If you haven't heard, we're giving out free, fully smart contracts as a 5% rebate to anyone who purchases any of our research packages above the introductory novice $50 level. This is not your Daddy's rebate! The rebate actually gets larger as DB goes down in price. For those who may be coming late to the party, we can offer a 5x long gold (or even a long gold, short DB) smart contract rebate as well. Of course, the bulk of our research targets banks and entities other than DB, but I thought we'd make DB the subject of the rebate to drive the point home. Below is an actual contract crafted off of the price of a single share of DB for about 2 weeks.

Click here to explore and subscribe to our research. You will have to be willing to fully identify yourself and comply to the terms or our program (in essence, promise not to use the package for anything other than our rebate) in order to qualify for the rebate. Once the subsciption is paid for, email us to get started.

Oh yeah, if you haven't heard...

An Analysis of Deutsche Bank's Likely Recapitalization - German Tax Payer Bailout or German Bank Depositor Bail-in?

Deutsche Bank is going to need some money, and it's going to need some quite soon. The next two or three articles that I write will focus on why there is such a need. In a concerted effort to reduce or potentially eliminated the risk of taxpayer-funded bail-outs of European banks, the EU implemented a new “bail-in” regime beginning on January 1, 2016. As such, rules which require banks and certain systemically significant market participants in EU member states will have to write-down, cancel, convert into equity or otherwise modify certain unsecured liabilities if such steps are required to recapitalize the institution. What is the most bountiful unsecured liabilities of a bank? Read more...

Our next article will continue to hammer home the liklhood that DB will have to recapitalize, and where they probably WONT'T be getting the money from, as well as the likelihood it will come from someone who really didn't plan on giving it up (Ahem, depositors/savers/checking account holders). For those who are not yet convinced, peruse these related items...

The research and knowledge subscription module "European Bank Contagion Assessment, Forensic Analysis & Valuation" contains a full report of a very large European Deutsche Bank counterparty that faces a full 27% downside from current levels. It appears as if no one suspects a clue. It also contains much, much more (including at least 3 to 5 suspect banks). We can break this apart a la carte, if requested.

As excerpted:

The Macro Scene for Italian Banks

• Italian Banks:The Impact of Rising NPLs
   

   

  2m 45s

  
• The IMF has always been overly optimistic when it comes to Italy
   

   

  1m

  
• European banks' exposures to oil and gas
   

   

  2m

  
• Impact of Negative Interest Rate Policy
   

   

  15m

  
• Domiciles That Don't Look Good
   

   

  5m

  

This Bank as Ground Zero

• Putting the Ground Zero Bank into Perspective Re: Germany and the EU
   

   

  5m

  
• Ground Zero & It's Counterparties - Contagion Risk
   

   

  5m

  
• Ground Zero's Adverse Counterparty Risk Movement
   

   

  5m

  
• Systemic Risks
   

   

   

  

Susceptible Bank 1: Strong Country, Suspect Global Bank - Key Performance

• Negative Interest Rate Come to More Banks
   

   

  30m

  
• Susceptible Bank 1: Common Equity Returns
   

   

  4m

  
• 2Q2016 Basic Financial Results
   

   

  3m

  
• 2Q2016 Division-wise Performance
   

   

  5m

  
• 2Q2016 Net Interest Margin & Fee Income
   

   

  4m

  
• 2Q2016 Funds Under Management
   

   

  1m

  
• 2Q2016 Performance by Geography - Europe
   

   

  4m

  
• 2Q2016 Performance by Geography - North America
   

   

  2m 30s

  
• 2Q2016 Performance by Geography - Asia
   

   

  3m

  
• 2Q2016 Performance by Geography - Latin America & MENA
   

   

  1m

  
• 2Q2016 Gross loans and advances Personal/Consumer
   

   

  4m

  
• 2Q2016 Gross loans and advances Corporate/Commercial
   

   

  4m

  
• 2Q2016 Gross loans and advances Financial Loans
   

   

  1m 30s

  
• 2Q2016 In Summary
   

   

  45s

  

Susceptible Bank 1: Financial Modeling

• Susceptible Bank 1: Forensics,Valuation & Contagion Risk Assessment
   

   

  40m

  

Enter Italy's "Bear Stearns" 2Q2106

• The Metrics
   

   

