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WORLD’S 2ND LARGEST SILVER MINE SHUT DOWN

The world’s second largest primary silver mine, Tahoe Resources Escobal Mine, was forced to shut down operations in Guatemala by a ruling from the country’s Supreme Court. This was due to a provisional decision by the Guatemalan Supreme court in respect of a request by CALAS, an anti-mining group, for an order to temporarily suspend the license to operate the Escobal Mine until there is a full hearing. (picture courtesy of Tahoe Resources)

While this story has been out for a few days, I believe there is a great deal of misinformation on the Mainstream and Alternative media about the current situation and future outcome of Tahoe’s flagship Escobal Mine. Some analysis suggests that this is just a small speed-bump for Tahoe, so when they are able to address disputed regulatory issues, production and profits will shortly return once again.

However, there also seems to be a another side to the story that could cause more problems for Tahoe with a much longer suspension time than the company is publicly stating. For example, the following was published in the article… Tahoe Resources forced to halt Escobal mine in Guatemala:

A Shutdown Of The Escobal Mine, Ranked #2 In The World, Would Remove 21 Million Oz Of Supply

According to the 2017 World Silver Survey, Tahoe Resources Escobal Mine ranked #2, behind Fresnillo PLC’s Saucito Mine in primary silver production in 2016.  Here are the top five producing primary silver mines in 2016 (Moz – million ounces):

1. Saucito (Mexico) = 21.9 Moz
2. Escobal (Guatemala) = 21.2 Moz
3. Dukat (Russia) = 19.8 Moz
4. Cannington (Australia) = 18.2 Moz
5. Uchucchacua (Peru) = 16.2 Moz

Furthermore, the data in the 2017 World Silver Survey reports that a total of 265 million oz (Moz) of primary silver was produced last year.  Thus, the Escobal Mine represents 8% of total global primary silver mine supply.  If Haywood Analysts are correct that production at Escobal may not resume in 2017, than the mine is likely to lose nearly half of the 20-21 Moz forecasted for 2017.
While this is not a great deal of silver compared to total world silver supply of 886 Moz (in 2016), if the Escobal Mine is shut for a longer period of time, or indefinitely, it could impact the silver market over the next few years.

Credit to srsroccoreport.com

BUY GOLD & SILVER BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE | US Mint AP President

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Deutsche Bank Trader Admits To Rigging Precious Metals Markets

After months of "smoking guns" and conspiracy theory dismissals, a Singapore-based Deutsche Bank trader (at the center of fraud allegations) finally confirmed (by admitting guilt) what many have suspected - the biggest banks in the world have conspired to rig precious metals markets.

The Deutsche Bank trader, David Liew, pleaded guilty in federal court in Chicago to conspiring to spoof gold, silver, platinum and palladium futures, according to court papers. Bloomberg notes that spoofing involves traders placing orders that they never intend to fill, in an attempt to manipulate the price.

Following an introductory period that included orientation and training, LIEW was eventually assigned to the metals trading desk (which included base metals and precious metals trading) in approximately December 2009. During the Relevant Period, LIEW was employed by Bank A as a metals trader in the Asia-Pacific region, and his primary duties included precious metals market making and futures trading.

Between in or around December 2009 and in or around February 2012 (the "Relevant Period"), in the Northern District of Illinois, Eastem Division, and elsewhere, defendant DAVID LIEW did knowingly and intentionally conspire and agree with other precious metals (gold, silver, platinum, and palladium) traders to: (a) knowingly execute, and attempt to execute, a scheme and artifice to defraud, and for obtaining money and property by means of materially false and fraudulent pretenses, representations, and promises, and in furtherance of the scheme and artifice to defraud, knowingly transmit, and cause to be transmitted, in interstate and foreign commerce, by means of wire communications, certain signs, signals and sounds, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1343,which scheme affected a financial institution; and (b) knowingly engage in trading, practice, and conduct, on and subject to the rules of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange ("CME"), that was, was of the character of, and was commonly known to the trade as, spoofing, that is, bidding or offering with the intent to cancel the bid or offer before execution, by causing to be transmitted to the CME precious metals futures contract orders that LIEW and his coconspirators intended to cancel before execution and not as part of any legitimate, good-faith attempt to execute any part of the orders, in violation of Title 7, United States Code, Sections 6c(a)(5)(C) and 13(a)(2); all in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 371.

