Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Malignant Self Love of the Plutocrats - PPT Puts On the Afterburners

Signorelli, Sermon and Deeds of the Antichrist

“'Respect for government, respect for the Supreme Court, respect for the president, it’s all gone,' he said. 'Even respect for the Federal Reserve.' (lol That ship sailed long ago)

The Volcker Rule, which was part of the Dodd-Frank regulatory legislation, is being chipped away at by Republicans, which doesn’t sit well with him. 'There is no force on earth that can stand up effectively, year after year, against the thousands of individuals and hundreds of millions of dollars in the Washington swamp aimed at influencing the legislative and electoral process.'

'The central issue is we’re developing into a plutocracy,' he told me. 'We’ve got an enormous number of enormously rich people that have convinced themselves that they’re rich because they’re smart and constructive. And they don’t like government, and they don’t like to pay taxes.'

He wondered how many lectures and presentations he had sat through with economists 'telling us open markets are wonderful, everybody benefits from open markets.' Eventually, Mr. Volcker said, someone in those lectures would always ask, 'What about that poor manufacturer in my town? But that concern was dismissed too easily, with talk of worker retraining or some other solution far easier said than done.'"

Andrew Ross Sorkin, Paul Volcker, at 91, Sees ‘a Hell of a Mess in Every Direction’


"Often the narcissist believes that other people are 'faking it', leveraging emotional displays to achieve a goal.  He is convinced that their ostensible 'feelings' are grounded in ulterior, non-emotional motives.  Faced with other people's genuine emotions, the narcissist becomes suspicious and embarrassed.  He feels compelled to avoid emotion-tinged situations, or worse, experiences surges of almost uncontrollable aggression in the presence of expressed [genuine] sentiments.

Narcissists like being feared. It imbues them with an intoxicating sensation of omnipotence. Narcissists damage and hurt but they do so offhandedly and naturally, as an afterthought.  They are aware of what they are doing to others — but they do not care.”

Sam Vaknin, Malignant Self-Love

Stocks were weak overnight, dropping on both the Asian and the European openings.

But they were reeling on the open of the US futures markets, led even lower by the results from real economy stocks like CAT, who are not doing all that well, and are symptomatic of global slowing.

Gold got a strong safe haven bid, rallying up above 1240.  But that gain gave up ground as the day wore on, finishing off around the $1230 level.  Silver is following. 

As a reminder there will be a Comex gold option expiration on Thursday the 25th.

Need little, want less, and love more.  For those who stand firm until the end will be saved.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Skittish - The Quiet Coup

"I am not so optimistic that this reform is possible, because there has in fact been a soft coup d'etat in the US, which now exists in a state of crony corporatism that wields enormous influence over the media and within the government.

Let's be clear about this, the oligarchs are flush with victory, and feel that they are firmly in control, able to subvert and direct any popular movement to the support of their own fascist ends and unslakable will to power.

This is the contempt in which they hold the majority of American people and the political process: the common people are easily led fools, and everyone else who is smart enough to know better has their price. And they would beggar every middle class voter in the US before they will voluntarily give up one dime of their ill gotten gains.

But my model says that the oligarchs will continue to press their advantages, being flushed with victory, until they provoke a strong reaction that frightens everyone, like a wake up call, and the tide then turns to genuine reform."

Simon Johnson, The Quiet Coup, August 2010

Stocks were a bit weak today, having opened quite a bit lower than Friday's close in the futures market.

Jitters over the Chinese economy were the putative cause in spokesmodel land.

Gold and silver were off a bit on a stronger US Dollar as shown in the chart below. The DX Index is topping 96.

There will be a gold option expiration this week on Thursday the 25th.

Looking at the chart below, I remind you of the active role that both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama played in consummating what had been a trend to turn away from The New Deal and the working class since the 1970's, in partnership with the Republicans and their traditional supporters amongst the affluent professional class, aka the highly credentialed 'winners.'

Have a pleasant evening.

Physical Gold Flowing Steadily Out of the US

Exhaustible supply meets seemingly insatiable demand.

There is a sea change underway in the global monetary regime that has been in place since the 1971, and the unilateral abandonment of the gold standard by Richard Nixon.   This current evolution is a major historic event, and as such, happens slowly for a very long time, and then all of a sudden, catching most by surprise.

The 'gold float' is the available physical supply at anywhere near current prices held primarily in the US and the UK for export to Asian Demand.

When the 'float' is exhausted higher prices, likely much higher, will be required to free up existing inventory held by strong hands and official sources.

History suggests that when the physical supply float collapses, and that information becomes known generally by markets, the gold pricing pool will also collapse, and suddenly so, because of the pyramid of leverage that is being shakily maintained.

The pool, the great gold pricing manipulation game, will continue until it can no longer be sustained.

Gold is being treated and traded as if it is just another currency, and is managed for all the reasons that currency prices are managed in a fiat monetary regime managed by central banks.

Unfortunately for them they can only 'create' gold through leverage and non-transparency.

Weekly Gold and Silver Flows In Funds and ETFs

Flowing, from West to East.

We seem to have indications of a durable bottom being formed.

Let's see if that trend continues.

Funny Finance, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Banks

Who could have seen it coming?

When Economic Models Meet Reality

The Mispricing of Risk

Innovation in Financial Products

Aftermath of a Financial Bubble 

Allocating Precious Liquidity

Inside Nikki Haley's Shocking Speech to Secretive Far-Right Group

"Just days before she resigned as UN Ambassador, Nikki Haley delivered a private speech to the Council for National Policy, a secretive group of influential right-wing figures. Journalist Max Blumenthal obtained exclusive access and reveals shocking details -- including Haley's admission that she threatened the Chinese ambassador with a US invasion of North Korea."

The gist of this interview is that Nikki Haley was being lauded by the liberal media and the corporate Democrats as standing out in the Trump administration as a moderate, and even as a 'woman of color.'

It is similar to the rehabilitation of  George W. Bush amongst the Democratic political elites.  Its like he and Bill Clinton are political cousins.  And in some ways they were.  And the Obamas and Hillary will suck up to anyone who is an insider and an enabler of the moneyed interests, like themselves.

The interview makes the case that the goal posts have moved so far to the right that even war hawks and neo-liberals are starting to look like benign moderates.

The move has been so steady and gradual and so protracted that most don't even notice, how 'flaming socialists' like Obama are really yesterday's corporate Republicans.

You may see the original article at The Real News Network.