“There is only one kind of shock worse than the totally unexpected: the expected for which one has refused to prepare.”
Mary Renault, The Charioteer
"The dictatorship, and the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting. It provided an excuse not to think for people who did not want to think anyway. I do not speak of your ‘little men,’ your baker and so on; I speak of my colleagues and myself, learned men, mind you. Most of us did not want to think about fundamental things and never had. There was no need to.
Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-1945
"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.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers From Prison
If today was the fourth Friday in June then this must have been thee annual rebalancing of the Russell 2000.
And so about 40% of the daily volume in equities came in the last five minutes of trading.
Gold and the dollar finished higher, while silver slumped a little with stocks.
VIX remains comparatively complacent.
Next Tuesday the 27th will be a precious metals futures option expiration on the Comex.
Have a pleasant weekend.
