108.1 percent
Italy
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 106.6 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 120.7 percent
Greece
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 106.1 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 170.6 percent
The Eurozone As A Whole
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 68.4 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 87.3 percent
Japan
Debt to GDP ratio in 2007: 172.1 percent
Debt to GDP ratio in 2012: 211.7 percent
So how does all of this end?
Well, it is going to be messy, but it is very difficult to say exactly when the system will collapse under the weight of too much debt. Some nations, such as Japan, are able to handle very high debt loads because they have a very high level of domestic saving. Up to this point, an astounding 95 percent of all Japanese government bonds have been purchased domestically. But other nations collapse under the weight of government debt even before they reach a debt to GDP ratio of 100%. The following is an excerpt from a recent Congressional Research Service report…
It is hard to predict at what point bond holders would deem it to be unsustainable. A few other advanced economies have debt-to-GDP ratios higher than that of the United States. Some of those countries in Europe have recently seen their financing costs rise to the point that they are unable to finance their deficits solely through private markets. But Japan has the highest debt-to-GDP ratio of any advanced economy, and it has continued to be able to finance its debt at extremely low costs.
When a government runs up massive amounts of debt, it is playing with fire. You can pile up mountains of government debt for a while, but eventually it catches up with you.
Over the past 10 years, the U.S. national debt has grown by an average of 9.3 percent per year, but the overall U.S. economy has only grown by an average of just 1.8 percent per year. That is unsustainable by definition.
There is going to be a tremendous price to pay for the debt binge that the U.S. government has indulged in over the past decade. During Barack Obama’s first term, the amount of new debt accumulated by the federal government breaks down to about $50,521 for every single household in the United States. That is utter insanity.
If you can believe it, we have accumulated more new government debt under Obama than we did from the inauguration of George Washington to the end of the Clinton administration.
And most Americans realize that something is seriously wrong. One recent poll found that only 34 percent of all Americans believe that the country is heading in the right direction, and 60 percent of all Americans believe that the country is heading in the wrong direction.
If we keep piling up so much debt, at some point a moment of great crisis will arrive. When that moment arrives, we could see havoc throughout the entire global financial system. For instance, most people don’t really understand the key role that U.S. Treasuries play in the derivatives market. The following is from a recent article posted on Zero Hedge…
This time around, things will be far worse if nothing is solved. If the US loses another AAA rating, then the financial markets could face systemic risk. The reason for this is that US Treasuries are one of the senior most forms of collateral used by the banks to backstop the $600+ trillion derivatives market.
As any trader who trades on margin can tell you, when the value of your collateral is called into question, those on the other side of the trade come looking for you to put up more capital on your trades. This can result in assets being sold en masse (similar to what happened after Lehman failed) and things can get very ugly very fast.
For much more on the danger that derivatives pose to our financial system, please see this article: “The Coming Derivatives Panic That Will Destroy Global Financial Markets“.
Once again, nobody knows exactly when the sovereign debt bubble will burst, but if we continue down the path that we are currently on, it will inevitably happen at some point.
And according to Professor Carmen Reinhart, when this bubble does burst things could unravel very rapidly…
“These processes are not linear,” warns Prof. Reinhart. “You can increase debt for a while and nothing happens. Then you hit the wall, and—bang!—what seem to be minor shocks that the markets would shrug off in other circumstances suddenly become big.”
At some point the global financial system will hit the wall that Professor Reinhart has warned about.
Are you ready?
View full post on The Economic Collapse
Why the “Unconscionable” Tax Burden Will Continue
The U.S. tax code places a “significant, even unconscionable burden” on taxpayers and needs to be completely overhauled. That is the view of Nina E. Olson, national taxpayer advocate with the Internal Revenue Service, as she explained to Congress on January 9. The code is so complicated, that individuals and business have to spend more than 6 billion hours a year in compliance. By Olson’s calculation that equals 3 million people working full time all year, equal to one of the largest industries in the nation.
