Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Happy New Year - Non-Farm Payrolls on Friday

“The Lord bless you
and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine upon you
and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face toward you
and give you peace.”

Numbers 6:24-26

The wiseguys managed to goose the stock indices up a bit into the close, but the overall performance of the markets into the year end is not a bang, but a whimper.

Gold and silver are pushing the breakouts.

There will be a Non-Farm payrolls report on Friday.

The trade tensions and government shutdown/dysfunction will continue to weigh on the markets in the coming year. Not to mention the lagging economic health of the broader public.

"Don't be surprised if we see these 1,000-point swings in the Dow. That is our new reality for a while," Mohamed El-Erian said.

Terrific. 

Need little, want less, love more. For those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.

Have a Happy New Year's day.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - In the Bleak Midwinter - The Holy Innocents

Merson The Flight Into Egypt

"What can I give Him,
Poor as I am? —
If I were a Shepherd
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a Wise Man
I would do my part, —
Yet what I can I give Him, —
Give my heart."

Christina Georgina Rossetti, A Christmas Carol


"And Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, 'Out of Egypt I called my son.'

Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent word to kill all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the magi."

Matthew 2:13-16

Pride and a love of self and of power makes families homeless— and in its rage murders innocents, as it was then and is now.

Stocks attempted to extend the government-sponsored 'rebound rally' today but with only mixed success, as they finished largely unchanged after a solid try to move higher.

Please note from the charts that this retracement rally is now at the 38.2% level on the Fibonacci index.

Next Monday will be a full day trading session, but the markets will be closed on Tuesday for New Year's Day.  Monday will be the last trading session of 2018.

Typically the day of New Year's eve is one of light trading, but in this market who can tell.

Gold and silver continued to move higher, planting a solid close as they appear to break out from their intermediate trend higher, from gold's bottom at 1159 in early August.

I have marked some new lines on the charts that may help us to track the price of gold as it climbs 'a wall of worry.' 

At some point the 'gold pool' of price management will collapse due to a dearth of physical gold at the current prices.  And then we may see a significant price adjustment, as has happened in the past after protracted periods of similar 'management' by the Banks.

There will be a Non-Farm Payrolls Report on Friday.

My son and I have been watching Narcos: Mexico on Netflix this week.  It is a very good extension to the series.

Have a pleasant weekend.

RussiaGate In Review with Aaron Mate - Unreasoned Fear is Neoliberalism's Response to the Credibility Gap

At the inception of this entire RussiaGate spectacle I suggested that it was a political distraction to take the attention away from the rejection by the people of neoliberalism which has been embraced by the establishments of both political parties.

And that the result of the investigation would be indictments for perjury in the covering up of illicit business deals and money laundering.  But that 'collusion to sway the election' was without substance, if not a joke.

Everything that has been revealed to date tends to support that.

One thing that Aaron overlooks is the evidence compiled by William Binney and associates that strongly suggests the DNC hack was no hack at all, but a leak by an insider who was appalled by the lies and double dealing at the DNC.

In general, RussiaGate is a farcical distraction from other issues as they say in the video. And this highlights the utterly Machiavellian streak in the corporate Democrats and the Liberal establishment under the Clintons and their ilk who care more about money and power than the basic principles that historically sustained their party. I have lost all respect for them.

But unfortunately this does open the door for those who use this to approve of the Republican establishment, which is 'at least honest' about being substantially corrupt servants to Big Money who care nothing about democracy, the Constitution, or the public.  The best of them are leaving or have already left, and their party is ruined beyond repair.

This all underscores the paucity of the Red v. Blue, monopoly of two parties, 'lesser of two evils' model of political thought which has come to dominate the discussion in the US.

We are heavily propagandized by the owners of the corporate media and influencers of the narrative, and a professional class that has sold its soul for economic advantage and access to money and power.





And here is a bit more from Nate Silver—

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Leaven of the Pharisees

"Moral hazard is a situation in which one party gets involved in a risky event knowing that it is protected against the risk and the other party will incur the cost. It arises when both the parties have incomplete information about each other."


