Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Dismissive Complacency - The Leaven of the Pharisees

 

“Nature doesn't ask your permission; it does not care about your wishes, or whether you like its laws or not. You're obliged to accept it as it is, and consequently all of its consequences as well.”

Fyodor Dostoevsky 

 

"Foolishness 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; they did not believe in plagues." 

Albert Camus

 

"From the least to the greatest, all of them are greedy for unjust gains; and from prophet to priest they all act falsely.   They have treated the suffering of my people carelessly, saying, ‘all is well’ when there is no such safety.  They act shamefully, and commit terrible offenses. Yet they are not ashamed, and no longer even know how to blush.  And so they will be found among the fallen." 

Jeremiah 6:13-15

 

Stocks traded weakly today.

Volume was listless, even for our algorithmic age.

The dollar moved lower, giving up the 90 handle.

Gold and silver rallied.

They both have potential chart patterns that *could* signal a major move higher in January.

Let's see what happens.

I do not recall seeing so many people acting so contemptibly and carelessly, and without shame.  

The self-deceit and hypocrisy and willful offensiveness against God's love among ordinary people, and even those who consider themselves people of God, is almost astonishing.  

And as for the few, those who serve money and power, they seem almost to be beyond redemption, so hardened are their hearts.

I wonder if this is how it always has been, and I am just noticing it in the quiet of my older years,  or if there is indeed an ebb and flow in the affairs of nations.

“Through pride we are ever deceiving ourselves.  But deep down below the surface of the average conscience a still, small voice says to us, something is out of tune.” 

C.G. Jung

Tomorrow will be the last trading day of 2020.

Have a pleasant evening.

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - On the Road to Damascus

 

"Hear this, you foolish and heartless people,  who have eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear."

Jeremiah 5:21

 

"They have treated the suffering of my people carelessly, saying, ‘all is well’ when there is no safety.  They act shamefully, they commit terrible offenses; and yet they are not ashamed, and do not even know how to blush.  They shall be found among those who are fallen." 

Jeremiah 6:14-15

 

“We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it.” 

Blaise Pascal, Pensées

 

"The selfishness of an age that has devoted itself to the mere cult of pleasure has tainted the whole human race with an error that makes all our acts more or less lies against God.   It is better to find God on the threshold of despair than to risk our lives in a complacency that has never felt the need of forgiveness."

Thomas Merton

 

"I was being called to surrender the very citadel of my self. I was completely in the dark.  I did not really know what repentance was or what I was required to repent of.  It was indeed the turning point of my life.  God had brought me to my knees and made me acknowledge my own nothingness, and out of that knowledge I had been reborn.  I was no longer the centre of my life, and therefore I could see God in everything." 

Bede Griffiths 

 

 The Dollar managed to hang on to the 90 handle today.

Gold gained slightly, while silver gave up a little of its recent gains.

Stocks were weak in the broader markets, but showed some buying in the 'story stocks' especially big cap techs.

Volumes and market activity remain very low due to seasonal factors.

You will be happier if you stop looking to see every little thing that people do that bothers you.  

And it will give you more time to look at yourself.

That's really the point of the distraction and obsession with finding faults in others— to prevent us from looking at ourselves, and into our own hardened and foolish and deluded hearts.

Have a pleasant evening.

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - An Attractive But Deceitful Recovery

 

"These violent delights have violent ends,
And in their triumph die..." 

William Shakespeare

 

"I know nothing that I may say can influence you.  You have no souls to be influenced.  You are spineless, flaccid things. You pompously call yourselves Republicans and Democrats.   You are lick-spittlers and panderers, the creatures of the Plutocracy." 

Jack London, The Iron Heel

 

“Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, or even a duty.  Sin is not a distance, but is a turning of our gaze, in the wrong direction." 

 Simone Weil

 

Today was one of the lightest trading days of the year by volume.

And it was also a Comex metals option expiration, albeit one of slight significance.

As I said last week, the tape was scoured clean by wild swings and volatility.

And now the paint can be applied, into the year end. 

What does it profit a man, to gain the whole world, but to lose their souls.

But to virtually throw them away for so little?

Have a pleasant evening.

Christmas Day

Let all my nothingness be drowned in the ocean of your mercy.

Narrator:  Then the Grinch heard a sound  Rising over the snow.  

It started in low, Then it started to grow. 

But the sound wasn't sad.  Why, this sounded merry. 

But it was merry. Very. 

Every Who down in Whoville, The tall and the small, were singing without any presents at all. 

He hadn't stopped Christmas from coming. It came. 

Grinch: Somehow or other, it came Just the same! 

Narrator: And the Grinch, with his Grinch feet ice cold in the snow, Stood puzzling, and puzzling. 

Grinch: How could it be so?  It came without ribbons! It came without tags! It came without packages, boxes or bags! 

Narrator: And he puzzled and puzzled till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. 

Grinch: Maybe Christmas he thought doesn't come from a store. Maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more. Max! Help me! I'm feeling!

Narrator: And what happened then, well, in Whoville they say, that the Grinch's small heart grew three sizes that day.

Dr. Suess, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas

"Man has places in his heart which do not yet exist— and into them enters suffering, in order that they may have life. 

Love does not make you weak, because it is the source of all strength— but it makes you see the nothingness of the illusory strength on which you depended before you knew it.” 

 Léon Bloy

 

“Love endures everything, love is stronger than death, love fears nothing.  Help me, Lord, that my eyes may see all with mercy, so that I may never suspect or judge from appearances, but look deeper for what is good and beautiful in others' souls, and then come to their aid. 

Let all my nothingness be drowned in the ocean of your mercy.” 

Maria Faustyna Kowalska

 

"God bless us, every one!" 

Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol