Elizabeth Warren: How the Regulators Are Protecting the Banks From Disclosure of Fraud

"Fraudus est celare fraudem." 
The concealment of fraud is a fraud.

Take a careful listen to Senator Elizabeth Warren pulling out the truth from Daniel P. Stipano, Deputy Chief Counsel, Comptroller of the Currency, and Richard Ashton, Deputy General Counsel, Federal Reserve.

"You have made a decision to protect the banks but not to help the families who were illegally foreclosed on. Families get pennies on the dollar for being the victims of illegal activities. And you know of cases where the banks broke the laws, but you are not going to tell the homeowners.

People want to know that their regulators are watching out for the American public, not the banks."

Senator Elizabeth Warren

Other people are doing a much better job of covering this than I am, notably Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism, and I regularly include their links on my site.

It is a shame and a scandal that is representative of what is wrong with the current structure of the economy and the markets, the regulatory capture that favors insiders and special financial interests over basic law and justice for the public.

And I think it is a failure of the liberal agenda that calls blindly for stimulus, but at best pays lip service to significant reform.  As for those who call for austerity without reform, they are at best useful for the one percent, and of harm to most everyone else. 

The genuine reformers are found on both the right and the left, and might best be called progressives.  Unfortunately they are a group without a party or a portfolio these days, except for a few shining lights like Warren and Sanders.  From what I hear the situation in the UK and Canada is equally as bleak.  Oligarchies abound elsewhere.  As for Europe, it is just a mess of conflicting interests that one might strain to call a governing body of the most powerful special interests and their outside supporters.

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Funds and Trusts - Part II

I normally don't post this twice in one day, but I do wish to document this price action for future reference.

Heavy selling in paper has triggered a water fall decline that is seriously testing some very long term lows today, going back to gold's original ascent out of the cup and handle.

The selling in the related sectors such as the miners has been particularly brutal. As one of the paid pundits said today, 'They are clearing out the casual allocators.'

This is Street talk for skinning the little guy and the non-insider, the average, frightened investor.

Intraday gold tagged 1491.

I have gone back and marked the current chart with past support and resistance figures. Those are indicated on a segment of a chart from 2011 included below. The current chart will come out at the regular time.

Watch silver for an indication of a subsidence in selling.

Don't even ask, because I will not tell you when to sell or to buy. At most I may occasionally give some indication of what I am thinking.

And today I am thinking that this is a major test of the bull market by some very determined hedge funds and bullion banks who are overpowering the real physical markets. And they are doing so almost fearlessly because they know that the punishments, if any, are a minimal share of the profits.  And they most likely have the approval of the Anglo-American banking establishment. 

If you believe that the monied interests will only apply their financial repression to the weak, the disabled, the elderly, the poor, and immigrants you are kidding yourself, and falling for the oldest ruse in the book.

If you wish to do something, support the efforts for reforming the financial system.

Michael Hudson: Obama's Cat Food Social Security Budget Strategy and Stealth Tax Increases

What some of the 'conservatives' have figured out is that 'chained CPI' is also a threat to those who rely on incomes.

The chained CPI would also apply to the income tax brackets, to adjust for 'inflation creep.'

By seriously understating inflation, the chained CPI would also result in steady, hidden tax increases on non-privileged income by allowing inflation to push income levels higher without adjusting tax brackets.

Remember how the AMT was originally pitched as a way of forcing the wealthy to pay taxes despite loopholes, and instead became a snare for the middle class?

It's a win-win for the crony capitalists and liberal statists.  Because in corporatism the state is the corporation and the corporation is the state.  And it takes care of its own.

Less money for the elderly, and more income taxes from their working children.  And the government can mask their inflation while continuing to deliver wheelbarrows of money to the Wall Street banks and their friends, while providing a blind eye to their tax loopholes and havens.

The oligarchs maintain a tight control on any investment opportunities and returns, driving savings where they like using the power of their exchanges and the Federal Reserve. And it is easy to game when you are included in a stream of privileged information and dark pools of trading. 

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Funds

The hedge funds seem to be having their way with the metals market.

This makes us wonder how relevant the paper market is to the physical market.

It must be very difficult to be a retail provider of gold and silver in market where your base pricing is set by such fluffy nonsense. 

Jim Cramer offers what could be at least a partial explanation although I am sure the mainstream pundits will be quick to defend the system as it is.