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Title: Metal prices fall further than during Great Depression
Source:
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URL Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/ ... n-during-Great-Depression.html
Published: Dec 2, 2008
Author: Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Post Date: 2008-12-02 18:08:14 by 2big2fail
Keywords: None
Views: 178
Comments: 4
Kevin Norrish, the bank's commodities strategist, said the average fall in the price of copper, lead, and zinc has been roughly 60pc since the peak in July this year. All three metals were traded on the London Metal Exchange in the inter-war years so it is possible to make a comparison. Prices for the three metals fell 40pc from their highs in 1929 before touching bottom in 1933, with the bulk of the fall in 1930 as the slump spread worldwide. "Lead and zinc have already lost more than they did in the 1930s," he said. Copper was hit hardest during the Depression, despite the electrification drive in the US and the Soviet Union, falling 70pc at one stage before creeping back in the mid-1930s. The reason was an 85pc fall in US construction, then the biggest user of the metal. Barclays Capital said the broader equity markets are already discounting the sorts of "savage declines" in corporate profits that were last seen in the Slump. It said (trailing) price to earnings ratios are actually lower now than they were the early 1930s, with moves in credit spreads that suggest investors are anticipating depression-era levels of economic contraction. The credit markets continued to exhibit signs of extreme stress yesterday. The iTraxx Crossover index measuring default risk on low-grade European bonds punched above 950 for the first time. The investment grade index hit 188. The spreads are now flashing the sort of danger signals seen before the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September. Each episode of the financial crisis over the last eighteen months has been preceded by a big jump in the iTraxx indexes.
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#1. To: 2big2fail (#0)
At least maybe people will stop trying to steal copper from lightpoles and getting electrocuted.
Pugs rule, all other dogs drool.
hi 2big, thanks for the post and welcome to 4um.
There is no morality in war. Morality is the privilege of those judging from the distance. War is only death and destruction.--John Cory
How's that good? It's removing one of the few remaining ways to eliminate stupid people with criminal intent.
Bring on the Depression. Bring it the F*** ON! If digging ditches and eating beans for a few years is what it takes for me to see some worthless sacks of crap bankers and politicians living in sack cloth and being spat upon by my fellow Americans well... where's my shovel?!?!
It's good if thousands of dollars in frozen foods aren't lost because the power was off after a service lateral theft. And, it's good that an insurance company won't be tempted to recup their losses by hiking rates the next year after covering such damages and repairs. I know you wanted to take shot at copper-aluminum wire thieves really bad, but you didn't think this one through before you pounced.
#2. To: 2big2fail (#0)
#3. To: Turtle (#1)
At least maybe people will stop trying to steal copper from lightpoles and getting electrocuted.
#4. To: Axenolith (#3)
How's that good? It's removing one of the few remaining ways to eliminate stupid people with criminal intent.
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