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Ted Butler, silver position limits make Wall Street Journal, thanks to 'Charlie Sheen'
'Charlie Sheen': Secret Silver Investor?
By Katy Burne
Dow Jones Newswires
via The Wall Street Journal
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2011/03/08/charlie-sheen-secret-silver-investor/
Charlie Sheen loves tiger blood, machetes, and goddesses. But is he also a closet commodities fan?
A person writing under the name "Charlie Sheen," the disgraced sitcom actor, filed a comment with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission last week, and he recommended that the agency adopt more conservative position limits on derivatives tied to silver.
Market participants were buzzing about the appearance of Sheen's name in the otherwise low-gloss world of commodities.
(It's not as though silver bugs, already a crew prone to conspiracy theories about speculators and market manipulation, needed more reasons to worry.)
CFTC spokesman Dennis Holden was unable to confirm that the March 1 filing was posted under a bogus name. The letter attributed to Charlie Sheen was erased from the agency's archives on Tuesday following inquiries from Dow Jones Newswires.
... Dispatch continues below ...
Prophecy Resource Spins Off Platinum/Palladium Venture:
World-Class PGM Deposit in Yukon
Company Press Release, January 18, 2011
VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Prophecy Resource Corp. (TSX-V:PCY)and Pacific Coast Nickel Corp. announce that they have agreed that PCNC will acquire Prophecy's Nickel PGM projects by issuing common shares to Prophecy.
PCNC will acquire the Wellgreen PGM Ni-Cu and Lynn Lake nickel projects in the Yukon Territory and Manitoba respectively by issuing up to 550 million common shares of PCNC to Prophecy. PCNC has 55.7 million shares outstanding.
Following the transaction:
-- Prophecy will own approximately 90 percent of PCNC.
-- PCNC will consolidate its share capital on a 10 old for one new basis.
-- Prophecy will change its name to Prophecy Coal Corp. and PCNC will be renamed Prophecy Platinum Corp.
-- Prophecy intends to distribute half of its PCNC shares to shareholders pro-rata in accordance with their holdings.
Based on the closing price of the common shares of PCNC on January 17, $0.195 per share, the gross value of the transaction is $107,250,000.
For the complete announcement, please visit:
http://prophecyresource.com/news_2011_jan18.php
An identical memo was posted under the name of David J. Dunak, a self-described silver investor, on Feb. 24. In an interview on Tuesday, Dunak said he took cues for his wording from precious metals commentator Ted Butler. Other comments on the CFTC website also contain language that mirrors Butler's online commentary.
It's possible other silver investors also picked up similar language from Butler -- even a sitcom star recently fired from his day job, or stand-ins for Sheen.
On the website SilverSeek.com, Butler invites readers to "rattle on the cages" of the CFTC, among others, and lists the email addresses of CFTC staffers "for those who wish to contact the regulators." He provides a separate sample letter for regulators on the website of Investment Rarities Incorporated.
An email to Butler Research LLC, Butler's publishing company, was not immediately returned Tuesday.
Representatives at CBS, the network airing Sheen's former sitcom "Two and a Half Men," didn't immediately return requests for comment. Sheen couldn't be reached.
Dunak said he had no knowledge of the Sheen memo. "I don't assume any other identities," Dunak said. "I never have."
In "Charlie Sheen's" March 1 memo, the writer asks the CFTC to re-adjust its proposed position limits in silver.
"Sheen" says that the "current formula would result in a position limit of over 5,000 contracts for any single speculator." The memo writer said that limit is equivalent to 25 million ounces of silver. Only three mining companies worldwide produce that much silver each year.
It turns out that even real silver experts agree with "Charlie Sheen." Critics of the CFTC's proposed rules have called for a revised cap of 1,500 contracts or fewer to prevent market manipulation in silver.
If Charlie Sheen, Martin Sheen, or any other actors want to weigh in on the CFTC proposed rules, the agency's website is accepting comments through March 28.
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Sona Drills 85.4g Gold/Ton Over 4 Metres at Elizabeth Gold Deposit, Extending the Mineralization of the Southwest Vein on the Property
Company Press Release, October 27, 2010
VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Sona Resources Corp. reports on five drillling holes in the third round of assay results from the recently completed drill program at its 100 percent-owned Elizabeth Gold Deposit Property in the Lillooet Mining District of southern British Columbia. Highlights from the diamond drilling include:
-- Hole E10-66 intersected 17.4g gold/ton over 1.54 metres.
-- Hole E10-67 intersected 96.4g gold/ton over 2.5 metres, including one assay interval of 383g of gold/ton over 0.5 metres.
-- Hole E10-69 intersected 85.4g gold/ton over 4.03 metres, including one assay interval of 230g gold/ton over 1 metre.
Four drill holes, E10-66 to E10-69, targeted the southwestern end of the Southwest Vein, and three of the holes have expanded the mineralized zone in that direction. The Southwest Vein gold mineralization has now been intersected over a strike length of 325 metres, with the deepest hole drilled less than 200 metres from surface.
"The assay results from the Southwest Zone quartz vein continue to be extremely positive," says John P. Thompson, Sona's president and CEO. "We are expanding the Southwest Vein, and this high-grade gold mineralization remains wide open down dip and along strike to the southwest."
For the company's full press release, please visit:
http://sonaresources.com/_resources/news/SONA_NR19_2010.pdf
