Mr. Cohan Responds On His Silver Rigging Exposé - Two US National Publications Refused the Story

"We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put up a façade to prevent ourselves from seeing it.”

Blaise Pascal

This is starting to make more sense. 

Apparently Mr. William Cohan, a highly respected journalist, did look at all the relevant information he had been provided, and decided to write a story about rigging in the silver markets.

It was submitted and refused by at least two US publications which refused to run it.

Based on past history, one might assume the two national publications that refused to publish it were on the order of The New York Times, and perhaps Bloomberg News or even possibly Forbes.

The actual reasons that they gave for refusing to publish the story are not stated. One can assume they were not sufficient for Mr. Cohan to decide to take his name off of it in his professional judgement, so we can only surmise. 

So we cannot tell if this was editorial scruples, a failure in fact checking, or just good old fashioned minding of one's place.

Insiders never speak ill of insiders.

Bill was good with publishing the piece at ZeroHedge with his name on it.  So he apparently still had confidence in what he had written. 

 

That speaks volumes. 

At that point the whistleblowing parties, if one might call them that, deferred, feeling perhaps that printing something like this on the web alone, even on a large and widely read site, would relegate it to something easily dismissible by the status quo.  The Very Serious Players choose to read only properly vetted, fully credible and approved mainstream sources.

I am being a bit sarcastic, but not so much.  The thought leaders and ruling class in the US are, alas, out of touch almost without regard to their origins. And one does not have to think too hard about it to discover why.  They only read the right publications, watch the right shows, talk to the right people, say the right things, and think the right thoughts.

They live in virtual palaces and bubbles of ease and influence.  To borrow a phrase from one of their less pliant pets, when they go out amongst the common people, it often resembles Prince Charles on a royal visit to Papua, New Guinea.   As George Orwell noted in his diaries, 'apparently nothing will ever teach these people that the other 99% of the population exists.'  

They exist, they just don't matter in the halls of power anymore.

I might have suggested some publishing options a little 'out of the box' like The Guardian or Der Spiegel.  Choosing publications that might be less beholden to the New York financial powers seems as though it could be a more fruitful course of action.  South China Morning Post, or even the Asia Times?  Radio Free America?

So there you have it. We have a story. And the mainstream media refuses to publish it. And there is some wrangling about where and when it might achieve adequate exposure to do some good.

To:  addressees

Thank you all for writing me regarding Andrew Maguire's story of alleged "manipulation" in the silver market. As you may know, I was approached 11 months ago by a PR representative of Mr. Maguire's who wanted to introduce me to Andrew and to his attorney Gordon Schnell, at Constantine Cannon, in New York. I found what Andrew had to say very interesting, especially so in light of a piece I had written in the New York Times about the silver market three years ago.  A Conspiracy With a Silver Lining

I wrote up the story and submitted it to a national publication in the United States, which decided not to publish it. I then tried another, national financial publication, which also decided not to publish it. I then abandoned hope that the story would be published.

About a month ago, Ned Naylor-Leyland contacted me and suggested that Zero Hedge might publish the story. I thought that would be a fine idea.

Unfortunately, Mr. Schnell did not like the idea of Zero Hedge, nor apparently did his clients. They also declined to approve the use of key facts and key quotations that I felt needed to be included in the story to give it credibility. Part of my agreement with them was that they would be given quote approval and without their approval, I could not use their quotations or their information.

They did not approve. At that point, without their cooperation, I did not feel the piece could be published. I explained that to Mr. Naylor-Leyland but he didn't seem much interested in those facts and then went on to encourage the publication of the piece to which you are all responding.

All of which is to say, you are directing your passion to the wrong person. If you want the piece published, you need to reach out to Mr. Maguire and Mr. Schnell.

Thank you for your interest and your passion on this topic.

William D. Cohan

Related:  Ned Naylor-Leyland Suggests Media Overhanging an Exposé of Rigging in the Silver Markets

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Curiouser and Curiouser

Gold was holding a weak bounce and silver drifted lower today, while US equities were showing their first ~2% correction in some time.

Today was unusual only because the metals did not react much to stocks, and also to their option expiration on the Comex, although as I have indicated October may not a particularly important contract per se.

The big news in metals is still the opening of the Shanghai metals exchange, which takes deliveries in physical not cash. The East is where the action is these days for gold and silver.

I recently read about the concept of terra nullius.  It is the principle in law by which ownerless land and other property may be taken by exogenous parties for productive use.   In its abuses, the more 'civilized' decide that the indigenous peoples do not have fully human societies, and are too incapable or insufficiently evolved to be considered proper owners who can make efficient and proper use of the assets (aka fully exploit).   It is a particularly popular concept with the ubermenschen.  

 

I think there are some actors out there that would like to declare terra nullius on the indigenous 99%'s retirement accounts, pensions, deposit savings, civic assets, and a whole lot more than they have already opened up for plunder.  They are on a roll, and seemingly insatiable.

During the day I noted an interesting revelation about an unpublished article said to contain some fairly important sounding information about rigging in the silver markets. You may read about that here.

If there is nothing untoward going on the silver market, it may be one of the few notable markets that hasn't been systematically rigged by our largely unreformed financial system.   My gut hunch is that this has been one of those half assed, poorly thought out government programs that gets co-opted by market wiseguys and free-booted into one of their personal piggybanks.  The credibility trap and personal embarrassment of some overly important people keeps a lid on.  Until it doesn't.  There are some big sharks circling the tank.

Have a pleasant evening.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Whoops!

Today we got something a little unexpected. I have to admit it caught me by surprise, and brought back at least a little twinge of seller's regret.

Russia's new draft law permitting them to seize foreign assets and to offer compensation for their nationals who suffer from the Western sanctions shook up the markets a bit, starting with some tremors in the Dax, but achieving their full blossom in US equities. The popular indices were down about 1.5 to 2 percent.

Some pointed to the very low durable goods number this morning, which is fashionably dumb. Durable goods is notoriously volatile because of airplane sales. If you back those out of this morning's figures, then the number was not notable. 

 

And AAPL has reported some problems with their new iPhone6.  The cases are bendably thin, and they are having some software problems.  

 

Our market are this fragile?   It was more likely geopolitical jitters triggering profit taking from the tech bubble fostered by debubbling in AAPL and BABA.

And these sorts of big moves are characteristic of the narrow market we are in, as shown by the NDX/RUT and SPX/RUT ratios.

The same line of dumb thinking says that if we get a revision to 2Q GDP tomorrow it might be over 5 percent, and that would prompt the Fed to tighten more quickly next year, due to our remarkable recovery.

A revised 2Q GDP with no supporting trend, a stagnant median wage, and a recovery that is so selective that it is almost embarrassing if you don't spend all your time talking to the 'right class of people.' Are you kidding me? I cannot believe the level of groupthink that possesses the financially aloof and their spokesmodels on financial television. It's pathetic.

The next move of the markets may be lower, and the support levels are obvious. We are still in a formation that looks like a large inverse head and shoulders consolidation. So we would be looking for any market moves that either negate or activate that formation.

So the markets remain risky, but the volumes and market action is 'narrow,' driven significantly by professional trading that is algorithmically driven. So are we in the long managed rally as we saw in the early 2000's or the kind of reckless bubble making we have seen so often since 1987? Probably both since they are children of the same policy errors.

Have a pleasant evening.