Tag: news

Gold Flows East As Three Pieces Of Bacon Sell For €105 Million

Today’s AM fix was USD 1,281.75, EUR 953.99 and GBP 797.65 per ounce.
Yesterday’s AM fix was USD 1,266.00, EUR 951.25 and GBP 798.75 per ounce.

Gold rose $14.40 or 1.13% yesterday, closing at $1,294.07/oz. Silver hit a high $20.90 and closed the day with a gain of $0.25 closing at $20.81.

Click here for this month’s Insight ‘Talking Real Money: World Monetary Reform’

Yesterday, the World Gold Council released its Gold Demand Trends 2013 Report which demonstrates quite clearly that the Chinese continue to accumulate gold; gold continues to flow east to both government and consumer channels. The report also showed that central banks continue to accumulate and there is positive news that jewellery trade is up.

Key findings:

Continued consumer growth in China. 
Total consumer demand was 210t in Q3 2013, a rise of 18% compared to the same period last year.

Central banks continue to be strong buyers of gold, albeit at a slower rate.
Q3 2013 was the 11th consecutive quarter of net purchases of gold.

Jewellery consumption in South East Asia, outside China, was also strong.
Hong Kong was up 28%, Vietnam up 14%, Thailand up 57% and Indonesia up 19% on the same quarter last year albeit off low bases.

Government regulations in India are dampening demand figures.
India recorded a 32% decline in consumer demand compared to the same quarter last year. However year to date, demand remains robust, up 19% compared to the first three quarters of 2012, following the surge in demand sparked by two price falls earlier in 2013.

Francis Bacon’s ‘Three Studies of Lucian Freud’

In another vote of confidence in the world of art, a triptych by Francis Bacon, titled ‘Three Studies of Lucian Freud,’ sold for €105 million ($142 million), a world record price for a painting.

However, Felix Salmon at Reuters believes that there is a speculative play in place and there is a number of people selling big-ticket contemporary art works at auction who have only owned these pieces for a short time and this is a key indicator that there is flipping in the market.

Salmon opines that there is signs of a speculative bubble, one that has been going on for years, even through the darkest hours of the financial crisis but that this latest burst of record selling prices could be the tipping point.

The price was pushed up by €44 million ($60 million) more than the auction house had estimated it would sell for. Believe it or not, but the price was decided after just ten minutes of bidding. This price smashes the previous record set when ‘The Scream’ by Edvard Munch sold for €89 million ($120 million.)

The auction also set a record for the highest amount ever made at one auction with €687 million (€511 million) worth of paintings were sold and included artists such as Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock, Roy Lichtenstein and Mark Rothko.

Lucian Freud, who died in 2011, was also the subject of a second full-length Bacon triptych, painted in 1966. That work, however, is missing.

Whilst owning a Francis Bacon painting is out of the reach for most people, you can visit his studio where all these ‘expensive’ paintings were created. In keeping with the aura that surrounds Bacon’s life, his studio and its entire contents were moved from London to Dublin in 1998, and is on display in the Hugh Lane Galleryin Parnell Square, Dublin.

The Hugh Lane Gallery has its own amazing story in that Sir Hugh Percy Lane, its founder, died on board the RMS Lusitania in 1915 when she was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat.

No trip to Dublin is complete unless you visit this stunning exhibition; Bacon’s studio is a revelation and you can marvel at how three pieces of Bacon were sold for an incredible €105 million or 3.78 tons of gold at today’s price of €953/oz.

Click here for this month’s Insight ‘Talking Real Money: World Monetary Reform’

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via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/z_UxQVvNSYc/story01.htm GoldCore

Spanish FinMin "Concerned" As Public Debt Surges To New Record

Spain’s public debt climbed sharply in September to a new record high of 954.863 billion euros, casting doubt about the government’s ability to meet its target for the end of the year. Even finance minister Cristobal Montoro acknowledged that “there are concerns about the pace of the increase,” adding that this meant bringing down the public deficit even more of a priority. As El Pais reports, according to figures released Friday by the Bank of Spain, the state’s outstanding obligations climbed 10.181 billion euros in the month from August to a level equivalent to 93.4 percent of GDP. The government’s target for the full year is 94.2 percent, a figure that has already been revised upward. The central bank estimated GDP in the 12 months to September at 1.022 trillion euros.

