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Posted by Wealth Wire

The debt-based monetary system creates an illusion of wealth. It allows for claims on real goods to significantly exceed the actual amount of real goods. You then have a number of people believing they have wealth, since they have claims (pieces of paper or tokens) showing that they have these real assets, whereas, in reality, if everyone was to claim the real goods, there would not be enough to go around.

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Interview With Ted Butler

Ted Butler is one of the better-known silver analysts (and longtime silver bulls) in the world. The founder of Butler Research, a monthly publication focused on precious metals, Butler has been pounding the table on silver since way back when it was trading for $4/ounce.

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By Marc Davis, BNWnews.ca

With potash prices spiking higher in response to surging global foods costs, the world’s most advanced “independent” potash project is in the cross-hairs of an increasing number of deep-pocketed suitors.

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Author: Brian Sylvester

Austerity programmes across Europe, continued debt problems in the US and further political uncertainty all point to a continued uptrend in gold prices, says Brien Lundin. A Gold Report Interview.

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By Michael Brush, MSN Money

Recent dips are giving us another chance to get in on the great gold rush. The factors driving the metal higher -- broken governments and fragile economies -- aren't going away.

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Author: Lawrence Williams

Speaking at GATA's sold-out Gold Rush conference in London, Eric Sprott affirmed his strong views on gold and his even more positive thoughts on silver.

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Edmund Conway

That's right: come Monday morning we will have managed to survive four decades of fiat money – though, given the chaos in markets in recent weeks, it is anyone's guess how much longer it will last.

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By Myra P. Saefong, MarketWatch

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Silver has always been seen as less precious than gold, but it has certainly proved itself worthy of investors’ attention — and demand for it as a hedge against the world’s financial woes is likely to grow.

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Edmond J. Bugos

After launching the Shanghai Gold Exchange in October 2002, the exchange’s principals announced a three-part plan to liberalize trading: 1) establish a deferred delivery service (as physical transactions are settled pretty much the same day); 2) create gold-related investment products in order to promote domestic investment demand and create liquidity; 3) integrate the exchange into international markets – which includes expanding import/export licenses and allowing foreign entities to become members.

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Author: Amanda Cooper (Reuters)

Analysts believe that gold stocks could well take the upper hand after a long period of underperformance in relation to physical bullion as the flow of cheap money from the U.S. slows

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By The Economist

Striking gold is generally considered a slice of good luck. Owning it, however, is a sign that you fear the worst. Some people buy the yellow stuff because they think it looks pretty, to be sure. But the quintessential gold bug is an investor who expects every form of paper wealth to collapse, along with civilisation itself.

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By Marc Davis, www.BNWnews.ca

Though Nevada’s world-famous gold fields have historically yielded over 150 million gold ounces, they are still proving to be geologically fertile hunting grounds for exploration-minded junior mining companies. Two good examples are Auex Ventures and Fronteer Gold.

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By David Galland, Casey Research

While there are many reasons that gold and silver are going to keep moving higher as the fiat currencies trend lower, at our recent Casey Research Summit in Boca Raton, faculty member Mike Maloney pointed out a fact that, while obvious in hindsight, I had never heard mentioned previously.

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Author: Fayen Wong
SHANGHAI (REUTERS)  -

London specialist consultancy GFMS reckons Chinese gold imports could exceed 400 tonnes in 2011 with silver, too, expected to exceed domestic supply.

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By William Mbaho, BNWnews.ca

Heightened global demand for vanadium especially from China, is prompting the global steel industry to aggressively seek out new supplies, especially in the U.S. where this 21st century metal is becoming increasingly indispensible. Even U.S. President Obama is championing this metal’s promise for green energy applications.

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Author: Geoff Candy

The yellow metals performance in the face of silver's washout last week was rather impressive and an addition to the factors why UBS expects gold to continue going higher this year.

Gold's performance last week, in the face of a drop of around 30% in the price of silver was rather impressive and, could be an indicator of things to come.

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By Marc Davis, www.BNWnews.ca

The quest to commercialize one of Latin America’s last undeveloped major gold deposits is one major step closer to a prospectively big pay day for its unlikely owner – a small gold explorer named Exeter Resource.

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By Debbie Carlson 
Of Kitco News 

After a sharp drop in prices this week, the outlook is hazy for precious metals price direction, but some analysts believe the metals could see the slide ending next week, at least for gold.

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Author: Lawrence Williams

Some observers think gold is in a bubble, but silver has been rising far faster. Can this momentum be maintained or is now the time to take at least some profits as the price closes on $50.

