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Weekly People's Gold and Silver Prices
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:
5/9-5/15/2021
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Friday, May 21, 2021, 7:45 am ET Entering the final trading session of the week, here's where the major averages stand: The Dow Jones Industrials are down 297.98 (-0.87%) on the week. A rally of just less than one percent will pull the index into a positive position for the week, avoiding a third straight week in the red. The Dow is up 11.36% in 2021. With Thursday's gains, the NASDAQ is already positive for the week, up 105.76 (+0.79). Should the NASDAQ end Friday with a gain or even a small loss, it would end a four-week losing streak. The worst 2021 performer of the major indices, the NASDAQ is up five percent year-to-date. The S&P 500 needs to gain just 15 points to end a two-week losing streak. At the close Thursday, it was down 14.73 (-0.35%) for the week. Year-to-date, the broad, large-cap index is up 10.73%. Down 64.91 (-0.40%) for the week, the NYSE Composite needs a small gain to end two weeks in the red and finish positive for the eighth time in the last 10 weeks. For 2021, the Composite is the leading index, up 12.26% on the year. With the Nikkei 225 posting a second straight session gain, up 219.58 (+0.78%), it ended the week positive, going against the trend of most other Asian-Pacific indices. As the leading indicator for direction, the Nikkei's gain Friday has shed a positive light on Europe. Most of the major national indices are positive. Germany and France are sporting small gains, while the FTSE is down single digits but trending close to unchanged at 7:30 am ET. If nothing else, US stocks have shown a considerable level of resilience this year as the country emerges from the pandemic lockdowns and restrictions on business. Even in the face of a restrained labor market and rampaging inflation, publicly-traded companies still appear to be in the sweet spot for most investors. As the recovery narrative gains traction and some - though not all - economic data point to a choppy rebound, there seems to be momentum building into the summer months, when trading is usually dulled and volumes are lower than normal. Investors remain bullish on stocks, secure in their faith that the Federal Reserve will backstop any negation and keep a lid on interest rates. While the 10, 20, and 30-year maturities have ballooned over the course of the year, they've remained below the highs made mid-March. As of Thursday's close, all of the long-dated bonds are back to where they began the week, the 10-year and 20-year bonds shedding four basis points on the day, while the 30-year dropped four and is actually one basis point below last Friday's close. As long as bonds don't scream higher, the Fed's projection that the current bout of inflation is fleeting, transitory, and contained, stocks should find ample rationales to continue their gains, despite historically-high valuations. The next change in sentiment should only occur after the next FOMC meeting, June 15-16, when the Fed may make some structural changes to their outlook amid calls for tightening by a number of participants, revealed in Wednesday's release of the April minutes. Since the April meeting, however, jobs data was bleak, so those in favor of reducing the level of QE from its current $120 billion a month, or at least discussing a tapering, may have changed their outlooks. Federal Reserve officials are walking a tightrope between runaway inflation and keeping investors happy. A policy mistake at this juncture appears unlikely, given the Fed's rapt attention to stock market performance above and beyond their dual mandate of full employment and stable prices, at which they have failed miserably. Unemployment is still stubbornly high and inflation is not just creeping into retail prices, but rather is galloping from wholesale into retail, at least according to the most recent CPI and PPI readings. Raising rates might solve the inflation dilemma, but it would hamper job growth. Their current path seems to be the one working best for Wall Street, though no Fed official will openly admit that saving equity bacon is their focus. Easy money policies will likely persist well into 2022 as will the choppy trading of stocks which seem to be pointing once again toward breaking out and making new all-time highs. The current environment is challenging only to those not invested in stocks, a condition that is probably by design. Thus, the Fed is going to be happy just getting along instead of making policy changes that might rock the boat, or, heaven forbid, tip it over. Crypto coins have weathered the storm which took down assets across the entire space by anywhere from 20-75%, with Bitcoin the largest and most obvious target. Wednesday's battering, which included most of the main exchanges being down and unavailable to execute trades early in the day, resulted in a net loss of 51% for Bitcoin from its recent all-time high. Cryptos are recovering, albeit slowly, which is probably a better outcome for all interested parties. Showing just how powerful the forces of the Federal Reserve are, Wednesday's beatdown of