 

But, apart from that, Spanish bond spreads near pre-crisis lows…

 

Yep – makes perfect sense…


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/ZRPM6b7U3i0/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Spanish FinMin “Concerned” As Public Debt Surges To New Record

Spain’s public debt climbed sharply in September to a new record high of 954.863 billion euros, casting doubt about the government’s ability to meet its target for the end of the year. Even finance minister Cristobal Montoro acknowledged that “there are concerns about the pace of the increase,” adding that this meant bringing down the public deficit even more of a priority. As El Pais reports, according to figures released Friday by the Bank of Spain, the state’s outstanding obligations climbed 10.181 billion euros in the month from August to a level equivalent to 93.4 percent of GDP. The government’s target for the full year is 94.2 percent, a figure that has already been revised upward. The central bank estimated GDP in the 12 months to September at 1.022 trillion euros.

 

But, apart from that, Spanish bond spreads near pre-crisis lows…

 

Yep – makes perfect sense…


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/ZRPM6b7U3i0/story01.htm Tyler Durden

WTF Chart Of The Day: The "It's Not Working" Edition

Despite Janet Yellen’s commitment to continue supporting the economic recovery the transmission system of government interventions is clearly broken. As STA Wealth Management’s Lance Roberts shows in the simple chart below, it has taken $35.17 of government intervention to generate $1 of economic growth over the past 5 years. More importantly, the rate of diminishing returns is increasing. In other words, it is taking consistently more dollars of intervention to create an incremental increase in economic growth.

 

 

In the meantime, as shown below, the continued liquidity programs from the Federal Reserve continue to boost asset markets towards more exuberant levels.

 

However, despite signs of a potential market “bubble” Janet Yellen clearly sees no such thing…


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/pmUU01Tr3gM/story01.htm Tyler Durden

WTF Chart Of The Day: The “It’s Not Working” Edition

Despite Janet Yellen’s commitment to continue supporting the economic recovery the transmission system of government interventions is clearly broken. As STA Wealth Management’s Lance Roberts shows in the simple chart below, it has taken $35.17 of government intervention to generate $1 of economic growth over the past 5 years. More importantly, the rate of diminishing returns is increasing. In other words, it is taking consistently more dollars of intervention to create an incremental increase in economic growth.

 

 

In the meantime, as shown below, the continued liquidity programs from the Federal Reserve continue to boost asset markets towards more exuberant levels.

 

However, despite signs of a potential market “bubble” Janet Yellen clearly sees no such thing…


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/pmUU01Tr3gM/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Fact Or Fiction: The President's 11-Point Plan To "Fix" Obamacare

Responding to his administration’s ongoing struggles with the launch of Obamacare, President Barack Obama announced a proposal today that would enable insurance companies to grant one-year extensions to the health plans of Americans who would otherwise face cancellation. Here are some of Obama’s other plans to fix the troubled rollout of his signature health care law:

1. Replacing glitchy healthcare.gov website with a convenient in-person enrollment kiosk located in Washington, D.C.

 

2. Enrollees allowed to keep preexisting medical conditions

 

3. Customers will no longer be automatically opted in to the weekly newsletter “Talkin’ Premiums” when they purchase insurance on the exchange

 

4. Allowing enrollees choice of whether to stay with their current doctor or go with well-regarded Minneapolis-area general practitioner Dr. Joel Glochowsky

 

5. Losing the semicolon in Chapter V, section 5, clause B

 

6. As a preventive measure, each American receives free raw steak to reduce swelling on shiners

 

