NAV Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Fund

Precious metals are under some pressure on the last trading day of August.

Let's see how we go into the holiday weekend in the US.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - White Boys Lost In the Blues

"Blues is like the roux in a gumbo. People ask me if jazz always has the blues in it. I say, if it sounds good it does."

Wynton Marsalis

As you may have seen last night, deliverable gold took another big dip yesterday as a good sized gold stash was warehouse transferred from registered to eligible.  I added some charts to that post from sharelynx.com earlier today.

There is also intraday commentary titled 'Wall Street Glitter Gulch' in which I talk about the post option expiration pullback here.

There was some talk today about the dip in gold being a sign of impending peace in the Middle East, tapering to come in September because of the slightly better than expected GDP revision this morning, yada yada.

This had all the look of the post option expiration hit on the September contract I was expecting, and which we really did not see in the first day after.

Despite some pockets of extraordinary excellence, gold commentary is, in general, not very well informed.  And this is not just a statement on the talking heads from financial television.   There are quite a few analysts and economists who act like they need to buy a vowel or two when it comes to the nature of money, as well informed they may appear to be on other matters. 

Perhaps they can't help it; they can talk and dress the game, but they don't have the soul to really play. They are just white boys lost in the blues.

P.S. Note to disappointed reader: I did not include Willem Buiter or Jon Nadler because they have been off the radar, and deserve to enjoy their privacy.   Although Mr. Nadler could almost certainly present a strong bid for a lifetime achievement award.

 

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Hard Time Killin' Floor Blues

"The rich are always going to say that, you know, just give us more money and we'll go out and spend more and then it will all trickle down to the rest of you. But that has not worked the last 10 years, and I hope the American public is catching on."

Warren Buffett

The market tried to rally off the 'better than expected' GDP revision up to 2.5%, with an increase in the inflation factor up to .8% as well.

War jitters have the markets on their heels.

Low paid fast food workers went on strike today for a living wage.  For the disconnected view of reality Bloomberg TV did a fine job this afternoon.  "No one is forcing them to take those low paying jobs." 

But at the end of the day, the biggest fog of tone deafness surrounds Washington from the Beltway in, afflicting most of the power elite including the feral demagogues of the right.

NAV Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Funds - Wall Street Glitter Gulch

"Life is a school of probabilities."

Walter Bagehot

The post-option-expiration hit on the metals arrived yesterday and today as gold was pushed back towards 1400 and silver was slammed back to 23.80, a decline of 1.20 from the recent high.

They were treading a bit lighter on gold because available for delivery is in short supply.

Inventory available for delivery took a sizable hit yesterday as there was a large transfer within the shrinking JPM vaults from delivery offered to storage.

The premiums on the Sprott funds are holding up remarkably well. The action in the miners has been fairly obvious with a price hit on that related sector preceding the bear raid on the metals.

That some analysts cannot refrain from drawing broad conclusions from such a small short term price fluctuation shows the desperation and poverty of thought in much of what passes for analysis today. Say and do anything for a raucous headline and some attention.

I almost fell out of my chair when I saw some fellow call the ten dollar decline in gold yesterday a sign that there would not be any military action in Syria. Ten dollars out of Fourteen Hundred. And they make fun of people for reading the fall of bones or chicken entrails. Freedom of speech does not demand freedom from thought.

This could be a deeper correction. Anything can happen. But typically not everything does happen, and that is why life is a school of probabilities. People fool themselves, and others, by making wild guesses, and then writing the hits in marble, and the many more misses in the sand. Well, that may work for coffee talk, but as actionable trading information it is a snare, and a death trap.

Don't get me wrong. I don't mind such chatter talk on chat boards by amateurs. Much of life is taken up in idle and largely harmless diversion and unstructured speculation. And all gamblers lie, and often shamelessly. The problem is when they lie to themselves.

I used to hang out with some of the older fellows at the Stardust's sports book, which was a marvel for the day.  We would watch basketball games and horse races, while they bet the over/under and mostly talked stuff about the old days, and who and what they know and knew.  Fun talk, but it never filtered into any of my wagers. I made some of the best returns betting against the skew of weekend tourist betting on their favorite California teams, against the odds. Gotta love those Lakers and the tourist spread.  And don't even talk about the poker tables.

Don't get me wrong. I am no god of gamblers.  No one beats the house in the long run if their bosses are doing the job right and the gamers are not cheating.   No one can beat true odds all the time. 

I knew a guy who had been the comptroller at Caesar's, who grew up in our old neighborhood back east. And he gave me a copy of Friedman on Casino Management, and set me straight.  I have won big, and lost big.  But the only truly winning bet I ever made there was thirty five years ago when I got married in a little church outside of town, in what was then the desert, but now is just another crowded suburb.

Wall Street reminds me of Las Vegas sometimes.  Pretty women, flashy callers, lousy odds, but no free drinks or cheap buffets. 

The pros and insiders in the US markets have shills and occasional enablers who go around and talk trash for them, but not on the little chatboards. That would be a waste of time and money, and there is no need for it.  There are plenty of parrots who can be taught to repeat lines in the hope of sounding wise.

I have previously mentioned the mostly unremembered testimony of A. Newton Plummer, a Wall Street 'publicist' who testified to the corruption of journalism and analysis by Wall Street money. And what made him credible was that he had a suitcase full of canceled checks to prove it.  They don't take checks or credit cards these days.   Information and high paying positions are the new coin of the realm for these sophisticates.  Journalism is approaching economics as a disgraced profession.

So let's see how the week progresses. September is not a delivery month so babies must play. But there is the problem of physical offtake of real bullion on the world markets that continues despite the antics on the paper exchange.