Ouro - Tópico principal

[Incognitus]

Se eliminar o QE deveria cair. Mas uma parte da queda presente já antecipa isso (outra parte vem de que foi uma bolha).

[hermes]

Cada vez mais os 2/3 estão numa de show me the gold! Só a Índia e a China são responsáveis pelo açambarcamento de 80% [586/732] da quantidade minerada no 2º trimestre deste ano, cf. WGC Q2.

O artigo que se segue é um sinal dos tempos do trend show me the gold, além de revelar o ponto focal. Reparem além disso o tratamento da prata: logo se vê. Pior ainda, o propósito é cotar o plástico antes de se pensar na prata!

Ainda assim, o artigo tem uma falha de discernimento do autor, quando diz: "Bullion for immediate delivery slumped 19 percent to $1,355.64 an ounce in London this year as some investors lost faith in the metal as a store of value and on speculation the Federal Reserve will slow stimulus as the economy strengthens." É que se ele tivesse razão, o ouro devia estar a ser tratado como uma batata quente e por isso o volume devia estar aumentar, em vez de ter secado.

Dubai’s DGCX to List Spot Gold Contract as Regional Demand Jumps

By Nicholas Larkin
October 30, 2013

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-10-30/dubai-s-dgcx-to-list-spot-gold-contract-as-regional-demand-jumps

Dubai Gold & Commodities Exchange plans to list a spot gold contract in the second quarter of next year as demand for the metal in the region increases.

The bourse, which offers gold and silver futures, is talking to local merchants and industry organizations and aims to get regulatory approval for the product by early 2014, said Chief Executive Officer Gary Anderson. Demand for bullion in Dubai expanded eightfold in the last six to 10 years, he said.

Dubai accounts for about 25 percent of global physical gold trade and the United Arab Emirates will grow as a precious-metals trading hub partly because of its location near the largest consuming nations, according to the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre, which owns a majority stake in the DGCX. Gold, set for the first annual decline in 13 years, advanced 14 percent since reaching a 34-month low in June as lower prices spurred demand for jewelry, bars and coins in Asia.

“Dubai is a very big center and we have a very good gold eco system here from refineries to jewelers and pretty much everything in between,” Anderson said today by phone from Dubai. “The one thing that’s really missing is a Dubai spot market.”

Bullion for immediate delivery slumped 19 percent to $1,355.64 an ounce in London this year as some investors lost faith in the metal as a store of value and on speculation the Federal Reserve will slow stimulus as the economy strengthens.

Gold Trade

Gold trade in Dubai totaled $45 billion in the first half of this year, compared with $70 billion in all of 2012, Gautam Sashittal, chief operating officer of government-owned DMCC, said in a Sept. 30 interview in Rome. The DMCC is a free zone with more than 7,000 companies, some in the precious metals industry, Sashittal said.

India and China are the biggest gold users, according to the London-based World Gold Council. Consumer purchases of gold will advance to as much as 1,000 metric tons in India and China this year, the council has said. That would exceed China’s record of 778.6 tons set in 2011 and approach India’s all-time high of 1,006.5 tons in 2010.

“There is increased demand and we sit geographically in a great location,” Anderson said. “This past 18 months there’s certainly been a trend where the trading of gold is moving from west to east.”

Investors sold 750.2 tons through gold-backed exchange-traded products this year, erasing $60.1 billion from the value of the funds, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Holdings reached 1,881.4 tons on Oct. 25, the lowest since April 2010.

DGCX Contract

The size of the spot gold contract will probably be 1 kilogram (32 ounces) and the DGCX is aiming to list a plastics contract in the first quarter, Anderson said. While there are “no concrete plans” yet for other precious metals products, a silver spot contract and platinum and palladium contracts may be possible in the future, Anderson said.

“Demand for silver in the area is relatively big and there’s no reason why it could not work, but again we would want to speak to the industry and see if there’s a real requirement for that to happen,” Anderson said. “Our real focus is on spot gold.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Nicholas Larkin in London at nlarkin1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Claudia Carpenter at ccarpenter2@bloomberg.net

[Happy_TheOne]

Se eliminar o QE deveria cair. Mas uma parte da queda presente já antecipa isso (outra parte vem de que foi uma bolha).

Mas esta mais que visto que o QE é infinito

[JoaoAP]

A Alemanha há dias aumentou o IVA nas moedas dos coleccionadores...
Ao menos estes ainda sabem que o que reluz.... é ouro.
Mas de facto o papel a dizer isto e aquilo...

[hermes]

A Alemanha há dias aumentou o IVA nas moedas dos coleccionadores...
Ao menos estes ainda sabem que o que reluz.... é ouro.
Mas de facto o papel a dizer isto e aquilo...

Está a afetar a prata, pois na Alemanha tinha uma taxa de IVA reduzida [7%] em comparação com o resto da Eurolândia. O ouro em bulião continua inafetado, como seria de esperar, pois é uma directiva da Eurolândia. Dir-se-ía que a Alemanha está gentilmente a ensinar aos seus cidadãoes o que não é bom para poupar.