all things crypto stands as a stark reminder that the Fed will not long stand for competition against it's fiat currency regime. Bitcoin, Ethereum and altcoins remain a thorn in the side of the Fed, one which they have not been able to sufficiently remove, so they have resorted to a kind of asymmetrical warfare, calling crypto nothing more than an asset class rather than currencies and using the power of the media to occasionally hammer down the gains. At the same time, cryptocurrencies have been widely embraced by Wall Street, which has never shied from any form of investment opportunity, be it risky, deadly, trendy, or defined by any other negative or positive adjective. From Wall Street's point of view, if something is tradable and people will spend money on it, they'll make markets for it and derivatives from it. Their handling and acceptance of crypto is no different from how they deal with any other asset class. Their penchant for trading may come to loggerheads with unstated Fed policy, but it appears, for now at least, that crypto and real-world assets can continue to coexist as long as the Fed has enough influence to keep an upper hand. As long as Bitcoin, Ethereum and other coin investments don't get out of hand and pose a threat to stocks, the Fed will allow their Wall Street cronies to trade, charge fees, and make money from them. After all, the volatility already well-known in the crypto universe is a boon to traders, who make money up or down. Beyond that, the Fed and other major central banks have openly stated that they are looking into launching their own digital currencies, so, they are learning a good deal from the petri dish of crypto splayed before them.
At the Close, Thursday, May 20, 2021:
Thursday, May 20, 2021, 9:27 am ET Stocks, and just about everything else, fell for a third straight day on Wednesday as the pattern that has persisted - down Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday; up Thursday, Friday - for two weeks now looks to extend to a third. With stock futures pointing to a lower open, the Nikkei turning in a muted response overnight (+53.80, +0.19%), and European stocks all rising from yesterday's near-death experience, there's a solid chance that Thursday will experience gains in US equities. After all, Wednesday's decline was cut short and stocks rallied through the afternoon and into the close. The Dow Industrials were down 580 points before 11:00 am ET, but finished with just a 164-point loss. The same was true of the NASDAQ, NYSE Composite and S&P 500. They all trimmed their losses significantly. The NASDAQ nearly ended up in positive territory. Noting the intra-day rally on the US indices leads directly to the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency debacle which saw Bitcoin as low as $30,000 before rebounding to above $40,000, the area in which it is currently trading. Most other cryptos were crushed on Thursday, with Ethereum losing quite a bit of momentum and luster. ETH traded as low as $1,860 in the sweeping downdraft of all things blockchain, but was hoisted back to a range between $2,500 and $2.900, a far cry from the lofty valuation of $4,384 less than a week ago. Volatility in cryptos is nothing new, and, while many novices were frightened by the sudden drop, more seasoned players were indeed buying the dip. The takedown of the crypto space in one fell swoop was largely attributed to a re-hash (no pun intended) of a Chinese ban on Bitcoin and other cryptos from 2018, though the news was presented as fresh via the usual controlled mainstream media: Yahoo Finance, Bloomberg, and Marketwatch. Adding to the agony was none other than Elon Musk, who was instrumental in kicking off the FUD-fest against the emerging crypto competition to the Fed and fiat. The takedown was similar to what the Fed, central banks worldwide, and their bullion bank proxies do to gold and silver on a routine basis. The Fed and their endlessly-printed fiat don't like competition and they equally don't have a sufficient answer to Bitcoin and the proliferation of cryptos. Just like they have little control over individual actors in the stock and bond markets, the Fed is reduced to jawboning, talking assets up or down, or outright nedia assaults, as was the case with Thursday's slaughter in crypto-land. When the smoke cleared and US markets closed, it was obvious that the victim of the across-the-asset-board selling was crypto. While oil took on losses, those were justifiable. Precious metals hardly suffered, with gold up a buck or three. If the intention was to make Bitcoin and its cohorts a little less attractive and stocks more likable, mission accomplished. There will be more inquisitions like this, but, as the crypto space has evolved and drawn in more Wall Street firms, it's likely that the overall effects will be less severe. That is, until the Fed is completely out of ammo except for the nuclear bomb of regulatory rapture which could include taxing crypto gains at 100% or banning their use - following China's lead - completely. The elites followed China's lead with lockdowns during the CV-19 crisis, so following them along the same path concerning blockchain and competing currencies would not be far-fetched.
