CME Hikes Gold Margins By 22% And Gold Drops by....0.4%, Resumes Climb ...Guess that means fear trumps greed...or...perhaps fear is trumping older fears.

Just after hitting a new all time high of above $1815 in spot gold, the CME immediately sent out a notice to members advising that gold margins for Tier 1 members were increasing by 22% for both initial and maintenance positions, from $4,500 to $5,500. Unfortunately for the CME, this predetermined move was telegraphed to the market weeks ago, and with rumor 57 out of 22 finally turning out correct, this latest move only managed to push gold down modestly, and at last check was once again trading above $1,800. Just like all central bank interventions, which now have a half life between 1 hour and 4 days max, so this latest exchange attempt to subdue prices will fail spectacularly. Naturally, just like in the case of silver, this will merely embolden the CME to proceed with hike after hike, which in turn will kill speculative elements while merely reinforcing the strong hands. End result: in one month gold will be above $2,000 with almost 100% certainty.

In addition, the CME also hiked CHF futures by 443%, Yen futures by 25%, Ruble futures by 36%, as well as TEN, UBE and I3. The only margins that were cut were those of Uranium which dropped from 1320/1200 to 990/900 for initial/maintenance.

CME notice goes out at 6:31 pm, and gold promptly resumes upward climb: