Initial GATA Announcement

Le Metropole members,

GATA is pleased to announce that we are now ready to make an all out effort to mobilize the gold community to confront those that we believe may have colluded to hold down the price of gold.

Our web site www.gata.org can be viewed on the internet and explains what the Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee is about. As the construction of our internet site has been completed, we are ready to accelerate the contribution phase of our campaign.

This week we will be contacting gold companies around the world to elucidate our position and solicit their financial support. We will explain that we believe various financial institutions in the U.S. have colluded to hold down the price of gold. We intend to launch an investigation into the Long Term Capital Management bailout, the Counterparty Risk Management Group and to other situations that have been brought to our attention.

It is also our position that many of these financial institutions are short hundreds of tonnes of gold as a result of "gold carry" trade positions. We believe that, as a group, their short positions are greater than one year's mine supply. We believe they know this is a very dangerous position to be carrying and that is why they may have "colluded" to keep the gold price from rising. It is our intention to expose the size of this short position.

Second, we are going encourage everyone associated with the gold community to support GATA. We would like them to verbally announce their support, make a financial contribution if possible and, if they have a website, to set up a mutually beneficial link up to www.gata.org.

It is our goal to raise the funds necessary to retain the services of an anti-trust law firm that will spearhead the investigation.

Thus far, we have had serious discussions with Philadelphia based, Berger & Montague on the issues we are raising. It is our goal to retain them as our attorneys. The karma seems right. Senior partner, Merrill Davidoff, became a member of www.lemetropolecafe.com the day before I appeared on CNBC in behalf of GATA. As a result of that appearance on TV, committee members, John Meyer and Chris Powell and I flew to Philadelphia to meet with Davidoff and two other Berger & Montague attorneys.

Davidoff is extremely knowledgeable about the gold market and has a very good grasp on the fundamentals of the gold industry. Berger and Montague won a $2 billion settlement in the Drexel Burnham/Michael Milken case, and, among many other cases was, or is, a litigant in the Exxon Valdez case, the Orange County case, one of the tobacco cases and one of the holocaust cases.

The Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee believes that we have enough momentum now to raise the funds necessary to retain a law firm of this caliber and to carry our agenda forward.

We ask you for your support and contributions.

All the best,

Bill Murphy
Chairman
GATA