Silver still isn’t getting any traction, but it will, and the move will be spectacular. Our London Trader friend, who is a Café member, clued us in to the latest interview he did with Eric King today. It is another MUST read to fully understand the gold and silver markets…

London Trader - There are Tremendous Silver Shortages

King World News is receiving reports of significant waits for delivery of silver. Today King World News interviewed the "London Trader" to get his take on the situation. The source stated, "It is so tight, the silver market is so tight that we’ve been waiting three weeks plus, before this takedown, for deliveries of size to arrive. I’m talking about tonnage orders. This is also key, most of the silver being delivered was refined after the orders had been placed, and again, that was before the takedown. You can just imagine how long the wait times will be going forward."

"This game is getting so stretched that it’s going to break. You don’t think the Chinese know this stuff. If we get a close above the 200 day moving average in the mid 30’s on silver, watch silver immediately pop $2 or $3. Silver is totally incredible. There is nobody in COMEX silver contracts anymore, other than casino players. The only way they have been able to keep silver depressed is by borrowing silver from SLV to meet immediate demand. That’s the only reason silver isn’t trading $10 to $15 higher right now.

There isn’t enough silver for investors to buy (in large amounts) so they have been using SLV as a flywheel. SLV is over 20 million ounces short on the silver they are supposed to have in the vaults to back the shares which have been issued. The silver isn’t there. So there are people who purchased SLV to own physical silver, but all they have is shares that aren’t backed by the physical silver.

Part of managing the price of silver recently has been for the central banks to attack the gold market. But what is interesting is how this manipulation of the gold price was effected. Obviously, the bullion banks, which are working with the central banks, have inside knowledge as to the timing and just how much gold is going to be available to them.

So, in order for the bullion banks to maximize the effect of the physical gold they get from leasing, they add high scale paper leverage. They then short-sell just enough tranches of COMEX contracts to surgically take out three important support pivots....

"Each of those important support pivots that everyone is watching, like the 50 day moving average and so on, each one of those are taken out in the access market in the quiet trading, overnight, on three successive days. In other words, they take out these three important pivots, which turns the momentum buyers into sellers. It also gets a bunch of funds to start selling as well.

So using as little ammunition (physical gold) as possible, and in thinly traded markets, they take out these pivots. They smash the price, but leave just enough physical gold for going into the fixes because the smart buyers are saying, ‘I’ll take it at this price.’ So, as we go into the fix, they’ve provided just enough physical to satisfy as many of those buyers as they can. They then smash it right after the fix, again, with paper.

That’s what’s happened with gold and it’s the reason it has been manipulated down to these levels. It’s the only way they could do it, and it’s a sign of absolute desperation when central banks are willing to risk giving bullion banks gold they will never, ever receive back.

You don’t think the Chinese aren’t sitting here taking every single ounce of that leased gold? Of course they are. There were actually three enormous physical buy areas that they pierced, where, literally, there was tonnage ordered. I estimate well over 100 tons of physical gold was taken between the first pivot they broke, where these guys loaded up with discounted gold, and this stuff disappears from the West to the East.

These central banks had to be in desperation to allow this borrowed gold to be absorbed by foreign entities. They needed to raise dollars in a hurry and they are extremely afraid of gold going through the roof. I was very, very surprised they got as far as they did (driving gold lower). They had to use an awful lot of gold to do it."

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_Daily
Web/Entries/2011/12/21_London_Trader_-_There_are_Tremendous_Silver_Shortages.html

-END-

That says it all about what is coming down the pike for gold and silver. It certainly is pleasant to have that input in our back pockets as we weather the recent debacle in the precious metals sector.

The gold open interest fell 405 contracts to 423,465 and the silver open interest fell 889 contracts to 101,165.