Rep. Dave Camp, chairman of the House and Ways and Means Committee, responded “This report confirms that the code is 10 times the size of the Bible with none of the good news. Our broken tax code has become a nightmare of loopholes and special interest provisions that create added complexities and costs for hardworking taxpayers and small businesses.”
To streamline a tax code that keeps getting bigger, Olson advocated repeal of the alternate minimum tax and reduction of income exclusions, deductions and credits. That done, Congress could supposedly lower individual rates by 44 percent and bring in the same amount of review.
Washington insiders are doubtless right that Congress, despite predictable protests, will not reform the code along these lines. Congress just raised tax rates in a quest to avoid the fiscal cliff. Congress likes doling out tax breaks and every group thinks their own loopholes are justified.
Though billed as an advocate for taxpayers Nina Olson had other issues on her mind. In the true punch line of her speech she warned Congress not to underfund the IRS: “The plain truth is that the IRS’s mission trumps all other agencies’ missions, because without an effective revenue collector, you can’t fund those agencies.”
Nina Olson knows that members of Congress represent those federal agencies as much as they represent the people in their districts. That’s why Congress will continue to tolerate a “significant, even unconscionable burden” on hardworking taxpayers. That’s why Congress is more likely to make the burden even more onerous rather than consider anything as sensible, streamlined and fair as a flat tax.
View full post on MyGovCost | Government Cost Calculator
Other • Technocrats Continue Turning Fiat Into Property As Global F
Technocrats Continue Turning Fiat Into Property As Global Financial Crisis Continues
Susanne Posel Dec 14th, 2012
Susanne Posel
Occupy Corporatism
December 14, 2012
The European Central Bank (ECB) is setting the stage of a complete financial collapse of fiat currencies across the globe. Joining in the scheme are other technocratic institutions such as the Federal Reserve, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan and the Swiss National Bank.
Under the guise of preventing a system failure during the global financial crisis, there will be “an extension of the existing temporary US dollar liquidity swap arrangements until February, 1 2014.” This action allows the central bankers to liquidate currencies under their jurisdiction “should market conditions so warrant.” Under this plan, euros backed by nothing can continue to pour into the system throughout the Eurozone “in addition to the existing liquidity-providing operations” in the US. This liquidation will take place “until further notice.”
The ECB Governing Council will oversee the operations of this scheme along with the other technocrats involved. The schedule of liquidity operations will “repurchase transactions against eligible collateral.”
The technocrats are posturing themselves to destroy all fiat currencies in order to make way for a new global currency under their complete control.
True to the intricate plans of the technocrats, the UN has proposed a complete overhaul in the report entitled, “Adapting the International Monetary System to Face 21st Century Challenges”.
They call for a “more intense debate on and reforms to the international monetary system imply that the current system is unable to respond appropriately and adequately to challenges that have appeared, or become more acute, in recent years. This paper focuses on four such challenges: ensuring an orderly exit from global imbalances, facilitating more complementary adjustments between surplus and deficit countries without recessionary impacts, better supporting international trade by reducing currency volatility and better providing development and climate finance. After describing them, it proposes reforms to enable the international monetary system to better respond to these challenges.”
Earlier this week, the Fed announced more stimulus admit the looming fiscal cliff, unemployment and strategic inflation caused by QE3. More bond buying is taking place, which means the Fed continues to become America’s biggest land owner.
The third round of quantitative easing enacted by Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank is nothing more than a massive land-grab in the domestic US by the technocrats under the guise of purchasing the mortgage-backed securities through the Federal Reserve to alleviate the pressure the banks are feeling from the bait-and-switch they caused.
Essentially, as the Fed buys the mortgage-backed securities, the central bankers will now own all those properties which were bundled and securitized. The experts are still coming to terms with how many homes, small business, small farms and other lands were mixed-up into this Ponzi scheme. The sum total numbers of victimized Americans are continuing to rise and are currently unknown. However, it is clear that as this monster grows, it will be the Federal Reserve at the helm, making sure that more Americans are displaced and foreclosed on.
Quantitative easing and its effects, according to the Bank of England, benefit “mainly the wealthy.” This plan boosts “the value of stocks and bonds by 26 percent, or about $970 billion.” It is understood that quantitative easing incites “social anger and unrest.”