For those of you Turdites out there who like to buy silver from German dealers, please read the following excerpt from an email that I just received from auragentum.de, one of my favorite pm dealers (they did not include a link, so I'm still looking for one).

"Der Deutsche Bundestag hat in seiner 243. Sitzung am 6. Juni 2013 die beiliegende Beschlussempfehlung des Vermittlungsausschusses – Drucksache 17/13722 – zu dem Gesetz zur Umsetzung der Amtshilferichtlinie sowie zur Änderung steuerlicher Vorschriften (Amtshilferichtlinie-Umsetzungsgesetz-AmtshilfeRLUmsG) angenommen." verkündete der Bundesrat am 6. Juni. Damit ist es nun Gesetz, dass Silberanlagemünzen ab dem 01. Januar 2014 nicht mehr mit dem ermäßigten Mehrwertsteuersatz von 7%, sondern mit dem vollen Satz von (derzeit) 19% belegt werden.

Die Steuererhöhung um 12 Punkte würde bewirken, dass z.B. der Wiener Philharmoniker und Maple Leaf nicht wie heute bereits ab 19,63 € erhältlich wären, sondern (bei gleicher Kursbasis) 21,83  kosten würden. Also je Unze um ca. 2,20 € mehr! Schlagen Sie also jetzt noch zu, solange noch der ermäßigte Steuersatz gilt, denn Silbermünzen werden ab 01. Januar automatisch 11,2% teurer! Vielleicht sogar noch mehr, denn wer weiß, ob nach der Bundestagswahl der normale Mehrwertsteuersatz noch bei 19% bleibt.

Aber es gibt auch gute Nachrichten: Zum einen bleibt Anlagegold weiterhin mehrwertsteuerfrei und zum anderen können sich auf dem aktuellen Kursniveau noch besonders günstig mit unseren heutigen Angeboten eindecken:

Germany has traditionally been a pretty good place to buy pm's.  Any profits on pm's (gold and silver), that were physically held for one year or more are and will continue to be tax free.  There is no value added tax on gold, this too, will not change.  Silver has been traditionally subject to a 7% value added tax for collector's coins (American Eagle, Maple's and Phili's included).  There has been a value added tax on silver bars amounting to 19%, using the argument that bars are used for industrial purposes and not collecting.  Effective January 1, 2014, silver coins will be taxed at purchase with a value added tax of 19% just like the bars.  At today's spot, that would amount to 2.20 Euro's per ounce more.  This means that if the spot price remains unchanged, stackers will still have to pay 11.2% more per ounce.  Just wanted to let you all know.

For those of us effected, we might want to pick up a little bit more silver than planned this year.  Take care guys!

Fonte: http://www.tfmetalsreport.com/comment/323017#comment-323017

[hermes]

Artigo interessante do Michael J. Kosares sobre a China, que tinha a obrigação de fazer as seguintes três preguntas, pois é um habitué do USAGOLD desde os anos 90...

• Porquê a suposição da Alemanha ter pedido o seu ouro todo de uma só vez, em vez de o ter pedido às mijinhas, i.e. da forma como está a ser feito? [Repare-se que isso destruiu a reputação dos EUA.]
• Porquê a escolha do Kg pela China, quando esta nem sequer é a unidade tradicional do Oriente [o tael], nem do mundo anglosaxónico [a onça troy]?
• Porquê o trabalho de refundir uma barra de 400 onça troy para obter 12.4 barras de 1 Kg? [I.e. barras uma ordem de grandeza mais pequena.]

China's gold coup d'etat

What it means for global gold owners

by Michael J. Kosares

http://www.usagold.com/publications/novreview2013.html

Editor's Note: This issue of Review & Outlook is based on a series of posts I made at the USAGOLD blog over the course of the past month. China has imported an unprecedented amount of gold bullion in 2013. So much so that, if it were to maintain the current pace, it would import nearly the equivalent of global production for the year. When the news first filtered out of China on the amounts of gold being mobilized through its Shanghai Gold Exchange, the numbers seemed too large to be believed. The obvious question became "What is the source of this extraordinary amount of gold bullion?" It was only in October when Reuters reported that much of that gold had been shipped from London-based exchange traded funds to Switzerland for refining into smaller Asia-friendly bars and then on to Hong Kong and Shanghai that the full picture came into focus. It was only then that the extraordinary numbers gained credibility.

Below I detail how the China gold trade mechanism works, the reasons for it, and why China's interest in gold is likely to remain of paramount importance to the global market for many years to come. I have updated the original statistics from recently posted reports at the Koos Jansen website based in the Netherlands -- a research source specializing in the China gold trade. To stay abreast of the China situation as well as other developments in the gold market on a daily basis, I invite you to visit our blog page linked above.

Part One - The London-Zurich-Hong Kong-Shanghai gold conduit

According to a recent Reuters report, the United Kingdom's gold exports to Switzerland jumped from 85 tonnes to 1,016 tonnes in the first eight months of 2013 — a twelve times increase. Some bullion market watchers attribute the huge increase to withdrawals or sales from exchange traded funds (ETFs) — an explanation that covers only half the story…….if that. When one learns where this gold ended up and why it went there, the true importance of this unusually large deployment begins to take shape.

