Ron Paul is the only one I’ve seen in American politics that seems to have a clue.

A pox on both their houses, the Democrats and Republicans.. However, in this election if Ron Paul gets anywhere close to a nomination, I will certainly support him.” - in The Daily Crux

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-%E2%80%9C-sequel%E2%80%9D-how-2011-repeat-2008%E2%80%94only-bigger-longer-and-uncut-bailouts

011’s The Sequel is certainly going to deliver that bigger bang—because it’s a lot bigger than 2008: The total sovereign debt of the PIIGS is about €3.1 trillion. That’s 20% of the eurozone’s GDP—just the PIIGS, just those five, forget about France, Belgium and the UK, which if added up easily doubles that €3.1 trillion figure.
Compare that to 2008, when the total toxic assets the Federal Reserve wound up having to buy amounted to about $1.5 trillion—about 11.5% of the U.S.’s 2008 GDP.
Answer: Because it will allow us to see what will happen over the months of September and October, when the crisis breaks.

In 2008, the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers triggered the crash—but it was not the cause of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008: The structural weaknesses were already baked into the situation—the Lehman bankruptcy was just the shove the global financial system needed to fall off the proverbial cliff.
Today, we are waiting for the Lehman-like event. My personal guess is Dexia will be the first to go unde

n 2008, when all the stock markets were going south, and all the name-brand banks were teetering, where did everyone park their money? What was the safe haven?
Treasury bonds. In fact, the flight to safety was so massive that Treasuries reached negative yields, when you factored for inflation.

What’s the safe haven in Europe? Gold.

Hence in my estimation, gold will rocket on. I would not be surprised if gold crosses $2,000 an ounce when the Lehman-like event happens, and goes on quickly to $2,500 before the end of the year. On my scale of augury, this is head-and-shoulders above a Strong Hunch, just shy of a Fearless Prediction: $2,500 by the New Year’s. After that?

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/egon-von-greyerz-too-late-jump-goldwagon

only circa 1% of world financial assets are invested in gold.

he mess the world is in will lead to unprecedented money printing in the US, EU, the UK and many more regions. And gold will continue to reflect the destruction of paper money. In addition, investors will increasingly mistrust paper gold and invest in physical gold only

Adjusting gold for real (not the published, manipulated) inflation the price would be circa $7,500.

The following chart shows where gold would be if the US gold reserves were at the same percentage (52%) of us debt as in 1913 when the Fed was founded. Gold would then be $27,000 today and going up to $33,000 in 2015 with a projected increase in debt of $ 6.5 trillion (6.5T).

irca 96% of all gold trading is paper. For anyone who demands delivery, there will be no gold to deliver.

Gold has recently made new highs against most currencies. In addition, after longer consolidations, the Dow is breaking down against gold (down 85% in 12 years), and gold is breaking up against both Oil and the Swiss Francs.

The world is now staring into the abyss and we are most likely entering the Dark Years which I wrote about two years ago. The consequences will almost certainly be unlimited money printing and a hyperinflationary depression.

tions: Up until today, between the call liquidation and the straddle selling we would have said the market was poised for a quick sell-off or a slow move higher. Today’s risk reversal trading by dealers makes us lean toward the latter, and at a slightly faster pace. Our technical analysis below highlights levels to watch. Options just don’t show us washing out right now. Perhaps another two or three margin raises will do the trick. Conclusion: Mildly Bullish
Technical: Gold shrugged off the two-day engulfing pattern from Friday, settling up $15 on the day and trading higher through the close. For all intents and purposes gold remains in a range and is looking for a settlement below 1720 or above 1785 to initiate the next leg. Interestingly, bullion did not test breakout area we previously described, suggesting that there may be strong buying interest in the 1730 area (our other indicators support this assertion). If gold fails to break out of this range on the upside it should test 1720. A move through 1720 or 1685 should prompt moves to the 1685 and 1825 strikes respectively. Long-term this market remains bullish, but short-term we think there is more potential to the downside (especially if the CME is ready to hike margins again). Conclusion: Sideways to Bearish