Defendant LIEW's employer, Bank A, was one of the largest global banking and financial services companies in the world. Bank A's primary precious metals trading desks were located in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Asia-Pacific region.

Defendant LIEW and other precious metals traders, including traders at Bank A, engaged in a conspiracy to commit wire fraud affecting a financial institution and spoofing, in the trading of precious metals futures contracts traded on the CME.

Defendant LIEW placed, and conspired to place, hundreds of orders to buy or to sell precious metals futures contracts that he intended to cancel and not to execute at the time he placed the orders (the "Spoof Orders").

Bank A operated a global metals trading team with traders in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Asia-Pacific region. Throughout his tenure on the metals trading desk at Bank A, defendant LIEW was supervised by and interacted with more experienced traders on the team. LIEW was supervised by other metals traders in the Asia-Pacific region, and, due to the nature of the nearly 24-hour trading cycle, LIEW interacted with members of the trading team in the United States and the United Kingdom. It was after joining the metals trading desk that LIEW was taught to spoof by other metals traders, including other metals traders at Bank A.

Defendant LIEW generated Spoof Orders manually. That is, LIEW physically clicked his computer mouse or keyboard keys to enter each Spoof Order, and physically clicked his mouse or keyboard keys to cancel that order.

A common technique employed by defendant LIEW was to place and cancel one or more Spoof Orders on one side of the prevailing market price. The intent of these Spoof Orders was to facilitate the execution of an existing Primary Order on the opposite side of the market. By placing Spoof Orders opposite the Primary Order, LIEW intended to create a false appearance of supply or demand and induce other market participants to react to this false information in order to move the market price and/or increase the available quantity at the desired price of the relevant futures contract. During the time the Spoof Order was live in the market, or shortly after it was cancelled, LIEW's Primary Order on the other side of the market would often execute at a more favorable price than was otherwise available before the Spoof Order had been placed.

 Coordinated spoofing involved one or more additional participants. When engaging in coordinated spoofing, defendant LIEW and/or one or more co-conspirators would place one or more Spoof Orders on one side of the market in order to facilitate the execution of Primary Orders placed on the opposite side of the market by either LIEW or a coconspirator. For example, LIEW would place a Spoof Order in order to facilitate the execution of a Primary Order placed by a co-conspirator, or a co-conspirator would place a Spoof Order in order to facilitate the execution of a Primary Order placed by LIEW. At other times, LIEW and one or more co-conspirators would each place one or more Spoof Orders in order to facilitate the execution of a Primary Order placed by LIEW or a co-conspirator.

During and in furtherance of the conspiracy, defendant LIEW engaged in solo spoofing or coordinated spoofing with traders at Bank A hundreds of times.

Prosecutors have brought very few cases against alleged spoofers but have stepped up their enforcement since the adoption of the Dodd-Frank financial law.

Deutsche Bank declined to comment.

From a July 2012 blog post, we discover that Liew quit banking then to start a tech company...

A bit like Vinicius, I was (and still am) in my third year out of University and making a very comfortable living as a trader at Deutsche Bank. Here in Singapore (sadly), a sort of toxic culture has been brewing that your “success” is deemed by your salary. Yes, I was getting a 6 digit annual salary, yes I was in the top % of wage earners of my age group (I’m turning 27 this year). A lot of people have labelled me “crazy” to “throw all I had away”, to which I would reply “This is my life, not yours. But thanks and good luck to you too”

This is not the first time Deutsche Bank has been involved, implicated, and exposed to rigging the precious metals markets.

