Alasdair Macleod's Contributions

In last week’s article I pointed out that negative interest rates should lead to a general shift in consumer preferences from money towards essential goods. Central bankers may wish for this outcome on a...

This coming Sunday Greece will hold its referendum. The question to be asked is not, as the foreign press initially reported it, about leaving the euro. It is about accepting or rejecting the troika’s bail-out terms.

Last Monday there was a meeting in Washington hosted by the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum (OMFIF) to discuss the future relationship, if any, of gold with the Special Drawing Rights (SDR).

China and Russia have taken the lead in establishing the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), seen as a rival organization to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, which are dominated by the United States...

Today’s obvious mispricing of sovereign bonds is a bonanza for spending politicians and allows over-leveraged banks to build up their capital. This mispricing has gone so far that negative interest rates have become...

Gold and silver started the year at a muted point, with gold at $1168 and silver at $15.50, from which modest rallies have developed, with gold up 4% and silver 6%. These rises were against a background of high volatility in equity markets...

The dollar continued its upward path against the major currencies this week, and gold and silver prices suffered accordingly. The bears have maintained the upper hand, as shown in the following charts of Comex prices and Open Interest.

Precious metals have had to endure a week of gathering dollar strength, which is at least partly the result of problems specific to the euro, yen and sterling. The result is gold has fallen a further $30 over the week, and silver by about $0.70c. The first chart is of gold and open interest on Comex.

Gold and silver had a bad week, with gold falling $25 to a low of $1262 by the Comex close yesterday, and silver by $0.50. This morning UK-time prices opened a little better on overnight physical demand, no doubt stimulated by those lower prices.

Gold and silver had a good week after the U.S. holiday last Friday. From a low of $1312 on Tuesday, gold rose to a high point of $1345 yesterday, and silver from $20.84 to $21.60. Open interest is climbing too for both metals, as shown in the following charts.

Earlier this week Bill Gross who runs Pimco’s bond fund made a conditional case for investing in high-yielding bonds, even though on first cut the yield benefit appears insufficient to justify the extra risk. Put bluntly, he suggests that investing in...

The rise in the gold price ran into profit-taking on Wednesday. Having raised $160 to $1345 some short-term profit taking is only to be expected, and silver followed suit.

It transpired last week that of the 43-odd tonnes per annum the Bundesbank expects to be returned from the New York Fed only 5 tonnes arrived in 2013. Furthermore, of the 373.7 tonnes stored with the Banque de France only 32 tonnes was delivered.

Jim Puplava comments on what he sees as the bright spots within the American economy and the effects of growth in domestic energy markets.

The Christmas and New Year's break, when Europe shuts down and stops thinking, is now well and truly over, and we are reawakening to the same old problems: Greece, Spain, Cyprus, Portugal, Italy, France…all with their hands out for money from Germany, Holland, Finland, and Austria.

The purpose of keeping accurate accounts is to quantify net worth at any given point in time – as well as the change from a prior date. It goes without saying that the measure used, money, should be constant if comparisons over time are to mean anything.

I have not faced the prospect of a new year with so much trepidation as when I contemplate what is in store for 2013. Systemic risks abound, which of themselves are not the main story, only milestones on the road to final currency destruction, unless governments somehow regain their senses.

We start with the definition of value. According to the glossary of von Mises’ Human Action, value is “always relative, subjective and human, never absolute, objective or divine”. It is reflected in human conduct, placing value in the same subjective category as fairness and morality.

There was a degree of predictability about the knockdown in gold and silver at the US futures market (Comex) last Wednesday. The reason is that the Commercials (together the producers, processers, fabricators, bullion banks and swap dealers) have large short positions, so they have a vested interest in lower prices.