Switzerland, according to the Koos Jansen website, has exported over 600 tonnes of gold to Hong Kong through August, 2013. Hong Kong, in turn, has exported over 700 tonnes of gold to the Chinese mainland over the same period through the Shanghai Gold Exchange. Through August, 2013 Koos Jansen puts the total Chinese gold mobilization through the SGE at a stunning 1672 tonnes. Now, with this report of ramped-up exports from the United Kingdom, another piece of the puzzle falls into place and we begin to get a fairly clear picture what these gold mobilizations entail. Switzerland and Hong Kong are acting as a conduit of western gold on its way to China — and probably, at least in part, to Chinese central bank reserves.

To what extent this gold mobilization is the result of some yet-to-be-identified external pressure on London's bullion banks, or simply business as usual, remains to be determined, but gold movements of this size usually do not occur in a vacuum. Hedge funds have been in the gold ETF liquidation mode since April at the behest, it seems, of certain bullion banks that have issued generalized ETF sell recommendations to their clientele (which includes the funds). The ETF selling has been blamed repeatedly for the rapid drop in the price. If all of this has been a ploy to drive down the price on paper and channel substantial amounts of physical gold to China, who is the winner in this game and who is the loser? And why is it being done?

The gold market is incurably opaque (no matter how diligent or persistent the arguments to the contrary that it isn't or that it should not be), and that is probably why so many are intrigued by it. Yet, at the same time, those who innocently own gold for asset-preservation purposes can rest assured that they will never become collateral damage in these affairs as long as they do not allow themselves to lose patience or forget the reasons why they purchased gold in the first place.

Commencing to have doubts about the currency

Gold is never sought by those who think all is well with the world. It is sought by those who believe that things could go wrong, or indeed, that things have already gone very wrong. The true believer might be someone of incredible private wealth, as was the case with Bernard Baruch in the 1930s, or it might be a great nation-state like Germany or China today. When the sitting Secretary of the Treasury asked Bernard Baruch why he was buying so much gold, the reply came quickly that he "was commencing to have doubts about the currency." China and Germany -- the former by buying gold on the open market and the latter through its gold repatriation program -- are acting on doubts of their own. Up until today, we were unaware of the degree to which those doubts had manifested themselves in the hidden corridors of the world gold market. . . .Now we know. In the first eight months of 2013, China produced 270 tonnes of gold from its mines, and theoretically almost four times that amount through its London – Zurich – Hong Kong -- Shanghai gold conduit. In future years, China's gold import operations likely will be considered a major financial coup d'etat.

The Telegraph's Andrew Critchlow explains that China's consumption of raw materials makes it "only a matter of time before the renminbi replaces the dollar as the primary currency for trading commodities and resources such as crude oil and iron ore." He comes to an ominous conclusion: "The debt ceiling farce in Washington and China's growing reluctance to continue underwriting the US economy by buying up its bonds and adding to America's near $17 trillion (£10.5 trillion) debt mountain suggests that this tectonic shift in the global trade system could be just around the corner."

While financial markets' attention was riveted on Washington's budget theatrics, the United Kingdom and China quietly entered into a game-changing currency swap arrangement that will allow the two countries to trade for goods and services directly in their own currencies, thus cutting out the dollar middle man. "All of a sudden," says Kathleen Brooks, research director at Forex.com, "there's potentially no dollar risk." The two countries quickly followed the swap arrangement with easier access to Chinese financial markets for British investors, including we might assume London financial firms, and the same for Chinese banks in the United Kingdom. By circumventing the dollar, the UK and China are sending a strong message about the greenback's future as the world's sole reserve currency -- all toward a "de-Americanized world" as China's state -owned Xinhua news agency put it.

Zhu Baoliang, an economist in China's State Information Center, a research unit of the National Development and Reform Commission and powerful planning agency, told Financial Times, "We need to continue to diversify. Even without this latest debt debate, it would still be necessary to diversify." With this endeavor, it seems China and Europe have crossed a Rubicon of sorts and shifted the playing field in financial markets. It's one thing for Iran or Libya to challenge the pre-eminence of the dollar, but another thing entirely when China and Europe do it.

Part 2 - Screen-traded fiat gold could get very violent wake-up call

"This could turn into a very violent wake-up call for [screen-traded gold]. People talk about 'fiat currencies', but we also have 'fiat gold.' Volatility is too cheap right now." — Gold refiner quoted by John Dizard in his Financial Times column this weekend

In Reuters' initial report on the London-Zurich-Hong Kong-Shanghai gold pipeline, Macquarie gold analyst Matthew Turner speculated that the 1016 metric tonne United Kingdom export was shipped to Switzerland for refining into "smaller bars more attractive to Asian consumers or to be vaulted there instead." Though vaulting cannot be ruled out, the recasting explanation makes considerably more sense given the times and the extraordinary amount of gold being imported by China – over 1500 tonnes so far this year as mentioned above. It is difficult to imagine a scenario in which China would be interested in vaulting gold in the West – particularly at a time when the West is experiencing difficult financial and economic circumstances.

