Comex Commodity
Comex Commodity just cut the minimum size of the margin on gold contracts up to $6,075 with the previous low of $6,751. This measure does not make economic sense, since the price of gold is currently in the range of 2% from their highs.
The lower border of the requirements also does not make sense, especially in comparison with the margin requirements for silver contracts on the Comex Commodity. Decrease of margin requirements allows you to control the amount of gold worth more than $25 for every dollar margin. Minimum margin requirements on silver contracts are much higher. At the close of silver today, investors can control $8.30 am of silver for every dollar margin.
It should be remembered that the common sense and the sequence is not the only factors, which Comex Commodity takes into account when establishing these requirements. Can be Comex Commodity trying to scare off the speculators and investors from the silver market, offering them the best margin opportunities in the gold market?
Just think about it. By the end of this month will redemption of the next round of silver options Comex Commodity, and will begin the first day of the notification about the delivery of the silver contracts for July 2011. Both of these events may cause a strong demand that can devastate registered (physical) reserves of silver on the Comex Commodity.
16 June 2010 the total volume of warehouses Comex Commodity was 119,5 million ounces of silver. Since then, we observe a constant outflow of silver with these warehouses, especially its registered type designed to perform the contract of supply. In the beginning of this íåäåëèñóììàðíûå reserves of silver on the Comex Commodity fell below 99 million ounces, down by more than 17% over the last year. More importantly, the number of registered stocks fell to a record low of less than 30 million ounces! The rest of the silver on the Comex Commodity called «acceptable» (eligible), - this means that it is property of investors, simply storing it in warehouses of the exchange. Acceptable reserves may not be used to perform contracts Comex Commodity, if, of course, individual owners do not decide to make them available for these purposes.
When reached maturity in March and may of contracts 2011 Comex Commodity, a considerable part of them was closed for cash money, " it is permitted by the rules of the COMEX. Nevertheless, calculations of cash with the owners of the contracts were made at the level of rumor by as much as 30% greater than spot prices! Probably, that the percentage of cash settlement under contracts December 2010 was also higher than usual.
Sellers contracts Comex Commodity, obviously, would not have to pay 30% of the prize at the ñïîòîâóþ price at the closing of the cash settlement, if they had the opportunity to put the physical silver. The fact that relatively few silver is taken from the registered reserves the COMEX for the contracts have reached the age of maturity, is an important indicator of a lack of physical metal.
I don't know reduced if the COMEX margin requirements for çîëîòîäëÿ order to scare off some investors with a high level of leverage of ownership of the silver options with approaching maturity and commodity contracts. The choice of the time looks, of course, suspiciously.
Today (17.06) is not the best day for the U.S. government on several fronts. Informal index misery, folding the official data on unemployment and the growth of consumer prices Bureau of labor statistics, is equal to 12.7, which is the highest figure since 1983! From June 1993 to may 2008 the index of unhappiness was below 10. He is constantly above 10 November 2009.
And the news all continued to deteriorate. At the press-conference of the International monetary Fund in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the United States, together with Greece, Ireland and Japan were named the countries most in need of restoration of public Finance and solve debt problems.
In a recent interview to Agency Bloomberg, the former Federal reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan (Alan Greenspan) has warned that a default of the government of Greece, could push us back into recession. He also noted that «the chances of Greece avoid default are very small».He even more stressed the seriousness of the situation, saying that the risk of a Greek default now «is so high, that you can almost say that it is a hopeless situation».
Today, Germany and France have created another program of rescue of the Greek government. Widespread concerns about the fact that the Greek default could trigger a chain reaction of defaults is much worse than what we have experienced, when the collapsed Lehman Brothers in 2008. In the financial markets Greek companies already pay 27% APR on a two-year loan, " such a huge interest rates almost assume the inevitability of a government default. Today's aid package does not solve the problem of public expenditure of the country lives beyond its means. Instead of solving the debt problem, the inevitable only postpone for a few months in advance.
If in Greece will default, that is a very real risk that Ireland, Italy, Spain, Portugal, California, new York and Illinois can also quickly declare defaults on its debts.
As I recommended that from the very beginning, to protect yourself you should get rid of some of your assets in foreign currency and to increase the availability of physical gold and silver, that is the only form of money, which had never graduated from bankruptcy.
