THEODORE BUTLER INTERVIEW
Cook: All of a sudden gold demand has exploded. What’s the size of these purchases and who’s doing it?
Butler: We can document close to 3 million ounces of gold worth $4 billion has been purchased in the big gold ETF, GLD and in COMEX deliveries over the past month.
Cook: How does that compare with past purchases of gold?
Butler: This is extraordinarily large and it came before the recent price rise. It has the earmark of coming from a big buyer.
Cook: Who do you think is the big buyer?
Butler: I’m guessing the big buyer in GLD is JPMorgan. We can verify that the COMEX gold is definitely going to JPMorgan. That’s a published fact.
Cook: Is it for them or a client?
Butler: Mostly for the bank itself, but also for a client. It doesn’t matter whether it’s for them or somebody else. JPMorgan is the kingpin of the gold and silver market and these huge COMEX deliveries prove it. These are the biggest gold deliveries in the history of the COMEX.
Cook: Anything fishy about this?
Butler: They’ve taken three times the amount allowed by COMEX position limits. They were given a hedge exemption. In other words, they went to the regulators with some cockamamie story and were given approval to ignore the rules that everybody else has to follow. It stinks to high heaven.
Cook: What are they doing with silver?
Butler: They’re still aggressive, but they can’t get the big dollar amount of silver because there’s not that much available. They moved into gold because they can’t get the silver. That makes silver the jewel.
Cook: So they bought the silver first?
Butler: Yes, they’ve been buying physical silver for five years. They’ve been buying the gold for only a month.
Cook: Why are they buying billions of dollars of gold?
Butler: Because they think it’s going to go up in price. Nobody buys anything if they think it’s going down. That’s true with any investment.
Cook: Why are they accelerating their purchases?
Butler: They are expecting a price rise sooner than later, otherwise why rush like this?
Cook: Does this mean we should be buying gold instead of silver?
Butler: Heavens no. Although this is bullish for gold, they have spent a lot more time and money buying silver. They must think silver is going to go up a lot more.
Cook: Why is that?
Butler: There’s so little silver relative to gold in the world. JPMorgan never had to secure an exemption for buying a larger quantity of silver like they did with gold. The silver isn’t there in that large of an amount.
Cook: How long can this go on?
Butler: The fact that JPMorgan has thrown caution to the wind in buying gold tells me we’re getting close to the end. Silver buyers should buckle up. If we get one more sell-off it will probably be the last one.
Cook: Why in all the daily commentaries on gold and silver, do we not read anything about JPMorgan? It only comes from you.
Butler: I don’t know. The facts are available and they are incontrovertible.
Cook: Summarize your views on silver.
Butler: Silver is more bullish today than ever before. The fact that JPMorgan has loaded up on silver makes it more of a sure thing.
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