Lots of talking heads are mumbling that this year's sell off will complete the wipe out of the Jr market. The average estimation is about 40%. I think it will be closer to 60%. I think we have to adapt to a permanent change. My first impressions were that the houses and exchanges would agree to stop producing shares that don't exist just so they could be sold short to drive down the entire market. After stdying this in more detail it appears that they are in cahoots over this quazi illigal activity. What appeared to be a glimmer of hope faded fast. They view the retail as a waste of energy and like gas companies who in league with politicos, forced you to pay before pumping (fradulently), are now working on ways to make this worse. You'll notice that our regulators have done nothing at all anywhere. The only time you see any action is when they know it will end up in court or on the public radar. The business of wanting a tax on trades won't be applied to the big guys. If it does it will be offset by the payments they receive but you and me, we'll pay in full.
It's looking like we won't have a Jr market next year. It will be here but it won't be people driven. It will be almost entirely machine driven. Currently they tell us that it's 60% but that does not tell us how much of the trading is in the venture alone. I'm betting it's a lot closer to 80%. Perhaps even 90%. Hard to believe? They have been asked to look into it but 2 years later, silence. I have a number of reasons to believe that cuu has been a victim of this foul play. These robo traders are allowed to create shares out of thin air and sell them at a loss. This is then registered on the share price despite the fact that the shares are not bought back. They can't be bought back, they never really existed! If you and I traded fake shares to others we'd be arrested. Not so for the big guys.
The majors know what's happening to the market. Given the prices you'd expect a flurry of buyouts. Not happening. Not going to happen either. They claim the little guys want too much but from where they stand it sure looks like they are just asking a fair price. The majors take the advantageous view of this being the market. They want Jrs to take a loss. In some cases I expect to see them make offers at cash value. The Jrs will have no place to turn. As bankrupcies become the norm the majors will reap the benefits. I know this is a hard reality to adapt your thinking to but this is chaos economics 101.
We are fortunate to have a desirable deposit and a money man. We may end up waiting for a long time to sell this if the majors can get deposits for free. We may have to start looking for finance. Consider this. The majority of deposits do not have a backer. They depend on the markets and lenders like Mineral Fields. Who is going to lend to an explorer under these conditions? No one. The people who have seen this coming are divesting their lending arms or leaving the companies entirely. It's looking like the only ones who have a chance of surviving are those with a backer who is interested in developing the deposit and they will have complete control over the price. You can quickly see that there won't be a point in being public.
