The biggest withdrawal came in the CNT vault, where 1.138 million ounces (including 737k REGISTERED oz) were withdrawn- an astonishing 17.3% of CNT’s entire physical silver inventory vaporized overnight!
and……it’s gone!
GMT
|
CCY
|
EVENT
|
ACT
|
EXP
|
PREV
|
0:00
|
NZD
|
QV House Prices (YoY) (MAR)
|
6.5%
|
-
|
6.3%
|
1:30
|
AUD
|
NAB Business Conditions (MAR)
|
-7
|
-
|
-3
|
1:30
|
AUD
|
NAB Business Confidence (MAR)
|
2
|
-
|
1
|
1:30
|
CNY
|
Consumer Price Index (YoY) (MAR)
|
2.1%
|
2.5%
|
3.2%
|
1:30
|
CNY
|
Producer Price Index (YoY) (MAR)
|
-1.9%
|
-1.9%
|
-1.6%
|
GMT
|
CCY
|
EVENT
|
EXP/ACT
|
PREV
|
IMPACT
|
5:45
|
CHF
|
Unemployment Rate s.a. (MAR)
|
3.1% (A)
|
3.1%
|
Medium
|
5:45
|
CHF
|
Unemployment Rate (MAR)
|
3.2% (A)
|
3.4%
|
Medium
|
6:00
|
EUR
|
German Trade Balance (€) (FEB)
|
16.8B (A)
|
13.6B
|
Low
|
6:00
|
EUR
|
German Current Account (€) (FEB)
|
16.0B (A)
|
9.7B
|
Low
|
6:00
|
EUR
|
German Exports s.a. (MoM) (FEB)
|
-1.5% (A)
|
1.3%
|
Low
|
6:00
|
EUR
|
German Imports s.a. (MoM) (FEB)
|
-3.8% (A)
|
3.3%
|
Low
|
6:00
|
JPY
|
Machine Tool Orders (YoY) (MAR P)
|
-21.6% (A)
|
-21.5%
|
Low
|
7:15
|
CHF
|
Consumer Price Index (MoM) (MAR)
|
0.3%
|
0.3%
|
Medium
|
7:15
|
CHF
|
Consumer Price Index (YoY) (MAR)
|
-0.5%
|
-0.3%
|
Medium
|
7:15
|
CHF
|
CPI – EU Harmonised (MoM) (MAR)
|
-
|
0.3%
|
Low
|
7:15
|
CHF
|
CPI – EU Harmonised (YoY) (MAR)
|
-
|
0.1%
|
Low
|
7:15
|
CHF
|
Retail Sales (Real) (YoY) (FEB)
|
2.5%
|
1.9%
|
Low
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Industrial Production (MoM) (FEB)
|
0.4%
|
-1.2%
|
Medium
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Industrial Production (YoY) (FEB)
|
-2.8%
|
-2.9%
|
Medium
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Manufacturing Production (MoM) (FEB)
|
0.4%
|
-1.5%
|
Low
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Manufacturing Production (YoY) (FEB)
|
-1.4%
|
-3.0%
|
Low
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Visible Trade Balance (£) (FEB)
|
-8600M
|
-8195M
|
Medium
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Trade Balance Non EU (£) (FEB)
|
-3650M
|
-3280M
|
Low
|
8:30
|
GBP
|
Total Trade Balance (£) (FEB)
|
-2800M
|
-2362M
|
Low
|
13:30
|
-
|
IMF Releases World Economic Outlook Update
|
-
|
-
|
High
|
CCY
|
SUPPORT
|
RESISTANCE
|
EURUSD
|
1.2968
|
1.3079
|
GBPUSD
|
1.5213
|
1.5325
|
“The forces which have propelled gold returns higher over the past decade, namely a weakening U.S. dollar, falling real interest rates and a rising U.S. equity risk premium have all moved into reverse since the end of last year,” Deutsche Bank said.The critical factor on the longer-term chart is that $1522 remains unbroken. Given the fall from $1800, there might be scope for a further rebound.
Below the streets of Kansas City, there are deep underground tunnels where a group of vagrant homeless people lived in camps.The saddest part is the fact that authorities found dirty diapers in the areas near these tunnels. That must mean that babies were being raised in that kind of an environment.
These so-called homeless camps have now been uncovered by the Kansas City Police, who then evicted the residents because of the unsafe environment.
Authorities said these people were living in squalor, with piles of garbage and dirty diapers left around wooded areas.
Deep beneath Vegas’s glittering lights lies a sinister labyrinth inhabited by poisonous spiders and a man nicknamed The Troll who wields an iron bar.Could you imagine living like that? Sadly, for an increasing number of Americans a “normal lifestyle” is no longer an option. Either they have to go to the homeless shelters or they have to try to eke out an existence on their own any way that they can.
But astonishingly, the 200 miles of flood tunnels are also home to 1,000 people who eke out a living in the strip’s dark underbelly.
Some, like Steven and his girlfriend Kathryn, have furnished their home with considerable care – their 400sq ft ‘bungalow’ boasts a double bed, a wardrobe and even a bookshelf.
The homeless people who live down here are called Mole People. They do not, as many believe, exist in a separate, organized underground society. It’s more of a solitary existence and loose-knit community of secretive, hard-luck individuals.The New York Post followed one homeless man known as “John Travolta” on a tour through the underground world. What they discovered was a world that is very much different from what most New Yorkers experience…
In the tunnels, their world is one of malt liquor, tight spaces, schizophrenic neighbors, hunger and spells of heat and cold. Travolta and the others eat fairly well, living on a regimented schedule of restaurant leftovers, dumped each night at different times around the neighborhood above his foreboding home.Even as the Dow hits record high after record high, poverty in New York City continues to rise at a very frightening pace. Incredibly, the number of homeless people sleeping in the homeless shelters of New York City has increased by a whopping 19 percent over the past year.
