SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - All For the Fed

Stocks had a hard go of it today, but managed to hold the level on their latest bubble up to near highs.

Economic news was limping in this morning with existing home sales missing estimates.

Stock market volume fell 14% off its ten day moving average. Volumes are lackluster.

GDP second go for the 3Q estimate tomorrow.

Have a pleasant evening.

Here is the Lord's Prayer Advertisement Banned By British Cinemas

"Leading UK cinemas are refusing to screen a Church of England commercial reciting the Lord's Prayer. But what are the rules on religious advertising, asks Justin Parkinson.

It features the Archbishop of Canterbury, a grieving man, bodybuilders, a festival-goer, emergency workers, a cattle farmer, a choir, refugees, a commuter, schoolchildren and the audience at a baptism. They say the words of the Lord's Prayer.

Official advertising rules are aimed at preventing misleading, or causing harm or offence. Advertisers must take care not to incite hatred or promote discrimination on religious grounds

Three of the UK's biggest cinema chains - Odeon, Cineworld and Vue - have banned the advert from being shown on the same bill as Star Wars: The Force Awakens, due to open just before Christmas.

DCM, the agency handling these matters for the cinemas, argues it could offend those of "differing faiths and no faith".

The Church of England says this is "plain silly" and could have a "chilling effect" on free speech...

The Advertising Standards Authority, which ensures the CAP's rules are followed, has so far received no complaints about the Lord's Prayer advert and the dispute remains solely between the Church of England and the cinemas."

BBC, Lord's Prayer Advert


"Christmas celebration this year is going to be a charade because the whole world is at war. We are close to Christmas. There will be lights, there will be parties, bright trees, even Nativity scenes – all decked out – while the world continues to wage war.

It’s all a charade. The world has not understood the way of peace. The whole world is at war. A war can be justified, so to speak, with many, many reasons, but when all the world as it is today, at war, piecemeal though that war may be—a little here, a little there—there is no justification.

What shall remain in the wake of this war, in the midst of which we are living now? What shall remain? Ruins, thousands of children without education, so many innocent victims, and lots of money in the pockets of arms dealers.”

Francis I


The New Atheists embrace a belief system as intolerant, chauvinistic and bigoted as that of religious fundamentalists. They propose a route to collective salvation and the moral advancement of the human species through science and reason. The utopian dream of a perfect society and a perfect human being, the idea that we are moving towards collective salvation, is one of the most dangerous legacies of the Christian faith and the Enlightenment.

Those who believe in the possibility of this perfection often call for the silencing or eradication of human beings who are impediments to human progress. They turn their particular good into a universal good. They are blind to their own corruption and capacity for evil. They soon commit evil, not for evil's sake but to make a better world.

Reigns of terror are thus the bastard child of the Enlightenment. Terror in the name of utopian ideals would rise again and again in the coming centuries. The Nazi death camps and the Soviet gulags were spawned by the enlightenment. Fascists and communists were bred on visions of human perfectibility. Tens of millions of people have been murdered in the futile effort to reform human nature and build utopian societies.

The danger is not Islam or Christianity or any other religion. It is the human heart—the capacity we all have for evil. All human institutions with a lust for power give their utopian visions divine sanction.”

Chris Hedges

Part of me says this is of no consequence, but it is a sign of the times, of a world that has forgotten its weakness and seeks to become perfectly powerful on its own terms.

God has a way of standing before the nations in judgement.

And for that, I tremble for the world, and ourselves.

The way to answer this is not to take action against the cinemas, or those who would ban prayer or any mention of God on their media or in their presence.

The way to answer this is to make this Christmas a special season of prayer for peace in the world, to join hands spontaneously, and recite the Lord's Prayer. Not to provoke anger, but to witness for the good news. They may have their god of the markets, or their god of themselves. But we will not be silenced.

And much more importantly, without which all this is just vanity, we must take those words to heart, and not let them become a charade. To do this we must make them a living part of our daily routine and interactions with others, so that our lives themselves become living prayers, and we do not fall into a pious hypocrisy.

Answer harshness with kindness, anger with peacefulness, and indifference with caring.

'Your love for one another will show to the world that you are my disciples.'

Of course we do not do this well. Like the Lord's own apostle Peter we are tempted to anger and violence, tempted to deny our relationship, often confused and uncertain. And he had seen with his own eyes, and heard directly with his own ears, our Lord as He walked on the earth.

And so we gather ourselves up, acknowledge our faults, and go forward again, and again, in grace, ever-growing, ever becoming as He wills us to be if we do but accept his commandment to love one another as we love Him, and He us.

Narcissists and Psychopaths

"Psychopaths are social predators, and like all predators, they are looking for feeding grounds. Wherever you get power, prestige and money, you will find them.

Psychopaths view any social exchange as a 'feeding opportunity,' a contest or a test of wills in which there can be only one winner. Their motives are to manipulate and take, ruthlessly and without remorse.

