What's going on with Gold, Gold Stocks, Euro and USD?

With all of the chaos in financial markets, and also commodities, how are the USD and the Euro affected and also the precious metals? Well, first of all, we need the proper context of this world market situation. We are in the middle of a super world crash. These take a year to get into full swing. They develop over time. Minding that, realize that we may not see the worst for another year for the world stock markets. We are in the midst of a crash. This situation is no ordinary financial crash, this is definitely on par with what happened in the Great Depression. If you look at that, you find the US did not go into a full depression until a year or two after the first stock crashes. Then by 1933, the Dow had lost about 90%. So, the point is, if I am right and the world is heading into a real depression and not just a recession, we won’t see bottom for several years. CNBC for example is so fast paced that they are constantly looking for a bottom now, but that seems way too premature. Then again, they seem to see themselves as stock market cheerleaders. It’s kind of hard to be cheerleaders when your team is losing badly. But, the point is you need to keep from getting caught up in the instant news viewpoint looking for something to happen right now that is a ways down the pike. Scope of this financial crisis Just take a look at this partial list of nations in big currency trouble as of now, all due to the rapidly deteriorating world financial/economic situation: Argentina – Just nationalized the pension funds to help with their ongoing financial deficits, their stock and bonds are falling drastically – again. Russia – Russian stocks collapse in recent weeks causing weekly market shut downs. The Ruble severely falls. Russian Oligarchs lose hundreds of $billions in the stock crashes. The Russian central bank is using a great deal of foreign reserves to prop up Russian banks. There is actually talk of another Russian default in the future by credible media. Oligarchs have to repay $47 Billion in the next two months in various ways, and it’s doubtful they will be able to. Iceland – In the midst of a drastically falling currency and literal bankruptcy as they guarantee all deposits in banks that had lent out many times the GDP of the entire country. They now cannot even import food without paying in advance in foreign currency. China – Said to be a ‘house of cards’ by Andy Xie, former chief economist for Asia of Morgan Stanley. China has supported its economic growth by excessive lending to its industries over the last ten years and hidden non performing loans. China has acted to prop its stock markets. China has a huge hidden banking crisis about to unfold. 50% of China toy manufactures out of business as an example. Hungary – In the middle of a currency speculative attack as they try to deal with foreign exchange and the collapsing financial/credit markets. Korea – Won falls 9% in a day as companies lose $billons apiece in foreign exchange losses when their hedges against the USD turn south. Korea has foreign exchange problems amidst the disastrous credit markets. Doubts are now floating about how many developing and even developed trade partners of the West have enough foreign exchange reserves to defend their currencies. And last but not least in this sampler – the US – and unmitigated banking disaster, and it’s said that if the US did not take the huge steps to quasi nationalize the banks here, the entire US banking industry would have totally collapsed. US corporations are having to hoard cash to operate, whereas normally they use short term credit to fund payrolls, operations, etc. This lack of short term credit is a huge constriction on US and all Western economies right now. These same problems are now spilling over into Asia, once thought to be relatively immune. EU- Said to have even worse exposure to the credit crisis than the US if that can be believed. They bought heavily of all the bad financial paper emitted from the US, and had their own credit bubble as well. Major EU banks have lent heavily to the developing Easter European regions, and now are on the hook for trillions. Etc, Etc, I’m just glossing over this. There is lots to say. EU employment, especially in the Club Med (southern EU) nations in the tank, and so are their...

Je me connecte

---

J'en profite