Intersting point of view from Jeff Nielson on seeking Alpha today.

First of all, bullion-ETFs soak-up billions of investor-dollars each year, which would otherwise be invested in real bullion, or in the shares of precious metals miners. Naturally, this has helped to depress the price of silver, and severely depress the price of silver miners – since almost all of the diverted investor-dollars were diverted from the miners, and not bullion, itself. I also showed how these fraudulent investment vehicles have been used to artificially inflate the supposed inventory-levels of silver stockpiles.

Specifically, at a time when actual silver inventories are at their lowest level in centuries, the (supposed) amount of “bullion” these funds claim to hold has singlehandedly resulted in “official” inventory levels tripling in just three years – after plunging by 90%.

Today's market price is based upon these phony “inventories” despite the fact that the bullion-banks who claim to hold all this silver are never subjected to audits, to determine that they are not only holding enough silver to cover their custodial agreements with the “bullion-ETFs" - but are also holding sufficient silver to cover the MUCH larger “short” positions of these Manipulators (see “Silver Manipulation the worst in history – Ted Butler”).

Unless and until there is such a full and complete audit, the only rational assumption for investors is this supposed “tripling”of inventories is totally illusory, which also means that the “bullion” that is claimed to be held by these bullion-ETFs is also illusory.

As I have also mentioned before, it is elementary economics than any “good” which is undervalued will be over-consumed (relative to its current price). Thus, we have TWO extremely important dynamics which are setting up this sector for a final “implosion” of the criminal conspiracy by the anti-precious metals cabal.

First, price-suppression means the (actual) tiny inventories of silver are still declining not increasing. It is simply absurd to claim that with record, investment demand and declining mine production (due to the dramatic cuts in base metals production) that inventories are increasing. The under-pricing of silver simply confirms this trend.

Secondly, with real inventories only 1/3rd of what is claimed by the Manipulators, continuing to under-price silver (through continued manipulation) must result in a supply “squeeze” which inevitably causes the price to “spike” (and begin to correct toward some sort of medium-term equilibrium). Given that there has been no similar depletion of gold stockpiles (merely the transfer of ownership), it is far more likely that the final defeat of the anti-gold cabal will be accomplished via a default in silver markets.

The BIG question in the minds of all precious metals “bulls” is when and how will this final victory occur?

Many commentators have pointed to the rigged Comex markets in New York as the place where the final destruction of the Manipulators will occur. However, with the short positions of the bullion-banks, and their (supposed) “custodial agreements” with the bullion-ETFs being “two sides of the same coin”, then implosion could originate in either component of this fraudulent manipulation.

A bullion-default at the Comex (or “Crimex”, as some like to call it) is a very simple scenario. The Comex is essentially selling its phony, “paper” futures for less than any other bullion market. Thus, at some point, large buyers will simply step into this market and continue relentless, heavy buying until default occurs.

Specifically, there would be a “failure to deliver” of bullion to a buyer (or buyers) - who chose to hold their futures contract until expiry, and thus take “physical” delivery of real bullion. As has been reported by several commentators, apparently such a default nearly occurred just weeks ago (see “Did ECB save Deutsche Bank from Comex gold-default?”).

There has been a great deal of frustration among the “gold bugs” (in particular) that such a final “show-down” has not already taken place. However, perhaps we would all be more patient in this respect if we were to try to put ourselves in the position of such big “players”.

Looking at silver, based on fundamentals, it is totally obvious that silver is headed for a spectacular explosion in its price. At a time of record demand for gold and silver, there are lower inventories of silver (relative to gold and in absolute terms) than at any time in centuries. Simultaneously, the gold/silver price ratio is more unfavorable for silver than at nearly any time in history, currently over 60:1. The long-term price ratio (over thousands of years) is 15:1. Additionally, as “elements” in the Earth's crust, silver is only 17 times as plentiful as gold. Thus, a 60:1 ratio is not remotely sustainable, even over the medium term.

