SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Pushed Up In Dull Trading

Stocks opened lower, but were slowly pushed up to near unchanged in light holiday trading.

There will not be a lot of economic news this week.

Unless some exogenous event occurs to shake up the markets I suspect we will see the usual tape-painting into the year end.

Have a pleasant evening.

Shanghai Gold Withdrawals Top 2500 Tonnes For This Year

With 57.75 tonnes withdrawn in the latest week, the number of tonnes of gold bullion withdrawn from the Shanghai Gold Exchange stands at 2,503 tonnes for the year to date.

This is the most gold ever withdrawn from this or from any exchange in a single year that I can find in the post-WW II era.

And this record breaking phenomenon is for the most part being ignored.  It seems in retrospect almost unprecedented, and is particularly odd given the relative  'drying up' of deliveries of physical gold in NY and the shrinking of the 'free gold float' inventories in London.  

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - A Little Higher

Gold and silver drifted a little higher today on very light volumes in New York.

Gold is very quiet in its physical form in The Bucket Shop's licensed facilities.  Most of the action involves house to house deliveries to JPM.

The real action for gold is already in Asia, and not so much even in that long time bullion center of London.

And a very Merry Christmas to all.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts

This was a relatively inconsequential half-day for the US equity markets.

Have a pleasant holiday.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Ho Ho Ho

Gold was slightly weaker and silver held firm in very light holiday trading, after a little more active overnight trade.

Not much is happening with gold at The Bucket Shop.  More ounces were claimed by JPM for their house account.

Silver continues to see movement in and out of the warehouse.  I wonder if this is because there really is not counterpart in silver to the massive physical trading occurring in Asia, especially in Shanghai and Hong Kong.

And apparently not just the precious metals are heading East.   Hong Kong surpassed New York in IPOs this year.

Talk about greed killing the golden goose.

Have a pleasant evening.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Santa Claus Rally

Stocks continued to show modest gains today in light trading, despite some weaker than expected economic numbers this morning.

And so Santa is coming to Wall Street, with year end bonuses for all the little humps and humpettes.

I expect the trading tomorrow to be similar, lightly traded with an upwards bias. It will likely become comatose after the first hour.

Have a pleasant evening.