Herman Van Rompuy, president of the EU said: “Even if the worse of the eurozone crisis is behind us, much still needs to be done. But all the hard work is beginning to pay off. A lot has been achieved over the course of a year.”
The technocrats, after having destroyed Greece financially, are in the process of a buy-back program in which Greek banks will become further indebted to the central bankers until they are complete stripped of sovereign debt (when the leaders of the nation had over the country to the banksters).
The ECB agreed to give any nation in the Euro-Zone a bailout if they agreed to hand over the country to them under the guise of “new rules and conditions when applying for assistance.”
Greece is very attractive to the technocrats. The nation has massive untouched resources of gold, oil and natural gas – literally under the feet of the Greek people. With Greece slated to be the biggest producer of gold in 2016, the motives behind the bankster’s coercion of the Greek government into sovereign debt begins to make sense.
The Greek government agreed to the technocratic demands for sovereign debt in exchange for the bailout which will push the Greek economy further down with more fiat pumped into the system. Meanwhile, the citizens of Greece will lose their independence, benefits and become serfs to the central banking cartels.
Greece has large deposits of gold. The Canadian based Eldorado Gold Corp (EGC) is more than willing to be part of the creation of gold mines in lieu of the financial collapse in Greece. Along with the Australian-owned Glory Resources, EGC is hoping their efforts will add 425,000 ounces of gold (worth an estimated $757 million) to the institution that ends up controlling Greece’s finances.
Other resources in Greece which places the nation in the hands of the banking cartels are the substantial sub-Mediterranean natural gas and petrol fields at the precipice of the country. Controlling Greek energy exports would be extremely profitable for the technocrats. Numerous European-based corporations are bidding to have contracts for the extraction of these resources.
The Swiss Federal Institute (SFI) in Zurich released a study entitled “The Network of Global Corporate Control” that proves a small consortiums of corporations – mainly banks – run the world. A mere 147 corporations which form a “super entity” have control 40% of the world’s wealth; which is the real economy. These mega-corporations are at the center of the global economy. The banks found to be most influential include:
• Barclays
• Goldman Sachs
• JPMorgan Chase & Co
• Vanguard Group
• UBS
• Deutsche Bank
• Bank of New York Melon Corp
• Morgan Stanley
• Bank of America Corp
• Société Générale
Using mathematic models normally applied to natural systems, the researchers analyzed the world’s economy. Their data was taken from Orbis 2007, a database which lists 37 million corporations and investors. The evidence showed that the world’s largest corporations are interconnected to all other companies and their professional decisions affect all markets across the globe.
http://occupycorporatism.com/technocrat … continues/
Statistics: Posted by yoda — Sat Dec 15, 2012 10:55 am
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Labor-Force Participation Rates Continue to Shrink
Fewer and fewer people are working. The labor-force in the United States is with each month smaller and smaller. This affects the overall employment rate as Veronique de Rugy reports:
Recent job numbers show an added 146,000 jobs in November and an unemployment rate of 7.7 percent, down from 7.9 percent in October.
The minor improvement in the unemployment rate, however, is entirely due to shrinking labor-force participation. The labor-force disagreement has lowered the participation rate by 0.4 percentage point this year alone and affects pretty much every category of worker with the exception of 55 and older. So, while we have had some encouraging hiring this year, this drop in labor-force participation exaggerates the progress shown in the drop in unemployment rate.
The post Labor-Force Participation Rates Continue to Shrink appeared first on AgainstCronyCapitalism.org.
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Agriculture • Nitrate issues continue for fall
Nitrate issues continue for fall
Kansas State University Extension | Updated: November 23, 2012
Nitrates continue to be a concern for livestock producers as they deal with limited feed supplies over the fall and winter. Concentrations of nitrates can change as long as the plant is still growing and can respond to available moisture.
Fall cereal grains and cover crops – Wheat, rye, triticale and oats can accumulate nitrates. Test results have shown high nitrates this fall, and forages should not be grazed without testing for nitrates. This would include those that overwinter and might be grazed or hayed in the spring. Some of the brassicas such as turnips and radishes have had levels so high that their use for livestock feed will not be an option.