Therefore, armed with the knowledge that investing in silver will yield a huge windfall for all long-term investors, do you (as a large “player” in the silver market) force the inevitable implosion now (and “kill” the proverbial “goose that lays the silver eggs”) - or, do you patiently use the Manipulators game against them: buying as much grossly undervalued silver as you can from these criminals, before their inevitable self-destruction?

From this perspective, it is suddenly much less automatic that the demise of the Manipulators will occur at the Crimex.

I would remind people about an event which went practically unreported last year in North America: at the time of AIG's near-bankruptcy, the European bullion-ETFs “guaranteed” by AIG briefly plunged in value – to a price MUCH lower than the nominal price of the bullion they (supposedly) held. The reason? Investors were “betting” in a clearly visible manner that if AIG was forced into bankruptcy it would not be able to honour its “custodian agreements” with these bullion-ETFs – leaving the investors in these funds holding paper and not bullion.

Thus, the outrageously expensive bail-out of AIG (over $180 BILLION, and counting) was not undertaken solely in order to secretly funnel roughly $10 billion into the vaults of Goldman Sachs. It was also bailed-out to prevent a domino-like chain of events. All it will take is for one “bullion-ETF” to default, and then the entire scheme/scam of the Manipulators would inevitably collapse.

The sequence of events is obvious: after seeing one group of bullion-ETF investors wiped-out (or nearly so) by fraud, then obviously the unit-holders for all (so-called) bullion-ETFs would demand thorough and honest audits of the bullion-banks who are essentially running these scams.

Even if the bullion-banks could scrounge-up enough bullion to cover their “custodial agreements”, there would be little if anything left over to “cover” their much larger “short” positions. With “blood in the water”, futures-buyers would obviously immediately start lining up for “delivery” at the Crimex – hoping to be the last buyer to grab some real bullion before the Manipulators were completely wiped out.

Thus, there appear to be three very plausible scenarios leading to the destruction of the Manipulators, and the explosion of the price of gold and silver.

1. The frequently-predicted default at the Comex;

2. The bankruptcy of one (or more) of the bullion-banks; or

3. A default of one or more bullion-ETFs through a thorough audit being performed.

Given what the U.S. government has already shown it was willing to spend to “defend” AIG's custodial agreements with bullion-ETFs, the second scenario would appear to have the least probability of occurring. However, there is still somewhere close to a quadrillion dollars of derivatives floating around in Wall Street's private “casino”. Any surprise-implosion of a position in this market could create such unimaginable losses (hundreds of times higher than those of AIG) that a bail-out would simply be impossible to ram-through the corrupt, U.S. government – without literally setting off a second “American Revolution”.

Personally, I see the default of the bullion-ETFs to be slightly more likely than any other scenario for destroying the Manipulators. As with any scam, the larger it grows, the greater the likelihood of exposure. When bullion-ETFs were first created, their claim that they could buy infinite amounts of bullion, with zero “premiums” and store all this bullion for zero storage costs attracted little attention.

With the holdings of these bullion-ETFs rapidly approaching the total annual production of precious metals miners, and already being larger than the national stockpiles of almost every nation on Earth, this obviously-suspect “business model” will attract increasing doubt and skepticism among informed investors – until even blind/deaf/dumb “regulators” are forced to conduct a reputable audit of this sector.

For those hoping to read precisely when and where the Manipulators will meet their final defeat, I suppose you will be disappointed. Sorry, but I'm an “economist” - not a “psychic”. However, hopefully readers will derive some use out of this commentary.

First, because of depleted inventories, it is much more likely that it will be a silver default which “kills” the Manipulators, instead of a gold default. Secondly, as precious metals investors wait for this inevitable occurrence, you are reminded that there are three potential developments to watch for – and not just a “failure to deliver” at the Comex.

In the meantime, any/every investor who continues to add to his (or her) precious metals positions (preferably during short-term dips) is guaranteed to be richly rewarded. Given the extremely uncertain times in which we live, the reward of financial security is “precious”, indeed.

Disclosure: I hold no position in bullion-ETFs