Another camp evacuated

As Barry Ritholtz kindly points out with regard to the margin adjustment that took a touch of lustre off the metal that will carry us to the promised land:

As of this Monday, the minimum cash deposit for trading gold futures will be $11,475 per 100-ounce contract — at $1700 per ounce, that is a $170,000 position. The leverage is nearly 15 to 1... At 15-1, a less than 7% move against you wipes out your capital entirely.

Much as the comment-section simians at the Millionth Monkey might have gone completely bananas, does anyone else note a slight disconnect between the 'safe haven' theory of the price of gold and the level of indebtedness used to get that mattress stuffed with it?

The chart shows occupation levels at various thought-to-be-welcoming economic refugee camps compared to the day before the Swiss National Bank started pitching the vagrants out. They are gold, the bund (that proxy for the new deutschmark), the Swiss franc and the US dollar. The shaded area depicts the disaster zone from whence they have fled. It's the Eurostoxx Banking Index.

Ourselves shuddering to think what would come out if he really tied one on, John Hempton thinks it's about to all fall apart in Euroland. But we're more tempted by the possibility that the Bund Camp is next on the list.

----------------------------