Many psychopaths describe the traditional treatment programmes as finishing schools where they hone their skills. Where they find out that there are lots of techniques they had not thought about before.

You'll find them in any organization where, by the nature of one's position, you have power and control over other people and the opportunity to get something.  There are certainly more people in the business world who would score high in the psychopathic dimension than in the general population.

People tend to think of psychopaths as criminals. In fact, the majority of psychopaths aren't criminal. Not all psychopaths are in prison - some are in the boardroom. I always said that if I wasn't studying psychopaths in prison, I'd do it at the stock exchange.

Psychopaths show a stunning lack of concern for the devastating effects their actions have on others. Often they are completely forthright about the matter, calmly stating that they have no sense of guilt, are not sorry for the pain and destruction they have caused, and that there is no reason for them to be concerned.”

Robert D. Hare

And this is why we need rules and regulations, and why theories about naturally free markets are a cruel trick perpetrated by the predatory class upon the gullible.  And like campaigns to deregulate, they will seek to use and manipulate those regulators and any new regulations for their own advantage.

Rules alone will not be sufficient.  The more complicated the rules, the more easily they are bent to the schemes of the swindlers and their lawyers.  They knock down the simple and efficient rules and set a labyrinth of complexities and exceptions for themselves to use.

And this may also be a handy guide for interpreting and understanding the next financial crisis or presidential election, whichever comes first.

Shanghai Gold Deliveries and Deliveries on the Comex - The 'Rest of the World' According To Bloomberg

Gresham's law is an economic principle that states 'when a government overvalues one type of money and undervalues another, the undervalued money will leave the country or disappear from circulation into hoards, while the overvalued money will flood into circulation.'

Notice the 'sea change' that occurred with Shanghai gold flows starting in 2013.

And notice how the Western financial media views this phenomenon.

China Savers Buying Gold As 'Rest of the World' Exits

The 'Rest of the World' apparently does not include India, Russia, Turkey, much of the Mideast, and the European central banks who have been busy trying to repatriate their gold from New York and London.

I have included a chart showing 'Silk Road' gold consumption below.

In addition to all the wealthy individuals in the US and UK who are buying it for their own private vaults.

Who are the idiots who own most of the gold in the central bank crowd anyway?  The numbers are a bit hard to come by because for some reason the bankers are notoriously secretive in response to questions.

The 'official gold reserves' of all central banks in the world is also included below.  And the biggest goldbugs are the US, Germany, Italy, France, the IMF, Russia, China, Switzerland, Japan and the Netherlands.

True, a few central banks have disgorged some of their gold. The UK sold quite a bit of their sovereign reserves at the bottom, the lowest price for gold in dollars. Brown's Bottom it was called, presumably to rescue some 'trading houses' who were caught short.

"We looked into the abyss if the gold price rose further. A further rise would have taken down one or several trading houses, which might have taken down all the rest in their wake. Therefore at any price, at any cost, the central banks had to quell the gold price, manage it."

Sir Eddie George, Bank of England, September 1999

One might wonder what has some of the NY and London banking crowd so worked up?  What have they gotten themselves into now?  Their spokesmodels have been quite active in the media lately.

I am sure the truth of this will come out some day.  Most likely over some long weekend.

This is how Nixon unilaterally took the US off the international gold standard, and declared a new fiat regime for 'the rest of the world' under the rule of the US dollar reserve, thereby rewriting the Bretton Woods agreement by executive decree.

Is it true that only a few 'goldbugs' really care about this and no one else?

Most of the central banks know the truth of things.  They are just keeping quiet about it for now, for whatever reason.  I suspect that they are receiving pressure related to the antics of one or more of the Banks.

"Gold is unique among assets, in that it is not issued by any government or central bank, which means that its value is not influenced by political decisions or the solvency of one institution or another."

Salvatore Rossi, Central Bank of Italy, 30 Sept 2013

Do these fellows take us for complete fools?  Really?

Shanghai Gold Exchange Withdrawals of 49 Tonnes in the Latest Week

There were about 49 tonnes, or 1,575,000 troy ounces, of gold delivered from Shanghai in the latest week.

No matter what the pundits say about 'gold bugs' and all that sort of nonsensical disparagement, the central banks of the world have been net buyers of gold since about 2007, and the major countries of The Silk Road are buying gold bullion by the tonne each and every week.

Are they all unenlightened idiots? Goldbugs?

Bloomberg seems to imply that they are.  China Savers Turn To Gold As 'Rest of World' Exits

Are the central bankers of the world fools and dupes?

Or are we being misled by the global Banks?    Hard to believe, right?

Gold bullion is moving from West to East.

It is Gresham's Law in action.  

And they are dissembling, most likely to save a couple of the Banks once again and support a policy error that is both wrong-headed and unsustainable.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Gold Option Expiration Tuesday 24 November

"And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?  This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's!

