Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Racketeers

 

“Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die.  No one told them that dollars and cents were the real reason.  No one mentioned to them, as they marched away, that their going and their dying would mean huge war profits.  They were just told it was to be a 'glorious adventure'.

War is a racket.  It always has been.  It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives. Only a small 'inside' group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes."

Smedley Butler, War Is a Racket, 1935

"Investors placed a bet worth about $760 million on a falling oil price around 20 minutes before Iran's foreign minister announced on Friday that the Strait of Hormuz was open, ‌another sizeable wager on the world's most traded commodity ahead of major announcements in the course of the Middle East war. Large, well‑timed trades in recent months ​have drawn concern from U.S. lawmakers and legal experts that decisions around war and diplomacy can give some traders an ⁠edge in volatile and opaque derivatives markets."

Amanda Cooper, Traders Place Big Bet On Falling Oil, Reuters, 17 April 2026

"Seyyed Mohammad Mehdi Tabatabaei, a spokesperson for the Iranian presidency, dismissed claims made by U.S. President Donald Trump as 'baseless statements of the enemy,' including his claim that Iran agreed to never close the Strait of Hormuz again. Tabatabaei added that if the U.S. reneges on its promises, they will face 'dire consequences'."

Al Jazeera, 17 April 2026

"Wars do not usually result from just causes but from pretexts. There probably never was a just cause why men should slaughter each other by wholesale, but there are such things as ambition, selfishness, folly, madness, in communities as in individuals, which become blind and bloodthirsty, not to be appeased save by havoc, and generally by the killing of somebody else than themselves."

William Tecumseh Sherman, Michigan Military Academy, 19 June 1879

"This week, I am introducing legislation to end a war that should have ended long ago, the war in Afghanistan. The United States has been fighting The War on Terror since October of 2001 and it has cost 6 trillion dollars."

Senator Rand Paul, Repeal the 2001 Authorization for Military Force, March 5, 2019

“The war is waged by the ruling group against its own subjects and its object is not the victory over either Eurasia or East Asia, but to keep the structure of society intact. The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous.”

George Orwell, 1984, June 1949 

 

Today was a stock market index option expiration. 

Markets exploded higher on the news that Iran is offering to continue to discuss the cessation of hostilities given the recent ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, which was one of their key negotiating conditions.

There seems to be some discontinuity between what has been agreed and what is being reported.

But apparently an enormous short position on the price of oil was placed about 20 minutes before this latest development was announced.

Gold and silver rallied and then fell back a bit.

The Dollar slumped and then recovered.

Bitcoin rallied and may have broken out of its trading range, again.

VIX wallowed in a tide of good feelings.

Let's hope that a lasting peace is being slowly cobbled out of this pernicious 'fog of war.' 

We'll know more as this continues to unfold.

Some new realities seem to be emerging, with striking roots in the wisdom of the ages.

"The humility of the righteous will guide them, but the deceitfulness of the proud will destroy them."    Proverbs 11:3

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

Have a pleasant weekend. 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Who Are the Children of God?

 

"I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realise what it will be like when He does.  When that happens, it is the end of the world.  When the author walks on to the stage the play is over.  What is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else - something it never entered your head to conceive - comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left?

For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature. That will not be the time for choosing: it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realised it before or not.  Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side.  God is holding back to give us that chance. It will not last for ever."

C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, 1944

"This is how we know who are the children of God and who are the children of Satan: anyone who does not do what is good is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their neighbor."

1 John 3:10

"The masters of war pretend not to know that it takes only a moment to destroy.  Yet often a lifetime is often not enough to rebuild.  They turn a blind eye to the fact that billions of dollars are spent on killing, on devastation.  Yet the resources needed for healing, education, and restoration are nowhere to be found.

The world is being ravaged by a handful of tyrants, yet is held together by a multitude of supportive brothers and sisters.  Jesus told us, 'Blessed are the peacemakers.'  But woe to those who manipulate religion in the very name of God for their own military, economic, or political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth.

Those who rob your land of its resources, generally invest much of the profit in weapons, thus perpetuating an endless cycle of destabilization and death.   It is a world turned upside down, an exploitation of God's creation that must be denounced and rejected by every honest conscience.

