“LONDON—China took over from India as the world’s top consumer of gold in the first quarter of this year, cementing expectations that China will be the dominant buying force in the gold market in 2012, the World Gold Council said Thursday.
Indian gold demand dropped 19% on the year in the first three months of 2012, to 207.6 metric tons. The domestic gold sector was rattled by strikes following the announcement of new taxes on the gold trade and weakness in the Indian rupee made dollar-denominated gold more expensive for Indian buyers.In contrast Chinese gold demand rose 7% in the same period, to 255.2 tons, according to the WGC.Between them, China and India accounted for 54% of global gold demand in the first quarter.”

Read More Here : China Overtakes India as Top Gold Consumer

“An auction gallery in Georgia is selling what’s believed to be one of the rarest coins ever made in the United States — a $3 gold coin estimated to be worth up to $4 million.”

Read More Here: Rare gold coin may fetch up to $4 million at Georgia auction

“When asked about the decline in gold and silver, Turk responded, “It depends on how you look at it, Eric. The decline looks worse in dollars than euros because the euro itself has been declining against the dollar. But here is another way of looking at it.

When crude oil was $107 a barrel a few weeks ago, with gold at $1650, a barrel of crude oil cost 2 grams of gold. Now with crude oil at $94 and gold at $1550, a barrel of oil only costs 1.9 gold grams. So, by owning gold, your purchasing power over the last few weeks increased by 5% versus oil.

Admittedly, one would have done better if they were holding dollars, but who wants all that risk? You have to find a safe bank to place those dollars, and then be guaranteed that the Fed is not going to launch QE3. You would also need to be guaranteed that the federal government is going to drastically shrink its deficits. ”

Read More Here: Turk – Expect Tremendous Chaos, Europe Deteriorating Rapidly

Gold has dropped below $1600.00

In our opinion is an excellent opportunity to buy in at cheaper levels before the market explodes again.

You can watch prices here: thebulliondesk.com

If you have been waiting for lower prices, here they are. If you have not bought at all, here is a good opportunity.

No one knows for sure however my 30+ years of doing this tells me that below $1600 gold and $30 Silver levels they are a good buy and you could do very well down the road.

Need help on figuring what and where, email or call us.

“Overall it would appear to the pragmatic observer that gold and silver are not through their bull runs yet as the global financial turmoil is far from over. The current gold (and silver) price hiatus is because many see the Eurozone crisis, which is the most newsworthy at the moment, as deteriorating further, but those fleeing it financially are putting their trust in the US dollar rather than gold. Given the U.S.’s own economic problems, which are neatly being hidden from public perception in the runup to this year’s Presidential election, this has to be a pretty shortsighted viewpoint and will surely come to an end before too long. When it does both gold and silver will likely resume their overall upwards trend – but probably not as rapidly as the major gold and silver bulls would have you believe.”

Read more here: Fickle gold and silver prices – a pragmatist’s viewpoint

Read More Here:
1792 Silver Center cent, from the first group of coins ever struck at the U.S. Mint, may bring $1,000,000

“A very important objective change has taken place in the gold market. Its price is not moving above the resistance established in the 1600 to 1900 wide berth range. Its price is not moving below support in the same wide permitted range. When the gold price has approached the 1800 level recently, all manner of naked soldiers emerge with imaginary swords to whack the price down, to bring it under heel. The ruse has a high cost in the real world though, as the gold cartel has been forced to shed an enormous supply of gold as punishment for each naked short episode. The opponents to fraudulent controlled manipulated markets have emerged in force to respond. They fight from the East. They fight for a fair and equitable market.

They are poking holes in the floor of the syndicate helm where legs fall through. Demand for the gold core has become acute with pitched battles. The financial press reports none of it. In desperation, the cartel has conducted regular and routine raids of the Exchange Traded Funds, using shorted shares as the ticket at the rear dock window to cart off gold bars. What a corrupted bill of lading. Meanwhile, the major gold suppliers from mine output appear to be on the defensive or actually on the ropes. The deficit in silver only punctuates the precious metals shortage, as investment demand ramps up. The dutiful lapdog press prefers to tell the story of reduced jewelry demand, without noting how it emphatically signals the powerful bull market. The stories rely on the public being poor students of history. Still, the underlying forces behind the Gold & Silver bull markets remain a team of horses, the 0% cost of money and the debasement of currency in sovereign bond redemptions. The system is broken. Long live the new system that comes, based upon gold and barter, as the US Dollar loses its vital ticket in global trade settlement.

Read the rest here: The Gold GroundHog Grind

Those events are aided by naked shorting and illegal concentration in both gold and silver and the shares. Mind you, this is being done in a market to control it and in addition government and central banks relish stomping gold and silver into the ground. For years they hid what they were doing. Today their manipulations are in your face. These dramatic forced price falls are fortunately accompanied by heavy buying by China, Russia, India and others.”

Read more here: Manipulation of the “Paper Gold” Market, “Worthless” Paper versus Physical Gold

“As we approach the end of 2011, the silver spot price has admittedly endured a tougher road than we would have expected. And let’s be honest – what investment firm on earth has pounded the table on silver harder than we have? After the orchestrated silver sell-off in May 2011 (please see June 2011 MAAG article entitled, “Caveat Venditor”), silver promptly rose back to US$40/oz where it consolidated nicely, only to drop back below US$30 within a two week span in late September.1 The September sell-off was partly due to the market’s disappointment over Bernanke’s Operation Twist, which sounded interesting but didn’t involve any real money printing. Like the May sell-off before it, however, it was also exacerbated by a seemingly needless 21% margin rate hike by the CME on September 23rd, followed by a 20% margin hike by the Shanghai Gold Exchange – the CME’s counterpart in China, three days later.”

Read more here: Silver Producers: A Call to Action

So do I believe that the silver market is manipulated?

Read more here: Paper Trading & Manipulation in Precious Metals