Commodities Volatile while some banks mask write-downs

The Gold Price fell to $1643 per ounce by Tuesday lunchtime in London – still 1.1% up for the week so far – while stocks and commodities suffered another battering as Greek debt fears once again rattled the markets.

Copper fell 1.9%%, while WTI crude oil lost over 2%, dropping to $76 a barrel.

Fiat Currency of Gold Coins?

The Silver Price dropped to $30.21 – 0.8% up on last Friday's close.

"Gold continues to benefit from the current pessimism regarding the global economy [and] the realisation that the Eurozone debt issue is far from being resolved," says today's note from Standard Bank's commodity analysts.

"We expect physical [gold] demand to be quite decent in the coming days," adds Edel Tully, precious metals strategist at UBS.

"After the recent washout, gold positioning is far from extended, and this is quite a bullish signal for price strength ahead."

Stock markets meantime fell Tuesday for the fifth session running, with the FTSE100 here in London dropping through 5000 – a level it first crossed on the way up in August 1997.

The finance ministers of France and Belgium today pledged to "step in" if necessary and bail out the part-nationalized Dexia banking group.

Dexia received a bailout worth around €6 billion in 2008. Its share price fell to a low of €0.81 Tuesday morning – 44% below where it closed last week – after ratings agency Moody's placed Dexia on review for downgrade, citing "concerns about the group's sizeable reliance on short-term funding and the consequent liquidity gaps".

Last week Fitch, another ratings agency, referred to Dexia's "structural weakness" and warned that the bank faces growing difficulties in getting access to funding.

Several European banks have now "marked to market" the Greek government bonds they own, making writedowns of 50% or more. But others – including French banks BNP Paribas and Societe Generale and the Franco-Belgian Dexia Group – have so far only recorded the 21% loss agreed at a Eurozone summit in July.

"It's no coincidence that the banks with some of the biggest holdings of Greek debt took the smallest writedowns," says Peter Hahn, professor of finance at Cass Business School in London and a former managing director at Citigroup.

"You've got banks, which are supposedly comparable, putting different values on their assets. That destroys the credibility of the banking system, and is one of the reasons why the shares are being hit so badly."

"The market is increasingly worried about the potential of the Greek crisis and the calamity that could be created if there was a messy default," says Jane Foley, senior currency strategist at Rabobank in London.

"We could be in for a shakeout even larger than the Lehman shock," adds Hideki Amikura, Tokyo-based foreign exchange manager at Nomura Trust Bank.

"While last week saw precious metals largely following equities on a downward slope, gold and silver's moderate gains this week are a positive sign that they are returning to favor on haven demand," reckons one bullion dealer here in London.

"Investors will be reassured that last week's rout [of gold] was driven more by a flight to cash to meet margin calls and mitigate losses on equities than by a fundamental shift in perceptions of gold's value."

Luxembourg prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker, who chairs the Eurogroup of single currency finance ministers, confirmed Tuesday morning that he has cancelled a meeting of Eurozone ministers scheduled for October 13 to discuss whether or not Greece should receive the next installment of its bailout funding, worth over €8 billion.

The cancellation follows Greece's announcement on Sunday that it expects to miss its deficit-cutting targets for 2011.

Greek finance minister Evangelos Venizelos said today that the government has enough money to last until mid-November if the next installment is delayed. He has previously said it would run out of money by the middle of October.

Dollar and Sterling Gold Prices remain broadly where they closed on Friday 23 September, while the Euro Gold Price is up 1.7% over the same period. In the so-called commodity currencies, the Gold Price has risen 2% against the Canadian Dollar in that time and 3.4% against the Australian Dollar – recovering most of the losses in that currency incurred towards the end of last month.

Looking to Buy Gold?...
Ben Traynor, 04 Oct '11
Editor of Gold News, the analysis and investment research site from world-leading gold ownership service BullionVault, Ben Traynor was formerly editor of the Fleet Street Letter, the UK's longest-running investment letter. A Cambridge economics graduate, he is a professional writer and editor with a specialist interest in monetary economics.

Trouble Coming Soon

Ready Access to real bullion is the only defence

WE HAVE OBSERVED world financial markets – including the gold market – for more than 40 years, watching the Gold Price move from $42 per ounce through what we are seeing today, writes Julian Phillips of GoldForecaster.