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/complete-paulson-q2-holdings-summary-cuts-citi-20-bofa-52-adds-64-wells-fargo

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/third-points-june-30-holdings-update

When witnessing this latest vapor volume melt up, what can one say but victory for the bulls... Oh yes, ignore that the relentless rally is on 40% of the past 10 day average volume.

ou usually don't get three straight months of negative results unless you are in a recession

otrivit Organizaţiei pentru cooperare economică şi dezvoltare (OCED) francul este supraevaluat cu 41% faţă de euro, pe criteriul puterii de cumpărare.

Cei de la Auto Express au arătat că multe modele cunoscute de mașini au fost rulate mai mult de 50.000 de km pe an până ca ele să ajungă la un prag în care sunt mai economice decât cele pe benzină.

Astfel, o Skoda Octavia cu un motor diesel de 2 litri, ar trebui să fie rulată cel puțin 50.000 de km pe an, timp de 3 ani, ca să fie mai eficientă decât una cu un motor pe benzină. Prețul de achiziționare este cu 3.000 de lire mai mare.

De asemenea, un Fiat 500 ar trebui să fie rulat aproape 52.000 de km pe an.

Pieţele emergente nu mai pot fi privite ca nişte pete luminoase", spune economistul Nouriel Roubini.

Organizaţia pentru Cooperare şi Dezvoltare Economică (OCDE) a estimat săptămâna trecută că economia Greciei se va contracta anul acesta cu 3,5% şi va creşte cu 0,6% anul viitor, când datoria ţării va ajunge la nivelul record de 161% din PIB. De asemenea, instituţia estimează că rata şomajului în Grecia va ajunge în 2011 la 16% şi la 16,4% în 2012 iar rata inflaţiei va urca la 2,9% şi apoi va scădea la 0,7%.

OECD estimează că datoria Greciei va scădea la 100% din PIB în 2035, de la aproximativ 140% din PIB în 2010, dacă Grecia nu va reuşi să-şi îndeplinească obiectivele din programul de privatizare de 50 miliarde de euro. Dacă acest program va avea succes, OCDE prognozează că datoria Greciei va scădea la 60% din PIB în 2035, plafonul fixat de UE

IB-ul ajustat sezonier, a urcat cu 0,1% faţă de primul trimestru, când a urcat cu 1,3%, arată datele Biroului Federal de Statistică din Germania
Economiştii intervievaţi de Bloomberg se aşteptau ca creşterea economică să fie mai puternică, de 0,5%.
Faţă de aceeaşi perioadă a anului anterior, creşterea economică a fost de 2,8%.

n Romania, peste 200 de oameni au un coeficient de inteligenta de peste 132, nivel ce depaseste valoarea medie cuprinsa intre 90 si 110. Mai concret, 238 de romani. Ei sunt membrii unei societati fondate la Oxford (Regatul Unit) in `46, cu scopul de a gasi si reuni cei mai inteligenti oameni din lume, pentru a-i determina sa gaseasca solutiile problemelor esentiale cu care se confrunta omenirea.

La ora actuala, Mensa are in jur de 110.000 membri in peste 100 de tari, din care mai mult de 50.000 in Statele Unite si aproximativ 26.000 in Marea Britanie. Comparativ cu tarile vecine, precum Serbia, Ungaria si Bulgaria, numarul inteligentilor din Romania este mic.

Economia Japoniei s-a contractat mai puţin decât estimau economiştii în trimestrul doi, în principal mulţumită lucrărilor de reconstrucţie de după cutremur şi tsunami.
PIB-ul s-a contractat la o rată anuală de 1,3% în cele trei luni încheiate la 30 iunie, acesta fiind al treilea trimestru consecutiv de scădere. Economiştii intervievaţi de Bloomberg estimau un declin al economiei de 2,5%.