On the other hand, we know that four of the world's top gold refineries are located in Switzerland — Valcambi, Pamp, Argor-Heraeus and Metalor. Roughly 70% of the world's annual gold production is refined in Switzerland and it is considered the center of the world's gold refinery business. Its bars are trusted on the world's gold exchanges by the top banks, bullion dealers, jewelry manufacturers, and nation-states alike. If Turner is right about recasting the bars into Asia-friendly units -- and I think he is -- Switzerland would be the place to do it, particularly in light of the volume reportedly being re-refined. In my view, China intends for this gold to be transported to and remain in the East; otherwise it would not have gone to the trouble of having it recast into Asa-friendly bars.

Bar recasting fits Asian exchange trading units

To gain a deeper understanding of what China might be up to, some background is essential. Let's start with the trading units at the two major Chinese exchanges involved in the gold trade – the Hong Kong Gold and Silver Exchange and the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE) – because that goes a long toward explaining why the 1016 tonne export made an initial stop in Switzerland before moving on to China.



The tael is the standard unit of weight on the Hong Kong exchange. It equals 1.20337 troy ounces or 37.4290 grams, fineness in the past has been 99% but this standard has been upgraded to 99.99% to conform to international trading standards. According to gold expert Timothy Green's The Gold Companion (1991), the standard trading sizes on the Hong Kong exchange are five and ten taels. The basic contract is 100 taels, or 120.377 troy ounces, as opposed to the standard 100 troy ounce contract on U.S. futures exchanges. The Hong Kong Gold Exchange is an outlet for much of Asia and the tael trading units, once again according to The Gold Companion, are used in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand and Viet Nam.

Dragon's hoard includes Chinese people, Peoples Bank of China

The SGE is the only gold exchange in mainland China and its contract-trading unit is the kilo bar (32.15 troy ounces), once again a significant deviation from the western exchange standard of 100 troy ounces. SGE widely publicizes itself as a "delivery market" -- thus the smaller and familiar kilo bar size as its chief trading unit makes a great deal of sense. Most of the metal moving from London to Asia through Switzerland will more than likely end up in the hands of consumers in the form of jewelry and small bars (see stats below). What few people realize is that all of this activity is fully sanctioned by the Chinese government and the Peoples Bank of China (PBOC). In fact, the Shanghai Gold Exchange is owned by the PBOC. As a result, any unallocated gold imported and stored at the exchange for future delivery is, indirectly at least, gold inventory at China's central bank.

Drawing again from the Koos Jansen analysis, the China Gold Market Report – compiled by the key players in China's gold market, including analysts for the SGE – lists the following distribution of physical metal through the Shanghai exchange in 2011:

456.66 tonnes – Jewelry manufacturing
53.22 tonnes – Industrial raw materials
21.55 tonnes – Gold coins
213.85 tonnes – Investment gold bars
13.52 tonnes – Other, unnamed industrial purposes
284.88 tonnes – Net investment…[D]emand arising from the transfer process of gold as an investment tool

Total = 1043.68 tonnes

To offer a measuring stick that might give that total number additional meaning, it equals roughly 40% of annual mine production, one-eighth the U.S. gold reserve, and nearly one-third Germany's reserve. (Keep in mind, too, we are talking 2011 numbers not 2013 numbers after the latest massive imports outlined above.)

It is no secret that the Chinese people have a traditional, transcending attachment to gold. That same attitude, it should be kept in mind, permeates almost the whole of Asia and, as more and more people partake in the fruits of Asia's rise economically, the demand for gold is likely to grow with it. As such, the demand we have seen thus far could be just the tip of the iceberg, particularly when you take into consideration China's ambition to build a significant central bank gold reserve. China is likely to take advantage of any drop in the price to load up as it did betweem April and August, 2013.

Fiat currency, fiat gold

In a recent Financial Times opinion piece, John Dizard explored the burgeoning tension building between the paper and physical gold markets. He pointed to the very situation in the physical gold market we have just covered in depth. He talks about the shortage of kilo bars globally, the recasting of 400 troy ounce ETF bars for shipment to China, and the upside-down forward rate on physical gold -- a strong indicator of short physical supply. Dizard poses the question, "Could the gold flow back from those kilo bars to recasting as good delivery 400 oz bars?" In other words, does the London-Zurich-Hong Kong-Shanghai pipeline run in both directions? An unidentified gold refiner answers: "Much of that has been converted to jewelry. It would be a lengthy process. Those are pretty sticky hands…This could turn into a very violent wake-up call for [screen-traded gold]. People talk about 'fiat currencies', but we also have 'fiat gold.' Volatility is too cheap right now."

HSBC's role in the China gold trade

One more point of interest before I put this piece of the China analysis to rest: HSBC, the multinational bank headquartered in London, is the chief storage facility for the largest gold ETFs. As mentioned in my previous article, much of the gold transferred to Switzerland by HSBC came out of the ETFs. In addition, HSBC is an important trading member in the daily London Gold Market Fixings. Founded by Sir Thomas Sutherland in the British colony of Hong Kong in 1865, HSBC stands for the Hong Kong Shanghai Banking Corporation.

