SLV ETF Adds More Silver: 2,929,386 Ounces on Thursday

The gold price wandered around either side of unchanged for most of Far East trading on Thursday, before finally catching a bit of a bid shortly after 2:00 p.m. Hong Kong time. By the time that New York opened at 8:20 a.m. Eastern yesterday morning...gold was up about six whole dollars...and that was also its high of the day at $1,416.90 spot.

From the Comex open, gold struggled right up until the end of Comex trading at 1:30 p.m...and then the roof caved in as the New York bullion banks pulled their bids. In the thin volume of electronic trading, this had its usual devastating effect...and the gold price cratered over twenty bucks.

Gold's low tick [$1,391.40 spot] was around 3:15 p.m...but managed to recover back over the $1,400 mark before the 5:15 p.m. New York close.

Silver hit its high of the day [around $33.80 spot] moments before the London open...and opened unchanged in New York. From there, silver slowly drifted lower before getting the living snot kicked out of it in electronic trading after the Comex close.

It should come as no surprise that silver hit its nadir [$31.72 spot] at precisely the same time as gold...around 3:15 p.m. Eastern. From it's early morning high around 8:00 a.m. in London, to its absolute low in electronic trading in New York...silver got smacked for a hair over two bucks...although it did manage to recover a good chunk of those losses before the close of trading.

As Ted Butler pointed out to me yesterday, the price drops in electronic trading involved very little volume...but it was as blatant a criminal act as you'll ever witness in any commodity market.

It's obvious to both Ted and myself that JPMorgan et al [along with the CME] have been given a get-out-of-jail-free card by CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler...and will be allowed to wiggle out of their short positions without ending up in the slammer, no matter how much harm they do along the way.

When all was said and done yesterday, gold was down 0.68%, platinum down 0.06%, palladium down 0.51%...and silver was down 4.26%. Any questions?

The dollar continued to slide lower, with some price volatility during early London trading...and closed down just under 30 basis points at the end of the New York day.

For reason's I still can't figure out, the gold shares were down right from the New York open yesterday...and continued to decline all day long despite the fact that the gold price was in positive territory until 1:30 p.m. Eastern. The HUI closed virtually on its low of the day...down 2.92%.

Even though the gold price got creamed for over $20 in a two hour period...that fact doesn't stand out on the HUI chart unless you know where to look...and there's no sign of the fact that gold recovered ten bucks after its 3:30 p.m. low.

The silver stocks got smoked across the board. It was wall-to-wall ugly yesterday...and it's on counterintuitive share price action days like yesterday when I wonder if someone isn't dicking with the share prices.

But, as I've said before, maybe I'm looking for black bears in dark rooms that aren't there.

The CME's Daily Delivery Notice showed that 61 gold along with 10 silver contracts were posted for delivery on Monday. All the usual suspects were in attendance...and the link to that action is here.

The GLD ETF had another down day yesterday...this time shedding 214,613 ounces. The SLV ETF went the other way...adding another big chunk of silver. This time it was 2,929,386 troy ounces. In the last two days the SLV ETF has added 10.4 million ounces...which is a bit over five days of world silver production. That, dear reader, is a lot!

Over at Switzerland's Zürcher Kantonalbank last week, they reported adding 9,613 ounces of gold and 392,675 ounces of silver to their respective ETFs. I thank Ted Butler for those numbers.

The U.S. Mint had a smallish sales report yesterday...as they reported selling another 25,000 silver eagles. Month-to-date the mint has sold 83,500 ounces of gold eagles, along with 2,663,500 silver eagles.

It was another slow day over at the Comex-approved depositories on Wednesday. They received no silver at all...and shipped out a smallish 34,655 ounces. We are only three business days away from the first silver being shipped out the door for the March contract...and not a single shipment of any size has been received at the Comex to meet this delivery demand. There's still time, of course, but it's getting pretty close to the wire.

¤ Critical Reads

Adjusted Monetary Base Goes Vertical

Today's first story is courtesy of reader Mike Molleur...and is to be found posted over at zerohedge.com. The increase of $142 billion in the last two weeks is the fifth largest Adjusted Monetary Base expansion in history. The ongoing upward movement of this chart may result in some further acuteness of inflationary expectations. The story is one paragraph long...and the chart is worth the trip all by itself. Click here.

