5 replies to this topic

[Rogerdodger]

IMPORTANT NEW NOTICE: Demand for bullion products has increased significantly in recent days. As a result, we may experience delays in supply and possibly delays in processing and shipping by our vaults. We apologize for this inconvenience and will do everything in our power to service your orders as quickly as possible. While cancellation fees still apply, prices are guaranteed regardless of the length of the delay. We remain committed to providing you the best service no matter what market conditions prevail.

Kitco currently has numerous physical gold, silver, and platinum coin and bar items in stock, available for immediate delivery. Please call for more information.




Is just me?

This kind of stuff always makes me wonder what's really going on.

I've always worried about holding GLD since there is always possibility of criminal activity, etc. and one's virtual gold virtually disappears.

Sleep well.

[bobalou]

I saw the news,,to me, that tells me gold might not be done on the down side,,but could be some kind of short covering ?

[Tor]

IMPORTANT NEW NOTICE: Demand for bullion products has increased significantly in recent days. As a result, we may experience delays in supply and possibly delays in processing and shipping by our vaults. We apologize for this inconvenience and will do everything in our power to service your orders as quickly as possible. While cancellation fees still apply, prices are guaranteed regardless of the length of the delay. We remain committed to providing you the best service no matter what market conditions prevail.

Kitco currently has numerous physical gold, silver, and platinum coin and bar items in stock, available for immediate delivery. Please call for more information.




Is just me?

This kind of stuff always makes me wonder what's really going on.

I've always worried about holding GLD since there is always possibility of criminal activity, etc. and one's virtual gold virtually disappears.

Sleep well.

Personally I wouldnt read too much into it, Joe Sixpack piling in from watching too much CNBC. They're all panicking with this pending recession.

Inflation has likely peaked going into 2009. It is quite possible we deflate from here, with all commodites and I think we have already seen a 5 wave advance completed in gold.

Move on, is my view at this stage.

[rono]

Hi Roger,

Several things have been going on and it is VERY interesting and represents as bloody huge divergence. This disjoint is between the paper side of the precious metals market and the physical bullion side.

Ever since the price of gold and silver started dropping, the individual buyers have really stepped up to buy physical bullion - not paper, not pseudo paper, not stuff to store in a warehouse, but the REAL stuff to hold in your hand. Over the past several weeks as the price dropped, this trade picked up steadily. I've made 5 purchases in the past 10 days and the last few I had to wait in line - to buy.

Second was on the 14th when the Mint announced they were suspending all sales of 1 oz. gold eagles without much clarification. This of course spooked quite a few and created more demand. However, the reason was that they hadn't been able to get any 1 oz. gold planchets but were still selling fractional gold as in 1/2, 1/4 and 1/10 oz.

Next I rec'd an email from apmex that they were experiencing difficulties in the supply chain for bullion products and if I placed an order, to please be patient and that they'd fill it as soon as they were able.

Next came the banner on kitco stating the same thing.

My coin dealer is experiencing some supply issues with select products - gold eagles, silver eagles and kruggerands - but still have lots of odds and sods.

And still the huge issue is the divergence between demand for physical metal and the securities market version of bullion.

peace,

rono

IMPORTANT NEW NOTICE: Demand for bullion products has increased significantly in recent days. As a result, we may experience delays in supply and possibly delays in processing and shipping by our vaults. We apologize for this inconvenience and will do everything in our power to service your orders as quickly as possible. While cancellation fees still apply, prices are guaranteed regardless of the length of the delay. We remain committed to providing you the best service no matter what market conditions prevail.

Kitco currently has numerous physical gold, silver, and platinum coin and bar items in stock, available for immediate delivery. Please call for more information.




Is just me?

This kind of stuff always makes me wonder what's really going on.

I've always worried about holding GLD since there is always possibility of criminal activity, etc. and one's virtual gold virtually disappears.

Sleep well.

[Rogerdodger]

How to Make Convincing Fake-Gold Bars
Posted 03.14.2008
LINK
On Wednesday, the BBC reported that millions of dollars in gold at the central bank of Ethiopia has turned out to be fake: What were supposed to be bars of solid gold turned out to be nothing more than gold-plated steel. They tried to sell the stuff to South Africa and it was sent back when the South Africans noticed this little problem.

The problem with making good-quality fake gold is that gold is remarkably dense. It's almost twice the density of lead, and two-and-a-half times more dense than steel. You don't usually notice this because small gold rings and the like don't weigh enough to make it obvious, but if you've ever held a larger bar of gold, it's absolutely unmistakable: The stuff is very, very heavy.

The problem is, anyone who so much as picked up one of these bars should have known immediately that they were fake, no fancy test required. The weight alone is an instant dead giveaway. Even a forklift operator lifting a palette full of them should have noticed that his machine wasn't working hard enough. I think they must have been swapped out while in storage: Someone walked in each day with a new fake gold bar and walked out with a real one. If they were fake on arrival then everyone who handled them in any way must have either had no experience with gold or been in on the scam.
The first exception is depleted uranium, which is cheap if you're a government, but hard for individuals to get. It's also radioactive, which could be a bit of an issue. The second exception is a real winner: tungsten. Tungsten is vastly cheaper than gold (maybe $30 dollars a pound compared to $12,000 a pound for gold right now). And remarkably, it has exactly the same density as gold, to three decimal places. The main differences are that it's the wrong color, and that it's much, much harder than gold. (Very pure gold is quite soft, you can dent it with a fingernail.)

A top-of-the-line fake gold bar should match the color, surface hardness, density, chemical, and nuclear properties of gold perfectly. To do this, you could could start with a tungsten slug about 1/8-inch smaller in each dimension than the gold bar you want, then cast a 1/16-inch layer of real pure gold all around it.
Such a top-quality fake London good delivery bar would cost about $50,000 to produce because it's got a lot of real gold in it, but you'd still make a nice profit considering that a real one is worth closer to $400,000.

Edited by Rogerdodger, 25 August 2008 - 05:52 PM.

[dougie]

wondered why my doorstops were not working well in the recent windy days