Stocks and Precious Metals Choice - Economic Cargo Cults - Quad Witching Stock Option Expiration

"Whenever you pray, forgive if you have anything against someone else, so that your Father in heaven may thereby forgive you."

Mark 11:25


"When we forgive, we do not simply put up with the person’s hurtful behavior, blame ourselves for the person’s behavior, pretend that we weren’t hurt, or say the person didn’t mean to hurt us.  Instead, we acknowledge that we are all imperfect humans.

 Forgiveness is a moral decision to see the other person’s worth, let go of anger, and offer compassion, benevolence, and love toward the offender."

Robert D. Enright, Forgiveness Is a Choice


"And forgive us the debts of our sins, as we forgive those who have sinned against us."

Matthew 6:12

Repentance means seeing and being sorry for our own mistakes, sins, and foolishness.   It must come first.  Perfect people can never forgive others, or accept themselves as they are, only some distorted version.

This is why God does not forgive us unless we can forgive others.   Not to punish us.  It is for our sake, not His.  If we are unable to forgive others, we are dead to love.  He gives us the great courtesy of freedom of will, and grants us our refusal even for what is for our own good.

Forgiving others is hard.  That is why we were given such an extravagant example of sacrifice and forgiveness for others.  Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

For God so loved the world.

Stocks bounced today, off short term oversold conditions that were almost incredible.

Gold and the Dollar also bounced today, and the VIX remains in a very high risk level.

To say that the markets remain fragile would be an understatement.

There are a number of stimulus plans and initiatives being considered, now that a few of the Congressional knuckle-draggers have shambled back to their corporatist compounds.

This is a demand shock.

It is not a run-of-the-mill recession in the business cycle. It is more like a market crash due to some global event like a world war that is only loosely under our control.

The focus of the administration and the financial powers should be to soften the blow to the consumer, and keep the spark of demand alive.  And once the medical crisis has eased, to engage in serious stimulation to bring back the recovery.

But there are many powerful constituencies lining up for bailouts and handouts.  In the last crisis the  consumer was given the short end of the stick as the moneyed interests settled down at the public trough.

And they are lining up already to do it again.   The privileged become hysterical when they see the status quo in peril.

As a remined, this Friday will be a stock market quad witching option expiration.

Do I think the stock market has bottomed?   No.  Not yet.

We have not seen the kind of shattering drop after a brief 'relief rally' that is generally multi-day.

Governor Cuomo today said that the peak of the virus will not be seen in New York for 45 days.  That might be optimistic, depending on the actions that are taken.

The usual suspect were back to their old antics pretty shamelessly today.  And I have been surprised to see some of the old names from crashes past coming on to once again render their foul nostrums.

They will never learn.  The question is, will we?

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Fed Shock and Aw Shucks - Be Still, And Know That I Am God

'The least of these...'

"Show me your ways, O Lord, and teach me your paths.  Lead me in your truth, and teach me: for you are the God of my salvation; and I wait for you all the day.  Remember, O Lord, your tender mercies and loving kindness for us, as they have always been of old."

Psalm 25:4-6


“To escape the pain caused by regret for the past or fear about the future, this is the rule to follow: leave the past to the infinite mercy of God, the future to His good Providence, and give the present wholly to His love by being faithful to His grace.”

Jean-Pierre de Caussade


"Wonderful providence indeed which is so silent, yet so efficacious, so constant, so unerring. This is what baffles the power of Satan.  He cannot discern the Hand of God in what goes on; and though he would fain meet it and encounter it, in his mad and blasphemous rebellion against heaven, he cannot find it."

J. H. Newman


"God has a way of standing before the nations with judgement, and it seems that I can hear God saying to America 'You are too arrogant! If you don't change your ways, I will rise up and break the backbone of your power! And I will place it in the hands of a nation that doesn't even know my name. Be still, and know that I am God.'"

Martin Luther King


"Indeed, the truth that many people never understand, until it is too late, is that the more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt.

Despair is the absolute extreme of self-love. It is reached when a person deliberately turns his back on all help from anyone else in order to taste the rotten luxury of knowing himself to be lost.

It is therefore of supreme importance that we consent to live not for ourselves but for others. When we so this we will be able first of all to face and accept our own limitations."

Thomas Merton

Gold held up today on support, first at 1450 and then around 1500, after another crushing liquidation and bear raid.   Silver was hit hard.  Mining stocks were hammered.   And then they bounced back.

The powerful trading houses on Wall Street have no concern for anything but their own personal greed.  Several are serial felons who break the rules and bend the regulations and spread corruption at every opportunity.