And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?"

Robert Bolt, A Man For All Seasons


"Sherman, who started with so much, lost everything. But he gained his soul. Whereas I, you see, who started with so little, gained everything. 'What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but loses...' Ah well. There are compensations."

Tom Wolfe, Bonfire of the Vanities

Gold and silver struggled to hold on to support today in a lackluster trade. They faded into what might best be described as an irrelevant close.

There was a fairly long intraday comment here called 'An Essay Considering the Current Monetary Orthodoxy and Gold.'

In this I consider a statement that seems to represent the picture, a collection of  received catch phrases, that many financial journalists, and economists for that matter, walk around repeating as the commonly accepted dogma that signifies good standing in their profession.

To take issue with it is to imperil your standing in the acolytes of the insiders, the very serious people, in the halls of Anglo-American power.

There are a number of these orthodoxies about.  The 'efficient markets hypothesis' was a good one, a real knee-slapper that only made sense if you had already surrendered your intellect to a world that kept you, and rewarded you.

It presumes that all men are as good as angels, and act in a group with perfect rationality and selflessness, in a devotion to the highest benefits for all.  And if they are left alone at this, their works will continue to become even more virtuous and productive.

And a whole movement in economics and politics tore down decades of sound regulations and cast them on the fires of ideology, burning the books of the past on the basis of this tenet of modern economic certitude.

There was another overnight commentary, a reprint really that might be of some technical interest, titled 'What Is Driving the Price of Gold?'  It was something I had done in 2008 that considered the price of gold across a wide variety of financial data and sought to find the greatest influences on its price.

Alas, I am not so sure that if I did this same thing again that it would 'work.'  The markets have progressed quite a bit since then, mostly in the wrong directions when it comes to price discovery and sound investment practice.

We will be getting a second estimate of Q3 GDP next week and a few other real economy odds and ends, their reliability of varying quality.

There will be an option expiration for gold on the Comex, Tuesday 24 November.

And as a reminder, next Thursday 26 November will be a holiday in the US for Thanksgiving and of course the markets will be closed.

Little matters now though except for the Federal Reserve and what they will choose to do with our paper money.

Speaking of which, someone let me know that there will be a 'special meeting' of the FOMC on Monday November 23.

Advanced Notice of a Meeting under Expedited Procedures

It is anticipated that the closed meeting of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System at 11:30 AM on Monday, November 23, 2015, will be held under expedited procedures, as set forth in section 26lb.7 of the Board's Rules Regarding Public Observation of Meetings, at the Board's offices at 20th Street and C Streets, N.W., Washington, D.C. The following items of official Board business are tentatively scheduled to be considered at that meeting.

Meeting Date: Monday, November 23, 2015

They issue these meeting notices occasionally.  From a quick glane at past notices they seem to have one of these almost every month.  It is probably not for anything of immediate consequence, but let's keep an eye on it.

Gresham's Law still works, apparently, and what remains in the vaults of the West is increasingly the synthetic gold and silver of hypothecated paper claims, while the real physical bullion continues flowing East in surprisingly large amounts, almost unremarked and unmentioned.

Speaking of Gresham's Law, there was little activity domestically at The Bucket Shop, but another large chunk of gold left the Brinks warehouse in Hong Kong.  bullion levels there have fallen well below one million ounces again.  That is less than a week's delivery in Shanghai.

Does Gresham's Law work on people. I mean the more blatantly self serving and corrupt a people may become, does that society start to raise up its worst to the heights, while the sound and virtuous retreat to their studies and private lives?  The current field of candidates for the highest office and the ways they talk could make one wonder about this.

We keep quite a few secrets in our proud and exceptional society.  Because we have quite a bit of which we ought to be ashamed, that needs to remain hidden, and cannot bear the light of day.

Have a pleasant weekend.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - The Beat Goes On

“Of course I believe in reestablishing Glass Steagall. But let me go further. I do not believe that, given that six financial institutions have assets today around $10 trillion - 60 percent of the GDP of the United States - I do not believe that Congress has the capability of regulating Wall Street.

I believe that Wall Street regulates the Congress and that you gotta break these guys up. The president needs economic advisors who do not come from Wall Street. He needs advisors prepared to stand up to Wall Street.

Wall Street cannot continue to be an island unto itself, gambling trillions in risky financial instruments while expecting the public to bail it out.

You have to bring people together who may not agree on every issue, but who understand that the middle class is collapsing and we are moving toward an oligarchic form of society, where the billionaires will control the economy and the political life of this country."

Bernie Sanders

As long as any type of crime or swindle is profitable, and the penalties for crossing the line can be absorbed as a cost of doing business, there will be no peace or prosperity, and no sustainable recovery.

History has proven this, and common sense embraces it.

And yet we still have no meaningful financial and political campaign financing reform.  Why is this?

Have a pleasant weekend.