  5m

  
• The Subprime Bank That Puts Bear Stearns to Shame
   

   

  5m

  
• Breakdown by sector of “off-statement of financial position”
   

   

  3m

  
• Parallels to Bear Stearns Before it Popped
   

   

   

  
• The Notional Value Argument Often Used By Entities Taking Large Losses
   

   

   

  
• In closing, excessive leverage brings us right back to 2008 again…
   

   

  3m

  

Enter Italy's "Lehman Brothers"

• Income Statement – 9M2015 vs 9M2014 – A short analysis
   

   

  2m

  
• Net Interest Income Analysis
   

   

  3m

  
• Customer Loan Quality
   

   

  3m

  
• Financial Assets
   

   

  3m

  
• Financial Derivatives
   

   

  3m

  
• Fair value adjustments in hedge accounting: details of income items - Banking Group
   

   

  2m

  
• Fair value adjustments in hedge accounting: details of income items
   

   

  2m

This is the 4th installment of our public service announcements on Deutsche Bank subsidiary, Xetra-Gold's gold note offerings. Since a lot has been covered already, it's advisable that you read the first 3 articles to catch up:

1. Veritaseum Knowledge Exposes Frightening Counterparty Risk At Deutsche Bank for "Gold Investors"
2. Is Deutsche Bank Prepping for Fraud Charges Against It's Gold Derivative Products?

3. The Debate on the Potential of Fraudulent Actions At Deutsche Bank Subsidiary, Xetra-Gold

Now, that we have determined that Deutsche Bank subsidiary Xetra-Gold "may" not have been fraudulent, mainly because they stated in their prospectus things that contradict and befuddle the misleading things they stated in their marketing material, we are left to ponder, "Well, we know the offering was unethical, but was it illegal?" Unfortunately, I'm not a lawyer thus cannot accurately opine on such. Alas, I can speculate as a laymen. The Xetra-Gold derivatives were offered in the UK, as well as several other jurisdictions. Let's peruse the UK perspective via the FCA in the difference between clear and misleading financial advertising:

"Financial adverts and promotions can be misleading for many reasons, but there are some questions you can consider to help you spot and avoid misleading financial adverts, such as: ... Are there important points that are only shown in the small print?"

Hmm... Let's take a look at the Xetra-Gold advertisement, and cross reference it to it's prospectus:

You guys tell me, is this a blatant case of false advertising, or is it not? Let me know in the comment section below. It's not as if DB is totally innocent in these matters, for they just signed a consent order admitting the manipulation of gold prices. This goes deeper than many may care to admit. Deutsche bank seems to be dumping its gold exposure, and what better way to dump it than to sell it unsuspecting gold derivative note buyers. This is how it could be going down...

Deutsche Bank, through it's Xetra-Gold subsidiary, has a guaranteed, zero premium call option.

1. DB/Xetra-Gold accepts money from investors who are told they are buying gold, from “an economic perspective”.
2. DB/Xetra-Gold takes money that was supposed to buy gold (at least in the eyes of many investors) and does whatever they want with it (which could include buying gold) because gold delivery on demand is not guaranteed and the investors have been disclaimed against ownership of, and rights to, the gold underlying as well as price correlation, and failure to deliver.
3. If the price of gold goes up, DB/Xetra-Gold can fail to deliver (as disclaimed) and keep the capital gains profits. They don't even have to match the price of the gold underlying. or return the initial investment.
4. If the price of gold goes down, DB can deliver gold on demand and keep the spread from gold spot and the price originally charged for the gold notes.

This is good work, if you can get it, no? 

This is how a company like DB can have over 90% in profitable trading days, because they never had a chance of losing in the first place. The losses belong to their clients! This is speculation, of course (wink, wink). Now, legal eagles say that we can't scream fraud, because Deutsche clearly says they have the motivation to, and the ability to, rip you off in their prospectus (but not in their marketing materials).

Which leads us to the end of "The Debate on the Potential of Fraudulent Actions At Deutsche Bank Subsidiary, Xetra-Gold", where John Titus (see his videos at the end of this article at the bottom) explained to me after I queried about misleading and contradictory marketing materials:

I asked, "If marketing materials are negatively contradicted by the prospectus then the marketing materials are fraudulent and misrepresentative, no?" He replied...