Part 3 - Insights on the way China thinks about gold

As Chief Market Strategist for Anglo Far East, the precious metals logistics and custodial services company, Alex Stanczyk travels frequently to China and has extensive knowledge and experience about its attitude towards gold. In the following snippet from a longer interview at the Koos Jansen website, he discusses China's gold strategy and what it might mean for the market in the months and years to come. The interview took place in early September 2013, and it is reprinted here with permission.

I might have a small advantage over some other gold commentators. I have been invited to China on several occasions to speak. One of those occasions was to speak to the Chinese government - it was a think tank on monetary policy. I know China is ramping up its gold reserves massively during this period of time. I think they're likely importing way more than the figures you and I see show.

Our firm has got personal experience dealing with the guys that transport the gold, the security companies. One of our partners had lunch in the recent past with the head of the largest global operations company in security transport. He said there is a lot of gold that they're moving into China that's not going through exchanges. If the gold is for the government they don't have to declare where it's going. They don't have to declare where it's going in, or where it's heading. If you look at the way the Chinese do things, why would they tell?

We talked to the head of the largest refinery in Switzerland and he told us directly that all that metal that's coming out of London (904 tons YTD) is being refined into kilo bars and sent to China, as well as metal that's coming in from other areas in the world, that's all going to China. It's way more than is being reported or moved through the exchanges. All the kilo bars go to the Chinese people but the PBOC is likely only buying good delivery.

The Chinese government is encouraging the people to buy gold for three reasons:

Number one, it soaks up capital that would otherwise flow into bubble markets like real estate and equities.

Number two, gold provides a strong base in case of inflation or other economic chaos. This provides stability and lowers the chances for civil unrest if there are economic problems.

Number three, if the people would sell it back, it gives the PBOC [Peoples Bank of China, its central bank] a way to increase its reserves by stealth. Remember the PBOC is very secretive about their gold reserves. It buys a huge amount of gold off books using proxies, so it can keep it reserve numbers hidden. This is very Chinese if you understand the Chinese mindset. The next time they will report on their reserves it will be 3000 tons, probably higher.



There is this game that the Chinese play, it's called Weiqi (pronounced Way Chee), and it's similar to chess. In Weiqi you have to surround your enemy slowly and lay a trap, and then close the trap all at once. That's the way the Chinese think, they don't really disclose what their plan is, they just move tiny pieces around the board in a seemingly incoherent way, but when all the pieces are lined up that's when the trap is sprung. All of the government party leaders play this game, and the CEO's and chairman of China's largest businesses are all part of the party.

I have spoken to a highly placed member of CSRC [China Securities Regulatory Commission] and he told me directly that the government's purpose over the next five year plan is to curb real estate and equities investment and get more people investing in gold.

If you see the massive demand that's going over to Asia it's really staggering. Year to date 1800 tons was imported into India and China, out of an annual mine supply of 2700 tons. It's a massive imbalance, this never happened before.

I think we have passed the [gold market] bottom. The fundamentals for the reasons it started going up in the first place never changed; the sovereign debt and the amount of money supply increase. Gold is only measuring the devaluation of paper currencies. This trend is been going on for many years and I don't see it changing because the governments of the world don't have solutions to the problems that they've got.

[End quote]

[Zel]

o meu GDXJ voltou ao ponto onde o comprei, os goldbugs estao a falhar

[hermes]

Segue-se uma boa medida do pulso do sistema monetário presente.

Com tanta escandaleira a acumular-se:

• libor -> manipulação das taxas de juro
• WM/Reuters -> manipulação de divisas
• a manipulação do preço do petróleo

Não há tapete que aguente e tape isto tudo.

Chase Isn't the Only Bank in Trouble

By Matt Taibbi
November 5, 12:55 PM ET

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/chase-isnt-the-only-bank-in-trouble-20131105#ixzz2johJ1eUZ

I've been away for weeks now on a non-financial assignment (we have something unusual coming out in Rolling Stone in a few weeks) so I've fallen behind on some crazy developments on Wall Street. There are multiple scandals blowing up right now, including a whole set of ominous legal cases that could result in punishments so extreme that they might significantly alter the long-term future of the financial services sector.

As one friend of mine put it, "Whatever those morons put aside for settlements, they'd better double it."

Firstly, there's a huge mess involving possible manipulation of the world currency markets. This scandal is already drawing comparisons to the last biggest-financial-scandal-in-history (the Financial Times wondered about a "repeat Libor scandal"), the manipulation of interest rates via the gaming of the London Interbank Offered Rate, or Libor. The foreign exchange or FX market is the largest financial market in the world, with a daily trading volume of nearly $5 trillion.

Regulators on multiple continents are investigating the possibility that at least four (and probably many more) banks may have been involved in widespread, Libor-style manipulation of currencies for years on end. One of the allegations is that traders have been gambling heavily before and after the release of the WM/Reuters rates, which like Libor are benchmark rates calculated privately by a small subset of financial companies that are perfectly positioned to take advantage of their own foreknowledge of pricing information.

