Friday, March 28, 2014

Weekend Chillout - Were have been here before

With Gold falling to below $1300 it seems that $100 of the fear trade has been bled out of the market (not that the situation on the ground in Ukraine has changed any). We have been here many times before and no doubt will be again.

PEAK GOLD: How The Romans Lost Their Empire

By Ugo Bardi


A Roman “Aureus” minted by Emperor Septimius Severus in 193 CE. At nearly 8 grams, the Aureus was truly an imperial coin – the embodiment of Rome’s wealth and power. (image from Wikipedia).

In this post, I argue that precious metal currency was a fundamental factor that kept together the Roman empire and gave to the Romans their military power. But the Roman mines producing gold and silver peaked in the first century CE and the Romans gradually lost the capability of controlling their resources. In a way, they were doomed by “peak gold.”

When I heard for the first time that the Roman Empire fell because of the depletion of its silver and gold mines, I was skeptical. Compared to our situation, where we are facing the depletion of fossil fuels, the Roman case seemed to me to be completely different. Gold and silver don’t produce energy, they don’t produce anything useful. So, why should the Roman Empire have fallen because of something we might call “peak gold”?

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Keiser Report: Money out of Thin Debt Air

From RT

Published on Mar 27, 2014

In this episode of the Keiser Report, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert discuss the paper fist ruling the Empire of Debt. They look at the poor people being financially strip searched, stopped and frisked and then choked while standing in an X-Factor like line in order to get a low paying job at a supermarket.

In the second half, Max interviews entrepreneur and investor, Matthew Mellon, about bitcoin and the blockchain, luxury shoes and Hanley-Mellon.


Boom Bust - Peter Schiff: It's not the weather, the economy is headed towards recession

From Boom Bust

David Seaman Hour with Abby Martin

Listen to the chat between David and RT host Abby Martin here

Why the Australian dollar is on a roll

Three factors fueling gold's rally