SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Quad Witching - Dreadnoughts

Today was the September 'quad witching' option expiration for equities and their futures.

The volume was high, but the volatility dampened quite a bit, as the gyrations of the past four days shook out as many speculators as possible.

And so the markets took to the weekend as quietly going out as loudly as this week had come in.

Deutsche Bank seems to be in a fair amount of trouble, as they do not have the reserves to cover that rather impressive fine levied by the US Department of Justice, at $14 billion.  That would eat into their capital, which they can hardly spare.

Interesting that the US seems to be so tough on 'foreign' banks, but so accommodating for its own.  Well, that is just what happens in a currency war, when the domestic Big Banks of Wall Street act as financial dreadnoughts.

The abuse of the markets is becoming a commonplace.   One wonders how far it can go.

All eyes on the FOMC next week.  

Have a pleasant evening.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - A Full Heart, A Heavy Mind

"While Elizabeth Warren attempted to deliver her keynote speech at the Democratic Convention in July, which included an unabashed endorsement of Hillary Clinton after Warren had failed to endorse Senator Bernie Sanders during the critical primary campaign, chants of 'we trusted you' could be heard reverberating through the cavernous hall in Philadelphia...

It’s long past the time for the U.S. Senate to stop conducting isolated, piecemeal investigations and undertake the type of in-depth hearings that the Senate held from 1929 to 1932 that led to the public’s understanding of the serial criminal activities on Wall Street that had produced the Great Depression and which led to the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act — legislation which protected this nation for 66 years until its repeal in 1999 during the Bill Clinton administration."

Pam and Russ Martens, Elizabeth Warren Opens Up Pandora's Box


“You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me. In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.

I did not then see what is now the most shining and obvious thing; the Divine humility which will accept a convert even on such terms. The Prodigal Son at least walked home on his own feet. But who can duly adore that Love which will open the high gates to a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful, and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape? The words compelle intrare, compel them to come in, have been so abused by wicked men that we shudder at them; but, properly understood, they plumb the depth of the Divine mercy.

The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation.”

C. S. Lewis, Surprised By Joy

For those of you who have asked, the queen's MRI was good, as good as it gets for someone with an incurable but 'manageable' illness, and I thank you for your thoughts and prayers.

We were discussing vacation with one of the doctors earlier this week, and we shared some stories about our own trips to the same places in Canada years ago. And she said that 'it is nice that you have such memories to remember in a time like this.'

And I thought, but did not say it so as not to be too cheeky, 'What do you mean, these times now are among the best!'    We have never loved each other more, and so enjoyed doing every little thing as a couple. A trip to the local farm stand together is as enjoyable as a deluxe trip to Paris.

The words 'sacrament of the moment' take on a new meaning when written, not in a book, but in the heart stripped bare of its illusions.

At times it does feel a bit like having open heart surgery without anesthetic and a dull knife. That is the only way to describe this. I imagine the illness of a child is even worse. Watching a loved one suffer is a torment truly known only to those who have known it.  This is a pain more 'intimate.'

And so now I think, or I at least hope, that I see and perhaps even understand the depth of life a bit better, and know more of my own failings and shortcomings more clearly, and regret them in a way that is hard to describe. And for this I am grateful.

On the darker side, I have pretty much given up hope that there will be any meaningful reform initiated or even willingly accepted by the privileged class in the US. The money is just too good, and their pride and greed suppress all caution and fears.  Although it is clear that a few are waking up to the possibilities, and are attempting to paint a better picture of themselves for history.

So we will likely see the sorts of things that we saw during the protests, and even riots, of the 60's and 70's before some meaningful change occurs.  No one who really remembers what it was like will wish this, but I am afraid that it now seems too likely.

And what concerns me the most is that I get the impression that the rich and powerful feel that they are ready for it, and that it even presents an opportunity, as do all conflicts for the soulless moneyed interests.   And so therefore their response will be hard-line and stupidly self-destructive.

Tomorrow is the stock option expiration, and the next week we will have the Fed's FOMC meeting for September on Wednesday the 21st.

Have a pleasant evening.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Risk On - One Question For the Candidates

For whatever reasons, probably the poor economic data making the marketeers doubt that the Fed will be increasing rates anytime soon, it was a risk on day in the equity markets.

Tomorrow will be the September options expiration.   Notice the big 'wash and rinse' swings we have been getting in the past few days after a couple week of a sideways chop snoratorium.

Have a pleasant evening.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Blast Radius

Gold and silver bounced back a little bit today as the dollar gave up some of its recent gains.

It is not always this way, but at this time at least the precious metals seem to be price driven by the forex traders, who care not a whit about supply and demand.

That is setting up a real witches brew of malinvestment, because they are attempting to sustain the unsustainable with increasing use of force of leverage and market dominance.