A month ago, Bloomberg reported that it had observed a pattern of spikes in trading in certain pairs of currencies at the same time, at 4 p.m. London time on the last trading day of the month, when WM/Reuters rates are released. From the article:

In the space of 20 minutes on the last Friday in June, the value of the U.S. dollar jumped 0.57 percent against its Canadian counterpart, the biggest move in a month. Within an hour, two-thirds of that gain had melted away.

The same pattern – a sudden surge minutes before 4 p.m. in London on the last trading day of the month, followed by a quick reversal – occurred 31 percent of the time across 14 currency pairs over two years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. For the most frequently traded pairs, such as euro-dollar, it happened about half the time, the data show.

The recurring spikes take place at the same time financial benchmarks known as the WM/Reuters (TRI) rates are set based on those trades…

The Forex story broke at a time when the industry was already coping with price-fixing messes involving oil (the European commission is investigating manipulation of yet another Libor-like price-setting process here) and manipulation cases involving benchmark rates for precious metals and interest rate swaps. As Quartz put it after the FX story broke:

For those keeping score: That means the world's key price benchmarks for interest rates, energy and currencies may now all be compromised.

Perhaps most importantly, however, there's a major drama brewing over legal case in London tied to the Libor scandal.

Guardian Care Homes, a British "residential home care operator," is suing the British bank Barclays for over $100 million for allegedly selling the company interest rate swaps based on Libor, which numerous companies have now admitted to manipulating, in a series of high-profile settlements. The theory of the case is that if Libor was not a real number, and was being manipulated for years as numerous companies have admitted, then the Libor-based swaps banks sold to companies like Guardian Care are inherently unenforceable.

A ruling against the banks in this case, which goes to trial in April of next year in England, could have serious international ramifications. Suddenly, cities like Philadelphia and Houston, or financial companies like Charles Schwab, or a gazillion other buyers of Libor-based financial products might be able to walk away from their Libor-based contracts. Basically, every customer who's ever been sold a rotten swap product by a major financial company might now be able to get up from the table, extend two middle fingers squarely in the direction of Wall Street, and simply walk away from the deals.

Nobody is mincing words about what that might mean globally. From a Reuters article on the Guardian Care case:

"To unwind all Libor-linked derivative contracts would be financial Armageddon," said Abhishek Sachdev, managing director of Vedanta Hedging, which advises companies on interest rate hedging products.

Concern over all of this grew even hotter last week with the latest Libor settlement, in which yet another major bank, the Dutch powerhouse Rabobank, got caught monkeying with the London rate.

Rabobank paid over a billion in fines to American, British, Dutch and Japanese authorities and saw its professorial CEO, Piet Moerland, resign as a result of the probe. The investigation revealed the same disgusting stuff all of the other Libor probes had revealed – traders and various other mid-level bank sociopaths laughing and joking about rigging rates and screwing customers all over the world. From the WSJ:

In a July 2006 electronic chat, an unidentified Rabobank trader was informed about the bank's plans to set Libor "obscenely high" that day, according to an exchange cited by the Justice Department. The trader responded, "oh dear . . . my poor customers . . . . hehehe!!"

Here at home, virtually simultaneous to the Rabobank settlement, Fannie Mae filed a suit against nine banks – including Barclays Plc (BARC), UBS AG (UBSN), Royal Bank of Scotland Plc, Deutsche Bank AG, Credit Suisse Group AG, Bank of America, Citigroup and JPMorgan – for manipulating Libor, claiming that the mortgage-financing behemoth lost over $800 million due to manipulation of the benchmark rate by the banks.

And virtually simultaneous to that, JP Morgan Chase disclosed that it is currently the target of no fewer than eight federal investigations, for activities ranging from possible bribery of foreign officials in Asia to allegations of improper mortgage-bond sales to . . . the Libor mess. "The scope and breadth of risky practices at JPMorgan are mind-boggling," Mark Williams, a former Federal Reserve bank examiner, told Bloomberg.

The point of all of this is that any thought that the potential Chase settlement might begin a period of regulatory healing for it and other Wall Street banks appears to be wildly mistaken. If anything, the scope of potential liability for all the major banks, particularly in these market-rigging furors, appears to be growing in all directions.

A half-year ago, it looked like the chief villains in the Libor mess at least were going to get away with writing relatively small checks. Back in March, a major private class-action suit filed by a gaggle of plaintiffs against the banks for Libor manipulation was tossed by a federal judge here in the southern District of New York on the seemingly preposterous grounds that a bunch of banks getting together to monkey with the value of world interest rates in this biggest-in-history financial collusion case was somehow now an antitrust issue.

The banks in that case humorously implied that the victims might have done better to sue for fraud instead of manipulation ("The plaintiffs, I believe, are confusing a claim of being perhaps deceived," one bank lawyer put it, "with a claim for harm to competition"), and the judge seemed to agree.

Moreover, when the plaintiffs' lawyers tried to make a point about the seemingly key fact that a series of governments had already concluded settlements with the banks for manipulating Libor, the judge – the Hon. Naomi Rice Buchwald – mocked the plaintiffs' lawyers for trying to ride to civil victory on a wave of government settlements:

Wait a second. Your job here, as plaintiffs' counsel, looking for whopping legal fees, is not to piggyback on the government. Indeed, the reason that there are statutes that provide plaintiffs' counsel with attorney's fees is a recognition that the government has limited resources.