“People with advantages are loathe to believe that they just happen to be people with advantages. They come readily to define themselves as inherently worthy of what they possess; they come to believe themselves 'naturally' elite; and, in fact, to imagine their possessions and their privileges as natural extensions of their own elite selves.”

C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite


“Instead of flooding the entire economy with liquidity, and thereby increasing the danger of inflation, the Fed could support the stock market directly by buying market averages in the futures market, thereby stabilizing the market as a whole.”

Robert Heller, Federal Reserve Board, 1989


“Only crime and the criminal, it is true, confront us with the perplexity of radical evil; but only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core.”

Hannah Arendt

A massive, 'price insensitive' buying program turned stocks around and closed them in the green.

Very impressive.

Some times when you have nothing nice to say, it is better to say nothing at all.

Our 'self-identified elite' on both sides of the ideological spectrum are most often unprincipled, delusional hypocrites, otherwise known as whited sepulchers.

Aren't they always?

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Making Stocks Great Again - Big Bounce Off Deeply Oversold

Feeding the beast

"They have record kinds of numbers.  So I think it's a tremendous opportunity to buy.   Really a great opportunity to buy."

D. J. Trump, 25 December 2018

As soon as Trump said the above on Christmas Day, I was fairly certain that my theory of why Treasury Secretary Mnuchin was calling the banks was correct.

The word came back to Trumpolini that the fix was in, and he could not resist making a statement to show what a great stock market trend caller he is.

Mnuchin did not need to know how the Banks were doing with regard to liquidity. And he certainly didn't need to let it slip that he was calling the Banks to the public.   He was getting Wall Street in line, and giving the other wiseguys out there a heads up so they would not get in the way.

And then Trump came out an hung a lantern on it.  It was like erecting three billboards proclaiming the official desire to 'Make Stocks Great Again.'

And so we saw the rescue of the stock markets today, in the first real, concerted attempt by government and business to pump that bubble back up.

And it worked fairly well.  And those who had faith in the bubble were rewarded.

And if you think that they did this for your benefit, you are rather foolish.

so another check has been paid to that great account marked, 'moral hazard.'

I was only a little surprised that they did not put their minds to this sooner in the decline.  Perhaps they needed for the oversold condition to work itself into place, and get a clear path for the ramp higher in the busy holiday schedule.

I did not watch television after the first couple of hours, because we went out and about with the company that is still here.    My son's girlfriend is a real sweetheart from Shanghai via London, and is a wonderful helper in the kitchen.

She has never seen an actual prime rib roast of size before.  And she was very much taken with the electric carving knife.  She kept volunteering to cut the roast for me.  She found the whole thing to be fascinating.  LOL.   Tonight we are going out for a hot pot dinner.  I am really enjoying all this.

I have marked the Fibonacci retracement levels on the charts. I may have to tinker with them a bit. The problem is where to mark the beginning of the decline.

Let's see how long they can keep this pig aloft.

Gold and silver were higher most of the day, with silver hanging on but gold given up its safe haven gain.

Have a pleasant evening.

Humility Saves Us From Foolishness

“As long as you are proud you cannot know God.  A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you...

True humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself, less."

C. S. Lewis


"Further, all of us should be kind and helpful to one another, and carry ourselves with humility: for God is set against the proud, but graciously favours the humble."

1 Peter 5:5


And how did little Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content.

"As good as gold," said Bob, "and better.  Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard.  He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see."

Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol


"It seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances.  The fact that the foolish person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent.

In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with him as a person, but with slogans, catchwords, and the like that have taken possession of him.  He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being.

Having thus become a mindless tool, the foolish person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings...

Only the humble believe in Him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that He does wonders where people despair, that He takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly.

God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; He loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken...

In the Incarnation the whole human race recovers the dignity of the image of God. Thereafter, any attack even on the least of men is an attack on Christ, who took on the form of man, and in his own Person restored the image of God in all.

Through our relationship with the Incarnation, we recover our true humanity, and at the same time are delivered from that perverse individualism which is the consequence of sin, and recover our solidarity with all mankind."