Crop residues – If an average or better grain yield was harvested, nitrates are less likely to be a problem in the crop residue left behind. However regrowth or volunteer growth in fields where grain production levels were substandard may contain problem levels of nitrate due to excess N fertilizer remaining in the soil. Sample the plant material you expect animals to graze, and in the case of fields with highly variable growth, collect separate samples that represent the different growth and maturity levels attained.
Baled forages with high nitrates – Sample each field or lot separately, because different fields or cuttings may have different nitrate levels present. The more samples you collect the better information you will have to make decisions. Nitrate concentrations tend to be highly variable within a field which can be reflected in individual bales. Storage will not decrease the nitrate concentration in baled forage.
The same sample that is used for a nitrate test can return information on protein and energy content. Corn hay baled earlier this summer is likely to be much higher in quality than corn residue baled after grain harvest. Applying the forage test information to a plan for feeding is an easy return on investment.
High nitrate feeds should be mixed with other feedstuffs to reduce the total nitrate concentration in the diet. Young, pregnant and stressed animals are more susceptible to nitrate toxicity. Make sure to consider nitrates from all components of the diet. This includes the water source. Introduce the high nitrate feed gradually over several days. Avoid situations where a large intake of high nitrate feed may occur in one meal. Over time, animals can adjust to higher levels in the diet. Feeding smaller amounts several times a day can be used to adapt cattle to nitrates. If grazing, gradually increase hours of access to the high nitrate feed.
A few pounds of grain (2-5 lbs) in the ration will dilute the nitrate in the total ration and provide the carbohydrates for bacteria to quickly convert the nitrogen into ammonia. Mixing of the ration should be thorough enough so that one animal does not have the opportunity to over consume the high nitrate component. Reduce the amount of the high nitrate component in the mix and begin a process of working back up if winter storms alter feeding patterns.
Silage – Test silage for nitrates before feeding. Silage can still contain toxic levels if the initial level was very high. Nitrates are reduced during ensiling however the reduction can range from 20 to 80%. Forage that was dry going into the silage pile may only have a 20% reduction.
Green forages generally provide the needed Vitamin A for cattle diets, however animal stores can be depleted in two to six months. High nitrates in feedstuffs may increase the requirement for Vitamin A. Given these considerations, providing supplemental vitamin A makes good sense and is not expensive to do. See March 2007 Beef tips for more on Vitamin A deficiency.
Horses – Horses are not nearly as susceptible to nitrate toxicity as ruminants. Some conversion of nitrate to nitrite occurs in the cecum but at a much lower rate than in ruminants. Pregnant mares can tolerate much higher levels than cattle but there is no published data on actual levels that horses can tolerate. Nitrate poisoning that does occur in horses happens more often in association with accidental fertilizer spills or water contamination.
This year has been abundant in nitrate challenges for producers. Incorporating high nitrate feeds into cattle diets can be done but it will require good management and attention to details.
http://www.cattlenetwork.com/cattle-new … 13241.html
Statistics: Posted by yoda — Sat Nov 24, 2012 2:02 pm
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Illegal Campaign Contribution Issues Continue to Plague the President, Yet Little Coverage
It is always our effort at Against Crony Capitalism to present a balanced and non-partisan point of view on the issue of crony capitalism. Both “major” parties engage in it. It stinks, and whether Republican, Democrat, or other we will call an individual or group out on it.
With that said.
The Government Accountability Institute run by Peter Schweizer has looked deeply into the campaign contributions of both major candidates (forgive me Gary Johnson) and found areas of concern. GAI was early in calling for Mr. Romney to disclose his bundlers. Obama disclosed them, and in the name of transparency, GAI felt Romney should also. I agree with them.
GAI has also uncovered some pretty important information regarding the use of credit cards by the president in his campaign. For instance, why have millions of dollars in contributions come from individuals in bogus zip codes?