The banks must have thought they'd hit the lottery, with this potentially deadly Libor suit suddenly stopped dead in its tracks by a grumpy federal judge with an apparent distaste for plaintiff lawyers who collect "whopping" legal fees. So the victims tried to take a different tack, appealing to a federal panel in an attempt to allow them to file their suits against the banks on a state-by-state level.

But then, in a seemingly fatal blow to the private claims, the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation ruled in favor of the banks, sending the case right back into the courtroom of the same judge who'd dumped on the plaintiffs' lawyers and their "whopping fees."

That was just a month ago, at the beginning of October, and back then it seemed like the banks might somehow escape the Libor mess with their necks intact.

Now, a month later, yet another bank has been forced to cough up a billion dollars for Libor manipulation, Fannie Mae has filed a major suit on the same grounds, and the Guardian Care Homes case is not only alive but looking like a threat to cancel billions of dollars' worth of Libor-related contracts. Not only that, many of those same banks are being sucked into what potentially is an even uglier scandal involving currency manipulation.

One gets the feeling that governments in all the major Western democracies would like to sweep these manipulation scandals under the rug. The only problem is that the scale of the misdeeds in these various markets is so enormous that even the most half-assed attempt at regulation will cause a million-car pileup.

There's simply no way to do a damage calculation that won't wipe out the entire finance sector when you're talking about pervasive, ongoing manipulation of $5-trillion-a-day markets. That's the problem – there's no way to do a slap on the wrist in these cases. If they're guilty, they're done.

[hermes]

A mensagem anterior tinha um segundo propósito: ver as companhias do índice GOFO, que ainda tem um mecanismo bastante similar ao usado na LIBOR... e decidido por meia dúzia de agentes.

Gold body mulls working with exchange on rate benchmark

By Clara Denina

http://www.business-standard.com/article/reuters/gold-body-mulls-working-with-exchange-on-rate-benchmark-113110500966_1.html

LONDON (Reuters) - The London Bullion Market Association is considering whether to partner with an exchange to produce its gold-lending reference rate to ensure it can meet tighter rules coming on financial benchmarks, its new head said.

The Gold Forward Offered Rate (GOFO), the equivalent of LIBOR for the gold market, is used as a benchmark for dealers, central banks and others to swap gold for U.S. dollars with miners who may need gold to meet contracts or investors for short-selling and other purposes.

LBMA Chairman David Gornall told Reuters last month that the 150-member trade body could charge its members more or even stop providing GOFO if stiffer new regulation makes it too expensive to run.

"We are still in deliberation. It's one of the options, but ... we have been approached by a few exchanges, and it's definitely something that the board will be considering in terms of which direction we take now that we have come to a crossroads on the benchmark," incoming Chief Executive Ruth Crowell told Reuters in her first interview since being appointed last week.

Crowell is currently deputy CEO of the LBMA, the trade body for the wholesale over the counter (OTC) market for gold and silver bullion, and will succeed Stuart Murray as the new CEO at the end of December.

Regulators are pushing for new rules on commodity benchmarks after the LIBOR (London Interbank Offered Rate) was entangled in a manipulation scandal last year.

The LBMA has found itself at a turning point as it needs to decide whether to remain a trade association or become an organised trading platform, given that regulation is likely to discourage opaque bilateral trades, which currently dominate the wholesale gold market.

REGULATION BY 2014

Madrid-based IOSCO (International Organisation of Securities Commissions) has been looking at how to oversee market benchmarks since 2012, and GOFO is likely to come under scrutiny soon.

"We will get a little more clarity next year, but basically for the next three years there is going to be a lot of back and forth", before the rules are settled, Crowell said.

British watchdog Financial Conduct Authority said earlier this year it could start to regulate physical commodity benchmarks from 2014.

The LBMA currenlty sets GOFO each day by polling its eight major bank dealers on the rates at which they are prepared to lend gold. It also publishes the gold forward curve, used for valuing end-of-day positions.

The association already has links with the London Metal Exchange (LME), which together with LCH.Clearnet launched the Synapse clearing system for OTC gold forward trades in December 2010 using the LBMA forward rate curve.

The LME declined to comment on whether it has offered to manage GOFO for the LBMA.

The Synapse service has recorded only modest activity, however. Only 930,000 gold ounces were matched and cleared year-to-date, compared with 208.5 million ounces transferred in London bilateral trade.

Activity could pick up if regulation demands it, however, Crowell said.

"The current cleared product is a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation. Everyone is waiting to know whether forwards will have to be cleared in the EU on a mandatory basis," she said.

"Until that is known, it is difficult for the members to decide whether to change the existing way of trading."

MORE DATA

Regulation is the most immediate challenge for the future of the LBMA, Crowell said. One of her aims is to make more trade data available to the market.

"One of the things I have always been pushing for is for us to have ... turnover data that can be seen by the market, not only for regulators but also for investors wanting to know the size and the liquidity of the market," she said.

Further engagement in Asia, as the gold market moves eastwards, is another focus, she added.

