Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Bubbling Into the New Year - Gold Breaking Out as Stocks Rise to Records

Mammon, Child of Pride

"Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction."

Erich Fromm


"Over the last thirty years, the United States has been taken over by an amoral financial oligarchy, and the American dream of opportunity, education, and upward mobility is now largely confined to the top few percent of the population.  Federal policy is increasingly dictated by the wealthy, by the financial sector, and by powerful (though sometimes badly mismanaged) industries such as telecommunications, health care, automobiles, and energy.  These policies are implemented and praised by these groups’ willing servants, namely the increasingly bought-and-paid-for leadership of America’s political parties, academia, and lobbying industry.

If allowed to continue, this process will turn the United States into a declining, unfair society with an impoverished, angry, uneducated population under the control of a small, ultrawealthy elite.  Such a society would be not only immoral but also eventually unstable, dangerously ripe for religious and political extremism.

The real challenge is figuring out how the United States can regain control of its future from its new oligarchy and restore its position as a prosperous, fair, well-educated nation."

Charles Ferguson, Predator nation


"Fascism begins the moment a ruling class, fearing the people may use their political democracy to gain economic democracy, begins to destroy political democracy in order to retain its power of exploitation and special privilege."

Thomas Clement Douglas

US equity markets pushed higher into the close to new highs, led by a fairly narrow advance of the usual big cap suspects in quiet trading.

Gold has broken out of its downtrend and silver is following suit.

We are in financial asset bubble territory. This one is eventually going to end as badly as 2008 and 2002.

But there is no stopping a group a people determined to become rich quickly, when they are maddened by greed with thoughts of future consequences or collateral damage to others. Even words of caution inflame their sense of entitlement to spoils and towering pride.

And they have plenty of examples to emulate amongst our prominent people and leaders.

Let's see how we go into the New Year.

Have a pleasant evening.

Christmas Day 2019 - Implications of the Incarnation

Into the ancient holy land
Behold, the son of God is come to man.

For this is truly my body.

In Innocence fall all heroes and their creeds;
An age is done, an age from here proceeds.

And this is the chalice of my blood,
of the new and everlasting covenant.

What consuming pagan fires could not do—
A covenant of love, and Word made flesh, in You.

Which for you and for the many shall be shed
for the forgiveness of sin.

Sleep swells His breast, though heavy pressed,
By Golgotha, and Adam's sin,
And the hopes of he who signs his name herein.

Jesse



"He has shown you what is good. The Lord requires you to act justly, and to love kindness and mercy, and to walk humbly with your God."

Micah 6:8


"Only the humble believe in Him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that He does wonders where people despair, that He takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly.

God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; He loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken.

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


Repentance - Forgiveness - Thankfulness

These are the greatest gifts that you may ever receive.


Have a Merry and Blessed Christmas

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Christmas Eve

"The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them a light has shined."

Is 9:1


"And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were stricken with fear. And the angel said to them, 'Fear not: for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be for all people. For this day in the city of David there is born to you a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign; you shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying in a manger.' And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace toward men of good will."

Lk 2:9-14


"All things came to be through him,
and without him nothing came to be.
What came to be through him was life,
and this life was the light of the human race;
the light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness has not overcome it."

John 1:3-5

Stocks traded essentially unchanged in very quiet trading.

A handful of big cap tech stocks have been the bulwark of the US stock market rally this year.

The Dollar was unchanged as well.  

Gold and silver are attempting to break out.  I have updated the charts.

The markets will be closed tomorrow for Christmas Day.

Have a very Merry Christmas.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Very Quiet Holiday Trade

"If you are wise and understand God’s ways, prove it by living an honorable life, doing good works with the humility that comes from wisdom.  But if you are bitterly jealous and there is selfish ambition in your heart, don't hide the truth with boasting and lying. For jealousy and selfishness are not God’s kind of wisdom.  Such things are worldly, carnal, and demonic.  For wherever there is jealousy and selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and evil of every kind.

But the wisdom from above is first of all pure. It is also peace loving, gentle at all times, and willing to make a way for others. It is full of mercy and the fruit of good deeds. It shows no bias and is always sincere. And those who are peaceful will plant seeds of peace and reap a harvest of righteousness."

James 3:13-18


“God has ordered the world so that we may learn to help bear another’s burdens; for no one is without fault, no one is without their burdens, no one is sufficient in themselves, no one is wise enough by themselves; therefore we ought to bear with one another, comfort one another, help, instruct, and admonish one another.”

Thomas À Kempis

The trading desks are already on auto-pilot. The senior staff are on holiday.

The junior traders are just manning the desks, keeping the order flow moving for those last minute hedges of the closing year.

There is no sense in trading anymore this year, because the books are essentially closed. Job done, disaster averted once again.

Unless something happens.

The Fed poured literally billions in hot money into the markets to avoid another sell off such as we had this time last year.

And they have succeeded in inflating the bubble in financial assets even further. The transfer of wealth continues.

The reckoning has not been avoided, merely deferred.

Next year will be one of risings and fallings, of the revealing of what has been hidden, and especially, of how the mighty are fallen, and will be beaten into dust.

The foolishness of the maddened never ceases to amaze me.  Their shamelessness and misplaced pride is astonishing.

How gravely and carelessly we tempt the loving patience of God.   Perhaps now is a good time to step back, and examine our actions and our consciences. 

Have a pleasant evening.