As we noted in December, when we first reported that Deutsche Bank had agreed to settle allegations it had rigged the silver market in exchange for $38 million, we revealed something stunning: "in a curious twist, the settlement letter revealed that the former members of the manipulation cartel have turned on each other", and that Deutsche Bank would provide docments implicating other precious metals riggers. To wit: "In addition to valuable monetary consideration, Deutsche Bank has also agreed to provide cooperation to plaintiffs, including the production of instant messages, and other electronic communications, as part of the settlement. In Plaintiff’s estimation, the cooperation to be provided by Deutsche Bank will substantially assist Plaintiffs in the prosecution of their claims against the non-settling defendants."

Overnight we finally got a glimpse into what this "production" contained, and according to documents filed by the plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit, what Deutsche Bank provided as part of its settlement was nothing short of "smoking gun" proof that UBS Group AG, HSBC Holdings Plc, Bank of Nova Scotia and other firms rigged the silver market. The allegation, as Bloomberg first noted, came in a filing Wednesday in a Manhattan federal court lawsuit filed in 2014 by individuals and entities that bought or sold futures contracts.

In the document records surrendered by Deutsche Bank and presented below, traders and submitters were captured coordinating trades in advance of a daily phone call, manipulating the spot market for silver, conspiring to fix the spread on silver offered to customers and using illegal strategies to rig prices.

“Plaintiffs are now able to plead with direct, ‘smoking gun’ evidence,’ including secret electronic chats involving silver traders and submitters across a number of financial institutions, a multi-year, well-coordinated and wide-ranging conspiracy to rig the prices,” the plaintiffs said in their filing.

The latest evidence is critical because as the plaintiffs add, the new scheme “far surpasses the conspiracy alleged earlier.” As a result, the litigants are seeking permission to file a new complaint with the additional allegations, i.e., demand even more reparations from the defendants who have not yet settled, and perhaps even more evidence of ongoing market rigging. Their proposed complaint broadens the case beyond the four banks initially sued to include claims against units of Barclays Plc, BNP Paribas Fortis SA, Standard Chartered Plc and Bank of America Corp.

Representatives of UBS, BNP Paribas Fortis, HSBC, Standard Chartered and Scotiabank didn’t immediately respond to e-mails outside regular business hours seeking comment on the allegations. Barclays and Bank of America declined to immediately comment.

The Deutsche Bank documents show, among other things, how two UBS traders communicated directly with two Deutsche Bank traders and discussed ways to rig the market. The traders shared customer order-flow information, improperly triggered customer stop-loss orders, and engaged in practices such as spoofing, all meant to destabilize the price of silver ahead of the fix and result in forced selling or buying. It is also what has led on so many occasions to the infamous previous metals "slam", when out of nowhere billions in notional contracts emerge, usually with the intent to sell, to halt any upside moment in the precious metals/ 

"UBS was the third-largest market maker in the silver spot market and could directly influence the prices of silver financial instruments based on the sheer volume of silver it traded," the plaintiffs allege. "Conspiring with other large market makers, like Deutsche Bank and HSBC, only increased UBS’s ability to influence the market."

Some examples of the chats quoted are shown below. In the first example a chart between DB and HSBC traders in which one HSBC trader says "really wanna sel sil[ver" to which the other trader says "Let's go and smash it together."

Another chat transcript from May 11, 2011 reveals a Deutsche Bank trader telling a UBS trader that the cartel "WERE THE SILVER MARKET"(sic) based on feedback from outside traders to which UBS replies, referring to the silver market "we smashed it good", leading to the following lament "fking hell UBS now u make me regret not joining."

Finally, for all those traders who wonder what happened to their stops as a result of dramatic moves in the price, here is the answer: a June 2011 chat between a UBS and a DB trader comes down to the following: "if you have stops... who ya gonna call... STOP BUSTERS"

Liew's admission of guilt to a conspiracy to spoof precious metals markets seems like the final nail in the coffin of any conspiracy theory deniers - theory is now fact once again. The question is - will the regulatory crackdown on these manipulations actually reduce rigging in the markets?

Credit to Zero Hedge

The $5 TRILLION Silver Scam

The Secret Society That Controls The Precious Metal Market:Charles Savoie

Mining CEO Explains Why Silver Could Reach Over $136

Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,

His remarks started off like dozens of presentations that I had heard so many times before. . .

“Without silver,” began the speaker, “our entire society would go back to the Stone Age.”