At the Close, Wednesday, May 19, 2021:
Wednesday, May 19, 2021, 7:44 am ET The madness could last only so long before the magic carpet of endless stimulus, government checks and supplemental unemployment benefits was pulled out from under the markets. As of this writing, just before 8:00 am ET, everything is crashing. Bitcoin is off nearly 15% in the past 24 hours, hovering around $39,000. Almost all other cryptos are down as well. Crude oil is down nearly two percent. Gold and silver are being taken down, priced lower overnight and into the early morning London and US sessions. Japan's Nikkei got things rolling downhill with a 362-point loss (1.28%). European stocks are largely in the red, with Germany's DAX, Britain's FTSE, and France's CAC all down more than one percent and looking for support as US futures turn from red to blazing crimson. This is looking like a very big takedown, unless, of course, it's a fake-out, though that's probably not the case. All of this is happening on the heels of Tuesday's end-of-session puke-fest, when the day-trading longs all surrendered at once, en masse, the Dow dropping 200 points in the final 20 minutes of trading, the NASDAQ ripped 90 points lower. Everything should not be going down at once, but everything does when the only two positive readings come from the US Dollar Index, bouncing off support, and the Volatility Index (^VIX). Whether or not the top has been reached and it's all downhill from here isn't the question. It's the answer to fake markets propped up by equally fake fiat currencies, risky, coordinated Fed and global central bank policies, overvalued stocks, crypto craziness, and assorted other social and political ills, corruption, and bad karma from the "woke" crowds. With the exception of the 2020 February-March crash, which lasted mere weeks, everything's been going straight up since the 08-09 Great Financial Crisis. 13-year bull markets eventually peter out, no matter what. According to the Fed, however, not to worry. They've got inflation under control. They'll step in and throw another $4 or $5 trillion at the banks and major corporations, scoop up all the losses in the mortgage market and buy every treasury issuance Janet Yellen can invent. There's an infrastructure bill to be passed and more stimulus on the way from the phony president and free-spenders in congress. Everything will be just peachy! Don't panic. This is only a drill. Besides, if the pattern set the past two weeks plays out again, Wednesday will be just a bad memory when everybody buys the dip Thursday and Friday. It's all so not entertaining... except, watch carefully this six-minute clip from the film, "The Big Short" to get a scintilla of an idea of where we are. While the issues from the GFC are not the same as those we face in the present, the lesson is valuable. Today's problems are even more magnified and dangerous.
At the Close, Tuesday, May 19, 2021:
Tuesday, May 18, 2021, 8:40 am ET Over the past two weeks - and also significantly well before that - patterns emerged in equity trading that may offer some insight towards an understanding of what the future has in store. The most glaringly obvious pattern from the previous fortnight was the odd development of the dump and pump performed on US exchanges. For two weeks running, stocks lost ground Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, only to rally sharply Thursday and Friday. It's not so much that every well-heeled investor was taking profits early in the week and then buying them back later, and it may be just coincidental, but there it was, and, with this Monday's trade to the downside, it seems to be happening all over again. It's Deja Vu of Deja Vu or maybe the Bill Murray film, Groundhog Day is coming to fruition. Noting the repeat performance in US markets, across the Pacific, the gyrating Nikkei 225 continues to provide clues. A candlestick chart of the index shows that the downside moves over the past three months have been larger than the usual snapback rallies, but the overall trend is for enhanced daily volatility, resulting in massive up-and-downside performance. The daily ranges continue to expand, with Monday's rather smallish 260-point loss engulfing Friday's 636-point gain, thanks to the gap up open on the end of week trading session. Tuesday's Nikkei was even more spectacular, gapping up 107 points at the open and tacking on gains from there for a solid 582-point rally. Big moves have become the norm for the Nikkei over the past couple of weeks and the volatility seems to be only beginning. If it's a trend-setter, expect ranges on the European and US exchanges to follow suit. There are shifting winds in global markets and they're not all aligned perfectly, so it would be understandable if some blew up while others remained steady. Overall, however, the picture coming into focus is one of stagflation, supply issues leading to shortages (lumber and gasoline for instance), and