Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - All Along the Watchtower - There Must Be Some Way Out of Here

 

“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

"Hear the word of the Lord, that the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, proclaims to you: repent and change your ways and your deeds, so that I may remain with you in this place.  Do not put your trust in deceptive words, saying: 'This is the house of the Lord, the house of the Lord, the house of the Lord.'

If you truly change your ways and your deeds, if you are upright in your dealings with your neighbor; if you do not oppress the foreigner, the other, the orphan, and the widow; if you do not shed innocent blood in this land; and if you do not follow other gods and thereby cause your own destruction, then I will allow you to live here, in the land that I gave as a gift to your fathers long ago.

You have been placing your trust in deceitful words that are empty. Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, tell lies, worship the god of the land, and follow other gods about whom you know nothing, and then come and stand before me and say, 'We are safe,' all the while intending to continue doing these despicable deeds?  Has this house which bears my name become in your eyes a den of thieves?  Be assured that I am fully aware of what you are doing, says the Lord."

Jeremiah 7:2-11

Then Jesus said, “Did I not say that if you have faith you will see the glory of God?”  And so they removed the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said,  “Father, I thank you for hearing me.  I know that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the people standing here, so that they may believe that it was you who sent me.”

When he had said this, he cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come forth.”  The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with linen bands, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Then Jesus said to them, “Untie him, and let him go free.”

John 11:40-44

Today was a good day to ignore the markets, and to wait for the two big shoes to drop later this week: the FOMC decision on Wednesday, and the Non-Farm Payrolls report on Friday.

So after the usual sturm und drang, the major stock indices finished largely unchanged.

Gold and silver took back their  declines and finished largely unchanged.

VIX ended unchanged from its open.

The Dollar managed to hang on to a little rally.

So, barring exogenous events, the risk of which are certainly heightened as has been pointed out many times, the markets are likely waiting to see what the Fed's verdict on the economy might be.

Besides the deluge of dark and corporate money in politics, which is the root of all our evils, the biggest problem we are facing is the growing power of monopolies to fix pricing and bend regulations to their will.

It's a nasty business.  And it festers compliments of the credibility trap which is preventing any meaningful reform.

Given the general level of cynical corruption of justice proliferating the halls of power in the West, I have a fairly dour outlook for the intermediate term.   I admit to being biased against most politicians, but that is because occupations focused largely on the accumulation of money and power tend to attract the worst people to its ranks.  

Wall Street and the C suites of the corporate monopollies are the very heart of darkness.   And for now, as they have done so in the past, they seem to have taken control of the levers of our economy.

And the band played on.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - US Dollar: La Douleur du Monde

 

"A society that is in its higher circles and on its middle levels widely believed to be a network of smart rackets does not produce men with an inner moral sense; a society that is merely expedient does not produce men of conscience. A society that narrows the meaning of 'success' to the big money and in its terms condemns failure as the chief vice, raising money to the plane of absolute value, will produce the sharp operator and the shady deal.  Blessed are the cynical, for only they have what it takes to succeed.

America appears now before the world a naked and arbitrary power, as, in the name of realism, its men of decision enforce their often crackpot definitions upon world reality."

C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite, Oxford Press, 1956

Lord, thank you for withholding your righteous hand from our nation, for our arrogance in believing that for our betrayals, our greed, our cowardice, our pride, and the murders of innocents, that we are beyond your laws, and are not going to be judged. 

Help us instead to spread your presence wherever we go.  Fill our souls with your spirit and life.  Penetrate and possess our whole being, so that our lives become a radiance of yours. Shine through us, and be so in us, that every soul we come in contact with may feel your presence in our soul.

Let them look and see only you.  Stay with us, and then we shall begin to shine as you shine; shining as a light to others.  Let us thus praise you in the way that you love best by shining on those around us.  Let us preach your good news not with words but by our example, with your loving presence in what we do, by the evident fullness of the love our hearts bear to you.  Thank you for our many consolations, as we recall your loving kindness, and tender mercies.

 

Our foreign policy these days is to say to the rest of the world, 'Ok you're mad.  But how are you going to stop us?'

The answer, the judgement, when it inevitably comes, may be surprising.  

We have marginalized, silenced, and murdered our prophets and speakers of conscience.   How can we not be surprised when judgement inevitably comes?

Stocks rallied a bit after the big decline, but flopped a bit into the close.