Programul de relaxare cantitativă, prin care Banca Angliei aruncă pe piaţă miliarde de lire sterline, ar putea fi unul din multele cauze care au contribuit la accentuarea inegalităţilor dintre veniturile britanicilor şi, prin urmare, la revoltele care au zguduit Lond   

Karl Marx said it right. At some point capitalism can self-destruct itself because you cannot keep on shifting income from labor to capital without having excess capacity and a lack of aggregate demand,” Roubini said. “That’s what’s happening. We thought the markets work. They’re not working.”

“We’re not there yet but I think there is a risk that this is the second leg of what happened during the Great Depression,

This whipsaw trading is not typical of a bull market," Mary Ann Bartels, technical research analyst at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, wrote in a note. "The last time in history we saw these volatile movements were in 2008, 1987 and in the 1930's-early 1940's...The risks are increasing for a recession

For a trader like Detrick the opportunities are in small-cap stocks as well as gold and silver

The German government has said on numerous occasions that it does not believe euro bonds make sense and that'

Last week, the U.S. Department of Energy lowered its forecast for U.S. oil demand from growth to decline in 2011. It also cut its forecasts for growth in global oil demand, as did the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and the International Energy Agency.

"We see U.S. oil demand falling this year and, later, settling into steady declines after 2015," said Rick Mueller of Boston-based consultant Energy Security Analysis Inc.

imp demand in the United States and Western Europe won't fully offset growth in developing countries like China and India, whose appetite for crude nearly guarantees world demand will keep climbing.

"Demand is reaching a plateau, and is then likely to fall slowly,

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/15/made-in-china-but-still-profiting-americans/#

The study, from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Fransisco, estimates that of every dollar consumers spend on a product labeled “Made in China,” about 45 cents goes to China for the cost of the original import.

CATHERINE RAMPELL

Dollars to doughnuts.

On the other hand, about 55 cents of that dollar pays for services produced in the United States, such as the transportation for the product, rent for the store where the product is sold, the salaries of the salespeople at the store, the cost of marketing the product, the profits for shareholders of the retailer selling the product and so on.

The authors found that about 13.9 percent of all United States consumer spending goes to imports, including both final and intermediate goods. Chinese imports alone — including both final goods and intermediate goods from China — accounts for just 1.9 percent of total consumer spending.

http://www.gizmag.com/swarmanoid-swarming-robots-steal-book/19531/

This is not the time to be in risky assets ...commodities are going to collapse if there is a recession like other risky assets ,Gold is a hedge against tail risks and a financial meltdown, If you get to that point of paranoia, it’s time to buy canned food, guns, ammunition, gold bars and a log cabin in the mountains,” Nouriel Roubini recommends cash over gold an other commodities ....

Roubini – cash

If Microsoft wants to buy a company that makes devices that run its operating system, the obvious first choice would be Nokia

Nokia also has the best patent portfolio in the industry

U.S. homebuilder sentiment remained stuck near historic lows in August.

Buffett, chairman of the conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway, said his federal tax bill last year was $6,938,744, the equivalent of 64 shares of Berkshire Class A stock.
"That sounds like a lot of money. But what I paid was only 17.4 percent of my taxable income -- and that's actually a lower percentage than was paid by any of the other 20 people in our office. Their tax burdens ranged from 33 percent to 41 percent and averaged 36 percent

But 2011 tells a different story for this vital sector. Although the S&P 500 has put up a respectable 6.7 percent gain this year, the MSCI World Health Care Index has returned 12.7 percent and the Nasdaq Biotech Index has advanced by 16.6 percent. But health care and biotech are notoriously difficult industries to assess

hrough March 2010, health care shares worldwide underperformed the market

bout 80 percent of Americans currently have health care coverage, and the bill will add an estimated 30 million Americans, which will bring the coverage to about 90 percent.

The S&P 500 gained roughly 15 percent last year, while the health care sector gained about 1 percent

DNA sequencing has become easy and inexpensive and will revolutionize our lives over the next decade. The price will drop to about $1,000 in a few years, and it will change the world.

