The gold and silver selloff was caused by...

[Cu Penny Hoarder]

MORE MARGIN HIKES, and I'm not shocked one bit. More blatent manipulation by the CME. It's so obvious how desparate they've become.

From Zero Hedge:

CME just hiked gold margins by 21%, silver by 16% and copper by 18%. Mystery solved.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/case-closed-cme-hikes-gold-silver-copper-margins

Very glad I bought more today.

[JJM]

Aw shucks, I posted that in a thread ~6 hours before Tyler did...lol

It's too bad, that site used to kick ass!

[Cu Penny Hoarder]

I wish the rest of us could be as informed as you are.

[balz]

I'd like to understand a bit more... What are those margins for in the crash?

Anyone can explain the ABC of all this? I had a look at the link provided but am not sure to understand... What difference does it make if margins are X or Y or Z?

EDIT: I did some research... And apparently they changed the rule some days in advance and everyone who were strong on margins had to sell... and the information leaked... This is purely criminal!

[68Camaro]

There ya go... Thanks for posting this. It had to be something like this, but good to see the confirmation of it. Came out of the blue, and seemingly purposely designed to hit a down market for maximum affect. Wow, CME group sucks...

[neilgin1]

There ya go... Thanks for posting this. It had to be something like this, but good to see the confirmation of it. Came out of the blue, and seemingly purposely designed to hit a down market for maximum affect. Wow, CME group sucks...

let me ask two questions of everybody, a market that makes a 25% move, can that be called "volatile"?

second, do you believe that when 90% plus of all market participants are bullish, that could be dangerous to the up move in question?

and dont ever think i'm a CME defender, but when a market trades twiggy, margins go up...every single futures market in the past that traded twiggy, margin hikes. i've even see it in the Bellys, during a squeeze, the exchange institute a policy of liquidation only orders in that front month....the margin on grains? oh boy.

you see, thats why you guys are smarter than any damn futures trader, you DONT have to pay margins stacking, you DONT have to sit in front of a screen, having three million heartattacks because the market is whipping about.

both this market and gold went down, coz everybody and their mother was bullish and everybody was tapped, when everybodies bullish, who's left to buy?...i'm talking futures now. Sep 9, i wrote i felt it was going to 33...now what if i had been honcho at some hedge fund, and then sell? is that a nefarious plot?....no. and if the hedge fund was big enough i would have been pounding it, its about making money. That said, i sure would have covered half to three quarters of the companys position before the weekend, because i'd like to get some sleep!!...and with margin hikes, 5 dollar moves, crazy volatilityeven when you making money, is not a recipe for sleep when dealing large in the future mkt.

[balz]

Someone on the other page:

Personally, I don't see what all the fuss is about. If you own silver it is because you really don't care what the fiat equivalent is. My silver didn't change. It's still hiding in a deep, dark hole in the Midwest, same as last week.

+1

[68Camaro]

Can't dispute anything you say Neil. And I certainly think any exchange is entitled to their own rules. However, this one seems arbitrary and wrong timed.

I don't know [edit] motivations. Just know that they KNEW exactly what affect this would have before they did it. And anyone that was in the know could easily play that. For those that are on margin (which I have never done, will say with near certainty that I won't ever do), with a sudden down market, and a sudden margin call aggravated by a market hike, enough of these will have to sell at least something, and the crush will be on.

As to who was left to buy - well, for every seller there was a buyer. Just at a lower price, as the bargin hunters come out. No, it all makes sense. But it doesn't reflect a real price of a real commodity. This is all the paper game.

[neilgin1]

furthermore, big bank trading desks have been using the Comex silver mkt as an ATM, because THEY CAN.

face it, we all here are perma-bulls...and thats the correct PHYSICAL silver intermediate to long term position, silver IS going higher. The problem is this: guys that stack in the real, or smaller coin ops, smelters, get a wild hair, and think they can "play the futures"...MOST of these guys are perma bulls too, because they KNOW the value of silver. But you have 2,000, 3,000 smaller entities, or individual retail accounts arrayed against a handful of large institutions with guys who KNOW how the futures market really works, its about pressure points. Say you're head PM futures trader at Bank XYZ, you look at investor sentiment, says small speculators are 97% bullish. and a small spec can be a dentist with a net worth of 3 million dollars, that aint "small", but in futures it is, medium specs are 70%....mkts banding between 39 and 42, gold sentiment is equally lopsided. Gold opens down $35, silver opens down .75....what do you do now? YOU POUND THE #### OUT OF IT! "Gordon Gecko" is real, he bets on "sure things", bouncing small spec perma bulls, who are vulnerable are a sure thing.....any man here in that postion would do it too.
a funny Ebay story, not funny haha, bid on a roll of great coins, a couple days ago, with todays price factored in, i was the high bid, three days ago, the next day some guy ramps the bid, blows me away. Now, this hump...get this...actually retracts the bid today, after close, the seller lets him, and his excuse was "entered wrong amount", wtf is that?....i'm FINE with it, his first bid was titch below mine, and he used and odd penny number XXX.37, thinking he's cool, then on his second bid, he ramped me...HE KNEW what he was typing in, and the seller let him off the hook probably...might be a good customer, etc. So dont think its just the Comex, where some crooked [shucks] goes on. Anytime two people trade, there's always room for crooked [shucks]. Thats when i trade, i REALLY trust no one.

[68Camaro]

I follow you. Agree.