For weekend reading, a couple of short snippets on falling silver supplies and corporate earnings.

Regards - VHF

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BEST OF JIM COOK

October 22, 2008

Mind Boggling Data from Ted Butler

Zinc prices are currently at half the cost of production. Zinc mines are closing left and right. They produce more silver as a byproduct than any other type of mining. Estimates run to 160 million ounces a year. Annual mining production is 670 million ounces.

Most zinc concentrate is shipped to China for smelting and refining. They have lax environmental standards. China reports widespread closing of zinc refineries. Suddenly a massive amount of silver won’t be coming to market. That’s on top of runaway investment demand.

Ted Butler thinks the current anemic growth in the silver ETF and other above ground indicators means we are out of silver now. At current silver prices virtually every silver producer must shut down or go broke. You couldn’t have a more bullish scenario. This could be the single greatest buy point in the history of the market. Nobody understands silver like Ted Butler when he’s this bullish you should be too.

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TSG

October 25, 2008

Earnings fall out of bed again in Q3…

In the third week of Q3-08 reporting season with a total of 1056 companies having reported (up from 569 last week), average earnings collapsed to -39% (down from -23% last week and -13% two weeks ago) versus Q3-07. This compares to a year-over-year 36% drop in Q2-08 earnings, a 30% decline for Q1-08, a fall of 57% for Q4-07, a 21% drop for Q3-07 and a 13% jump for Q2-07. Q3-08 also marks the fifth quarter that earnings have deteriorated as the season matured.