Either way, recent indicators point to a third-quarter slowdown. German business confidence hit its lowest level in nine months in July, according to the respected Ifo research institute, while the ZEW index of current conditions for investors slipped to its lowest level in two-and-a-half years.
Ken Wattret, chief euro-zone economist at BNP Paribas in London, said Germany's exports are likely to weaken "significantly" in the second half amid deteriorating business confidence in the euro-zone and U.S.
"Leading indicators for the German economy, such as ZEW and Ifo, should weaken considerably by September due to troubles in financial markets and the euro-zone," Mr. Schulz said.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904006104576501143919533866.html?mod=rss_economy

country's state pension fund had started heavily buying shares. That perception reversed a sharp fall in the Shanghai stock market and

ant. A stronger yuan is in China's own interests, since it helps to curb domestic inflation—the government's overriding priority—but it also helps the rest of the world by encouraging imports and choking off exports.

The research house said this suggests that Beijing wants, among other things, to "make friends and influence people.

Shanghai stocks rallied after a Chinese newspaper, the Economic Observer, reported that the National Social Security Fund bought at least 10 billion yuan ($1.56 billion) in domestic shares since Tuesday.

Analysts say the central bank is now willing to let the yuan appreciate at a slightly faster pace to hold down prices of imported goods

China's fears over inflation have increased as a result of the U.S. Federal Reserve's announcement that it intends to keep ultra-low interest rates in place until mid -2013

short-term speculative funds—flowing into China and other emerging markets in the quest for better returns.

Food prices are skyrocketing all across the globe, and there’s no end in sight. The United Nations says food inflation is currently at 30% a year

A fund controlled by George Soros, the billionaire hedge-fund manager, owns 23.4 percent of South American farmland venture Adecoagro SA.”

Jim Rogers is also quoted in the same story, saying, “I have frequently told people that one of the best investments in the world will be farmland.”

Prediction #1) Food supplies will become more scarce.
Prediction #2) Food prices will double over the next 2-3 years, and then probably double again in another 2-3 years.
Prediction #3) When food prices are 400% of today’s levels, backyard farming or gardening pays off big in terms of real dollar savings.

ut you CAN grow something more valuable than gold and money: Food!

ROUBINI:

http://www.economonitor.com/nouriel/2011/08/15/is-capitalism-doomed/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=is-capitalism-doomed

The massive volatility and sharp equity-price correction now hitting global financial markets signal that most advanced economies are on the brink of a double-dip recession. A financial and economic crisis caused by too much private-sector debt and leverage led to a massive re-leveraging of the public sector in order to prevent Great Depression 2.0. But the subsequent

recovery has been anemic and sub-par in most advanced economies given painful deleveraging.

Now a combination of high oil and commodity prices, turmoil in the Middle East, Japan’s earthquake and tsunami, eurozone debt crises, and America’s fiscal problems (and now its rating downgrade) have led to a massive increase in risk aversion. Economically, the United States, the eurozone, the United Kingdom, and Japan are all idling. Even fast-growing emerging markets (China, emerging Asia, and Latin America), and export-oriented economies that rely on these markets (Germany and resource-rich Australia), are experiencing sharp slowdowns.

st governments, especially in Europe, are so distressed that bailouts are unaffordable;

he US Federal Reserve will likely start a third round of quantitative easing (QE3), but it will be too little too late. Last year’s $600 billion QE2 and $1 trillion in tax cuts and transfers delivered growth of barely 3% for one quarter. Then growth slumped to below 1% in the first half of 2011. QE3 will be much smaller, and will do much less to reflate asset prices and restore growth

urrency depreciation is not a feasible option for all advanced economies: they all need a weaker currency and better trade balance to restore growth, but they all cannot have it at the same time. So relying on exchange rates to influence trade balances is a zero-sum game. Currency wars are thus on the horizon, with Japan and Switzerland engaging in early battles to weaken their exchange rates. Others will soon follow.

Gold is good for hyperinflation, but don't worry. Paranoia à guns, gold physic.