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Procter & Gamble to Raise Prices as Costs Increase

Talking about 'inflationary expectations'...reader Phil Barlett has the next read of the day. It's a Reuters piece that turned up in yesterday's edition of The New York Times. Proctor & Gamblewill raise some prices as it absorbs higher commodity costs and its sales goal may be under pressure if business does not improve in the United States and other developed markets, Chief Financial Officer Jon Moeller said. I didn't hear any signs of economic recovery in that comment, did you? Linked here.

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Airfares Are Chasing Oil Prices Higher

This story is one that I shamelessly stole from yesterday's King Report...and it's from the Wednesday edition of The New York Times. Airline passengers should prepare themselves for sticker shock this year. As the carriers have tried to keep up with rapidly rising oil prices, they have already increased their fares four times since the start of the year, compared with only three increases for all of 2010. The airlines have also raised some of their fees, imposed summer peak-time surcharges and added hefty fuel surcharges on international flights. Link here.

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Thousands protest against high food prices in Delhi

Reader 'David in California' sent me this posting from over at bbc.co.uk yesterday. Thousands of people have gathered in the Indian capital, Delhi, to take part in a rally to protest against rising food prices and unemployment. A steady stream of protesters, carrying red flags, has been marching through the streets of central Delhi since early morning...and has led to massive traffic jams in the city. As long as world's central banks keep printing money, the higher all commodity prices are going to rise. It's Economics 101. Link here.

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New Home Sales Plummet 13% To 284,000 Annualized Rate, 19K Actual Homes Sold Lowest Monthly Ever

Washington state reader S.A. is up to the plate with our next story of the day. This is another zerohedge.com piece that shows just how bad the real estate market is in the U.S...and that's not about to change for a very long time. It's one paragraph of prose...along with two charts...and it's worth the trip. Linked here.

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President of Iceland veto of Icesave repayments bill sparks outrage

What would this column be like without at least offering from reader Roy Stephens. This AFP story was posted late last night over at the france24.com website. President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson's decision to veto a new bill on Icesave that had passed parliament with a large majority has sent shockwaves through Iceland, where many thought the painful issue was finally coming to a close.

Icelandic negotiators have been struggling for more than two years to reach an acceptable deal on how to repay Britain and the Netherlands for the 3.9 billion euros ($5.3 billion) they spent compensating around 340,000 of their citizens hit by the collapse of online bank Icesave in October 2008 at the height of the financial crisis.

I know exactly how the approximately 350,000 good citizens of Iceland are going to deal with this. They're going to vote it down...which exactly what they should do. This is well worth the read...and the link is here.

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Hundreds of repossessed homes and idle cranes go for auction in Ireland

Reader U.D. has this story from Ireland that's posted over at the irishcentral.com website. Apartments that until a few years ago sold for $205,000 in the Celtic Tiger economy are now on the market at discounts as low as $34,167 during Ireland's first ever mass auction of repossessed homes. Even the upscale Dublin 4 district is offering apartments formerly on sale for $1,230,030 for a previously unheard of reserve price closer to $300,674. The auction is on April 15th. Linked here.

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Rage against the Political Machine: Election Will Herald a New Era in Ireland

While we're on the subject of Ireland...here's another Roy Stephens offering about that country...this one from the German website spiegel.de. When the Irish vote in the country's general election on Friday, they will be keen to punish those politicians they see as responsible for the country's sorry state. But the hands of the next government will be tied by the European Union, whose multi-billion bailout gives it power over the nation's fate.

Ireland's 5 million people are deeply ashamed of the fact that, 90 years after the republic's independence, the country is once again under foreign control, this time in the form of the experts from the European Union and International Monetary Fund who have been overseeing Dublin's economic and financial policies since November.

These are incredible times in both Ireland...and Iceland. This story is also worth your time...and is linked here.

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The Precarious Rebellion: Eastern Libya's Taste of Freedom Tainted by Fear

Roy Stephens has our one story about Libya today...and it's posted over at spiegel.de. Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi has lost control over eastern parts of the country, where rebel militias are now in charge. While the people celebrate their newfound freedom, though, they worry that the teetering regime might strike back with new savagery...and foreign nationals are scrambling to leave Libya as fears of a civil war grow. Link here.