More importantly we've seen why the Gold Price has moved over these decades and fully understand the monetary history and role of gold. The events of the last three years have interrupted the currency experiment that used paper notes not redeemable either in gold or in anything else except more paper notes.

Right now we're watching the most recent experiment. The Euro, which is only one decade old, suffers the consequences of sub-par financial management, and it's taking Europe to the brink of failure. It's touch-and-go as to whether the Eurozone or the Euro will survive the present crises.

The Eurozone bailout package almost doubled in size to cope with Greece, Ireland and Portugal, to over €400 billion. The markets smiled at first, but then sank back into trepidation as the Italian government had to pay the highest interest ever for funds at a recent auction. When markets keep on being disappointed it signals something far more than just a temporary correction. As markets just dip slightly it's becoming clear that they're in a sort of denial, waiting for something to trigger what we're expecting at any time.

How is this driving gold, which is sitting now around $1,600 after having fallen from a peak of over $1,900? Look at the funds that hold physical gold. They've fallen by less than 2%, which is hardly significant.

Look at the demand from Asia. It's coming in at the lower levels as it has done in past falls; this fall, however, is far more significant. Look back when speculators and banks drove gold from $300 to $390, then farther back to $326 in 2005 – short-term traders can (under the right market conditions) drive prices a long way. In the more recent, 2008 case, Investor Meltdown created conditions where covering margins triggered 'stop loss' protections and the search for liquidity allowed for the precipitous falls.

It was just like a threatened body drawing its limited blood supply to its center, boosting its concentrated central defenses but starving its peripheries, which are now in danger of dying off, endangering the entire body. But gold is at the center and only got a shock.

But was that a change in trend? Have gold and silver market conditions changed, fundamentally?

We're now at the point where solutions and reformation must take place in the monetary world, far faster than governments are capable of and require a degree of consensus that looks unlikely to be achieved. So, what next?

The last couple of weeks have seen nearly all global markets falling, in concert. Yes, they're trying to recover, but this is dependent on some good news coming forward before December. It may be that failure to resolve the Eurozone debt crisis precipitates a far more dramatic set of market events as many important nations' economies confirm deflationary conditions and recessions.

The markets are telling us that bad news is on the way. Far more than just a downturn is being indicated by market behavior. Major structural changes will be forced on the developed world. It's losing wealth to the emerging world and oil producers. The recovery prospects are more than dim. There's far too much debt for the developed world to repay, so more debt will cripple it. Inflation to cheapen money is an alternative (and one the Fed prefers to deflation) but accompanied by a liquidity crisis and banking seizure, will more than likely lead to a degree of inflation that is uncontrollable.

We are on the brink of structures failing, spiraling the financial world into such a bleak scene comparable with the 1930s and the Second World War are valid.

The markets have not yet discounted that picture. And gold and silver prices pulled back solely in the search for liquidity, not because the safe-haven qualities of gold and silver evaporated. With the US Dollar the only standing safe haven in the currency world and one not too far away from its own meltdown, gold and silver have yet to really show their historic qualities. We're very close to a major financial accident that will cause far deeper problems for the developed world.

Many investors have seen the writing on the wall and have seen it since 2008. Now, the writing's more alarming than in 2008. The 2008 scene was when there was more economic strength than there is now. Now, the warnings come on the back of a developed world economy that is failing to grow, failing to resolve debt crisis, and failing to lead its way back to economic health. Disaster doesn't give that much warning. When it comes, a tranquil scene suddenly panics, while irreparable damage is done.

Whether this forecast is correct or not, we can all see that we have to be prudent and take precautionary measures to safeguard our wealth. If we don't, then we'll lose it. We're at the point when we need to be ready for the worst and situate ourselves out of harm's way. If the storm doesn't come, we can always come out of shelter and carry on. But if it does, when we come out of shelter we'll be able to do much more. Are you ready?

Buying Gold? Make it easier, cheaper and safer – using your choice of professional vaults in London, New York or Zurich, Switzerland...
Julian D.W. Phillips, 04 Oct '11
From Bullion Vault