• A report in the AP shows the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) trade alliance seems to remain strong despite western sanctions.  India admitted to purchasing 3 million barrels of Russian oil at a 20% discount rate this week.
  • There’s no mention of how the purchase will be transacted, what currency they would use; however, the top-line story of India refusing to follow western trade sanctions reflects the BRICS alliance is delivering economic results.
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Source: theconservativetreehouse.com

Banks Are Restocking Gold At Fastest Pace In Years 

Banks are in the process of restocking gold at a pace not seen in years.

Gold

In a recent article, I speculated that the big players might be prepared to let the price of gold run. Part of this will mean increased delivery volume in April after a very strong March. The Comex vaults have been steadily depleted over the last several months, however, 1.6M ounces of gold just showed up since March 1 as shown below. This is the largest inflow since October 2020 and we are only halfway through March!

 

   

Gold

  • Almost every vault is now adding to inventory which is a complete reversal from last month
    • JP Morgan and Manfra are leading the way with increases of 7.1% and 15.2% over the last month respectively
    • JP Morgan now has positive flows over the last year. Again, the net gain of JP Morgan inventory over the last year has been added in the last week

Why is every vault adding metal all of a sudden? Why is JP Morgan aggressively restocking its inventory? What are the banks preparing for?

Source: zerohedge.com