 | MONEY DAILY | Commentary on Stocks - Bonds - Gold - Silver - Crypto - Oil/Gas and more |
| HOME | PRICE GUIDE | STORE | BLOGS | SPORTS | BUSINESS | WILD SIDE | CONTACT | ARCHIVES |
Weekly Survey of Gold and Silver Prices
Single Ounce Silver Market Price Benchmark
Money Daily has been providing business and financial market news, views, and coverage on a nearly continuous basis since 2006. Complete archives are available at moneydaily.blogspot.com.
PRIOR COVERAGE:
|
Sunday, October 18, 2026, 11:54 am ET Outside of the usual political grandstanding, there's little to move markets other than earnings reports, which will take center stage this week as some of the biggest publicly-traded companies report for the third quarter. Positioning prior to the midterms remains a fool's game. There's clearly a newfound disdain for tech and AI, owing mostly to crumbling cost structures to build data centers and fund the expansion of the latest, greatest technology. Since closing at its most recent all-time high on October 6, the NASDAQ has fallen some 5.3%. According to early voting exit polls and data, Democrats are leading Republicans as they usually do with actual Election Day now just 16 days off. By Monday, another handful of states that set the timetable for early voting at 15 days prior to the election will join the fray, with the last of the early-voting states joining in no later than the following Monday. Whether or not one buys into the "two-party system," the results should cause more factionalism, no matter which party ends up in control of the House and Senate. The one certainty is that the White House will remain in control of the Republican party, with President Trump as its titular leader. His effectiveness in the final two years of his term in office, will be affected negatively if Democrats win just the House, and possibly catastrophically if they take the Senate as well, because then, a case for impeachment might actually result in his removal from office, or, as was the case with Richard M. Nixon, he could be forced into resignation by his own party, saving the country from the horrors of an impeachment trial, though neither party seems to be disposed to forego such delectable drama. So, stocks will move the market this week, rather than politics, which is as it should be. Stocks Only the Dow Industrials and NYSE Composite managed gains this week as fears of a financial AI implosion hounded the tech sector and sent the NASDAQ and S&P lower. The movement was most pronounced on the NAZ, though it is nowhere near panic stages. That will likely come after choose one: a) the October 27-28 FOMC meeting; b) the midterms, or; c) the December 8-9 FOMC meeting. One way or another, the delicate dancing narrative that the Republican party has contrived won't survive a political shakeup nor will it prosper under higher interest rates at the federal funds level. The elephant in the room being the extreme deficits now becoming de rigeur for incumbent parties on both sides of the aisle (as both the congress and the presidency are responsible parties), discussion of the bankrupting of the nation is not a debatable issue in any campaign, anywhere. Neither side wishes to address the problem with interest on the debt amounting to an annual bill of more than $1.25 trillion, though it is likely the most important issue facing the country today, has been for at least the past five years, and will continue to be so until it is addressed or the government defaults or inflates the currency out of existence, the latter being the most likely outcome. In the meantime, there will be less than three weeks left of shouting, finger-pointing, posturing, and name-calling on the campaign trail. Sometimes, it's better to get caught up trying to game stocks than listening to an endless stream of intelligence-insulting sloganeering. The week ahead is one of the two biggest in terms of volume of companies reporting third quarter results: Monday (before open): Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF), Fifth Third Bank (FITB); (after close) Steel Dynamics (STLD), Crown Holdings (CCK), Zions Bancorporation (ZION) Tuesday (before open): 3M (MMM), Hasbro (HAS), Ally Financial (ALLY, Northrop Grumman (NOC), General Motors (GM), Ge Aerospace (GE), Halliburton (HAL); (after close) Spacex (SPCX), Netflix (NFLX), United Airlines (UAL), Chubb (CB), Intuitive Surgical (ISRG), CapitalOne (COF) Wednesday (before open): Northern Trust (NTRS), AT&T (T), CME Group (CME), Abbot Labs (ABT), Danaher (DHR), Philip Morris (PM); (after close): IBM (IBM), Tesla (TSLA), Meta Platforms (META), Lam Research (LRCX), Texas Instruments (TXN), Crown Castle (CCI) Thursday, (before open): Comcast (CMCSA), Tractor Supply (TSCO, Lockheed Martin (LMT), Nokia (NOK), Dow (DOW), Blackstone Group (BX), American Airlines (AAL), Valero (VLD); (after close): IngCentral (RING), Bloom Energy (BE), Western Digital (WDC), Verisign (VRSN), Sallie Mae (SLM), Newmont Mining (NEM) Friday, (before open): Booze Allen (BAH), American Express (AXP), Gentex (GNTX) On the economic front, the market will learn about Housing Starts, Building Permits, and Pending Home Sales on Tuesday, and S&P Global Flash PMI and University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment on Friday. Relevant data releases can be found at Trading View. Treasury Yield Curve Rates
