26 August 2015

Remembering the Summer of 1929


This is one of the best documentaries on the Crash of 1929 if you wish to get a feel for the times.   You may find it interesting to watch the whole thing below.

I have posted the entire documentary twice before:  once, on the 80th anniversary of Black Thursday in 2009, and once before in December of 2007.

I remember the Summer of 1929 being described as unusually hot, with the stock market going up and down like a roller coaster, making investors and pundits almost dizzy.  That is, until the great push up to the very height of the market in early September.

It was the laissez-faire abuses of the 1920's, the reign of supply side economics,  the institutionalized political corruption of easy money, an oversized,  overly influential and powerful financial/industrial sector that set the stage for the terrible Depression of the 1930's.

It also gave rise to the many reforms introduced by the FDR administration.

Most of which have been steadily overturned, one by one, by the big money interests who care for nothing but themselves, and would do it again, and again, if allowed to do so.

Most of the scams of the moneyed interests are remarkably simple, and the same over time.  At least they are once you scrape away the jargon, the bells and whistles, and paid for policy theories of pedigreed prostitutes.

The titans of Wall Street are no smarter than many smart people who do much more difficult jobs and lead simple, honest lives. But they are driven, they are insatiable, and they are shameless.

Enough people are easily fooled in each generation by well scripted ideological PR campaigns, clever revisions and misrepresentations of history, and the steady drumbeat of slogans and propaganda to allow the same old scams and abuses to come back again.  And unfortunately even very smart and powerful and greatly advantaged people are always willing to do anything for money.

Here is a link to the transcript of this documentary.

Narrator: At sea and on land, everyone seemed to be making money. It was a stampede of buying. And major speculators like John Jacob Rascob whipped up the frenzy. He told readers of The Ladies’ Home Journal that now everyone could be rich. September 2nd, Labor Day. It was the hottest day of the year. The markets were closed and people were at the beach. A reporter checked in with astrologer Evangeline to ask about the future of stock prices. Her answer: the Dow Jones could climb to heaven. The very next day, September 3rd, the stock market hit its all-time high.

Ben Karol, Former Newspaper Delivery Boy: My father and I had an ongoing discussion about the stock market. And I used to say, “Pop, everybody’s getting rich but you. You know, you work so hard and you’re never going to make a nickel. All you do is you keep delivering these newspapers and that’s about it. The guy who’s shining shoes is in the stock market, the grocery clerk is in the stock market, the school teacher’s in the stock market. The teller at the bank is in the stock market. Everybody’s in the stock market. You’re the only one that’s not in the stock market.” And he used to sit and laugh and say, “You’ll see. You’ll see. You’ll see.”

Narrator: On September 5th, economist Roger Babson gave a speech to a group of businessmen. “Sooner or later, a crash is coming and it may be terrific.” He’d been saying the same thing for two years, but now, for some reason, investors were listening. The market took a severe dip. They called it the “Babson Break.” The next day, prices stabilized, but several days later, they began to drift lower. Though investors had no way of knowing it, the collapse had already begun

Narrator: In the weeks to follow, the market fluctuated wildly up and down. On September 12th, prices dropped ten percent. They dipped sharply again in the 20s. Stock markets around the world were falling, too. Then, on September 25th, the market suddenly rallied.

Reuben L. Cain, Former Stock Salesman: I remember well that I thought, “Why is this doing this?” And then I thought, “Well, I’m new here and these people” — like every day in the paper, Charlie Mitchell would have something to say, the J.P. Morgan people would have something to say about how good things were — and I thought, “Well, they know a lot more about this market than I do. I’m fairly new here and I really can’t see why it’s going up.” But then, when they say it can’t go down or if it does go down today, it’ll go back tomorrow, you think, “Well, they really are like God. They know it all and it must be the way it’s going because they say so.”

Narrator: As the market floundered, financial leaders were as optimistic as ever, more so. Just five days before the crash, Thomas Lamont, acting head of the highly conservative Morgan Bank, wrote a letter to President Hoover. “The future appears brilliant. Our securities are the most desirable in the world.” Charles Mitchell assured nervous investors that things had never been better.

Craig Mitchell, Son of Charles E. Mitchell: Practically every business leader in America, and banker, right around the time of 1929, was saying how wonderful things were and the economy had only one way to go and that was up.



"Running for President under the slogan "Rugged Individualism" made it difficult for Hoover to promote massive government intervention in the economy. In 1930, succumbing to pressure from American industrialists, Hoover signed the Hawley-Smoot Tariff which was designed to protect American industry from overseas competition. Passed against the advice of nearly every prominent economist of the time, it was the largest Tariff in American history. (at that time the US was a large export economy with a trade surplus).

Believing in a balanced budget, Hoover's 1931 economic plan cut federal spending and increased taxes, both of which inhibited individual efforts to spur the economy.

