Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Self-Sanctified and Thrice-Damned

 

"Free market economic 'literature' as economists call it — and their papers frequently are works of fiction — gave succor and intellectual respectability to the decades of deregulation and tax cuts that have bankrupted the country.  Congress is compromised, to be sure, but lobbyists and members need economic studies as cover for what they are doing.  

The United States is a plutocracy, with an income and wealth distribution that rivals South America’s worst cases, but economists refuse to acknowledge that these outcomes are attributable to ill-advised public policies on taxation, regulation, trade, and education spending over the last several decades. 

Economists bleat about 'globalization' as though it were inevitable rather than a set of deliberate policy choices.  Markets are political creations, so results produced by them are not inviolable or free from question."

Lee Sheppard, Economists' Malign Influence on Taxes, Forbes, May 3, 2012

 

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

Blaise Pascal, Pensées 

 

"Our future could be one in which continued tumult feeds the looting of the financial system, and we talk more and more about exactly how our oligarchs became bandits and how the economy just can’t seem to get into gear.   Recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. We’re running out of time." 

Simon Johnson, The Quiet Coup, May 2009

 

“Instead of flooding the entire economy with liquidity, and thereby increasing the danger of inflation, the Fed could support the stock market directly by buying market averages in the futures market, thereby stabilizing the market as a whole.” 

Robert Heller, Federal Reserve Board, 1989 

 

"Too many of America's elites - among the super-rich, the CEOs, and many of my colleagues in academia - have abandoned a commitment to social responsibility. They chase wealth and power, the rest of society be damned."

Jeffrey Sachs, The Price of Civilization, January 2012

 

“Political decisions helped to create the super-elite in the first place, and as the economic might of the super-elite class grows, so does its political muscle.  Surging income inequality is such a strong violation of our expectations that most of us don’t realize it is happening.” 

Chrystia Freeland, Plutocrats

 

"The suspicions that the system is rigged in favor of the largest banks and their elites, so they play by their own set of rules to the disfavor of the taxpayers who funded their bailout, are true.  It really happened.  These suspicions are valid.” 

Neil Barofsky, TARP Inspector General 

 

Stocks managed to rally higher and hold their gains for the most part.

The biggest driver was Tesla, which is receiving an order for 100,000 vehicles from Hertz.

After the bell Facebook missed its revenue estimates and gave a soft revenue forecast for the future. 

I tend to look at the revenue numbers first, as a good CFO with a flexible accounting structure cane make short term profits do just about anything thy want.

Remember Cisco, which famously beat their earnings number by one penny, quarter after quarter?

Actually this whole market reminds me of 1999-2001.

It is more than a bubble;  it is a Ponzi scheme.

Facebook pledged a $50 billion stock buyback program though, so all was quickly forgiven, or at least forgotten.

Gold and silver managed to rally today even as the Dollar slightly strengthened.

And the band played on.

Have a pleasant evening. 

 

 

 

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - This Attractive But Deceptive World

 

"Use the inconspicuous events and situations of everyday life as material for sanctification. Do it in obscurity."

Dorothy Day

 

“I believe that the desire to please you Lord does in fact please you.  And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.  I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.  And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.  Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.  I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.” 

Thomas Merton

 

"Then the rich man said, ‘Please, Father Abraham, at least send Lazarus 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

 

Stocks, meaning the SP 500 mostly, took another run at a new high today, and fell short again.

The Techs are floundering a bit as the enthusiasm for the speculative bubble wanes.

Gold and silver were up sharply, but manage to get sold down a bit into the close.  No breakout yet.

Gold continues to be drained out of Hong Kong.

The Dollar edged lower.

Have a pleasant weekend.

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - A Gathering of Vultures

"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 

 

"The foolish ask nothing better than not to have to understand anything, and they even used to get together and try not to understand, because the last thing of which a person is capable is to be malicious and foolish all by themselves.   Without understanding, they form spontaneously into herds, not according to any particular affinities but in obedience to the petty ideology, which swallowed up the whole of their small lives, allotted them by birth or chance. They would far rather kill than have to think." 

George Bernanos, Under the Sun of Satan 

 

"Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring.  Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvelous, intoxicating.  Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, or even a duty."

Simone Weil 

 

"The most important problem in the world today is your soul, for that is what the struggle is about." 

Fulton Sheen

 

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

Luke 17:37

 

Stocks managed to gather themselves and rally in the afternoon, although techs finished well of the highs.

All eyes are on the SP500, and its bid for a new high.

The Michael Milken Conference is ongoing this week in Beverly Hills, and pundits have been appearing from there frequently during the day on financial television to inform us.

About as insular and myopic as you might expect from such a gathering.   Kind of a  frat party for the pampered princes of finance.

Gold and silver were up with the Dollar.

The VIX hit another near term low. The lowest since the beginning of the pandemic I believe.

Gradually, then all of a sudden.

And they never see it coming.

They don't care, and we don't believe in it.

Have a pleasant evening.

 

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Stock Market Bubbles and Systemic Corruption

 

"The sense of responsibility in the financial community for the community as a whole is not small.  It is nearly nil.  Perhaps this is inherent.  In a community where the primary concern is making money, one of the necessary rules is to live and let live. 

To speak out against madness may be to ruin those who have succumbed to it.   So the wise in Wall Street are nearly always silent.  The foolish thus have the field to themselves.   None rebukes them." 

John Kenneth Galbraith, The Great Crash of 1929 

 

"As many as a dozen members of Congress and their aides took part in insider trading based on foreknowledge of market moving information on Capitol Hill, disgraced Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff told CNBC in an interview.

Legal analysts say that Wall Street insider trading laws do not apply to Congress.  As an open and public institution, the legal assumption has long been that any member of the public can have access to information about how Congress works.  In practice, though, that's simply not true, as powerful members of Congress come into contact daily with market-moving tidbits.  That gap between the law and the reality has made Capitol Hill a virtual free-fire zone for insider trading. Over the years, academic studies have found that members of the House of Representatives beat the market by as much as six percent per year and members of the Senate do even better than that."

Eamon Javers, Congress Members Took Part in Insider Trading, 11 Nov 2011

 

"The period of financial distress is a gradual decline after the peak of a speculative bubble that precedes the final and massive panic and crash, driven by the insiders having exited but the sucker outsiders hanging on hoping for a revival, but finally giving up in the final collapse." 

Charles Kindelberger, Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises 

 

"The system of corruption depends on another factor beyond secrecy, one that is perhaps even more important: impunity.  Impunity means that the rich and powerful escape from punishment even when their malfeasance is in full view. Impunity is epidemic in America.  The rich and powerful get away with their heists in broad daylight. 

When a politician like Bernie Sanders calls out the corruption, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal double down with their mockery over such a foolish 'dreamer.'  The Journal recently opposed the corruption sentence of former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell for taking large gifts and bestowing official favors — because everybody does it. 

Our major institutions, the ones that should know better, are often gross enablers of impunity."

Jeffrey Sachs, The Age of Impunity

 

The SP 500 managed to add another day of gains to its quest to make a new high.

The NDX and the big cap techs, not so much.

The VIX is back down to recent lows.    Speculation is a bit frothy.

The Dollar moved lower.

Gold and silver both rallied and managed to hold on to a big piece of their gains.

Another huge tranche of physical gold went walkabout out of the Comex warehouses in Hong Kong.

Slowly, gradually, and then all at once.

And who could have seen it coming.  Except the pampered princes of privilege.

Have a pleasant evening.