Yields cooled significantly in the week as buyer demand was satiated and possibly overbought, though the deep insider faction of government operatives cannot be fully dismissed as the cause of the abrupt relaxation. It certainly seems to be more political theater than anything else. 10-year notes yielded some 15 basis points lower than the previous Friday, and 30year bond yields dropped by 17 bips. Price action on shorter-term two-year notes was less pronounced, dropping just six basis points. Spread on 2s-10s fell to +35, and full spectrum eased to +131. The temporary easing is just that: temporary. Lower rates are likely to persist until the next FOMC meeting on October 27-28 Spreads:
2s-10s
Full Spectrum (30-days - 30-years) Oil/Gas Oil prices spiked higher, with Brent approaching $110/barrel and WTI crude futures surpassing $100 as conditions in the Middle East continue to be difficult to assess and oil flows - despite some rosy predictions and proclamations - are still down considerably. Average price for a gallon of unleaded regular gasoline in the U.S. was $4.34 last week and $4.27 this week, though this brief respite is unlikely to last, given the higher price of crude. The midterms disaster for Republicans is unfolding at gas stations and grocery stores across the country. Gas prices in key states:
California (leader): $6.15 (-0.24) On Sunday, October 18, there are thirty-four (34) states with average prices at or above $4.00, with fourteen (14) below the $4 threshold, not including Hawaii ($5.61) and Alaska ($4.90), with three above $5 (California, Nevada, and Washington) and one, California, above $6.00. The Southeast has maintained as the lowest region overall over the past 16 weeks, with prices falling below $4.00 again this week ($3.59-3.88) in places like Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Texas, and Mississippi, with the Midwest region second, prices slightly higher, from $3.95 to $4.21. Exceptions include Florida in the Southeast and Michigan and Illinois in the Midwest. All Northeast states, from Delaware and Maryland all the way to Maine, continue to average well above $4.00. Bitcoin
This week: $81,297.99 Bitcoin continued to slide from recent highs, the usual predictions of breakout and higher prices for the imaginary tokens were dealt with a case of interest rate reality, sending the speculators scrambling for explanations. It's very simple. In a world full of hard-and-soft-money choices and raging inflation, vapor money isn't for everybody. In fact, most of the pricing activity in bitcoin and other crypto-currencies and tokens of faith are driven by little more than naked speculation. Once the specs are thoroughly routed, bitcoin and its brethren will return to roughly their intrinsic values, approaching zero. Precious Metals Gold:Silver Ratio: 73.22; last week: 69.09 Futures, per COMEX continuous contracts:
Gold price 9/18: $4,415.90
Silver price 9/18: $66.79
SPOT: (kitco)
Silver 9/18: $66.24 Silver became much cheaper against gold, according to the gold:silver ratio, as shorts had their way on the COMEX and in London, sending silver to its lowest price in nearly a year. Gold, being more stable, held up much better, with a drop in price on the spot market of less than $30 per ounce. By comparison, silver was shattered, losing nearly $4/ounce, a 6.3% move, week to week. The price decline in silver represents nothing more than seasonal bets and concerted efforts to drive the price lower in the derivatives markets. A shortage of silver supply still exists, though it was easier for short sellers to take command over the course of the week - and over the past eight months - because of rising interest rates. The quoted spot prices, derived from COMEX leveraged bets, has less to do with supply and demand and more to do with commitment of traders who see the metal as a trade rather than a commodity in demand. Being much more volatile than gold's price, which is dominated by central bank buying of the metal as a reserve holding, silver's price decline may contnue over the short term with industrial demand the main price component rather than silver being considered a monetary metal. In most circles, it is not greatly considered for its monetary qualities, a common error in today's derivative suppression regime. Movement in the GSR makes silver the preferable investment at the present time. Here are the most recent prices for common one ounce gold and silver items sold on eBay (free shipping included, numismatics excluded):
The Single Ounce Silver Market Price Benchmark (SOSMPB) was wallopped this week, dropping to $68.00, a mammoth loss of $6.20 per troy ounce from the October 11 price of $74.20. WEEKEND WRAP With just about two weeks until the votes begin a final and the makeup of the U.S. House and Senate are resolved, stocks will be more in focus than politics, with a huge batch of earnings reports on the week. Stocks have shown weakness over the past week plus, but there's a good chance that the indices will maintain resilience until the elections. After that, markets may become more of a free-for-all, with a multitude of changes on the horizon dependent of the direction of voting. Polls are still leaning the Democrats way, but the Republican narrative machine continues to assert its considerable will on the media. Anything - and maybe everything - goes in less than 20 days.
At the Close, Friday, October 16, 2026:
For the Week:
All information relating to the content of magazines presented in the Collectible Magazine Back Issue Price Guide has been independently sourced from published works and is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. All pages on this web site, including descriptions and details are copyright 1999-2026 Downtown Magazine Inc., Collectible Magazine Back Issue Price Guide. All rights reserved.
|