The speaker was the CEO of one of the largest silver mining companies in the world, and he was a special keynote at the annual closed-door meeting of the Atlas 400.

CEOs of mining companies almost always start their presentations talking about how important their mineral is.

“If we didn’t have cobalt we would all be cave men again. . .” or “Without molybdenumour modern technology would cease to exist.”

It sounds impressive, but the same story applies to just about every industrial commodity in the world, from copper to lumber to recycled steel.

It’s hardly an original argument and doesn’t impress me enough to be bullish on their mineral.

The real investment thesis about silver is that it’s a precious metal that has industrial qualities and a long-standing tradition of value.

Like gold, silver was an ancient form of money. And for good reason.

Out of the 118 known elements that exist on the periodic table, gold and silver share certain chemical properties that made them ideal as a medium of exchange to our ancestors.

Gold and silver are solid at normal temperatures (as opposed to Helium). They’re not radioactive (like Plutonium).

They’re not explosive when they come into contact with water (like Cesium), nor do they rust when they get wet (like Iron).

Most importantly, gold and silver are rare enough to be valuable, but not so rare that it would be almost impossible to mine more.

Between the two, gold is obviously more rare… hence the higher price.

There’s an old estimate from the US Geological Survey from the late 1960s suggesting that the ratio of silver to gold in the earth’s crust is about 21:1.

(So assuming that’s true, the theoretical price ratio between the two should be around 21:1)

And in ancient times the price ratio between the two metals was frequently in the range of about 15:1, i.e. one ounce of gold was worth 15 ounces of silver.

Today the ratio is about 75, based on a gold price of about $1230 per ounce, and a silver price of $16.35.

This is fairly high even by modern standards as the long-term average over the past several decades is about 50.

This would suggest that silver should in increase in price relative to gold in order for the ratio to return to its historic average.

(A ratio of 50:1 would imply a silver price of $24.60 based on a gold price of $1230.)

Now, all of this is an argument that many of us have heard before.

But I did learn something over the weekend from the mining CEO; he told us that the current mining production ratio between the two metals is about 9:1.

This means that 9 ounces of silver are mined for every 1 ounce of gold that’s mined.

This is very interesting from a supply/demand perspective.

According to the Silver Institute, demand for silver hit an all-time high in 2016.

But the price of silver, at least relative to gold, is hovering near a multi-year low at 75:1. (Again, the historic average is around 50:1).

Moreover, even though the price is 75:1, the new supply of silver is only 9:1.

In theory if the new metal supply is 9:1, then the price should be 9:1 (which would be a silver price of $136.67).

Obviously that’s a purely academic postulate; reality rarely conforms to theory. And the mining CEO wasn’t projecting a $136+ silver price.

But it seemed clear to him that there’s an unsustainably wide gulf between the gold/silver price ratio versus the gold/silver supply ratio, especially when silver demand is at an all-time high.

Commodity prices tend to move dramatically when the market realizes there’s a serious supply/demand mismatch.

That seems to be the case with silver right now.

And while it would be silly to expect $100+ silver, there are certainly credible reasons why the ratio should close the gap and move MUCH lower.

Do you have a Plan B?

Credit to Zero Hedge

Clif High: "Gold Rush" & End of Silver Price Manipulation

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Alan Greenspan: Ron Paul Was Right About The Gold Standard

As John Rubino eloquently puts it, "when the history of these times is written, former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan will be one of the major villains, but also one of the greatest mysteries. This is so because he has, in effect, been three different people." Greenspan started his public life brilliantly, as a libertarian thinker who said some compelling and accurate things about gold and its role in the world. An example from 1966: "This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists' tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard."

Yet everything changed a few decades later when Greenspan was put in charge of the Federal Reserve in the late 1980s, instead of applying the above wisdom, for example by limiting the bank's interference in the private sector and letting market forces determine winners and losers, he did a full 180, intervening in every crisis, creating new currency with abandon, and generally behaving like his old ideological enemies, the Keynesians. Predictably, debt soared during his long tenure.

