Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Black Thursday - The Crash of 2020

“Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky.  There have been as many plagues as wars in history; yet always plagues and wars take people equally by surprise.

When a war breaks out, people say: 'It's too stupid; it can't last long.'  But though a war may well be 'too stupid,' that doesn't prevent its lasting.  Stupidity has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves.  In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words they were human: they disbelieved in pestilences.

Albert Camus, The Plague


"Things are going to be getting very real this year, even as some continue to deny reality, to an almost astonishing degree of self-absorption and denial.   What is it going to take?"

Jesse, 27 February 2020


"Now is a good time to prepare, if you have not already done so, and to begin engaging in those simple procedures that may help us weather this."

Jesse, 28 February 2020


"This is going to end badly. Big changes are coming. What has been hidden will be revealed.  Rough seas ahead, mateys."

Jesse, 22 January 2020, I See It Coming

The market crashed today, or at least put the finishing touch on the first phase of the crash of 2020.

As you may recall I have been talking about the significance of this year, specifically the period before July, since 2018.

And away we go.

The Fed is coming in with the money spigot flush open tomorrow, to try and save the debt markets from locking up, thereby seizing the financial system.

I hope they succeed, at least temporarily.

The media pundits are talking again about the V shaped recovery, and buying up these bargains.

This is not over yet.  It will not be done until the virus has nearly run its course, and the economic impact has become known.

But the Merry Pranksters of Wall Street are rarely encumbered by conscience or shame.

I saw something remarkable today.  They were emptying the shelves at the local grocery store.  Not the usual bread-milk-water storm provisions.  No, they literally emptied the meat and poultry sections and the restocking from inventory as well, before 2 in the afternoon.

It looks like El Presidente shook up his comfortable Republican constituency in our 'hood last night. No one was saying 'media hype' today.

Ironically enough it appears that he was exposed to an infected person, but is not concerned enough to take a test.   I'll bet Melania is not so blasé about it, especially with regard to their son.

Dolly and I are 'social-distancing' as they say.   The young man is still in Oxford, England, and won't be returning for a little while.  I miss Mary, my best friend, especially on days like this.  But I am glad that I do not have to be concerned about her. 

Read the first quote from Camus above, and think hard about it, what it is saying.

Losses in the stock market are one thing, although sometimes it seems that this is the biggest concern here in these United States.  

The loss of friends and loved ones makes paper money losses pale by comparison.  Things can be replaced, people can't.   And that is what we are facing in this, at the end of the day, even as we choose to ignore it.

Repentance, forgiveness, thankfulness.

Have a pleasant evening.

Lazarus and the Rich Man - Repentance, Forgiveness, Thankfulness

“There was a certain rich man who was splendidly clothed in purple and fine linen, and who lived each day in luxury. At his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, who was covered with sores. As Lazarus lay there longing for scraps from the rich man’s table, the dogs would come and lick his sores.

Finally, the poor man died and was carried by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried, and his soul went to the place of the dead. There, in torment, he saw Abraham in the far distance with Lazarus at his side.

The rich man shouted, ‘Father Abraham, have some pity! Send Lazarus over here to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. I am in anguish in these flames.’

But Abraham said to him, ‘My son, remember that during your lifetime you had everything you wanted, and Lazarus had nothing. So now he is here being comforted, and you are in anguish. And there is a great chasm separating us. No one can cross over to you from here, and no one can cross over to us from there.’

Then the rich man said, ‘Please, Father Abraham, at least send him to my father’s home. For I have five brothers, and I want him to warn them so they don’t end up in this place of torment.’

But Abraham said, ‘Moses and the prophets have warned them. Your brothers can read what they wrote.’

The rich man replied, ‘No, Father Abraham! But if someone is sent to them from the dead, then they will repent of their sins and turn to God.’

But Abraham said, ‘If they won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded, even if someone rises from the dead.’”

Luke 16:19-31

The sin of the rich man in the parable of Lazarus was not that he had been given great wealth, even though has no gratitude, no sense of obligation, and thereby no empathy.   He thinks that it is all because of his own merits.

 No, his sin is that he allowed his preoccupation, his obsession with worldly possessions, to blind himself with his pride to the suffering of Lazarus, his poor brother, who sat every day on his doorstep.  And he gave him nothing, not even a look or a kind word.

It was only in the torment of the afterworld that the rich man's eyes are opened.   And looking across the great gulf he finally sees Lazarus, with the holy Abraham. And the first thing that the rich man does is to beg for comfort for himself, and ask Lazarus for a favor. He feels no repentance, never once saying that he is sorry.

For even as his eyes were opened, his heart remained hardened, obstinate, and he remained firmly in the grip of his sins.  It was his sins that were the chasm that separated him from true life— the door to his torment was locked from the inside.

Nations that have been blessed can blind themselves to their excesses and offenses, while taking sole credit for the blessings that have been given to them. And so they misuse their power and wealth and great fortunes, granted to them by God, to oppress and subjugate others.

And in their hardened hearts they hold their selfishness aloft, profanely, as the greatest good, the exceptional— even as they oppress and plunder and murder their own and others. Until at long last God humbles them, and breaks the backbone of their power.

"God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world."


C. S. Lewis

Let us thank God then, for both our consolations and our trials, which cause us to pause and reflect, and keep a righteous understanding of who we are, and whom we serve.   For both good and ill come with the ease of His good Providence, and from the endless ocean of His incomprehensible love.

Truly one has come back from the dead and spoken, spoken plainly to us, we who abuse the weak, and murder the prophets, to silence His word.

If only we can open our prideful minds and hardened hearts, and listen, and find life.

Limit Down - Stock Futures Plunge Into Bear Market Territory

I was watching the futures as President Trump addressed the nation.

Survey says:   LIMIT DOWN


Overnight markets in the US are falling as you can see in the charts below.

Overseas markets are falling hard as they open in the down 4% range.

A 'V shaped recovery' that the stock touts have been talking about is off the table barring something utterly unexpected.

The drag on the economy is going to last well into the second half of this year at least.

As for the markets, they may get a sugar high if the Fed cuts 100 bp as Trump is demanding. But that will not last.

But for tonight, perhaps the Plunge Protection Team can do some good for their constituents on Wall Street.  Or not.

No doubt the con games and narrative spin will continue until morale improves.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - A Gathering of Vultures

"Be human in this most inhuman of ages; guard the image of man for it is the image of God.   Those who are at present so eager to be reconciled with the world at any price must take care not to be reconciled with it under this particular aspect: as the nest of The Unspeakable.   This is what too few are willing to see."

Thomas Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable


"As everything in what used to be called creation becomes a commodity, human beings begin to look at one another, and at themselves, in a funny way, and they see price tags.   There was a time when people spoke, at least occasionally, of 'inherent worth'— if not of things, then at least of persons."

Harvey Cox, The Market as God


“Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, or even a duty."

Simone Weil


“There is nothing so threatening to systemic evil as those willing to stand against it regardless of the consequences.”

James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters


“Just as it was in the days of Noah, so will it be with the coming of the Son of Man. People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given away in marriage, up until the very day that Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came, and swept them all away...

And they said to him, 'Where will this happen, Lord?'  And He said to them, 'Where death is, there will be a gathering of vultures.'”

Luke 17:26-27, 37

Stocks seem to be locked in a bipolar mania.

The administration will have to do a much better job of propping up the financial asset markets.

Gold and silver were sold once again.  Some of this could be asset liquidation to cover margin calls in other holdings.

Or it could just be more of the same old from the Banks who are heavily short, and who wish to pick up miners on the cheap for the next leg up in the gold bull market.

Have a pleasant evening.