this is from ed steer, who notes a change in the bullion markets in the far east. also the amount of silver and gold supposedly held by the etf's continues to grow. but he estimates slv is still owed 25-30 million ounces.

In the last three days, I've noticed that there has been a change in pattern during Far East trading. It's not a lot, but it's something I haven't seen since I started watching the Kitco gold charts about ten years ago. A buyer [either going long, or covering short positions] is active in Hong Kong trading [in both gold and silver] that I've never seen there before. Is it something...or is it nothing? I know that three days activity can hardly be considered a trend...but I can absolutely guarantee you that this Far East activity [before midnight N.Y. time] that you see on the chart below [whether it's local buying...or from New York] has never occurred before. At least not on my watch.

click to enlarge

Open interest on Tuesday's big move in the gold price showed an increase of 6,242 contracts...which is not a lot, considering...with total gold o.i. now at 361,619. Yes, that's getting up there, and tomorrow's COT won't be happy reading...but we're still about 190,000 contracts below the all-time high of last year...so there's lots of room for the gold price to go higher if the boyz allow it. In silver, o.i. only rose 970 contracts...which is not a lot for such a big move in the silver price. The total open interest in silver is now up to 99,325 contracts. High, yes...but light years away from its highs of last year.

Yesterday there were more gold deliveries on the Comex. This time it was 486 contracts. The biggest issuer by far was JPMorgan...and the biggest stopper was Goldman Sachs. There are 1,500 contracts still outstanding for delivery in February. Over 90% of all deliveries in February should have occurred within three or four days of first day notice at the end of January. Why they are being so pokey slow about this is a mystery to Ted...and to me. None of this gold was 'delivered' off the exchange...only the ownership changed. The bars never left the racks...they just went from one bullion bank’s account to another. And on another Comex-related note...silver stocks rose by 950,000 ounces on Wednesday. By the way, if you want to keep up with daily changes in open interest, gold and silver deliveries on the Comex...and Comex warehouse stocks in all the precious metals...you can bookmark the URL you find at the link when you click here.

Yesterday's increase in the GLD ETF was 491,700 troy ounces...15.29 tonnes. The new record high for the GLD is now 1,024.09 tonnes. In silver, the SLV ETF finally got some of the gargantuan amount of silver that it's owed...6.9 million ounces...give or take. That's 214.6 tonnes. Ted Butler said that based on Wednesday's activity in the SLV...and even with this delivery...the SLV ETF is still owed between 25-30 million ounces. As of yesterday, the SLV held about 7,800 tonnes of the stuff. And the question is still out there...do the custodians, Barclays and JPMorgan, really have all the gold and silver they say they do? Call me a "doubting Thomas" if you wish...but I gotta see those nail holes before I'll believe...or personally own either fund.

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