Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Changing Lanes

 

"This elite-generated social control maintains the status quo because the status quo benefits and validates those who created and sit atop it. People rise to prominence when they parrot the orthodoxy rather than critically analyze it. Intellectual regurgitation is prized over independent thought. Voices of the dispossessed, different, and un(formally)educated are neglected regardless of their morality, import, and validity.

Real change in politics or society cannot occur under the orthodoxy because if it did, it would threaten the legitimacy of the professional class and all of the systems that helped them achieve their status...

Even Alan Greenspan admits that neoclassical economics has flaws in theory and practice, yet it continues to be the dominant model at universities and in society. The faulty belief in the uber-rational, self-interested homo economicus probably persists mainly because it is a projection of the people who inhabit the privileged class.

Corporate externalization of costs are absorbed by society and forgotten when heralding the successes of industrialists and capitalists. Resource extraction and environmental degradation, which are part and parcel of production, consumption, and consequently, economic growth, are downplayed or ignored."

Kristine Mattis, The Cult of the Professional Class


"I don’t think there’s any doubt that quantitative easing enabled the rich and the quick. It was a massive gift… I hope that we do indeed succeed in being able to say in the end the wealth effect was more evenly distributed. I doubt it.”

Richard Fisher, former Dallas Fed President, Apr 7, 2014


"A glance at the situation today only too clearly indicates that equality of opportunity as we have known it no longer exists. We are steering a steady course toward economic oligarchy, if we are not there already."

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Commonwealth Club Address, September 1932

The Consumer price information came in a little light this morning.

Stocks soared and went out near the highs.

The Dollar tanked.

VIX dropped back down again.

Gold and silver rallied sharply and held on to most of it.

No trend breakouts in the metals yet.

Blue skies.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The Witch of November

 

“These people honor me with their lips, and offer worship with their words, but their hearts are far from me. Their religion is nothing but the rituals and traditions of men, which they memorize. I will awaken them with one shocking blow after another. Their wisdom will be shown as foolish, and all their cleverness will be made worthless. Woe to those who go to great depths to hide their plans from the Lord, who do their work in darkness and think, 'No one can see us, so who will know?’"

Isaiah 29:13-15

"The mystery of Providence is a grace that gives those who accept it a power that is incomprehensible to the calculating mind of this world, that knows only what it can see and measure according to its own pride and willfulness.  And it confounds the ever-fading powers of the restless servants of wickedness in high places. 

His call occurs, and for our part we must rise and follow.  His yoke, though gentle, both constrains our natures, and at times leads us through the desert, those inevitable periods of dryness and self-denial.  But as we may need them, unexpectedly, there are consolations, His gentle kindness and tender mercies.  

This is no complacency, no retreat from the world, no quiet acceptance of evil, but rather a call to action.  We are directed not to linger, to watch and wait for ever more signs and wonders, gifts and consolations, not an endless menu of comforts so that we may be carried effortlessly to heaven, but to bear up with what we have been given, and to do His work, with love.   We are called to a love which is transformative when it is living for others, but a vain preoccupation and a kind of twilight of lingering misery and despair when it is not.

We will contemplate the face of God in the next world, but in this, we are called to action and His work in His creation and among His creatures.   This is the implication of the Incarnation."

Jesse, Providence Is the Hidden Hand of God, 13 December 2015

"Then Jesus said to his followers: ‘The things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to the one through whom they come. It would be better for them to be thrown in the sea with a millstone around their neck, than to lead one of these little ones to sin.'"

Luke 17:1-2

"This empire, unlike any other in the history of the world, has been built primarily through economic manipulation, through cheating, through fraud, through seducing people into our way of life, through the economic hit men."

John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hitman

"We are a generation made drunk with power and a perverse individualism that has been foretold for increasingly dark times.  May God have mercy on any who provide provocation and false teachings to others, and scandalous examples to their brothers and sisters, children and grandchildren, especially because of their willful selfishness, stubborn greed, and foolish pride. And you know who you are, if you are not already completely dead to the life of the Spirit."

Jesse, To a Power Drunk Generation, the Vista of Eternity, 19 January 2015

There was a lot of edgy positioning today in the markets, ahead of the consumer inflation data tomorrow morning.

The charts that show today's action are below.

Tomorrow morning's data may set the tone for the week.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Masquerade of Evil - Inflation Data Next Week

 

"'Gnosis’ was an enormous temptation in the early Christian Church.  What made it so insidious was the fact that the Gnostics very often did not want to leave the Church.  Instead, they claimed to be offering a superior and more authentic exposition of Holy Scripture, though, of course, this was only for the ‘superior souls’.  It inevitably encouraged not only an excited craving for higher initiation, but also an almost unbounded arrogance in those who had moved from mere ‘faith’ to real, enlightened ‘knowledge’.

Myth seeks the ascent of man to spirit; the Word of God seeks descent into flesh and blood.  Myth wants power; revelation reveals the true power of God in the most extreme powerlessness.  Myth wants knowledge; the Word of God asks for constant faith and, only within that faith, a growing, reverent understanding.   The revelation of God’s Word is gentle patience amidst the intractable tensions of life.  Error never shows itself in its naked reality, in order not to be discovered.  On the contrary, it dresses elegantly, so that the unwary may be led to believe that it is more truthful than truth itself.”

Irenaeus of Lyons, The Scandal of The Incarnation

"He became what we are, that he might make us what he is."

Athanasius of Alexandria, Against Heresies

“We who have so much to do seek quiet spaces to hear your voice each day. We who are anxious over many things look forward to your coming among us. We who are blessed in so many ways long for the complete joy of your kingdom. We whose hearts are heavy seek the joy of your presence. We are your people, walking in darkness, yet seeking the light.”

Henri Nouwen, Advent Prayer

"This great masquerade of evil has played havoc with all our ethical concepts. For evil to appear disguised as light, compassion, historical necessity or even social justice is quite bewildering to anyone brought up on traditional concepts.

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, The Cost of Discipleship

It was definitely a risk on day as stocks went roaring higher.

Fearless, into the weekend.

Gold and silver were under quite a bit of pressure, and went out near the lows.

VIX fell.

The Dollar fell a bit.

So is it blue skies ahead, with a Goldilocks economy in a calm and peaceful world?

Or whistling past a graveyard for a quick technical trade

Economic data in the form of Consumer Inflation may help us to decide.

Let's see what happens.

Repentance, forgiveness, thankfulness. 

These are gifts of the cross, illuminated by the resurrection, made possible by the Incarnation: the greatest gifts that we may ever hope to receive. And they are given freely, to all who will accept them. 

And in the end, isn't that what really matters?

Have a pleasant weekend.