Happy Birthday Emperor Vitellius

Roman Emperor Vitellius was born today September 7th in the year 15 AD.

Vitellius was only emperor for 8 months in the year 69 AD.

Interestingly he was the third of four men to be Emperor of Rome in 69 AD in the Year of Four Emperors.

After Emperor Nero committed suicide in 68 AD we had Galba and Otho and then Vitellius.  He reigned for 8 months and realized that his military were going to remove him in typical Roman fashion and install their military leader Vespasian.

Vitellius had decided to abdicate his position but the soldiers killed him on 12.22.69AD.  Vespasian took the job then and held it for a decade.

Here is a nice Vitellius silver denarius from his rule.

Ref Vitellius Denarius, RIC 109, RSC 111, BMC 39

Vitellius AR denarius. A VITELLIVS GERM IMP AVG TR P, laureate head right / XV VIR SACR FAC Tripod, raven below, dolphin above. RSC111, BCM39.

This coin and image are from wildwinds.com.  The go to website for matching ancient coins you are thinking about buying to known real coins.  Check them out whenever you have an ancient coin issue to research.  They are always linked here in the left hand column too if you forget the link.

Nice Price Action for the Precious Metals in September

Things are looking up for the metals this month anyway.

Here are charts for the past month.

Nothing to write home about relative to August, but a nice start to the month is a nice start to the month.  

2016 Standing Liberty Quarter Ounce Gold Coins Out Tomorrow at High Noon

Just a friendly reminder.

The 2016 Standing Liberty quarter ounce gold coins come out tomorrow at high noon, well high noon eastern standard time anyway.

These will probably sell out quickly as people look to buy them and flip them to collectors that miss out.

If you are interested in the coin, today is the day you should test out your US Mint account.  Make sure you can log in.  Make sure the payment information is up to date.  All that stuff.  Then it is just a matter of striking while the iron is hot tomorrow.

Good luck.

Big Gains for Precious Metals Today

Big gains for the metals today.

Silver cracked back above $20 and gold hit $1350 in the aftermarket after London closed.

Impressive day all around.

Here are the charts for London (the data source I use in Python for this).  The markets have continued up since here.

The Matrix Exposed

Fantastic article I wanted to share on printing money out of thin air and managed global trade.

The Matrix Exposed

Full article at the link.

Some teaser click bait to follow.


Now the subject of trade agreements always seems to elicit some very intense opposition to my own views. My claims have focused around the concept that so called Free Trade Agreements are anything but. These international trade agreements have two basic objectives. First is to create a cost arbitrage while negating the high risk proposition of undeveloped economies that naturally exists in a free market. Second is to protect the cost arbitrage from tariffs when targeting consumers back in developed economies. That’s really it. If you could lock those two objectives up on the back of a napkin the corporate interests would be happy for our legislators to sign it.

I’m about to prove that these trade agreements are the very essence of corporatism and together with fiat money have destroyed the natural self sustainment of capitalism through the requirement of private and public debt. In doing so corporatism has sabotaged the vast majority of American households thereby eradicating the capacity for economic growth. Leaving a tremendously precarious situation for those whose futures are not yet secured by fortune.

Note that labour cost arbitrage is not a real competitive advantage because it only works if government legislates away the naturally occurring free market risk. That is by definition, not a free market concept. So please, let’s stop calling these trade agreements ‘Free Trade’. And now think about a true capitalism cycle – Investment/production requiring profit, profit requiring consumption, consumption requiring income and income requiring investment – with only those parametres could firms profit if all firms implemented a labour cost arbitrage strategy?

And some charts too to back it up.

Metals Pricing Since 8.1.16