Iran predicts global oil prices to soar by 50 per cent Iranian officials predicted that global oil prices would soar by 50 per cent in the wake of EU

Iran predicts global oil prices to soar by 50 per cent

Iranian officials predicted that global oil prices would soar by 50 per cent in the wake of EU sanctions as the country's oil minister declared exports to "some countries" would be cut off.

In what will be seen as evidence of brinksmanship, Iran's parliament postponed debate on a proposal immediately to halt oil deliveries to the EU, which accounts for 20 per cent of Tehran's exports of crude.

Despite postponing the parliamentary debate, Rostam Qasemi, Iran'senergy minister, promised that exports to some countries, which he did not name, would be ended "soon".

Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Tehran on a three-day mission to investigate the suspected military dimensions of Iran's nuclear programme to a flurry of anti-Western invective.

A damning report released by the body in November accused Iran of military-related atomic activities for the first time.

The visit comes when Iran's relationship with the West is a fraught as at any time in recent years after the regime reacted with fury to a decision by the EU and the US this month to sanction the country's central bank and oil sector.

Gold bouncing off lows...

Gold appears to be making a reversal at oversold and long term support levels breaking a 5 month downtrend. Notice the strong volume accumulation as The Fed announces negative interest rates until late 2014. This is bullish for precious metals. In early August through October we advised a hold and urged caution. Since it pulled back it provided two secondary buypoints where we said it is buying time while others preached that the gold and silver market bull market had ended. Now gold appears to be bouncing off our buypoints similar to January 2011 and regaining its 50 and 200 day to the upside. Now the weak hands will come back at much higher prices

http://goldstocktrades.com/blog/2012/01/27/long-term-trend-up-in-gold-and-silver-is-intact-look-for-high-quality-exploration-companies/

...A potent upward move in gold and silver in addition to the oversold miners (Gdx & ASR) is just beginning to occur. Our scenario was to maintain our long term core precious metal positions even though such a posture was temporarily painful as many analysts concluded wrongly that deflation, bonds and the U.S. dollar were the only safe harbors.

What about the U.S. dollar now? Note all the media hoopla that regaled us with strength of the dollar recently. News from Europe and Washington appears to be melting the U.S. Dollar under the cover of all of this stimulative warming. We have called for this surprise rally we are observing in the face of all this dollar and treasury hoopla. How uneasy must be the shorts who have been caught by this recent rise. Short sellers went into October’s market with the largest short position since 2008. Such a one-sided posture is often punished as the shorts run to cover and thereby add to the upward move.

Technically there have been gaps from 2011 that need to be filled on the upside in precious metals and miners. We note that institutions have been hit hard by the gold’s price decline. Hedge funds must’ve been selling stocks that they held in common in order to meet margin calls. Additionally this consideration may have influenced collateral damage among investors. Perhaps the current rise may indicate the recent downtrend has been broken to the upside.