We must make a decisive change of course, a true conversion that will lead us in the opposite direction onto a sustainable path rich in human fraternity. in this region that has suffered so greatly. Yes, my sisters and brothers, you who hunger and thirst for justice, who are poor, merciful, meek, and pure of heart, you who have wept.  You are the light of the world." 

Leo XIV, Cameroon, 16 April 2024

“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the ones who do the will of my Father in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name?  Did we not drive out demons in your name?  Did we not accomplish mighty things in your name?’ Then I will declare to them solemnly, ‘I never knew you.  Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.’"

Matthew 7:21-23


Stocks continued to levitate today, disconnected from reality, harnessed in service to the prevailing narrative of peace and prosperity.  I have never seen anything this brazenly adapted to propaganda before.

The Dollar chopped around the lower end of the 98 handle.

VIX fell again.  It is running on lipstick and lies. 

Gold and silver were under a bit of pressure.

Bitcoin chopped sideways along the upper end of its trading range.

As you may have noted from the calendar we have been posting below, tomorrow is the stock index option expiration for April.  Important, but not a triple witch which occur at the end of the quarters.

Trump is touting peace and breakthroughs with Iran on the nuclear question, which are clearly fabrications, even while the troop buildups continue for 'the big decisive strike.'

And because of the increase in wickedness, the love of most will grow cold.

Have a pleasant evening. 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Plunging a Nation Into Instability and Disorder for Profit

 

"The systematic destruction of the American family farm and ranch is a mirror image of the treatment of the American Indian. Just as the Indian was stripped of his land and way of life, today’s traditional food producers are being squeezed out by corporate giants and government policies. When the entire nation becomes a reservation, perhaps then we’ll understand the price of ignoring history’s lessons."

Kempton Olney, Mother Earth vs Corporate Greed, 2024

"We seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike.  We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far off lands. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire weapons and ammunition they desire.  Too often we honor swagger and bluster and the wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others.  Some Americans who preach nonviolence abroad fail to practice it here at home." 

Robert F. Kennedy, Mindless Menace of Violence, City Club of Cleveland Ohio, April 5, 1968.

“And while the pensioners make for a tidier narrative, the reality is that no one benefits nearly as much from private equity as private equity itself. The system is designed so that firms put in less money and shoulder less risk than anyone else, yet reap the lion’s share of the profits.  The point is to earn returns for private equity executives.  Stephen Schwarzman didn’t earn $37 billion by putting teachers’ and firefighters’ interests first.

Private equity and other investment firms spent $42 million on congressional races in the 2020 election cycle, two-thirds of which went to Democrats.  Just four senators and sixty-two representatives didn’t get any private equity donations. In 2022, New York Democrat Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, pulled in more than $1.2 million in industry contributions, three times more than the runner-up.  Kyrsten Sinema, the Arizona Democrat-turned-independent who killed the 2022 provision that would have closed the carried-interest loophole, received more than half a million dollars in private equity donations in the previous election cycle. The industry’s primary lobbying group, meanwhile, has long boasted about its ability to stave off efforts to regulate private equity’s favored strategies."

Megan Greenwell, Bad Company, June 2025

"Banking and corporations have largely monopolized power in Western Civilization and in American society.  They are ruthlessly going forward to eliminate land, labour, entrepreneur-management skills and everything else the economists once told us were the chief elements of production.  The only element of production they are concerned with is the one they control: capital.  Thus capital intensification has destroyed food, manufacturing, farming and communities. All these processes result in the instability and disorder we see around everyday."

Carroll Quigley, The Oscar Iden Lecture Series, Georgetown University 1978

"American political corruption was the buying up of legislatures and assemblies to keep them from doing the people's will and protecting the people's interests; it was the exploiter entrenching himself in power, it was financial autocracy undermining and destroying political democracy.  By the blindness and greed of ruling classes the people have been plunged into infinite misery; but that misery has its purpose in the scheme of nature.  Something more than a century ago we saw the people driven by just such misery to grope their way into a new order of society; they threw off the chains of hereditary monarchy, and made themselves citizens of free republics."

Upton Sinclair, The Brass Check, 1919


Stocks continued levitating today, lifted higher by 'buy programs' grinding the stocks futures higher, led by the SP 500.

This is right out of Robert Rubin's playbook when he was Treasury Secretary.

