Hi Cockerel:

We seem to have been reading about things like the "Golden Cross" and market manipulation by the banks for years now. I think the average poor retail investor is waiting for, as you put it, TPTB to interpret some of this to mean that manipulation is ending and the gold and silver prices are going to achieve the heights that are always bandied about - for gold $1,400, $2,500, $5,000 or whatever. In our case we would all like to see AUM management announce that they are confident that the artificial manipulation of prices has ended and that this has encouraged them to reopen the mine, rehire their workers and start making money again. Anything less than that won't do us much good financially.

Lots of stuff in the paper this morning about banker suicides, all blaming the problem on the high mental stresses caused by the industry's aggressive, hard-working culture. Apparently Wikipedia has its own "banker suicides" page which quotes an unnamed source lamenting, "I tell people I'm a consultant, a lawyer, whatever - anything but a Wall Street guy." Interesting times indeed.