7. Meeting insurance companies halfway by letting them cancel health care plans for only the sickest patients

 

8. Obama agrees to preface all future health care updates with statement, “This thing is a hell of a mess”

 

9. Eliminates requirement for every enrollee to contract terminal disease

 

10. Offering easy-to-follow instructions on how to snap your own neck in the event that you are diagnosed with cancer and lost your insurance

 

11. Changing website background to blue

 

Source: The Onion


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/7qm7wrj_wSc/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Fact Or Fiction: The President’s 11-Point Plan To “Fix” Obamacare

Responding to his administration’s ongoing struggles with the launch of Obamacare, President Barack Obama announced a proposal today that would enable insurance companies to grant one-year extensions to the health plans of Americans who would otherwise face cancellation. Here are some of Obama’s other plans to fix the troubled rollout of his signature health care law:

1. Replacing glitchy healthcare.gov website with a convenient in-person enrollment kiosk located in Washington, D.C.

 

2. Enrollees allowed to keep preexisting medical conditions

 

3. Customers will no longer be automatically opted in to the weekly newsletter “Talkin’ Premiums” when they purchase insurance on the exchange

 

4. Allowing enrollees choice of whether to stay with their current doctor or go with well-regarded Minneapolis-area general practitioner Dr. Joel Glochowsky

 

5. Losing the semicolon in Chapter V, section 5, clause B

 

6. As a preventive measure, each American receives free raw steak to reduce swelling on shiners

 

7. Meeting insurance companies halfway by letting them cancel health care plans for only the sickest patients

 

8. Obama agrees to preface all future health care updates with statement, “This thing is a hell of a mess”

 

9. Eliminates requirement for every enrollee to contract terminal disease

 

10. Offering easy-to-follow instructions on how to snap your own neck in the event that you are diagnosed with cancer and lost your insurance

 

11. Changing website background to blue

 

Source: The Onion


    



via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/7qm7wrj_wSc/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Jacob Sullum in Forbes on the Legality of Exploring Drivers' Digestive Tracts

How is it
possible that a motorist pulled over for a rolling stop could end
up being forcibly subjected to two X-rays, two digital probes of
his anus, three enemas, and a colonoscopy, none of which discovered
the slightest trace of the drugs that police claim to have thought
he was hiding inside himself? That is the question raised by
a federal lawsuit that received wide
attention last week after it was highlighted by KOB,
the NBC affiliate in Albuquerque. The answer, Jacob Sullum
writes in Forbes, says a lot about the outrageous
indignities we have come to tolerate in the name of the war on
drugs, which has undermined our civil liberties to the point that
what happened to David Eckert after he was stopped in Deming, New
Mexico, seemed perfectly justified to the cops who detained him,
the prosecutor who approved their application for a search warrant,
the judge who granted it, and the doctors who helped execute
it.


Read the whole article.

from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/11/15/jacob-sullum-in-forbes-on-the-legality-o
via IFTTT

Jacob Sullum in Forbes on the Legality of Exploring Drivers’ Digestive Tracts

How is it
possible that a motorist pulled over for a rolling stop could end
up being forcibly subjected to two X-rays, two digital probes of
his anus, three enemas, and a colonoscopy, none of which discovered
the slightest trace of the drugs that police claim to have thought
he was hiding inside himself? That is the question raised by
a federal lawsuit that received wide
attention last week after it was highlighted by KOB,
the NBC affiliate in Albuquerque. The answer, Jacob Sullum
writes in Forbes, says a lot about the outrageous
indignities we have come to tolerate in the name of the war on
drugs, which has undermined our civil liberties to the point that
what happened to David Eckert after he was stopped in Deming, New
Mexico, seemed perfectly justified to the cops who detained him,
the prosecutor who approved their application for a search warrant,
the judge who granted it, and the doctors who helped execute
it.


Read the whole article.

from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/11/15/jacob-sullum-in-forbes-on-the-legality-o
via IFTTT