Sometimes you have no choice but to let someone in power have their way, and try to stay out of the blast radius when the inevitable reckoning comes.   Even when it is long past time for a change in strategy and style, and apparent to most that their approach is beyond all rational expectations.

Then hard reality intrudes, and their dreams of fame, vindication, and conquest collapse and burn in failure.  And the innocent suffer.

I am sure you are familiar with that axiom from your experience at work, especially if you have worked at a large organization staffed with 'very serious people' at the top.

I am not sure how far the monetary blast radius will extend, but it will almost certainly be fairly impressive.

Have a pleasant evening.

SP 500 and NDX Futures Daily Charts - Elitist Economic Knuckleheads

"Several economists I know seem to have assimilated a norm that the post-real macroeconomists actively promote – that it is an extremely serious violation of some honor code for anyone to criticize openly a revered authority figure – and that neither facts that are false, nor predictions that are wrong, nor models that make no sense matter enough to worry about."

Paul Romer, The Trouble With Macroeconomics

If Bloomberg television quoted his views correctly today, then a well known academic economist they cite explains that we have full employment, even though the labor participation is so low, because the video games available to consumers have gotten so good that people would prefer to stay at home and play them rather than work.

And so they don't work, and therefore we can ignore them and the economic engineers of the Fed can claim full employment with a straight face.

If the games were not so good, then people would get bored staying at home and would go to work. It is just a rational actor's choice.

Since when is work, for the majority of people at least, an optional choice for one type of pleasure and entertainment and diversion compared to others? Let's see, shall I go to the movies, go fishing, or go to work today?

How many moons are there on this guy's planet? What a knucklehead application of economic models and ideological stereotypes that makes reality into a kindergarten caricature.

Of course people would rather do whatever they wanted if they had the choice, rather than work at something that someone else gives them to do, especially for the 90% whose jobs are tedious and repetitious.

Why is it that the stooges of the moneyed interests always run to monetary economic incentives models to examine the choices of their masters, but do not seem to be able to apply them to the people who do the day to day work?

If anyone dare propose something that would diminish the elephantine incomes of their patrons by a few percent, they have a holy conniption fit about these 'job creators' being discouraged about building businesses. Why, if I get a penny less than $120 million this year for spending so much of my valuable time creating and promoting financial frauds, I don't think I will even bother to get out of bed.

Perhaps Mr. Economist should consider the time honored, common sense proposition that people are reluctant to take menial shit jobs for poverty wages, unless they are absolutely coerced into it. So rather than enhance the incentives, let's increase the coercion, for them.

Perhaps Mr. Economist might consider the revolutionary notion, a corollary to their own economic incentives models, that more people would be working if there were more jobs that paid living wages?

How much anecdotal information about people staying in long lines over night for decent jobs can they ignore in their stereotypical models?

When people say, I cannot attract good talent for jobs, do they ever consider raising the pay to attract a better caliber of candidate? Oh no, the free market only works from the top down.

What a world we have, that has such creatures in it. In fairness, the rubbish emanating from the left of the economic auditorium is often equally nonsensical. And that is because economics is too often a science that is flexible enough to serve whomever pays for it in a culture that considers greed to be the highest good, and for the market to be god.

Have a pleasant evening.

Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts - Central Bank Blather and Stock Option Expiration

"People of privilege will always risk their complete destruction rather than surrender any material part of their advantage. Intellectual myopia, often called stupidity, is no doubt a reason. But the privileged also feel that their privileges, however egregious they may seem to others, are a solemn, basic, God-given right."

John Kenneth Galbraith


"Countries such as Great Britain and the United States became rich because their citizens overthrew the elites who controlled power and created a society where political rights were much more broadly distributed, where the government was accountable and responsive to citizens, and where the great mass of people could take advantage of economic opportunities."

Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson, Why Nations Fail


"I don’t think there’s any doubt that quantitative easing enabled the rich and the quick. It was a massive gift… I hope that we do indeed succeed in being able to say in the end the wealth effect was more evenly distributed. I doubt it.”

Richard Fisher, former Dallas Fed President

Freedom is not an objective to be reached and then forgotten.  It is a way of life.

Gold and silver were lower today, largely on a stronger dollar and what I like to think of as stock market option expiration for September which is this Friday.  The options on miners are lucrative enough to warrant the attention of some of the pigmen.

It is fashionable but fatally myopic to blame everything on government manipulation when the regulatory bodies and their bosses are as ideologically and financially compromised as they are today, and the moneyed interests buy and sell politicians almost openly, and even then quite brazenly.

But still, these fluctuations in the metals themselves are just short term 'wiggles' for the most part, and the overall trend remains bullish.

So if you chase and fret about with these fluctuations, you may get dizzy, and a bit poorer, from chasing your own tail.  Especially if you are over-playing your hand and your temperament with excessive leverage.

The economic news starts trickling in tomorrow.

Have a pleasant evening.