CME lowers margins

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pmbug

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Yes Copper, too.
Maybe it's related to the dropping open interest ( http://www.pmbug.com/forum/f13/open-interest-futures-options-watch-gold-silver-679/ ), i.e. miners and big buyers bypassing the exchange:

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That's not true for copper, however:
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That's about the only reason I can think of that would make sense. They want to rekindle investment into the paper markets that John Corzine and MF Global killed.
 
PMBug,
I think it's something else, although related in a way. I think they need more longs to step in because the market cannot survive on shorts alone, and since they don't just "shake the tree", they crash in to it, no one wants to risk their money against someone who can and does simply conjure up as much imaginary paper silver as they want, as often as they want. Who in their right mind would go up against that? It's like a grasshopper going up against an elephant, it just makes no sense. Those who want metal now simply go to a wholesaler, refiner or simply buys large lots from places like Tulving.
 
Apparently Knight was a major player in the ETF racket, er..market. And as such the margins tripled overnight? I heard on CNBC this morning. Anyone got more on that?
 
KMS said:
Apparently Knight was a major player in the ETF racket, er..market. And as such the margins tripled overnight? I heard on CNBC this morning. Anyone got more on that?
Click to expand...

Knight accounted for 15% of all NYSE volume.

This is a tragedy.. Not a conspiracy.
 
So, they're lowering margins to draw in more suckers? It seems to me that whenever they want to slam silver they simply jack up margins and chase out everyone that's playing the arbitrage thing. Anyone playing the Comex game with any kind of size has a lot of cash backing those positions, so a 10 - 15% rise in margins can translate in to a huge sum that has to be deposited in their account within a very short period of time. From here in the cheap seats, it looks like the Crimex uses margins to cap the price and to shake leaves from the tree pretty much at will. Recently, when they jacked margin multiple times with silver only around 30 - 32, there didn't really seem to be any reasonable answer as to why, other than straight up price capping manipulation.

I still say that anyone playing SLV or the Crimex should have their head examined.
 
The CME Group on Thursday lowered margins for natural gas, gold, silver, copper, lean hog and live cattle futures, effective after close of business on Tuesday, Nov. 20.

CME, the biggest operator of U.S. futures exchanges, cut initial margins on COMEX 100 Gold Futures 18.5 percent to $7,425 a contract from $9,113, but left maintenance margins for the yellow metal unchanged.

The exchange operator trimmed maintenance margins to trade silver to $11,000 per contract, from $12,500, and initial margins to $12,100 from $16,875 per contract.
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http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/content/en//mineweb-fast-news?oid=162421&sn=Detail
 
That's a sign that there's no massive raid in planning. I guess through tonights COT report we'll learn that the commercials have covered a massive amount of shorts. The real picture will be visable next Friday, though, as the COT reports only cover data until Tuesday of the respective week.
 
swissaustrian said:
That's a sign that there's no massive raid in planning. I guess through tonights COT report we'll learn that the commercials have covered a massive amount of shorts. The real picture will be visable next Friday, though, as the COT reports only cover data until Tuesday of the respective week.
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Until we clear 1740 the trend isn't our friend in the short term. Market is setup to get a bounce but that's about it as is.
 
Although Open Interest remains high in silver, the CME must need a new flock of investors to fleece in paper metals, as the CME announced after Thursday’s market close a major reduction in gold and silver margins effective after the close Tuesday Feb 12th.

The CME cut gold initial and maintenance margins from $6,600 & $6,000 to $5,940 & $5,400 respectively, and also slashed silver initial & maintenance margins from $12,100 & $11,000 to $10,400 & $9,500, a reduction of 10% in gold & 14% in silver!
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http://www.silverdoctors.com/cme-slashes-gold-silver-margins-10-14/
 
The Gold market is very thin right now so I can see why the CME did this.

The volume yesterday was extremely low. Especially when you consider that spike lower we had. This morning, we have stop hunting going on as well. They were able to push gold around $2 with 100 contracts several times. Sometimes I really don't like being able to watch tick by tick.

I'd also like to note that open interest in gold has fallen quite a bit. Commercial net short interest is back in the 160k area. Over that period, large specs have really cut their long positions and put a lot of shorts out. So it could be that this benefits the shorts more since that seems to be the way the customers are shifting their positions. Moving margin requirements really doesn't impact the commercials.

net/net.. that just makes it easier for commercials to cover.
 
DSAbug said:
The Gold market is very thin right now ...
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Hopefully it's an indication that smart money isn't putting itself at risk of getting fooled a 3rd time (MF Global, Knight/PFG Best). Buy physical or GTFO. :judge:
 
PMBug said:
Hopefully it's an indication that smart money isn't putting itself at risk of getting fooled a 3rd time (MF Global, Knight/PFG Best). Buy physical or GTFO. :judge:
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Maybe... That whole 40 tons of gold thing at the comex is a response to that...

If they just do cash settlement.. I wonder what the response to that will be..
 
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This smells like a set up for the longs to get their dick stepped on again........better watch out here.
 
ancona said:
This smells like a set up for the longs to get their dick stepped on again........better watch out here.
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lol.. when has news not been that over the past 17 months?

Keep an eye on the COT numbers. comes out in 30 minutes
 
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CME lowered Comex 100 Gold futures (GC) margins for speculators to $7,975 per contract from $8,800 and cut Comex 5000 Silver futures (SI) margins to $11,000 per contract from $12,375.

The move partially reversed a 25 percent hike in gold margins in June after prices plunged to their lowest in three years.
...
CME also cut maintenance margins for gold to $7,250 per contract from $8,000.

The decrease of $750 per contract in gold speculative maintenance margins -- multiplied by both sides of the open interest in the market, which stood at 403,603 contracts on Thursday -- suggests $605 million less in margin escrow.
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http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/content/en//mineweb-fast-news?oid=219142&sn=Detail
 
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