"We wouldn't rule out opening an office in Asia, but more important in the future is making sure that we maintain and enhance the links that we already have, particularly in terms of getting more Asian members."

As well as GOFO, the trade body also sets standards for ethical gold mining and for refining and assaying gold and silver bars. (Reporting by Clara Denina; Editing by Jan Harvey and Jane Baird)

[Zel]

acerca da manipulacao:

1-os bancos fazem imenso dinheiro com prop trading
2-qs ninguem consegue ser um bom trader, nao interessa se vens duma ivy league school ou nao. portanto os trading rooms estao cheios de maus traders sem qualidades acima da media da populacao mas com um grau academico prestigiante da treta

como podem entao os bancos fazer muito dinheiro com o prop?

1-roubando os clientes
2-roubando a propria empresa e deslocando prejuizos para livros nao-prop onde nao ha bonus
3-manipulando o mercado (eu vi a coisa ser feita)
4-o grau academico prestigiante serve de legitimidade aos lucros e afasta suspeitas

nao ha milagres

[Happy_TheOne]

acerca da manipulacao:

1-os bancos fazem imenso dinheiro com prop trading
2-qs ninguem consegue ser um bom trader, nao interessa se vens duma ivy league school ou nao. portanto os trading rooms estao cheios de maus traders sem qualidades acima da media da populacao mas com um grau academico prestigiante da treta

como podem entao os bancos fazer muito dinheiro com o prop?

1-roubando os clientes
2-roubando a propria empresa e deslocando prejuizos para livros nao-prop onde nao ha bonus
3-manipulando o mercado (eu vi a coisa ser feita)
4-o grau academico prestigiante serve de legitimidade aos lucros e afasta suspeitas

nao ha milagres

Ja percebi porque nunca consegui ser trader em instituição nenhuma  além de ser bom trader nao tenho o grau académico prestigiante 

[Zel]

em portugal tb nao ha trading a serio, ha malta que executa ordens para clientes e portfolio

[hermes]

acerca da manipulacao:

1-os bancos fazem imenso dinheiro com prop trading
2-qs ninguem consegue ser um bom trader, nao interessa se vens duma ivy league school ou nao. portanto os trading rooms estao cheios de maus traders sem qualidades acima da media da populacao mas com um grau academico prestigiante da treta

como podem entao os bancos fazer muito dinheiro com o prop?

1-roubando os clientes
2-roubando a propria empresa e deslocando prejuizos para livros nao-prop onde nao ha bonus
3-manipulando o mercado (eu vi a coisa ser feita)
4-o grau academico prestigiante serve de legitimidade aos lucros e afasta suspeitas

nao ha milagres

Já sabemos do que a casa gasta, o problema é quando os escândalos vêm em catadupla, pois isso é essencialmente a morte dos mil golpes, já que o "corpo" não tem tempo para se curar.

[Zel]

hermes, muita gente diz que a depressao de 31 aconteceu devido a defesa do padrao do euro por parte dos bancos centrais

o que dizes?

[hermes]

O padarão ouro depois da 2ª Conferência de Génova [pós 1ª Guerra Mundial] não era igual ao padrão-ouro clássico, pois passou a haver réplicas [de papel, i.e. dólares e libras] do ouro e assim acabou a disciplina, pois, sempre que os parceiros comerciais deixaram, os dois países visados limitaram-se a enviar réplicas e a empurrar as medidas correctivas com a barriga para o futuro...

[Zel]

mas um sistema monetario com muito disciplina nao reduz o crescimento economico ao impedir transacoes? e a deflacao resultado do pouco dinheiro nao eh um problema para quem pede divida?

[hermes]

Por um lado, será que essas transacções deveriam mesmo ter ocorrido? Eu não sou contra o crédito, muito pelo contrário, mas já que se vai emprestar, convém aferir do prospecto de receber de volta. Por outro lado, o que achas do crescimento económico do século XIX?

Todavia, chamo-te a atenção para uma falha estrutural dos padrões ouro passados:  o ouro é a pior escolha possível para ser moeda transaccional, pois passa a haver um conflito com a sua função primeira de reserva de valor. Se não queres que os outros decidam o teu destino, porque haverias de querer que sejam os outros a decidirem o que fazer com as tuas poupanças?

Na essência, os padrões ouro passados eram sistemas socialistas e sempre que há a ascenção do socialismo, essa falha estrutural é exposta, como o prova os defuntos padrões ouro passados.

[Messiah]

Alguém pode colocar ai um gráfico de ticks, do Gold hoje para ver a que preços não houve negociação?

Houve um gap grandito no Gold gostava de ver quais os preços realmente disponíveis no mercado e qual foi o gap real.

Obrigado

[ana]

o ouro é dos activos mais dificeis de negociar, mas como reluz chama mt gente:D é uma pena as pessoas não verem isso e não estarem majé quietinhas. falo de quem não tem pratica de trading, claro.

[Messiah]

Nao acho que seja dificil é igual a tantos outros ... que possa ser mais volátil? Sim talvez, mas para isso as pessoas que o negoceiam tem que ajustar os seus níveis para níveis de risco adequados ao instrumento que negoceiam.