Also, why is Obama.com, which takes contributions for the campaign, owned by a US expat in China? Why does the site not ask for the CVV number when giving via credit card? (This helps ensure that a card is being used by the person to which the card is issued.) 68% of the site’s traffic is foreign. For a campaign donation gathering site this is a problem as foreign nationals are not allowed to contribute to presidential campaigns.
Though this issue was reported in Newsweek’s The Daily Beast, other major news outlets have not covered the story. Why not? Is the integrity of our electoral system no longer of concern to the #oldmedia?
The post Illegal Campaign Contribution Issues Continue to Plague the President, Yet Little Coverage appeared first on AgainstCronyCapitalism.org.
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Gold and Silver • 2012Gold and Silver Continue Marking Time
Saturday, August 4, 2012Gold and Silver Continue Marking Time
http://traderdannorcini.blogspot.ca/
Both Gold and Silver remain in consolidation patterns with tightening ranges as speculative HOT money flows which are exiting are being met by value-based buying and accumulation by stronger hands.
The loss of speculative interest in the precious metals over the last few months can be seen by the steady decline in overall open interest (the number of contracts open). Generally speaking, whenever speculators are interested in establishing positions in a particular market, the open interest will rise. When they are not, the open interest will fall.
Look at the following open interest chart of gold and tell me which of the two above-mentioned possibilities is occuring? Answer – speculative interest has been drying up in the gold market.
The reason for this is simple – the hot money crowd has no clear conviction as to whether or not the two big Central Banks of the West are going to move forward with a clearly defined bond buying program (aka – Quantitative Easing) of sufficient size to counter the effects of the sovereign debt crisis in Europe and the abysmal rate of growth in the US. That has sent them looking elsewhere for trading opportunities which they have found in the grain markets. While open interest has been shrinking in gold and in silver, it has been soaring across the grains.
Take a look at the following chart of Soybeans and note the vast difference in the open interest and by consequence, the VAST DIFFERENCE in its price chart.
What this once again demonstrates is that the driver of today’s markets remains the gigantic hedge funds and the rest of the hot money crowd. Once they train their guns on a market and come in on the long side in size, it will move higher. Whenever they lose interest, it will drift lower and if they exit their longs in large numbers, it will move lower quite sharply unless it is countered by extremely large buying of commercial interests and other deep pocketed spectulative forces.
Keep this in mind whenever you read comments that the current malaise in the gold and silver markets is being orchestrated by the bullion banks so that they can position themselves on the long side of the market for the next wave higher. That is pure nonsense. The gold and silver markets are currently moving lower because the hot money crowd has currently lost interest in them and is putting its money to work in other markets for the time being as they chase profits. Markets in sideways patterns do not make money for hedge funds. They require TRENDING MARKETS to ply their algorithms. Any hedge fund manager that wishes to retain its clients will, by necessity, be forced to look for markets that are trending and once they find them, that is where their monies will be put to work.
I wish that my friends in the gold community who keep attributing every single period of downward price action or sideway activity in the gold market to some nefarious suppression attempt by the bullion banks would realize that they are losing credibility among professionals whenever they assert such things. As a firm believer in the view that the feds have a vested interest in keeping the gold price under wraps, it is distressing to read some of the recent comments that I have seen attempting to explain why gold and silver are currently not trending higher.
I have stated clearly previously and repeatedly, that an objective analysis of price action and open interest that includes the Commitment of Traders reports, reveals that price suppression by the bullion banks occurs during periods of RISING OPEN INTEREST during which the large buy orders of speculative forces are met and attempted to be countered by large blocks of sell orders originating from the bullion banks. The selling, which is vastly different from ordinary scale-up selling programs that we see in every single commodity futures market, is designed to absorb as many of the hedge fund buy orders as possible to slow the upward progress of the gold market.
I have remarked in the past that sellers by nature wish to receive as HIGH A PRICE AS POSSIBLE for their product and thus will not try to OPPOSE a rise in price brough about by determined speculators. They will wisely sell only as much as is needed to offset their risk or lock in profitable prices for the future. AS price continues to rise, they will sell more at these higher levels and are obviously happy to see speculators take prices ever higher. Why would they ever attempt to actually knock the price lower if they are a legitimate hedger? If someone is determined to pay me a lot more money for my product, I’ll be damned if I am going to make a serious effort to try to prevent them!