central bankers adamantly denying the inflation they see right in front of their faces. Some of the Fed talkers have acknowledged the recent "spate" of inflation, though all of them agree that it is temporary. Ultimately, the Fed will be proven right given that their understanding of "temporary" or "transitory" is likely to differ widely from that of the common folk. For most people, a temporary condition would be weeks or months. In the eyes of central bankers, however, we're most likely talking years, so prepare for the worst because the momentum is building. The gas fiasco affecting the Eastern states and much of the Southeast over the past week is still in play despite the re-opening of the Colonial Pipeline over the weekend. The latest problem involves drivers for tankers, because skilled rig operators are in short supply, whereas the need is massive and immediate. As of Monday afternoon, half of the gas stations in Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, and the District of Columbia were still either out of fuel or had limited supply on hand. Eventually, the gas crisis will ease and things will get back to some degree of normalcy, though "normal" is another word which requires deep unpacking, as there are now at least three rationales: the new normal since the masks went on, the newer normal since the CDC issued new guidance last week, and the old normal before the whole virus crisis. There are other normals out there, like before 2000, but that's really pushing the envelope with a string and hardly relevant to anyone under the age of 35. Uh, oh. A sense that the world now lurches from one crisis or disaster to the next is a reasonable attitude. In this media-driven environment, any little thing gets magnified to incredible proportions if CNN, NBC, or the Washington Post believe it's important. Besides, the news presentations are huge distortions of reality. When a cop shoots a suspect or apparent law-abiding citizen, the news media always falls away from the side of law and order. Whether the person shot was brandishing a weapon or evading capture is irrelevant in propaganda-land. The message always has to come across as systemic racism, bad cops, or a complete failure of our system of justice, usually depicted as all three. The narrative is usually a good 180 degrees away from what actually happened and the unapologetic media seldom remedies their egregious errors. So, we have another pattern, known to those in the business of disinformation as the "news cycle." Something big has to happen to keep everybody off balance and focused on something other than the underlying overall decay of the system and there's plenty of decay to go around. Corrupt politicians, sleazy financial casinos, crumbling infrastructure, massive medical malpractice, the failed educational system and more are all contributing to a breakdown of anything and everything. Sometimes, these issues overlap, as was the case of last summer's "mostly peaceful" burning, looting and protesting in major cities during the virus crisis. That makes for blockbuster ratings and damage to psyches. Usually, though, the news has a flow, albeit one that is heading straight down the drain. Enterprising screen printers may want to stock up on t-shirts, hoodies and baseball caps emblazoned with "I survived" allowing space beneath to fill in the crisis de jour. As soon as one awful thing is resolved, another comes along to take its place. If it's not a bridge collapsing, it's a mass shooting, or tornadoes, forest fires, or a stock market meltdown. There's always something to fill the void of 21st century dystopia. Another crisis is on the way. Count on it. Trade accordingly. A couple of recent events are worth noting. Monday's equity decline was accompanied by gains in gold and silver, which is not the usual pattern. For years, it always seemed that if Wall Street was suffering, gold bugs and silver stackers had to be punished as well. Something changed on Monday. Whether it's the beginning of a trend remains to be seen. For what it's worth, however, precious metals have been on the mend for a couple of weeks and silver's push through $28/ounce is a remarkable development. It's approaching a ten-year high. A price of $28.88 was the top sopt price in 2020. Anything beyond that and it's off to the races. With apparently no remorse, Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, ravaged the crypto world over the weekend and again on Monday, tweeting the price of Bitcoin down as low as $42,101. When Musk tweets, crypto moves. That's a given. Variously positive or negative, he moves markets. While his activities may be construed as manipulation or the ravings of a bored lunatic, two words should be all the SEC needs to say to him: SHUT UP! For all of us plebes, that would be sufficient. But, since there is no SEC enforcement of any kind these days, we'll probably have to suffer Musk's deranged rantings a while longer.