The difference is that he was engaging in a wrong-headed attempt to limit the collateral damage from a financial crisis.

In this case it is a monument to ego and lawlessness.  And it will result in a bone-cracking market collapse.

But while the music is playing the looting will continue.

VIX is now firmly in complacent territory.

Gold and silver were shaved back a little.   Just the perks of being a part of an epic control fraud.   

Who is going to turn you in when everyone is dirty, including the regulators and the 'law.' 

This is a good example of the lawlessness of laissez-faire taken to its logical conclusion.  The natural state of human markets is not justice, equity, and rational distribution.

The misbegotten war with Iran is still in a running boil despite the peace assurances by the Prevaricator-in-Chief.

Plunging the nation into instability and disorder is not a problem for these jokers.  This is how they see themselves assuming positions of great power and control, with the undermining of the rule of law.

The remedy needs to be swift, and memorable. 

And because of the increase in wickedness, the love, the honor, and the sense of duty of most is grown cold. 

Madness.

Have a pleasant evening. 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Wine of Her Idolatry

 

“Men lost faith in the state not because Christianity held them aloof, but because the state defended wealth against poverty, fought to capture slaves, taxed toil to support luxury, and failed to protect its people from famine, pestilence, invasion, and destitution. Rome was not destroyed by Christianity, any more than by barbarian invasion; it was an empty shell when Christianity rose to influence and invasion came. A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within.”

Will Durant, Caesar and Christ, 1944

"Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows.  Outside, in the streets, in the general community, ‘everyone’ is happy.  One hears no protest, and certainly sees none.  You speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, ‘It’s not so bad’ or ‘You’re seeing things’ or ‘You’re an alarmist.’

And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must lead to this, and you can’t prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.

But your friends are fewer now. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.

You have accepted things you would not have accepted five years ago, a year ago, things that your father, even in Germany, could not have imagined. Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven’t done, for that was all that was required of most of us: that we do nothing.  You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair."

Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45

"Everywhere Rome was failing in her duties as mistress of the civilised world. Her own internal degeneracy was faithfully reflected in the abnegation of her imperial duties. When in any country the small-farmer class is being squeezed off the land; when its labourers are slaves or serfs; when huge tracts are kept waste to minister to pleasure; when the shibboleth of art is on every man's lips, but ideas of true beauty in very few men's souls.

When the business-sharper is the greatest man in the city, and lords it even in the law courts; when class-magistrates, bidding for high office, deal out justice according to the rank of the criminal; when exchanges are turned into great gambling-houses, and senators and men of title are the chief gamblers; when, in short, 'corruption is universal, when there is increasing audacity, increasing greed, increasing fraud, increasing impurity, and these are fed by increasing indulgence and ostentation." 

A. H. Beesley, The Gracchi Marius and Sulla, 1921

"God's heart is torn apart by wars, violence, injustice and lies. But our Father's heart is not with the wicked, the arrogant, or the proud. God's heart is with the little ones and the humble, and with them He builds up His Kingdom of love and peace day by day. Wherever there is love and service, God is there."

Leo XIV, 14 April 2026

"Come, I will show you the judgement on the great whore who reaches across many waters.  The kings of the earth have given themselves over to her in lust, and have become drunk with the wine of her idolatry."

Revelation 17:1-2


And here we are, falling into complacency, while dancing on a volcano.

The Dollar continued its slide lower, while gold and silver rallied.

Bitcoin has climbed back to the upper bounds of it intermediate trading channel.

Let's see if it will continue sliding sideways, or not.

VIX is once again down to its long moving average.  Generally a complacent place to be.

Stocks are utterly overvalued, and risk is utterly mispriced.

This is a 'hubris rally.'   They are pumping stocks up higher because they can, at least in the short term.  

And if you can't win a war, or manage an economy to the benefit of the public, at least you can make a show of prosperity, while enriching your cronies.

This will give heart to the true believers in various idols and systems.  

And as always, it will not end well.

People do not want to hear it.  Not one bit.  Pride and greed are ascendant.  The madness will hold no discourse with logic.  

The masks are falling away more quickly now.  What has been hidden is being revealed, the principalities and powers, the spiritual wickedness in high places.

You can choose to look away, but you can never say again that you did not know, or should have known whom you served.

Have a pleasant evening.