CASH: usd,

Not Euro

While traditionally, silver tends to follow market surges in gold

JP Morgan has also been caught red handed initiating coordinated naked short selling of silver equities as a way to fool average investors into believing that demand for the metal is falling.

The COMEX is not a free market by any means of the term. It is in fact a highly micromanaged exchange owned and operated by an organization called the CME Group based out of Chicago.

In May of this year, as silver edged towards $50 an ounce, CME hiked margins four times! Three times in the span of only seven days! Investors scrambled to unload their ETF’s, which they could no longer afford to collateralize, and silver’s price plummeted to around $30 an ounce.

As of this summer China now has its own Comex, called the Hong Kong Mercantile Exchange. T

he HKMEX moved into action only five months after the Chinese Pan American Gold Exchange was instituted. The exchange issues its own ETF’s in gold and silver. These securities, though, are not based on leverage or derivatives like most Comex based ETFs. The bottom line; the Comex global monopoly on commodities trade is over:

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2011-01/13/content_11846539.htm

http://af.reuters.com/article/metalsNews/idAFL3E7II0W920110718

orld investment in silver rose by an impressive 40% in 2010 and industrial use increased by 12%, while global supply from mining production only increased by 5%.

Gold’s price will soon become unreachable for common people, but silver will be there to fill the void.

As a result, we revise our 12-month gold target to $2000/oz." Basically everything that Zero Hedge has been saying for about two and a half years now. Naturally, this coming from Bank of America, should set of contrarian call alarm bells everywhere. Regardless, here is BofA's Michael Widmer explaining his call, as well as the full upgrade report from BAC, which lately has far, far greater problems than getting its commodities call right or wrong.

The most dramatic example of this is a drug called Gleevec, sold by Novartis (NYSE: NVS). Gleevec treats BCR-ABL leukemia, which is caused by a disorder of the BCR-ABL gene. Gleevec is one of the first drugs that specifically targets a genetic fault. It’s turned this type of leukemia into a controllable, chronic disorder rather than a rapidly fatal disease. DNA sequencing will do the same for other cancers and disorders.

Sequencing can tell you what disorders you’re most likely to suffer from, and even provide an expected timeframe for y our death. I had my DNA partially sequenced for $500, and the results suggest that I will die in my 90s from a heart attack. I’ve since modified my behavior by taking baby aspirin and Lipitor to reduce my cholesterol.

Illumina (NasdaqGS: ILMN) is the world’s most efficient gene sequencing firm and boasts the biggest market share. The technology is changing rapidly, and Illumnia faces some risk from competition, but the stock was the biggest contributor to our increase in net asset value last year.

Illumina DNA sequencer and was developed by one of our holdings Sequenom (NasdaqGM: SQNM).

We own Aetna (NYSE: AET), Humana (NYSE: HUM), UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) and WellPoint. About 10 percent of our portfolio is devoted to health insurers and we’re sitting on a year-to-date gain of about 40 percent.

Grow It Yourself: Save Money, Help Earth, and Improve Your Quality of Life
http://www.naturalnews.com/025699_f…

Green gardening secrets: How to eliminate bugs and pests without using poison
http://www.naturalnews.com/032276_g…

Food Forests – Design modern solutions from ancient traditions
http://www.naturalnews.com/033002_f…

How to grow your own pharmaceuticals (plant-based medicines)
http://www.naturalnews.com/009458_p…

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/bank-america-gold-upgraded-aaaa-12-month-price-target-2000

We raise gold target to $2000 on increased chance of QE

Looking ahead, the deterioration in credit quality in Europe andthe US coupled with an increased probability of QE3 means these pressures willcontinue. As a result, we revise our 12-month gold target to $2000

we still believe Brentshould average $102/bbl in 4Q11, and briefly touch $95/bb

Still, in a recessionscenario (a 1-in-3 chance according to our economists), Brent could break below$80/bbl, only to gain back that level when OPEC turns the taps off