Hmmm... On that note, let's take a look at whether DB has been a net buyer or net seller of gold exposure. Remember, Goldman, sold MBS structures to clients and then took big short positions betting against their own clients, reference "Goldman 'bet against securities it sold to clients'.

The subcommittee also released four internal Goldman Sachs emails. In one, says a subcommittee statement: "Goldman employees discussed the ups and downs of securities that were underwritten and sold by Goldman and tied to mortgages issued by Washington Mutual Bank's sub-prime lender, Long Beach Mortgage Company. Reporting the 'wipe-out' of one Long Beach security and the 'imminent' collapse of another as 'bad news' that would cost the firm $2.5m, a Goldman Sachs employee then reported the 'good news' – that the failure would bring the firm $5m from a bet it had placed against the very securities it had assembled and sold."

Goldman is fighting to clear its name after the $1bn fraud charges brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission last week, and wants the case settled in court.

The movie, "The Big Short" dramatized this rather well.

Well, guess what it looks like Deustche has been doing...

Deustche has been a net seller of foreign exchange risk, which includes (wait for it now, and guess....) gold! They probably were not cash sellers, but purchased swaps to reduce exposure, possibly along the parameters I mentioned above with the guaranteed, zero premium call option.

If you enjoy this free analysis, there's much more where this came from as we pick apart many other banks in our paid research and knowledge modules. WE just finished a true forensic valuation (very extensive, and detailed analysis) of a very large European bank that led to a huge short recommendation. Subscribe here and pass the word. Our bank analyses have performed very well in 2016, with Banco Popular and Banco Popular Milano doing roughly 40% to 80% in theoretical returns (contingent on how the positions were taken). We have done an excellent job historically as well, calling the fall of Bear Stearns, Lehman, Countrywide, GGP, etc. If you think the free stuff is intense, you should see the stuff that we sell!

How can Deutsche Bank destroy the EU? Capital fight and extreme, involuntary deleveraging. DB is closing nearly 200 German bank branches. Not a big deal, right? German bank's depositor base is 111% of German GDP. A run on German banks is literally a run on the German economy - the largest economy in Europe...

...not to mention a major (the major) funding source for DB's massive derivative positions.  

Current news events don't portend a positive outcome for Germany's largest bank either. Bloomberg reports: NordLB Boosts Shipping Provisions Five-Fold, Warns of High Loss

Norddeutsche Landesbank boosted provisions for bad loans nearly fivefold to 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion), as Germany’s biggest shipping lender prepares for its first full-year loss since 2009.

NordLB, controlled by the state of Lower Saxony, posted a loss of 406 million euros in the first half as it battles a prolonged slump in maritime markets, including eight years of crisis in the container segment. That compares with a profit of 290 million euros in the same period last year.

“The shipping crisis, which further intensified in the first half of the year, has necessitated impairments that were higher than planned,” Chief Executive Officer Gunter Dunkel said in a statement. The bank lowered its outlook for the year, now anticipating a “significant” loss. It had projected a “negative result” in the spring.

... NordLB’s pessimistic view highlights risks at other German banks, which hold roughly one-quarter of the about 400 billion euros in global shipping loans. Under pressure to unwind sour legacy maritime assets, banks including HSH Nordbank AG and Commerzbank AG are also trying to shrink their loan books.

 What does this have to do with Deutsche Bank? A lot! Because everybody wants to sell these assets that aren't considered very desirable, and all at the same time, we've made a bad situation worse - precisely when DB can't afford it.

Then there's the issue of DB's somewhat questionable assumptions and characteristics in its financial reporting. Deutsche Bank addendums are quoted as saying:

"The credit risk on the securities purchased under resale agreements and securities borrowed designated under the fair value option is mitigated by the holding of collateral. The valuation of these instruments takes into account the credit enhancement in the form of the collateral received. As such there is no material movement during the year or cumulatively due to movements in counterparty credit risk on these instruments."

What???!!! So, the value of collateral doesn't move now? On planet Earth, not only does the value of collateral move, it tends to move in the exact same direction as the value of the loan, borrowing or underlying, often at an exaggerated pace in the beginning (it's markets are the first to know of turmoil). Reference my podcast interview with Max Keiser at the 2:40 marker. Want some more? Read this page from our EU banking report a couple of quarters ago...

