My selection of tweets of the week concerning the evolution of the "paper" and physical gold markets: COMEX (futures), LBMA, closure of Swiss refineries...

Are we witnessing the end of "paper" gold with the blatant disconnect in between futures (paper) and physical market ? — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 18, 2020

From the front lines of gold: Royal Canadian Mint closed for 2 weeks. U.S. Mint backordered a month in advance. Brinks JFK on half shifts (gold can't move). Brinks Utah recovering from earthquake. European refiners can't ship to U.S. (travel restrictions). Sorry, no gold for you. pic.twitter.com/pn2w2Yg1CV — Jim Rickards (@JamesGRickards) March 20, 2020

#comex and #LBMA set the price of $gold and $silver. The banks seem to be on the wrong side of this trade. The second they both close paper markets, You can bet your ass the street price will skyrocket making paper irrelevant.



You can't hit pause in the critical market. — NYSE Daytraders (@Nysedaytraders) March 22, 2020

Once again: LBMA (@lbmaexecutive), #COMEX and the likes are NOT #gold markets. They trade meaningless derivatives that are disconnected from any reality. We'd rather call them #fakemarkets. Yet @Reuters is not getting it yet. @CFTC doesn't give a sh!t. https://t.co/VNvJFiDkYl — Ivan Franciscovich ~Liberate the Banked~ (@IvanFranciscovi) March 23, 2020

"Potential force majeure on the COMEX, lack of physical gold to honour requests for conversion of certain contracts."

Force majeure potentielle sur le Comex, manque d or physique pour honorer les demande de conversion de certains contrats. https://t.co/yqdixPslZo #or #argent #comex #coronavirus — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 24, 2020

They don t want you to go long gold on paper (futures) and ask for physical delivery. #shortage #comex #gold — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 24, 2020

Comex is the place where people sell gold which they dont have to people who dont want it because they cannot pay for it #comex #gold #leverage — freegold (@freegolds) March 24, 2020

Everybody buying #comex contract should now stand for delivery... — freegold (@freegolds) March 24, 2020

1/2 I’ve received some important information relating to what’s going on in Gold markets. Today, some banks failed to deliver physical in the comex bar EFP. As a result, these banks suffered large losses which will soon be announced. They’ve also decided to exit the comex market. — Roy Sebag (@roysebag) March 24, 2020

2/2 Now there remains a big shortage in physical in the comex denomination so rumors are the Comex will announce a force majeure and allow banks to deliver LBMA bars instead. This should be announced imminently. — Roy Sebag (@roysebag) March 24, 2020

#CME #COMEX having difficulty exchanging paper #gold for physical, contract is for 100oz bars. Now they are expanding to include #LBMA 400 oz, 1kg bars. https://t.co/DltXASxX5K — Clive Dunn (@cliveldunn) March 25, 2020

#COMEX futures is a game of musical chairs with around 200 players for every chair and the music has to stop sometime. In other words, the demand for physical $GOLD will simply overwhelm the paper market's ability to deliver https://t.co/W9EzhUiSOe — Rock-Creek Financial (@HaustP) March 24, 2020

#CMEGroup raises #COMEX #Gold futures contract

margin requirements +19.3%https://t.co/Niw9rKjvVp



Looks like today's near $100 oz upside price action volatility has them trying to squeeze out long fiat leverage$



What is Happening?!https://t.co/6aIu82ltSE — SilverDoctors.com (@SilverDoctors) March 24, 2020

"There is still a $20 spread between the spot price of gold and futures contracts (April 2020)."

On observe toujours 20 dollars d'écart entre le cours spot de l'or et les contrats futures (Avril 2020). — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 26, 2020

(1/2) If #gold refineries don't start to produce again shortly, the different paper markets (and paper product) are going to blow up, cash settlement + delivery force majeure. Then who is going to correctly quote gold and silver ? No ASK in physical market = no price discorvery — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 26, 2020

(2/2) If this plays out, nobody will quote gold, which leave a short window to revalue gold and move back to a gold standard. Fixing the global dollar shortage in the process. (There is a big "IF" in this scenario.) — Fabrice Drouin Ristori (@FabriceDrouin) March 26, 2020