Below is an excerpt from chuck butler's daily email (Pres. of Evergreen Bank) regarding the short positions that I thought you folks might find of interest. Could be driving prices down?

"It's a busy week this week... options expiry, first day notice for delivery into the February gold contract, $166 billion treasury auction, State of the Union Address, Little Timmy Geithner goes to Washington to answer questions regarding AIG... and I'm sure I've forgotten something. Anyway, unless some earth-shattering event occurs, I'm sure that the U.S. bullion banks have already received their marching orders... and will keep both gold and silver in check [or worse] for at least the rest of this week.

As I mentioned earlier on in this commentary, I'm still worried about the huge short positions in the precious metals... especially those held by JPMorgan and HSBC USA Ltd. These two U.S. banks hold the bulk of the Comex gold and silver short positions on the Comex... and [according to the OCC] about 95% of all precious metals derivatives held by all U.S. banks. How much more, if any, short covering is there still to go? Earlier this month I referred to it as "the sword of Damocles"... and it, dear reader, is still hanging over our collective heads."