For those who don't believe me, I made this call in early 2008 - twice. Once for Bear Stearns (Is this the Breaking of the Bear?) and once for Lehman Brothers (Is Lehman really a lemming in disguise? Thursday, February 21st, 2008 | Web chatter on Lehman Brothers Sunday, March 16th, 2008). Was I right? Of course, that was then and this is now, so the banks are better prepared, right? Of course. The graphic below was taken from our Banco Popular report (click here for more info), not from 8 years ago, but from a quarter ago - yes, 2016! Hey, there's more...

Now, just imagine that Italy's Banco Popular is the entity that DB used to hedge it's exposure, and Banco Popular (obviously) can't pay up on every(any?)thing. DB's gross exposure become's DB's net exposure as DB's notion value and market value converge near instantaneously if (or when) market shoots off in one direction (you can likely guess what direction that would be for stakeholders, and this time around that includes depositors and bondholders, not just shareholders).

What does this all mean?  Well, we went through this in explicit detail and have identified no less than 6 (and we're still actively looking) financial institutions that may have passed the EBA stress tests, but have miserably failed our examination - and that's without adding in the bank contagion factor!

To partake in this knowledge, join Veritaseum University and purchase the interactive research asset called "European Bank Contagion Assessment, Forensic Analysis & Valuation".

With nearly a billion USD invested in blockchain related startups over the last two years, even the true luddites are starting to take notice. Most still have no idea what this tech is capable of, so my job is to show all the light. On that note, I present a step-by-step guide to Collateralizing and Ensuring Physical Delivery of Gold Through the Blockchain - Faster, Cheaper, Safer!

What many may not realize is that Veritaseum, when used with our commoditized intellectual capital (Veritas), can actually move the value of, and secure, physical assets through the blockchain. This is the trade architecture from a high level.

If one where to speculate or hedge the value of gold, you can receive the price value of gold in exchange for USD (or EUR, or even forex pairs such as EURUSD, or even other assets such as copper). The Veritaseum contract would look like this...

This is a speculative/hedging contract receiving the derivative gold price and paying the derivative USD price over the weekend to NYSE market close on Monday. Yes! This is cool, but suppose you actually wanted to take physical delivery of said gold rather than take cash settled exposure? Well, to do that you still enter into this contract with the seller of said gold, but set the expiry date at time certain in the future for physical delivery of said gold (to be provided and guaranteed by the transportation service). Let's assume that time and date is as stated above. Said transportation service feeds into the Veritaseum system (via a custom implementation created through a Veritas purchase) and upon delivery confirmation of the physical gold the contract unwinds and the seller gets the buyer's funds plus a refund of their deposit which is put up as BTC collateral linked to the USD price - essentially paying him in USD up front - but locked into the blockchain. The buyer of the physical gold has been hedged into the GLD price this entire time and exchanges his gold-linked BTC for actual physical gold upon arrival as this BTC is released to the physical gold seller along with his USD-linked deposit. With such an arrangement, the gold purchase transaction can literally happen immediately, with all parties hedged into their respected requested exposures as they await physical delivery of the underlying.

If the physical gold does not arrive for whatever reason, the buyer still has his direct gold price exposure - basically a win-win situation. If the seller did not deliver the physical gold, then he/she will be forced to pay as if they sold and delivered the gold anyway by being exposed to USD price exposure relative gold and not receiving that deposit back until the end of the contract - whose expiry was defined as provable physical delivery of the gold.

But what about being exposed to BTC price volatility?

For those who do not want to be exposed to BTC volatility, simply open the advanced tab on the markets tab/interface and lever the contract to "outrun" your perceived exposure to BTC volatility. If you feel bitcoin will have an 4% standard deviation and you lever 5x, you will significantly mute said price delta in your trade results (the actual amount of leverage to use can be calculated using our trade modeling spreadsheet - in this case, 5x is rather excessive for an expected 4% STD).

This what that "smart contract" would look like...

This is what the entire trade would look like, levered 5x with BTC featuring 4% volatility.

Download the Veritaseum wallet and all tools needed to conduct this transaction (sans the physical gold and BTC, of course) here. Purchase Veritas (our tradeable Intellectual Commodity token) here.

Feel free to contact me directly here - I love to chat.