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Are leading precious metals ETFs based on undisclosed conflict of interest?

Section: Documentation

6:25p ET Monday, May 3, 2010

Dear Friend of GATA and Gold (and Silver):

Do financial houses HSBC and JPMorgan Chase & Co. have a conflict of interest in serving as custodians of the metal held by the major gold and silver exchange-traded funds, GLD and SLV, even as those financial houses are themselves holding major short positions in the precious metals? And does the failure of the prospectuses of those ETFs to note the short positions of their metal custodians constitute a material omission in violation of U.S. securities law?

Those questions are raised today in a compelling report written by Catherine Austin Fitts, founder and managing member of Solari Investment Advisory Services LLC, publisher of The Solari Report (http://solari.com/store/the_solari_report/), and a member of GATA's Board of Directors, along with her lawyer, Carolyn Betts.

Fitts and Betts note the increasing evidence that more claims to gold and silver have been sold than there is real metal to fulfill them. Of course GATA long has expressed skepticism about the precious metals ETFs and has wondered whether they are used in part for market manipulation, to make investor-owned metal available for shorting and price suppression at strategic moments, against the interests of the ETF investors.

The Fitts-Betts inquiry is titled "GLD and SLV: Disclosure in the Precious Metals Puzzle Palace" and you can find it at the Solari Internet site here:

http://solari.com/archive/Precious_Metals_Puzzle_Palace/

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.



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Prophecy Resource Corp. Appoints Rob McEwen to Advisory Board

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For Prophecy Resource Corp.'s complete statement:

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