Stocks were hammered, and after a rebound, smacked down into the close into the lows.  They were massively overvalued.   Many saw it coming, and warned you.

There are rumours going around everywhere. And this is understandable.

The government is going to shut everything down for two weeks.  The market is going to close.  There is going to be martial law.

Let's keep dealing with the reality of the situation as it is, and let the fears of the future and all the nonsense that surrounds it go its own way.

There is a new version of the influenza going around, and it is a bad one. We know what to do about it. We socially distance, which means not going out and about for the time being, except perhaps as one must.

We wash our hands, and guard against becoming infected and passing the infection on to others.

We saw exactly what was happening in China.  I told you here, and said to be prepared to shelter in place. We knew it, but many ignored it, as we have ignored so many other signs and warnings.

Many listened to lying and incompetent conmen, and the stooges of the moneyed interests, and so now are surprised and shocked at the state of affairs.   This is the oldest story in the world.

Get right, sit tight, take care of yourselves and your families.  And try to remember who you are, and who it is that you serve.

I remember you in my prayers, as I did so today, and will tomorrow.  Dolly and I had an espcially tasty lamb stew with rice for lunch and after a nice walk on a beautiful day, we both fell asleep.

We were up late last night. There was a scare with one of the little ones, six months, who could not breathe.  A trip to the ER and a test, and it was all handled well, and the proper medication for something not the Covid-19 was given.

I am grateful that we are not in the middle of a hard winter, with ice, power outages, and impassable roads. I am very grateful that I was able to rig up a temporary fix and get my internet, phone and cable tv back. Being out of touch for the weekend was hard.

People were shocked today when Trumpolini said that this might last a while.  Duh.  How did we not know that?  Because we listened to lies.  

Life goes on.  We are not exceptional.  But we can strive to be human, to be kind and thankful and sensible, even if others do not.

Do not allow them to bring you down, and avoid them if you must, but love them anyway, and remember them in your prayers.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - The End of the Beginning - Crash of 2020

"Now this is not the end.  It is not even the beginning of the end.  But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."

Winston Churchill


"A confident, aggressive delivery style - often larded with jargon, clichés, and flowery phrases - makes up for the lack of substance and sincerity in their interactions with others ... they are masters of impression management; their insight into the psyche of others combined with a superficial - but convincing - verbal fluency allows them to change their personas skillfully as it suits the situation and their game plan."

Paul Babiak and Robert Hare, Snakes in Suits


"We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men... Do remember that dishonesty and cowardice always have to be paid for.  Don't imagine that for years on end you can make yourself the boot-licking propagandist of any régime, and then suddenly return to mental decency.   Once a whore, always a whore."

George Orwell

Sorry this is so late, but my service provider decided to take the night off.   Why visit the Third World when you can experience it first hand.

We set a few records this week in the financial markets, none of them particularly life-enhancing for any but a few.   You know who you are.

Stocks were utterly hammered this week.  Hammered.

This is a direct result of the bloated and over-inflated condition that US stocks had reached, thanks in large part to the Fed, the Administration, and the usual suspects in the financial class.

The metals were beaten down this week in a particularly vicious waterfall decline.

Yes, there was definitely liquidation selling for cash this week. But it would be naive at best to dismiss the adventuresome and opportunistic trading on the short side in the metals by that whacky gang of serial felons at the Banks.

So, is it all over?

If we can somehow manage to financialize the coronavirus, we can then no doubt provide the monetary means to manipulate it, control it, and bend it to our wills, as we do with most other things.

But alas, it has eluded our efforts so far.   

So we hope for the best, but prepare for a range of eventualities, remaining skeptical in times of general deceit.    And it goes without saying that you know who is large and in charge of deception.

Especially between now and the end of summer.

I am not going to hazard any predictions and forecast in particular, except to say that you will know a tree by the fruit it bears.

I did take a brief trip to the market this evening to pick something up.  And now they have cleaned out the produce section.  Seriously?  A run on onions and bananas?

My son's girlfriend and her family offered to put me up in China to weather the coronavirus.  From what they have seen they are dealing with it, testing for it and controlling it, more effectively than we are.   They were dead serious.  You cannot make this stuff up.

Am I going?  For sixteen hours in a flying petri dish?  Home sweet, socially distanced but apparently sans oignons for now, home.  

But I am concerned, very concerned that we are walking blindly into a buzzsaw of lies and organizational incompetency.  

Take care of yourselves.  

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

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers (and sisters).

Have a pleasant weekend.

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.