Dietrich Bonhoeffer


"And so Jesus gave us a new norm of greatness.  If you want to be important—wonderful.  If you want to be recognized—wonderful.  If you want to be great—wonderful.  But recognize that he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.

That's a new definition of greatness.  And this morning, the thing that I like about it: by giving that definition of greatness, it means that everybody can be great, because everybody can serve."

Martin Luther King, The Drum Major Instinct

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - A Banquet of Consequences, a Celebration of Love

"The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them a light has shined."

Is 9:1


"An angel of the Lord appeared to the shepherds, and the glory of the Lord shone around them."

Lk 2:9

After the market action today one has to wonder if we will be hearing 'Santa Claus Is Coming to Town' or 'Nearer My God To Thee' in the trading houses and watering holes of the financial elite around the world.

Perhaps now it is easier to understand why Goldman was standing for so many gold contracts over the past month for their 'house account.'

What if I told you, with a reasonable amount of confidence with supporting facts about what would come next, would you listen to it?  Would you act upon it?

Or would it just enter into that great flood of data, hardly worth being called information, from which people pick and choose what to see and hear, based on whatever favors the narrative which best suits their personal prejudices, preferences, and desires of the moment?  This is the power of madness, or perhaps better said, the madness of power.

Tomorrow is Christmas Day, and we will have a house full of guests for Christmas dinner and the exchange of presents, and all that goes with it.  We are having a prime rib, and creamed spinach, and mashed potatoes with gravy, and a few other odds and ends that are traditional accompaniments for a Christmas dinner with friends and family.  The latest headcount is twelve to fourteen.

The young man is at the airport picking up his girlfriend who is coming in from London.  This will be the first chance I will have had to meet her in person.  I wonder who is more nervous, me or her.

I wish Mary was here, for any number of reasons, but mostly because her judgement and instincts on so many of the things that are truly important in this life were sound, empathetic, if not almost uncannily unerring.  I sought her opinion and counsel on everything (except anything mechanical).   She made me human.  She was my best friend.

I will see you on Wednesday.   I may post a little something tomorrow as the holiday permits.

Need little, want less, love more.   For those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.

Merry Christmas.

Have a pleasant holiday.

Rick Steves' European Christmas

"Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveler, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home.”

Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers



"At one time, most of my friends could hear the bell, but as years passed, it fell silent for all of them.  Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound.  Though I've grown old, the bell still rings for me, as it does for all who truly believe."

Chris Van Allsburg, The Polar Express



"This is quite the season indeed for friendly meetings.  At Christmas every body invites their friends about them, and people think little of even the worst weather.  I was snowed up at a friend's house once for a week.  Nothing could be pleasanter."

Jane Austen, Emma

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Bubbles Are Made By Men To End in Slaughter - A Savage Garden

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever."

Thomas Jefferson, Notes On the State of Virginia


"An evil and faithless generation demands a sign.  But no sign will be given it, except for the sign of Jonah."

Matthew 16:4


"Do not be deceived, for God is not mocked.  What a man sows, so shall he reap."

Galatians 6:7

Stocks once again went out on the lows after an early attempt to find a footing and rally.

After the failure to hold the rally after the European market close, it became fairly apparent that it was going to be another ugly day of a slow death by a thousand cuts.

It is frustrating, because those who did not act on the signs of the mispricing of risks in this blow off bubble top are most likely locked into their losses now by fear, and 'advice' from the salesmen for mispriced financial assets.

Thank God we bailed out the financial industry, and then undermined any attempts to reform and regulate their excesses.  The vampire squids of Wall Street must be fed.  Sham wow.

Gold and silver were off a bit as the Dollar was higher.

There will be a half day session on Monday, which is Christmas eve.

The markets will be closed on Tuesday in observance of Christmas day.

Remember to feed the least of His creatures, the birds of the air and animals of the field, during these hard months. And feed the hearts of those you meet, with a friendly word and a smile. Each person you meet carries a burden, and it may be lightened with a simple act of kindness.

Need little, want less, love more. For those who abide in God abide in them, and God in them.

Have a pleasant weekend.