Edmund Burke, Letter to a Member of the National Assembly, 1791
"China's central bank reported its biggest monthly increase in gold reserves in more than two and a half years in June, official data showed on Tuesday, although bullion prices tumbled. China's central bank maintained gold purchases for a 20th straight month, with its reserves hitting 75.44 million fine troy ounces by the end of June, versus 74.96 million a month earlier. The 480,000-ounce rise, equivalent to near 15 metric tons, marked the biggest monthly addition since October 2023."
Reuters, China gold reserves rise most since 2023, 7 July 2026
"Nor can private counterparties restrict supplies of gold, another commodity whose derivatives are often traded over-the-counter, where central banks stand ready to lease gold in increasing quantities should the price rise."
Alan Greenspan, Congressional Testimony, July 24, 1998
“Control frauds are seemingly legitimate entities controlled by persons that use them as a fraud “weapon.” A single control fraud can cause greater losses than all other forms of property crime combined. Financial control frauds’ primary weapon is accounting. Fraudulent lenders produce exceptional short-term 'profits' through a four-part strategy: extreme growth (Ponzi), lending to uncreditworthy borrowers, extreme leverage, and minimal loss reserves.
These exceptional 'profits' defeat regulatory restrictions and turn private market discipline perverse. The profits also allow the CEO to convert firm assets for personal benefit through seemingly normal compensation mechanisms. The short-term profits cause stock options to appreciate. Fraudulent CEOs following this strategy are guaranteed extraordinary income while minimizing risks of detection and prosecution.
The optimization strategy causes catastrophic losses. The “profits” allow the fraud to grow rapidly by making bad loans for years. The “profits” allow the managers to loot the firm through exceptional compensation, which increases losses.
When many firms follow the same optimization strategy a financial bubble hyper-inflates. This further optimizes accounting control fraud because the frauds can hide losses by refinancing. Mega bubbles produce financial crises."
William K. Black, Control Frauds: Recurrent, Intensifying Bubbles and Crises, 15 April 2010
"[Martin] Hennecke stressed that investors should go for physical forms of gold and other
precious metals rather than "paper gold investment scheme where there isn't full
backing, where the metal might be leased out or used for derivatives. That's
crucial because there is 80 times more paper gold in the market than actual
physical metal in existence in the planet."
CNBC Asia, Go for Gold and Silver, 2 September 2009
"The problem is that sensible liquidity support can easily become inappropriate subsidies, particularly when some financial institutions are considered 'too big to fail'. Outsiders will never observe the real-time information on which central banks make decisions, so we need to be able to trust the people running our central bank, otherwise the system will go badly wrong — again.
But it is also an all-too-accurate reflection of where we stand today with regard to global mega-banks and the large, nontransparent and highly dangerous subsidies they extract from the rest of society by being too big to fail. The people who run global mega-banks get the upside when things go well – they are paid based on their return on equity unadjusted for risk, so they prefer a lot of debt piled on top of very little equity.
When things go badly, the downside is someone else’s problem – in the first instance, typically, the Federal Reserve’s. In the run-up to 2007, the complacency of the entire Fed System can be traced in part to the cozy relationship between the New York Fed (headed then by Mr. Geithner) and the Wall Street elite. We cannot let this happen again."
Simon Johnson, Institutional Flaw At The Heart Of The Federal Reserve, 14 June 2012
Stocks popped yesterday on Monday, and flopped back today on Tuesday.
There seems to be a pattern here. lol
Gold and silver were hit fairly hard, with silver taking it on the chin.
VIX rose a bit.
The Dollar drifted a little higher onto the 101 handle.
Dollar strength is euro weakness. And Europe's 'leaders' seem content to wear their gimp suits for Trump.
SpaceX is underwater from its IPO. The only surprise is that there were those who bought it believing in anything more than a quick, cynical flip.
I included a chart below showing the composition of the US gold reserves since 2012. I could have gone further back but the result would have been pretty much the same. Unchanging.
The steadiness of the Mint's 'working stock' is a result of their policy of continual replenishment.
Now we know, by Greenspan's own admission above and from other sources, that the US engages in swaps and loans of its gold quite frequently. But those changes are never reflected in the official inventory.
I wonder what a thorough audit of not only the bullion but the claims on it would tell us?
It appears that the 'peace' MOU with Iran is falling apart.
"The US is revoking Iran's newly issued general license to export oil and is reimposing full sanctions on production and sales after Iran struck four commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz today, per a US official. The US says Iran's latest actions are 'wholly unacceptable' and will be 'met with consequences.'' And Iran responds, 'The MOU just ended here. If Washington wants to push, Tehran will respond by widening the front — closing Bab el-Mandeb is also on the table.'"
"Multiple loud explosions heard in Qeshm Island, Bandar Abbas and Sirik, near the Strait of Hormuz in southern Iran, with initial reports of US conducting strikes."
Still time to prepare and stock up.
Have a pleasant evening.