Along the way he was also instrumental in preventing regulation of credit default swaps and other derivatives that nearly blew up the system in 2008. His view of those instruments:

The reason that growth has continued despite adversity, or perhaps because of it, is that these new financial instruments are an increasingly important vehicle for unbundling risks. These instruments enhance the ability to differentiate risk and allocate it to those investors most able and willing to take it. This unbundling improves the ability of the market to engender a set of product and asset prices far more calibrated to the value preferences of consumers than was possible before derivative markets were developed. The product and asset price signals enable entrepreneurs to finely allocate real capital facilities to produce those goods and services most valued by consumers, a process that has undoubtedly improved national productivity growth and standards of living.

In the aftermath of the dot com crisis Greenspan cut interest rates to near-zero in the early 2000s, igniting the housing bubble, which neither he nor anyone else at the Fed was able to detect along the way. He even made it into the dictionary, as the "Greenspan put" became the term for government bailing out its Wall Street benefactors. From this the leveraged speculating community learned that no risk was too egregious and no profit too large, because government - that is, the Fed - had eliminated all the worst-case scenarios. Put another way, under Greenspan profit was privatized but loss was socialized.

Then, another metamorphosis took place: after Greenspan retired from the Fed in 2006 he began morphing back into his old libertarian self. A cynic might detect a desire to avoid the consequences of his past actions, while a neurologist might suspect senility. But either way the transformation has been breathtaking. 

Consider Greenspan's latest public address. In an extended interview published in the World Gold Council’s Gold Investor February issue, Greenspan repeated his now standard warning about the risk of coming stagflation, which would send the price of gold higher: "The risk of inflation is beginning to rise...Significant increases in inflation will ultimately increase the price of gold." As such, "investment in gold now is insurance. It’s not for short-term gain, but for long-term protection.” 

Going back to his libertarian roots, it was the idea of returning to a gold standard that Greenspan focused on: a gold standard that he said would help mitigate risks of an “unstable fiscal system” like the one we have today. 

“Today, going back on to the gold standard would be perceived as an act of desperation. But if the gold standard were in place today, we would not have reached the situation in which we now find ourselves,” he said.“[T]here is a widespread view that the 19th Century gold standard didn’t work. I think that’s like wearing the wrong size shoes and saying the shoes are uncomfortable! It wasn’t the gold standard that failed; it was politics.”

And the punchline: “We would never have reached this position of extreme indebtedness were we on the gold standard, because the gold standard is a way of ensuring that fiscal policy never gets out of line.” 

To be sure, this is something we discussed exactly two years ago, when we showed a chart showing the sudden end of prosperity for the "bottom 90%" of US earners at the time Nixon ended the US Gold Standard in August 1971, unleashing what ultimately would be the "Great Moderation", an unprecedented increase in US debt, and the stagnation of real incomes and net worth for all but the "top 1% of earners."

As we said then, in retrospect it is no wonder "why the 1% hates the gold standard" and added that the chart above, "should also clarify just why to the "1%", including their protectors in the "developed market" central banking system, their tenured economist lackeys, their purchased politicians and their captured media outlets, the topic of a return to a gold standard is the biggest threat conceivable."

As for Greenspan's repeated attempts to undo the past by admitting his mistakes, the jury is out. As Rubino concludes, "one of the nice things about the information age is that public figures leave long paper trails and can't therefore easily escape their pasts. Greenspan's past, being perhaps the best documented of any central banker in history, will haunt him forever."

That said, at least Greenspan is going out a gold bug.

* * * 

Below are the key excerpts from his Gold Investor interview:

Q. In recent months, concerns about stagflation have been rising. Do you believe that these concerns are legitimate? 

We have been through a protracted period of stagnant productivity growth, particularly in the developed world, driven largely by the aging of the ‘baby boom’ generation. Social benefits (entitlements in the US) are crowding out gross domestic savings, the primary source for funding investment, dollar for dollar. The decline in gross domestic savings as a share of GDP has suppressed gross nonresidential capital investment. It is the lessened investment that has suppressed the growth in output per hour globally. 

