posted by Susan on P's blog

Ed Steer from Casey with this morning report on the HUGE short position in silver which he believes is what is holding down the price:

“The new Commitment of Traders report came out yesterday… and it was a shocker… as there was huge deterioration in both metals. In silver, for positions held at the close of trading on Tuesday, November 24th… the bullion banks [principally JPMorgan] added another knee-wobbling 6,064 contracts to their already grotesque short positions. That’s 10+% increase in one week! As of last Tuesday, the bullion banks were net short 64,445 contracts… and that, dear reader, works out to 322.2 million ounces of silver… close to 50% of world silver production. And it’s a monstrously concentrated net short position as well, because when you take out the market-neutral spreads, four or less bullion banks are short a whisker under 50% of the entire Comex silver market! And the ‘8 or less’ bullion banks are short well over 70% of the entire Comex silver market! You don’t need a master’s degree in common sense to figure out why the silver price has not broken out to new highs during this move.”