HUNT for SILVER Silver Was $5 an Ounce and the 5000 Exchanges to Change the Rules in the Ounces Cost $25,000
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-~ Mark Perlstein - Black Sta r HUNTFOR SILVER Gary Allen is author of None Dare Call It Conspiracy; The Rockefeller File ; Kissinger; Jimmy Carter/Jimmy Carter; Tax Target: Washington; and, Ted Kennedy: In Over His Head. He is an AMERICAN OPINION Contributing Editor. • NELSON BUNKER HUNT, fabled son television series. He is, in fact, a of the legendary billionaire H.L. happy combination of sober realist Hunt of Texas, has been called "Sil and idealistic visionary. He is a sober verfinger" by financial journalists realist because he understands' the eager to dramatize his silver invest perilous direction in which our civili ments in the purple ad hominems of zation has been headed - the politi a James Bond novel. Hunt is neither cal instability, the civil turmoil, the an eccentric villain out of James financial catastrophe of hyperinfla Bond nor a sinister schemer in the tion and moral bankruptcy. And he is mold of J.R. Ewing of the "Dallas" an idealistic visionary because he is DE CEMBER,1 980 1 ~ . The miners at right help to deliver annual world production of silver that for twenty years has been in the neighborhood of 300 million ounces, Meanwhile, silver consumption is run ning at 500 million ounces a year. The Hunts realized that as available reserves are con sumed the price of the metal must rise. working for a better world in which speculator in silver. Speculators are the people govern themselves and short-term players. They do not buy their economy without being victim their holdings to keep, as Hunt was ized by a paper aristocracy which doing and continues to do. People profits by manipulating government gamble on the future price of pork and inflating currencies. bellies to make money in a relatively Mr. Hunt is a faithful Christian, short period - not as a long-term friendly, unassuming, and temperate. investment. With gold and silver, on He refrains from both liquor and the other hand, there are many who tobacco, flies tourist class on com -like the Hunts - see the metals as mercial airlines, and dresses simply. cash and prefer them to paper A member of the National Council money. They are investors for the of The John Birch Society, he is a long term. Thus Bunker Hunt put a determined patriot and a formidable fortune in silver for three reasons: opponent of Establishment Insiders (1.) Mr. Hunt is aware that for who seek to make America one more the past twenty years world produc colony in a New World Order. tion of silver has been in the neigh Earlier this year, Bunker Hunt and borhood of 300 million ounces annu his brother Herbert were targets of ally while consumption has been one of the most spectacular swindles about 500 million ounces. This means in financial history. This was marked that every year the world comes up by the now-infamous silver crash short on silver by about 200 million that culminated on March 27, 1980. ounces. This "shortfall" has been But before we describe this biggest made up from silver mined and holdup since the Brinks job, let's stored over hundreds of years. Since examine some of the reasons the about a third of the world's silver is Texas billionaire set out to acquire in the form of jewelry in India one hundred million ounces of silver and is locked up there because of the rather than, say, a million pounds of Indian Government's prohibition of kumquats. its export - Bunker Hunt quickly It has been alleged by the usual calculated that the "shortfall" would ~ Establishment propagandists that soon consume all the available re- j the Hunt brothers were irresponsible serves of silver and produce a price I "speculators" in silver and that it was squeeze. The price of silver was i their actions that produced the silver bound to rise dramatically. -£ debacle. But Bunker Hunt was not a (2.) Most people still listen to ~ 2 AMERICAN OPINION Bunker Hunt (left) and his brother Herbert (right) testify in Washington about silver. Hear ings have turned up substantial evidence sug gesting a plot to cheat the Hunts through commodity rules changes by persons who were holding short positions that would have required delivery of silver worth $1.9 billion. Walter Cronkite telling them that in began buying silver in the 1970s as a flation is rising prices. But Mr. Hunt hedge against inflation and political knows that rising prices are the effect chaos - an investment which had to of inflation and that the cause is increase in value due to the increas huge federal deficits that are spun ingly short supply in