Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Defy the World With Your Faithfulness

 

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You trust in God. Trust also in me."

John 14:1 

"Our hearts are continually prone to wander from Him; prosperity and enjoyment all too easily satisfy us, dull our spiritual perception, and unfit us for full communion with Himself.  It is an unspeakable mercy that the Father comes with His chastisement, makes the world round us all dark and unattractive, leads us to feel more deeply our sinfulness, and for a time lose our joy in what was becoming so dangerous.  

Though He has indeed no pleasure in afflicting us, He will not keep back even the most painful chastisement if He can but thereby guide His beloved child to come home."

Andrew Murray, Abide in Christ, 1895

"Do not be afraid little flock, for your Father delights to welcome you into His kingdom."

Luke 12:32

"Defy the world with love, and a light will come into your life. If we love and serve the Lord, as He loves us, we need have no fear, despite our human weakness.  Do not fear the blowing and bluster of men, for as you will see soon enough they are but shadows, a tempest of dust, for a day. 

Jesus, I trust in you."

Jesse, Nous, Les Petits de Dieu, 17 January 2025

"To escape the pain caused by regret for the past or fear about the future, this is the rule to follow: leave the past to the infinite mercy of God, the future to His good Providence, and give the present wholly to His love by being faithful to His grace.”

Jean-Pierre de Caussade, L'Abandon a la Providence Divine

 

Our starry-eyed markets finally shook off their Panglossian mispricing of risk.  

At least for a day.   Ahead of a long holiday weekend.

Stocks fell.

VIX ticked up off its recent lows.

The Dollar chopped sideways. 

Gold and silver exploded higher in what looked like a flight to safety.

A nice way to say goodby to August, and look forward to the three day weekend with the national holiday on Monday.

There are quite a few things one can be concerned about: the lopsided economy, the erosion of personal freedom, the undermining of the Constitution, complicity with  mass murder, the normalization of aggressive war, and the moral decline and servile corruption of the Western elite.   

We see the darkness and madness advancing, in a most shameful moment in history.  And we are at the center of it.

Jesus, I trust in you. 

Have a pleasant weekend. 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - All the Poets Can Do Is Warn

 

“This book is not about heroes.
English poetry is not yet fit to speak of them.
Nor is it about deeds, or lands, nor anything about glory,
honour, might, majesty, dominion, or power,
except War.
Above all I am not concerned with Poetry.
My subject is War, and the pity of War.
The Poetry is in the pity.

You shall not hear their mirth:
You shall not come to think them well content
By any jest of mine. These men are worth
Your tears. You are not worth their merriment.
Yet these elegies are not to this generation,
          This is in no sense consolatory.

They may be to the next.
All the poet can do to-day is to warn.
That is why the true Poets must be truthful.
If I thought the letter of this book would last,
I might have used proper names;
but if the spirit of it survives Prussia,—
my ambition and those names will be content;
for they will have achieved themselves
fresher fields than Flanders.”

Wilfrid Owen, Poems, 1920

For from the least to the greatest,
     they are greedy for unjust gain;
     and from prophet to priest,
     they all deal falsely.
They treat the wounds of my people carelessly,
     saying, Peace, peace,
     when there is no peace.
They act shamefully, they commit abominations;
     yet they have no shame,
     they do not know how to blush.
Therefore they shall fall among those who fall;
     at the time of my judgement, they shall be overthrown."

Jeremiah 6:13-15

Stocks managed to pull together a rally, shaking off some geopolitical and corporate concerns.

What, me worry?

VIX fell again.

The Dollar dropped further.

Gold and silver rallied in a flight to safety (or from insanity).

Assuming the stock market shakes off its bubble excess,  which can unfold in several ways and several time frames, gold looks poised to run to 4000.   

It *could* happen in a significant flight to safety sooner than we expect.

I am not quite as keen about this, given the economic damage from which gold (and silver) will rise.

But certainly the metals are no cause of this, but simply an effect, an indicator, of disastrous mismanagement. 

We are so foolish to allow such scoundrels and grifters to set the course of our societies.

Nothing is inevitable.   There is always a choice, another way.

Unfortunately most are choosing to look on and say nothing, until trouble comes to their doorsteps. 

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Abyss From Which There Is No Return

 

"Through his first year in Germany [1933], Dodd had been struck again and again by the strange indifference to atrocity that had settled over the nation, the willingness of the populace and the moderate elements in the government to accept each new oppressive decree, each new act of violence, without protest.  Dodd continued to hope that the murders would so outrage the German public that the [Hitler] regime would fall, but as the days passed he saw no evidence of any such outpouring of anger.  The controlled press, not surprisingly, praised Hitler for his decisive behaviour."