Finally in 1932 Hoover signed legislation creating the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. This act allocated a half billion dollars for loans to banks, corporations, and state governments. Public works projects such as the Golden Gate Bridge and the Los Angeles Aqueduct were built as a result of this plan.

Hoover and the RFC stopped short of meeting one demand of the American masses — federal aid to individuals. Hoover believed that government aid would stifle initiative and create dependency where individual effort was needed. Past governments never resorted to such schemes and the economy managed to rebound. Clearly Hoover and his advisors failed to grasp the scope of the Great Depression."

25 August 2015

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Option Expiration Tomorrow - How To Manipulate a Market


There will be an option expiration tomorrow for precious metals on the Comex.

Gold and silver were hit in the classic contract dump early on in the New York Trade.

Surprisingly the US dollar also fell.   Stocks tried to stage a rally but faded badly and fell into the close.

I wanted to take a moment to give the reader a little better view of the paper precious metals landscape into year end.

In the fourth chart below you can see the Comex gold contracts listed, with their volumes.  As you can see the most active contract remaining is December.  It will be the next active month.   There is some minor activity in October because of the options activity.

The fifth chart shows the silver contracts.  There the most active contracts are September and December.

So, if tomorrow is the option expiration for the September contracts, we would expect to see the action become more pivotal for silver, since silver is going to be an active month for that contract.

Gold, not so much as the active month fades.  But that does not mean that gold will become quiet, except perhaps at The Bucket Shop.   There is clearly a huge market for gold, and the exchanges in the East will keep buying and delivering large amounts of bullion.

Lastly I show the small amount of 'delivery' at the Comex in gold yesterday in which Goldman was most notable taking 4400 ounces worth of contracts for their 'house account.'

Let's see what happens as we work our way through the option expiration tomorrow, and also see how the equity and bonds markets keep digesting this disruption in their long climb to bubbledom.

Honest markets are not a nicety; they are a necessity, a sine qua non for productivity and prosperity.

The appalling lack of reform in the Anglo-American markets is extracting a heavy price.   We may not see it, we may be distracted and befuddled as to the true nature of things.  We may be deluded, and blinded to the true nature of our involvement and actions with the global markets.

The rest of the world may not be so similarly inclined.  And therein we have the basis for the currency war.

And finally at the end there is a brief video from Jim Cramer about how one goes about manipulating markets like stocks and commodities.  You move prices up, and then you smack them lower to create negative sentiment.

You spread stories and biases with the media.   You abuse the market system under the noses of regulators with the acquiescence hopefully of your fellow professionals, wreaking carnage on honest people and the real economy.

Have a pleasant evening.













SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Whiplash


US equities came in roaring this morning, with punters buying the dip with abandon.

Alas, it was not to be.

The rally faded badly into the afternoon, and the equity futures ended up in a classic whiplash reversal of an attempted 'dead cat bounce.'

So what next.

One thing is that the Fed is probably, if they are wise, taking any idea of a September rate increase off the table.

Not that a 25 basis point increase would make much difference.   The Fed has distorted the real economy badly, and created a formidable asset bubble in paper, and a systemically dangerous financial sector through policy errors and malign regulation .

No they won't do it if the markets are still wobbly because they do not want to do anything visible that could be pointed at later when the search for a scapegoat begins, like the last time, with furious words and much fake anger by the wise men of Capitol Hill.

Today's action was not encouraging since almost everything went lower.   We might have to spend a little time at these levels, allowing things to consolidate, before the bulls and their pals in the banking sector begin to attempt to reinflate this pig.

The Banks must be restrained, and the financial system reformed, with balance restored to the economy, before there can be any sustainable recovery.

When the suffering becomes visible and the reaction strong and widespread enough, perhaps change will come.

Have a pleasant evening.







24 August 2015

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Comex Option Expiration on Wednesday


Stocks took a beating today, particularly in the HFT trading of the first hour that saw the DJIA down over 1,000 points.

I think the 'fragile' underpinnings of these paper asset markets became all too clear this morning.  And they have not changed, not one bit.

Gold initially caught a stiff flight to safety, but was hit with selling even as the stock market saw a remarkable bounce off its bottom. How unusual.

The US Dollar was certainly no safe haven today as it slumped to a seven month low.

Silver is going to be a pivotal player I think, moreso in the next month than now in this inactive month of August.

Gold is now outperforming the SP 500 for the Year-To-Date. See the chart below. How about that for pet rocks. Both are lower priced in dollars. Gold has been rallying in most other currencies.

The Fed's Lockhart came out this afternoon in a speech on the West coast and reiterated his opinion that the Fed would raise rates this year, although he waffled a bit on his prior certainty. I would say that September will be off the table unless stocks can rally higher and make people forget was the underside of an asset bubble looks like.

There was very little action in The Bucket Shop on Friday, with no deliveries and little warehouse movement as shown below. Its a funny month that started off with big buys in gold, almost clearing out the available inventory, and then a big lapse into nothing.

Let's see how China and Europe trade overnight.

Have a pleasant evening.