comparison to out into the economy as fiat credit the increasing world demand on the and currency. Bunker believes that metal. Nonetheless, some have ac the politicians will continue to pump cused the Hunts of trying to "corner" money into the economy, in effect the silver market. To "corner" a mar buying votes from the unproductive ket one would have to acquire enough to be paid for by reducing the value of an essential commodity to obtain of the savings of the productive. a virtual monopoly in it and be able Deficit money takes on value only by arbitrarily to set the price. That was diluting the purchasing power of all not the Hunt objective. As Alan the money that is already in circula Trustman observes in the September tion . Mr. Hunt realizes that this pro issue of Atlantic: cess might continue until it takes a " . .. Their behavior was not typi wheelbarrow full of Washingtons cal of that of cornerers. In the first and Lincolns to buy a Big Mac. place, they told everybody who would (3.) Should the purchasing power listen what they were doing; they of our currency approach zero in a were big, big buyers and intended to hyperinflationary nightmare, the peo buy more and more. A cornerer oper ple would demand a more stable ates in secret until he owns substan means of exchange. At that time, gold tially the entire available supply, and would be too precious to be used in the then he squeezes the surprised inno everyday monetary transactions of cents who have sold short and must the average citizen and silver coins buy in higher. would once again become a means of "You would have to have been exchange. But it will not be the face belligerently deaf and disbelieving value that is stamped on the coin and anything but innocent to sell which is important (i.e., ten cents, short and then be caught surprised if twenty-five cents, fifty cents), but Nelson Bunker and William Herbert 0 the silver content of the coins. A dime had cornered silver and demanded :-.:§ might have the same purchasing pow that you deliver. Everybody knew I er as ten dollars in currency. they were buying and willing to pay a ~ For these three reasons the Hunts higher price. ~ 4 AMERICAN OPINION "In the second place, they never to find oneself. But, just like every tried to squeeze anyone. They took other player, the " shorts" knew the their deliveries slowly, over many risks when they contracted. They months, even accepted in settlement were all over twenty-one and none of some of their contracts non-certi arrived in town atop a wagonload of fied silver not on deposit with the pumpkins. Mr. Trustman reports exchanges, and gracefully rolled the what happened: bulk of their futures forward into ". the short sellers of silver later and later months so as not to were very short and in very hot water. squeeze the sellers. Cornerers? Not They had had plenty of advance qui te. " warning, and, as one month after While it is true that the Hunts another rolled around where the longs wished to acquire large quantities of never tried to squeeze the shorts,(and silver, as we have noted, they had the could not have done so even if they soundest of reasons for doing so. wished to, with the CFTCt and the Which is why they went into the ruling bodies of the exchanges look futures markets. As silver's price ing on), it became more and more continued to go up, the value of the difficult to sympathize with the Hunt silver futures rose rapidly, and short sellers of silver. But short they those paper profits were used to bor were, and facing the prospect of row more money with which to buy enormous, crushing loss." more silver futures positions.* In other words, these players had As this mountain of silver grew made a mistake in the market - a with the rise in price, the "shorts" crucial mistake. Trustman continues: who had agreed to deliver silver they "Silver was going out of control. didn't have, and therefore had to buy As the pri ce of silver mounted, it silver at increasingly higher prices to became ridiculous in the eyes of fulfill their contracts, grew progres many exchange members. Six dollars sively more nervous. Those who go an ounce? Seven dollars? For silver? hea vily short in a rising market lose. Sooner or later the bubble would Having to purchase silver at a high break. If not, they could always price in order to deliver it for a low make it break. It would be their duty, price is not a good situation in which they would claim, to make the price break, for the benefit of the makers •A commodity fut ures cont ract is a legally and users [of silver] and for the pro binding agreeme nt to buy or sell a designated tection of the public.