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Earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand

Here are two items that I lifted from The New Zealand Herald website yesterday that shows the immediate aftermath of the 6.3 quake they had earlier this week. The video, linked here, was taken within an hour of the quake...with most of it being shot in the downtown area. The 25 photos posted at this link were probably taken in the days following. A lot of the photos show the devastation from liquifaction...a very serious problem in the Canterbury Plains area. Both these links are must views...and I found portions of the video very disturbing to watch.

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Rick Rule - Much Higher Gold Prices Because of Move in Oil

My first gold-related story today is this blog over at King World News. Rick Rule of Global Resources says that disruption in the oil market...and the resulting higher prices will prompt more "quantitative easing" and probably much higher gold prices as well. Link here.

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Royal Canadian Mint Now Saying It's Difficult to Secure Silver

Here's a GATA release of a King World News blog where Eric King interviews Dave Madge, the director of sales at the Royal Canadian Mint about tightness in the silver market. It's a must read...as is Chris Powell's preamble...and the link is here.

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Ted Butler: Speak up and be heard by the CFTC one more time

Lastly today is another GATA release. Ted urges silver investors and believers in free markets to make one more appeal to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission in support of effective position limits in the silver futures market. I respectfully request that you take the time to make your voice heard one last time. Every voice will help...and that means you! The link to this must read essay is here.

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Gold volume yesterday was pretty decent...but it was very light in silver, once all the roll-overs were subtracted. The preliminary open interest numbers showed that there will be an increase in gold's open interest in the CME's final report this morning, despite the fact that the price got creamed late in the trading day. Silver's preliminary open interest numbers indicates the exact opposite...a decent decline in o.i. I would also suspect that the open interest numbers associated with blatant take-down in both gold and silver prices in the after-hours market will not be included in this morning's final open interest numbers, because it occurred too late in the trading day, so we'll have to wait until Monday's CME report for that to show up.

Silver's open interest in March is now down to 19,544 contracts...a decline of 8,731 contracts...based on the Preliminary report from the CME in the wee hours of this morning. I wouldn't be at all surprised if that decline was much larger once the final numbers are posted later this morning.

Wednesday's final open interest changes were not as bad in gold as I had previously expected...as gold o.i. only rose 2,357 contracts. I was expecting two or three times that amount. In silver, the total open interest continues to crater, as total o.i. was down another 3,558 contracts.

Ted Butler isn't sure whether this is short covering or spread trades being lifted. Since these are Wednesday's final numbers, they won't be in today's Commitment of Traders Report...so we'll have to wait until the COT report on March 4th to find out.

For the second day running, the backwardation between March and May is not to be found, as the settle price yesterday for Comex silver futures showed that the March delivery month was selling at a 1.4 cent discount to the May delivery month. Every other month, except May 2011, is still in backwardation. And, as I mentioned yesterday, Ted feels that May will return to backwardation once the roll-overs out of the March contract are all done.

Gold and silver prices recovered nicely during the Far East trading day during their Friday morning...but Ted feels that this is probably the New York bullion banks covering sort positions on the Globex trading system, rather than any local trading in the Far East. Now that London is open, both metals are under pressure once again. Why am I not surprised?

And, with most of the silver stocks on sale after yesterday's pounding, there's still time [but not too much time, in my humble opinion] to either readjust your portfolio...or get fully invested in the continuing major up-leg of this bull market in both silver and gold...and I respectfully suggest that you take a trial subscription to either Casey Research's International Speculator [junior gold and silver exploration companies], or BIG GOLD [large producers], with all our best [and current] recommendations...as well as the archives. A subscription to the International Speculator also includes a free subscription to BIG GOLD as well. And don't forget that our 90-day guarantee of satisfaction is in effect for both publications.

With the last trading day before First Notice Day now upon us, it will be interesting to see what JPMorgan et al will dish up when trading begins in New York this morning. Judging by what's happening in London at 9:50 a.m. local time...4:50 a.m. Eastern, it could be another bad day for both metals...and we'll find out soon enough.

Have a good weekend...and I'll see you here on Saturday.