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Author: Jan Harvey (Reuters)

Silver rose to its strongest since 1980 and Gold hit five week highs on the back of growing unrest in the Middle East

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By Marc Davis, www.BNWnews.ca

Silver promises to become the next big buzzword among investors in 2011 and beyond, according to one of the investment industry’s most prescient and successful experts on precious metals.

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Jason Hamlin


There are some bizarre things going on in the silver market at the moment, reminiscent of the supply shortages and high premiums witnessed in 2008. For starters, silver is currently in both short-term and long-term backwardation, suggesting there is higher demand for silver NOW than in the future.

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The Economist

Rising commodity prices both reflect and threaten the world’s economic recovery.

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Ryan Jordan

Cheap, Industrial Silver is an illusion

From the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008, contrarian investors began murmuring about getting into gold and short term Treasuries. It was almost a mantra: gold and Treasuries… gold and Treasuries. Something missing?

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The Economist

Commodity prices are surging at a very early stage of the cycle

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By Frank Holmes

Wall Street has been calling gold a bubble since 2005 when it hit $500. Some media naysayers remained negative even as they wrote the headlines proclaiming record highs and saw gold rise almost 30 percent in the past 12 months.

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By Marc Davis, www.BNWnews.ca

The ‘Holy Grail’ of renewable energy – grid scale power storage – appears to be finally within reach. So is the ability to make electric cars far more practical or user-friendly. 

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by Egon von Greyerz - Matterhorn AM

We now live in a world where governments print worthless pieces of paper to buy other worthless pieces of paper that combined with worthless derivatives, finance assets whose values are totally dependent on all these worthless debt instruments.  Thus most of these assets are also worth-less. 

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The One-handed Economist

The establishment argument against gold comes down to the statement that it is a collectable that earns no yield. Art, rare coins, stamps and gold and silver bullion do not earn a yield. Stocks, bonds and real estate earn yields, so the prudent investor should focus on these assets rather than gold or precious metals.

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Lawrence Roulston

With gold well into record territory, investor enthusiasm is boiling over.

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By Jerry Western with Lorimer Wilson
www.FinancialArticle
SummariesToday.com

If we continue down the same economic path that we have been following for the last four decades - and there is no indication that we won't even if we wanted to, or could, at this point - it is mathematically inevitable that gold and silver will approach infinity in U.S. dollar terms at some point in the future. Yes, approach infinity!

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Where Next?

Lawrence Roulston

With gold well into record territory, investor enthusiasm is boiling over.

There is a wide range of opinions on the outlook for metals, reflecting the uncertainty in nearly all of the variables that impact metal prices.

The sovereign debt and worries and fears of a double dip recession still cloud the outlook for some investors.  Another round of quantitative easing will inject another $600 billion into the global money supply.  The announcement of QE2 built confidence that the American economy will remain in positive territory.  It also re-ignited inflation concerns, pushing gold to a further record high.

Investors were already buying gold for its safe-haven status.  The gold market enjoyed a further boost as investors seek cover from looming inflation (read “currency devaluation”).

The high price of bullion has attracted a significant amount of media attention and drawn in a great many investors who might not otherwise be investing in gold. Many gold companies have followed gold higher: certainly, the big producers and the better-known among the developers and explorers have enjoyed big gains.

As the present gold rush is driven largely by investors seeking safety, the majors and the mid-tier producers trade at premium prices.  An inordinately large discount is applied to the next level down. A development-stage gold company clearly carries more risk than an established producer. The flip side is that the developers and advanced explorers offer a great deal more upside. The higher potential rewards arise in part from the higher leverage to the gold price offered by the smaller companies. A second benefit is that select companies will appreciate in value as their projects evolve toward production.

Gold is capturing the headlines, but other aspects of the mining industry deserve a share of the attention. North American and European investors continue to shun the base metal juniors for fear of further economic slowdowns. Those investors seem to have missed copper’s stealth march toward its previous record highs. Tin is now at an all-time record high. Other metals have also moved higher. That strength in the base metal markets is being propelled by demand from the developing world. The Asian mining companies are scouring the planet in search of metal deposits on which to develop new mines. The takeover activity is set to accelerate and to become far more visible.

The United States government continues its efforts to push down the value of the dollar.  On one level, a cheaper dollar would benefit American exporters.  Secondly, devaluing the currency reduces the real value of the multi-trillion dollar debt owing to foreigners.  Of course, downward  pressure on the dollar is quickly matched by other nations seeking to keep their export industries competitive.

On any given day, pundits could put together a string of headlines to support a case for any direction for any of the metals. Instead of simply speculating on metal prices, investors can instead put their money into companies that are adding value for shareholders.  The gains from successfully executing mineral development projects far exceed any realistic outlook for moves in metal prices.

Lawrence Roulston