Writing at the Silver Doctors Internet site, Bill Rice Jr., managing editor of the weekly newspaper in Montgomery, Alabama, The Independent, asks why gold and silver miners won't fight back against gold and silver market manipulation and price suppression:
http://www.silverdoctors.com/why-wont-the-miners-fight-back/
That question also has vexed GATA, but having dealt with many mining company executives for many years, we think we can explain it.
First, many gold and silver mining executives are simply uninformed. They tend to be technical people with a background in geology rather than financial people with a background in markets. As a result most have little idea of the monetary nature of their products, little idea of the competition those products present to government-issued money, and no idea at all about how the price of their products is suppressed by the creation of vast imaginary supplies in the futures markets to prevent competition with government money.
And second, while some gold and silver mining company executives do have an idea about the monetary aspect of their products, the difficult nature of the mining industry makes them too scared to pursue it.
That is, more than any other industry, the mining industry depends on the good graces of government for all aspects of its operation -- mining permits, royalty requirements, and compliance with environmental regulations being the biggest issues. And since the mining industry is also the most capital-intensive industry -- getting a mine into production can easily cost more than $1 billion -- the industry is dependent for financing on the big investment houses that are openly the agents of the central banks in the various markets.
Since government is the instigator of gold and silver market manipulation and the major investment houses are the scheme's implementers, any substantial gold or silver mining company that complained loudly about price suppression might soon find itself facing all sorts of government regulatory and bank financing problems.
But even if they don't complain about price suppression, mining companies are likely to die from it anyway, so they really don't have much to lose. Unfortunately few have realized this yet.
Complaining about price suppression should be the work of the World Gold Council, a mining industry organization that could give cover to its individual members even as there would be strength in numbers. But the council really is not very representative of the industry. Its limited membership list can be found here:
http://www.gold.org/about-us/our-members
And the council's personnel long have been far to close to central banks and the investment houses that work for them.
For years GATA has been providing the council all our documentation --
http://www.gata.org/taxonomy/term/21
-- but the council never acknowledges it. Indeed, the primary objective of the World Gold Council long has seemed to be only to ensure that there never is a world gold council, to ensure that the gold mining industry goes to its grave quietly.
