Every year, friend-of-the-site David Collum writes a detailed “Year in Review” synopsis full of keen perspective and plenty of wit. This year is no exception. Poignant and delightfully acerbic when necessary, considering the troubling times. As with past years, he selected Peak Prosperity as the site where it is published in full. It is longer than our usual posts, but worth the time to read in full. This is Part 1.
Introduction
Dave: You do lack self control, but I learned and laughed making my way thru this.
~ Larry Summers (@LHSummers), former Secretary of the Treasury
I’ve been trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty. What began more than a dozen years ago as a synopsis of the year’s events in markets and finance for a few friends morphed beyond my control into a Year in Review (YIR)—an attempt to chronicle human folly and world events for the entire year. It captures key moments before they slip into the brain fog. The process of trying to write a coherent narrative helps me better understand WTF just happened and seminal moments that catch my eye.
By far my favorite end-of-year recap for the last ten years. Finished it yesterday. Once again David hasn’t disappointed. He’s on my I want to go to dinner with list.
~ Jim Pallotta (@jimpallotta13), money manager and former owner of Boston Celtics
I’m game, Jim, even if it’s just a pretzel, nachos, and a brewski. The title, “Crisis of Authority,” is a double entendre. On the one hand, previously trusted authorities that we relied on to better understand the world are long gone. Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, and Tim Russert have been replaced with Chris Cuomo, Don Lemon, and Brian Stelter. Oops. Scratch Chris Cuomo..
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Marketwatch: Commentary Censorship
February 2, 2021
Marketwatch: Commentary Censorship
Yesterday (February 1, 2021), MarketWatch published an article on why the short squeeze on silver being discussed by some on WallStreetBets/Reddit would be short-lived. Having read a number of articles on the issue it was not difficult to identify some misleading/faulty statements in the article. I sent a comment through to point out these inconsistencies in the article only to receive a message back that my comment “has been rejected as it contains content that is in breach of our community guidelines.”
Here is the comment:
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Some misleading and missing ‘facts’ in this story.
First, the gold-to-silver price ratio is not ‘historically’ 60-1. That is only a relatively recent ratio. Historically, the ratio is about 15:1. (https://www.mining.com/web/alert-gold-silver-ratio-spikes-highest-level-27-years/)
Second, the argument that the WallStreetBets/Reddit crowd is justifying its position based on the industrial use of silver in electronics/technology is only partially accurate. Several others justifications have been forwarded: the ratio of silver mined to gold mined is even lower than the price ratio, about 8 ounces of silver to every 1 ounce of gold (https://www.jmbullion.com/investing-guide/james/silver-supply/); and, most importantly, there are 100s of paper ounces of silver to every actual physical ounce in existence, so taking physical deliver, as many are suggesting, will expose the fraud that is the precious metals market (https://www.goldbroker.com/news/paper-silver-market-250-times-size-physical-silver-market-526#:~:text=This%20would%20mean%20that%2C%20for,circulating%20in%20several%20financial%20products.)
And finally, many simply want to expose the fraud and manipulation by the Big Banks that has been going on for ages. (https://www.reuters.com/article/jp-morgan-spoofing-penalty/jpmorgan-to-pay-920-million-for-manipulating-precious-metals-treasury-market-idINKBN26K325)
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The community guidelines are fairly extensive, but I can find no where in my comment where I was in breach of them, except maybe “excessive links to external websites”; but is 4 excessive?
Blatant censorship? It seems so to me.