The Dollar chopped sideways.

Gold bounced, silver held its own.

VIX dropped.   Risk is not a sentiment that this market embraces.

Non-Farm Payrolls and the FOMC meeting next week as indicated in the calendar below.

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

Have a pleasant weekend.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Where Are the Snows of Yesteryear?

 

"De loin en loin, elle vient jeter dans l'âme du profond artiste un peu de sa paix, de sa grandeur mystérieuse, puis elle retourne à sa solitude immense, au milieu des rues pleines de peuple.  Il n’y a qu’une tristesse, lui a-t-elle dit, la dernière fois, c’est de n’être pas de saints."

Léon Bloy, La Femme Pauvre, 1897

When I see your heavens, the work of your fingers,
      the moon and stars that you set in place—
What is man that you are mindful of him,
     and a son of man that you care for him?
Yet you have made him little less than a god,
     crowned him with glory and honor.
You have given him rule over the works of your hands,
      put all things at his feet.

Psalm 8:4-7

"Et Jehanne, la bonne Lorraine,
   Qu'Anglois bruslerent à Rouen;
Où sont-ilz, Vierge souveraine?
   Mais où sont les neiges d'antan."

François Villon, Ballade des dames du temps jadis, 1533

"Beauty is but a flower,
That wrinkles will devour.
Brightness falls from the air;
Queens have died, young and fair.
Dust hath closed Helen's eye.
I am sick, I must die.
Lord have mercy on us."

Thomas Nashe, A Litany in Time of Plague, 1593

"The broken wall, the burning roof and tower
And Agamemnon dead."

W. B. Yeats, Leda and the Swan, 1933

“The dead will lie on open fields,
like sheaves behind the reaper,
with no one to gather them.
So let not the wise boast of their wisdom
or the strong boast of their strength
or the wealthy boast of their riches,
but let the one who boasts boast about this:
that they have sought the understanding of my ways."

Jeremiah 9:22-24

“We'll always have Paris.”

Rick, Casablanca

Stocks tried to rally today, but fell off into the close to set new lows.

Gold and silver were hit overnight with selling in the futures, and this continued into the day.

As one might expect for an option expiration on the Comex.  Like clockwork.

FOMC and Non-Farm Payrolls next week, as indicated on the economic calendar below.

Gold has hit the fibonacci retracement target at 2350 intraday.

They may have to let the metals up a bit, to smack them back down again next week.

Or not.   Even a three card monte game falls apart every now and then.

VIX is relatively elevated.

The Dollar chopped sideways.

And because of the increase in lawlessness, the love of most will grow cold.

But those who remain standing, until the end, will be saved.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - In the Heart of Darkness

 

"There was war in heaven. Michael and the angels fought against the dragon. The dragon fought back, but he did not have the power, and so lost his place in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down – that ancient snake called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He fell to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: ‘Now has come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah. For the adversary of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down."

Revelation 12:7-9

"And he said to them, 'I saw Satan falling, like lightning from the sky.'"

Luke 10:18

"To enter heaven is to become more human than you ever succeeded in being on earth; to enter hell is to be banished from humanity.  What is cast (or casts itself) into hell is not a man: it is 'remains.'  To be a complete man means to have the passions obedient to the will and the will offered to God: to have been a man – to be an ex-man or 'damned ghost' – would presumably mean to consist of a will utterly centered in its self and passions utterly uncontrolled by the will."

C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain, 1940

"Glorious Prince of the Celestial Host, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in the battle which we have to sustain against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.  Come to the rescue of men whom God has created to His image and likeness, and whom He has redeemed at great price from the tyranny of evil.  It is you whom the Church venerates as her guardian and protector; whom the Lord has charged to conduct redeemed souls into Heaven.

Pray, that the God of Peace will subdue Satan beneath our feet, that he may no longer hold men captive or do injury to the Church.  Present our prayers to the most High, that without delay they may draw His mercy down on us.  Seize the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, bind him and cast him into the abyss, that he may no longer seduce the nations."

Prayer of St. Michael the Archangel

Stocks took a dive today with a little bounce off the lows.

Gold and silver rallied, and held it for much of the day, but finally gave it up and slid a bit into the close.

VIX was elevated.

Comex option expiration for the precious metals tomorrow.

We are under the heel of powers and principalities, in the heart of darkness.

Only love will allow you to keep standing.

Have a pleasant evening.