Output per hour has been growing at approximately ½% annually in the US and other developed countries over the past five years, compared with an earlier growth rate closer to 2%. That is a huge difference, which is reflected proportionately in the gross domestic product and in people’s standard of living. 

As productivity growth slows down, the whole economic system slows down. That has provoked despair and a consequent rise in economic populism from Brexit to Trump. Populism is not a philosophy or a concept, like socialism or capitalism, for example. Rather it is a cry of pain, where people are saying: Do something. Help! 

At the same time, the risk of inflation is beginning to rise. In the United States, the unemployment rate is below 5%, which has put upward pressure on wages and unit costs generally. Demand is picking up, as manifested by the recent marked, broad increase in the money supply, which is stoking inflationary pressures. To date, wage increases have largely been absorbed by employers, but, if costs are moving up, prices ultimately have to follow suit. If you impose inflation on stagnation, you get stagflation.

* * * 

Q. As inflation pressures grow, do you anticipate a renewed interest in gold?

Significant increases in inflation will ultimately increase the price of gold. Investment in gold now is insurance. It’s not for short-term gain, but for long-term protection. 

I view gold as the primary global currency. It is the only currency, along with silver, that does not require a counterparty signature. Gold, however, has always been far more valuable per ounce than silver. No one refuses gold as payment to discharge an obligation. Credit instruments and fiat currency depend on the credit worthiness of a counterparty. Gold, along with silver, is one of the only currencies that has an intrinsic value. It has always been that way. No one questions its value, and it has always been a valuable commodity, first coined in Asia Minor in 600 BC.

* * * 

Q. Although gold is not an official currency, it plays an important role in the monetary system. What role do you think gold should play in the new geopolitical environment?

The gold standard was operating at its peak in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a period of extraordinary global prosperity, characterised by firming productivity growth and very little inflation. 

But today, there is a widespread view that the 19th century gold standard didn’t work. I think that’s like wearing the wrong size shoes and saying the shoes are uncomfortable! It wasn’t the gold standard that failed; it was politics. World War I disabled the fixed exchange rate parities and no country wanted to be exposed to the humiliation of having a lesser exchange rate against the US dollar than it enjoyed in 1913. 

Britain, for example, chose to return to the gold standard in 1925 at the same exchange rate it had in 1913 relative to the US dollar (US$4.86 per pound sterling). That was a monumental error by Winston Churchill, then Chancellor of the Exchequer. It induced a severe deflation for Britain in the late 1920s, and the Bank of England had to default in 1931. It wasn’t the gold standard that wasn’t functioning; it was these pre-war parities that didn’t work. All wanted to return to pre-war exchange rate parities, which, given the different degree of war and economic destruction from country to country, rendered this desire, in general, wholly unrealistic. 

Today, going back on to the gold standard would be perceived as an act of desperation. But if the gold standard were in place today we would not have reached the situation in which we now find ourselves. We cannot afford to spend on infrastructure in the way that we should. The US sorely needs it, and it would pay for itself eventually in the form of a better economic environment (infrastructure). But few of such benefits would be reflected in private cash flow to repay debt. Much such infrastructure would have to be funded with government debt. We are already in danger of seeing the ratio of federal debt to GDP edging toward triple digits. We would never have reached this position of extreme indebtedness were we on the gold standard, because the gold standard is a way of ensuring that fiscal policy never gets out of line.

* * * 

Finally, buried at the very end of the interview was perhaps the most interesting statement by Greenspan : the former Fed Chair's implicit admission that Ron Paul was right all along: 

Q. Against a background of ultra-low and negative interest rates, many reserve managers have been large buyers of gold. In your view, what role does gold play as a reserve asset?

When I was Chair of the Federal Reserve I used to testify before US Congressman Ron Paul, who was a very strong advocate of gold. We had some interesting discussions. I told him that US monetary policy tried to follow signals that a gold standard would have created. That is sound monetary policy even with a fiat currency. In that regard, I told him that even if we had gone back to the gold standard, policy would not have changed all that much.

For those unfamiliar, here is Ron Paul 's explanation of his plan for monetary freedom and a return to a gold standard. 

Credit to Zero Hedge