That is not what we see in gold however as bullion bank sell orders oftentimes come with a ferocity that is mind boggling to any trader that can watch the screen. However, this almost inevitably and with only rare exceptions occurs in a rising gold market with rising open interest. Note on that previous gold chart shown above that we did witness an exception with a bout of short covering among some of the big bullion banks on that run to $1900 and a corresponding decrease in total open interest – that was indeed a rarity but one that will at some point be witnessed again in the future.
The exact opposite occurs in a falling gold market – open interest declines as the bullion banks who have instituted the majority of the short positions then use the long liquidation wave to cover those shorts and realize their cash gains in the paper market. Remember as existing longs sell out and existing shorts buy back or cover their positions, open interest shrinks or declines. The result is that the NET LONG position of the speculators shrinks while the NET SHORT position of the bullion banks decreases. Recently we have even seen the relatively rare situation where the SWAP DEALERS, another normally negative force in the gold market, have actually managed to briefly hit a NET LONG position, albeit a small one.
That is what we are currently witnessing in both gold and silver – nothing more and nothing less. When we do get the return of speculative monies into the gold and silver markets once overhead technical resistance levels are taken out, look for the bullion banks and swap dealers to once again resume their selling programs.
Posted by Trader Dan at 9:50 AM
Statistics: Posted by DIGGER DAN — Wed Aug 08, 2012 1:38 am
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Agriculture • US Crop Conditions Continue To Suffer
Rain slows deterioration in US corn, soybean crops
The decline in US corn and soybeans slowed as rains providing relief to some parched areas, fostering crop recovery in some states, including Indiana.
The proportion of US corn rated in "good" or "excellent" condition dropped for an eighth successive week, to 24%, the lowest figure since 1988 – and down from a figure of 72% before drought began in early June to wreak crop damage.
The proportion of soybeans in good or excellent health eased two points in the week to 29%, also the lowest reading since 1988, and down from 65% in early June.
‘Crop conditions continue to suffer’
The declines reflected a continued worsening in more north westerly growing states, such as Iowa and Minnesota, which fared better in the early weeks of the crop decline.
In Iowa, "crop conditions continue to suffer as the rain [last week] was too late for some of the corn and winds flattened the weakened crop in some areas", US Department of Agriculture staff said.
"Farmers continue to chop corn," for silage rather than hoping for a crop of grain.
At broker Benson Quinn Commodities, Jon Michalscheck said: "Sharp declines in Iowa, Minnesota, and South Dakota are probably not what the market wanted to see but most likely were expected going into the report."
‘Development jumped’
However, Indiana’s crops, one of the worst hit by drought, staged some reversal, increasing by two points to 9% for corn rated good or excellent, and four points to 16% in soybeans.
"Scattered showers brought temporary drought relief in some northern and east central areas," USDA officials in the state said.
In Wisconsin, both corn and soybean crops improved, as "development jumped in response to recent precipitation".
"Some reporters noted that rain came too late to allow good corn pollination, while in other areas the crop was pollinating normally."
And in Tennessee, "with the exception of corn, crops improved slightly in condition and are rated in mostly fair-to-good condition", thanks to rains.
‘Disastered out’
For cotton, of which the state is a major producer, this meant a four-point increase to 43% in the proportion of the crop rated good or excellent.
However, thanks to deterioration in the crop in Texas, the top producing state, the US cotton crop overall declined, dropping three points to 44% rated good or excellent, more than reversing an improvement the previous week.
In Texas, "in the northern high plains, cotton under pivots continued setting squares. However, dry land cotton in the same area suffered due to lack of moisture", USDA staff said.
"Precipitation was spotty around the state last week, as most areas of the state only received traces of rainfall."
In corn, "there were increased reports of acres being disastered out by insurance companies".
http://www.agrimoney.com/news/rain-slow … -4805.html
Statistics: Posted by yoda — Tue Jul 31, 2012 6:52 am
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