by David Kranzler
Investment Research Dynamics
The last few delivery periods for gold and silver on the Comex have experienced a record number of longs standing for delivery. For gold, April’s record was topped by June’s record. Sandwiched in between these to “front month” contracts was a record amount of gold “delivered” in May (May is a non-front month contract). July silver appears right now to be headed for a record number of “deliveries.”
I put “deliveries” in quotes because a large majority of the entities which stand for “delivery” never remove their bars from the Comex vaults. For all we know the banks are using unallocated bars, or even bars that don’t exist, to satisfy the terms of the “deliveries.” That said, if the stoppers (the entities that take “delivery”) begin in large numbers to remove their bars from Comex vault custody and move the bars to alternative safekeeping, the potential exists to cause a run and eventual default on the Comex.