Erik Larson, In The Garden of Beasts, 2011

"Around the world, authoritarian leaders are on the rise.  They're working from a common playbook:  They use violent rhetoric.  They attack the media.  They see their political rivals as existential enemies to the nation.  Demagogues are willing to do or say anything to gain office or to consolidate their power.  Unconstrained by ideology, they have no concern for the consequences of their actions.  Anything that serves to make them more powerful is good enough for them — even if the political system that facilitated their rise should be destroyed in the process."

Daniel Ziblatt, Saving Democracy from Demagogues, 2022

"It can only be hoped that American democracy will thoroughly realize, before it is too late, that fascism is not confined to any one nation or any one party; and it is to be hoped that it will succeed in overcoming the tendency toward dictatorial forms in the people themselves. Only time will tell whether the Americans will be able to resist the compulsion of irrationality or whether they will succumb to it.”

Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism, 1933

"A society which respects civil liberty realizes that the freedom of its people is built, in large part, upon their privacy.  Those who love the twilight speak as if public education must be training in conformity.  We have also seen a sharpening and refinement of abusive power.  The legislative investigation has too frequently been used by the Nation and the States as a means for effecting the disgrace and degradation of private persons.  Unscrupulous demagogues have used the power to investigate as tyrants of an earlier day used the bill of attainder.”

John F. Kennedy, Opinion Piece, Boston Herald, October 1960

"If this government ever became a tyrant, if a dictator ever took charge in this country, the technological capacity that the intelligence community has given the government could enable it to impose total tyranny.   That is the abyss from which there is no return." 

Senator Frank Church, Meet The Press, 17 August 1975 

The silence among the Western elites in support of the worst wars of aggression and  mass murder that have been seen since the last World War is truly astonishing. 

We are expected to watch the actions of men who have become beasts in their lust for wealth and power, and say nothing.

Shame.  They have none, so we must be ashamed for them, that they can walk unashamed among free people. 

Stocks muddled around today, with a fair lack of conviction.

Gold and silver had a bit of a pop as the Dollar did a bit of a drop.

VIX is still quiescent.

How bad this is going to be is still hard to tell.  But it will end, badly. 

But be not deceived— God is not mocked. Whatever a man sows, so shall he reap."

The night approaches.

Have a pleasant evening. 

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Power Elite: Handmaidens of Death

 

“In reading the History of Nations, we find that, like individuals, they have their whims and their peculiarities, their seasons of excitement and recklessness, when they care not what they do.  We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it.”

Charles Mackay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, 1841

"Greed compels the materially obsessed to obtain the greatest piles of chips, but in the long term renders their chips to be almost worthless because they are unable to stop their fraud and plundering, even when it is in their best interests.  They are not governed by rationality or conscience or even common sense.  For periods of time oligarchies are able to survive in an uneasy equilibrium enforced by power, but ultimately these wickedly wealthy wither and die on their great piles of gains."

Jesse, Crony Capitalism, 17 December 2010

"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, 1956

“The ambition of Caesar and of Napoleon pales before that which could not rest until it had seized the minds of men and controlled even their unborn thoughts.”

Robert W. Chambers, The King In Yellow, 1895

"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.  The incarnate Lord makes his followers the brothers of all mankind."

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship, 1937


Stocks were slumping early in the day, but managed to find a footing and end the day in the green.

It's a familiar story of late.   Plop and prop.

Gold and silver both gained after early losses.  

Today was an option expiration for the metal futures on Comex.  

This monthly contract is more significant for silver than for gold. 

The Dollar chopped around and finished a little higher. 

VIX followed stocks pop and flop.

I think this market is dancing on the rim of a volcano, for a number of reasons previously stated.

But that's just my judgement, and it could be wrong.  

But it influences my positions and play in the markets.

I also think that some of my largest concerns about the course of events in the world are slowly coming to fruition.   

Pride fosters a lust for power and money, lawlessness and greed, that ultimately kills.  

And both are on full display in the Western countries.   Murder and lies.  It's their generational signature.

"You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies."    John 8:44

The only force that can stand against this is love, empowered by faithfulness to the implications of the Incarnation.

Evil cannot comprehend, much less overcome, the powerful love of the cross, the symbol of humility and service.

Have a pleasant evening.