This is the home of the Metzger family. Arielle,15. Her brother Austin, 13. Their mother died when they were very young. Their dad, Tom, is a carpenter. And, he’s been looking for work ever since Florida’s construction industry collapsed. When foreclosure took their house, he bought the truck on Craigslist with his last thousand dollars. Tom’s a little camera shy – thought we ought to talk to the kids – and it didn’t take long to see why.But after watching a news report or reading something on the Internet about these people we rapidly forget about them because they are not a part of “our world”.
Pelley: How long have you been living in this truck?
Arielle Metzger: About five months.
Pelley: What’s that like?
Arielle Metzger: It’s an adventure.
Austin Metzger: That’s how we see it.
Pelley: When kids at school ask you where you live, what do you tell ‘em?
Austin Metzger: When they see the truck they ask me if I live in it, and when I hesitate they kinda realize. And they say they won’t tell anybody.
Arielle Metzger: Yeah it’s not really that much an embarrassment. I mean, it’s only life. You do what you need to do, right?
Roughly a third of U.S. states today jail people for not paying off their debts, from court-related fines and fees to credit card and car loans, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. Such practices contravene a 1983 United States Supreme Court ruling that they violate the Constitutions’s Equal Protection Clause.If you are poor, the United States can be an incredibly cold and cruel place. Mercy and compassion are in very short supply.
Some states apply “poverty penalties,” such as late fees, payment plan fees and interest, when people are unable to pay all their debts at once. Alabama charges a 30 percent collection fee, for instance, while Florida allows private debt collectors to add a 40 percent surcharge on the original debt. Some Florida counties also use so-called collection courts, where debtors can be jailed but have no right to a public defender. In North Carolina, people are charged for using a public defender, so poor defendants who can’t afford such costs may be forced to forgo legal counsel.
The high rates of unemployment and government fiscal shortfalls that followed the housing crash have increased the use of debtors’ prisons, as states look for ways to replenish their coffers. Said Chettiar, “It’s like drawing blood from a stone. States are trying to increase their revenue on the backs of the poor.”
Residents filled the parking lot with bags and baskets hoping to get some of the baby food, canned goods, noodles and other non-perishables. But a local church never came to pick up the food, as the storeowner prior to the eviction said they had arranged. By the time the people showed up for the food, what was left inside the premises—as with any eviction—came into the ownership of the property holder, SunTrust Bank.Can you imagine watching that happen?
The bank ordered the food to be loaded into dumpsters and hauled to a landfill instead of distributed. The people that gathered had to be restrained by police as they saw perfectly good food destroyed. Local Sheriff Richard Roundtree told the news “a potential for a riot was extremely high.”
Components of the survey were consistent with the decline in headline optimism, as the net percent of respondents planning to hire fell to 0% (from +4%), those expecting higher sales fell to -4% (from +1%), and those reporting that it is a good time to expand ticked down to +4% (from +5%). The net percent of respondents expecting the economy to improve was unchanged at -28%, a very depressed level. However, on the positive side, +25% of respondents plan increased capital spending [ZH: With Alcoa CapEx spending at a 2 year low]. Small business owners continue to place poor sales, taxes, and red tape at the top of their list of business problems, as they have for the past several years.So why aren’t our politicians doing anything to fix this?
As the White House has previously announced, Justin Timberlake (who will be making his White House debut), Al Green, Ben Harper, Queen Latifah, Cyndi Lauper, Joshua Ledet, Sam Moore, Charlie Musselwhite, Mavis Staples, and others will be performing at the exclusive event.And so who will be paying for all of this?
Section 716 bans taxpayer bailouts of a broad range of derivatives dealing and speculative derivatives activities. Section 716 does not in any way limit the swaps activities which banks or other financial institutions may engage in. It simply prohibits public support for such activities.There will be no more $700 billion taxpayer bailouts. So where will the banks get the money in the next crisis? It seems the plan has just been revealed in the new bail-in policies.
. . . [C]onsider the brutal, unjust irony of the entire proposal. Remember, its stated purpose is to solve the problem revealed in 2008, namely the existence of insolvent TBTF institutions that were “highly leveraged and complex, with numerous and dispersed financial operations, extensive off-balance-sheet activities, and opaque financial statements.” Yet what is being proposed is a framework sacrificing depositors in order to maintain precisely this complex, opaque, leverage-laden financial edifice!The FDIC was set up to ensure the safety of deposits. Now it, it seems, its function will be the confiscation of deposits to save Wall Street. In the only mention of “depositors” in the FDIC-BOE directive as it pertains to US policy, paragraph 47 says that “the authorities recognize the need for effective communication to depositors, making it clear that their deposits will be protected.” But protected with what? As with MF Global, the pot will already have been gambled away. From whom will the bank get it back? Not the derivatives claimants, who are first in line to be paid; not the taxpayers, since Congress has sealed the vault; not the FDIC insurance fund, which has a paltry $25 billion in it. As long as the derivatives counterparties have super-priority status, the claims of all other parties are in jeopardy.
If you believe that what has happened recently in Cyprus is unlikely to happen elsewhere, think again. Economic policy officials in the US, UK and other countries are preparing for it. Remember, someone has to pay. Will it be you? If you are a depositor, the answer is yes.