At the Close, Monday, May 17, 2021:
Sunday, May 16, 2021, 9:20 am ET Trading was bifurcated over the week, with stocks (and just about everything else) tossed to the wild Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, only to be scavenged and rescued by foragers and bottom-feeders with massive rallies on Thursday and Friday. The market could best be described as bi-polar, as emotional traders transitioned from depression to euphoria mid-week for no apparent reason. Bordering on schizophrenia, day-trading maniacs at the major brokerages probably netted small fortunes, playing public fear and greed to their advantage, while at the same time slaughtering weaker participants. In more technical terms, the main indices touched down on their 50-day moving averages on Wednesday and performed their usual trampoline-line rebound into the weekend. That was not the case for the tiring NASDAQ, however, which remained mired in a post-panic funk, breaking through the 50-day on Monday and remaining submerged into the weekend. Currently residing in limbo, the NASDAQ levels are at a consolidating point between the highs and lows of April, which was a good month for the bulls. So far, May belongs to the bears. And in case anybody is suffering through deja vu, this week's pattern was almost a carbon copy of last week, featuring the same drop and pop, the end result in the red. Across the Pacific, Japan's Nikkei suffered more than the majors in the US and Europe, dropping dangerously dead upon correction territory, with losses by Thursday of 9.91% prior to Friday's miraculous 636-point rally, saving the bacon-wrapped sushi for Mrs. Watanabe and her closest friends at the BOJ. Treasuries did the same thing. The 10 year yield advanced from 1.60% to 1.69% by Wednesday, only to cut the losses by Friday, ending at 1.63%. Yield on the 30-year followed the game plan, rising from 2.28% to 2.40%, then back down to 2.35%. Skeptical observers might look at these patterns as sign of a certain kind of rigging where the pattern remains one which gives and takes variously, but eventually, equally, like a controlled demolition. The shorter end of the yield curve remains falt as a pancake at the zero-bound, right where the Fed has kept it for the past 14 months. The fact that real yields are grossly negative is nothing new, only now it's enhanced by obvious inflation in consumer goods. Adding to the pain was the shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline, which is purported to normally supply roughly half of the gas, diesel, and jet fuel to the Southeast, Atlantic coast and parts of the Northeast, all the way to New Jersey and lower New York. as the week wore on and gas stations ran out of fuel, many of the states serviced had their economies crippled, the worst-affected being the Carolinas, Virginia, Georgia, and the District of Columbia, though the politicians were reportedly unaffected, being that they mostly walk on air or at least many of them believe they do. The pipeline fiasco managed to send gas prices to extremes, with the national average soaring over $3.00 a gallon, the highest since 2014. While retail prices remained highest on the West coast, most of the country tasted some of the pain at the pump as fuel shortages coincided neatly with the beginning of the heightened driving season and the reopening of many local and statewide economies as CV-19 restrictions were being lifted. Once again, the mad tin-foil hatters made vague accusations mostly aimed at Joe Biden and other unpopular political icons. While the gas crunch was largely unrelated to the price of crude oil, WTI gained from $64.90 to $65.51 by Friday. The slow creep forward of the oil price is something to monitor. Having doubled over the past year, like the stock market, one has to wonder if there's an upper limit or whether it's a leading indicator of hyperinflation. Contemplation of runaway inflation is nothing to trifle over. Such episodes mark the beginnings and ends of fiat terror regimes, political powers and even the dignity of sovereign nations. Skeptics of Jerome Powell's protestations that the current bout of inflation is temporary or transitory better hope he's right, because the ravages of runaway inflation, especially within the confines of a damaged economy, will result in an inordinate amount of pain and suffering, especially for what little remains of the middle class, that caste being gradually dragged into poverty. The other side of the coin - outright deflationary depression - isn't any more appealing. Those who believe the Fed and the federal government capable of threading the needle between these two extremes may wish to learn how to whistle Dixie while wearing rose-colored glasses. Cryptocurrencies didn't quite play along with the volatility of other capital markets. They forged a path lower, with the largest, Bitcoin and Ethereum, playing tag at lower levels. Bitcoin continues to struggle above a lower bound of $46,000 and an upper range between $56,000 and $59,000. If it is to advance to levels envisioned by some of the more optimistic seers, it needs to find new catalysts and stronger hodlers than the current ones, especially those who are tuned in too heavily to the pied piper-like Elon Musk, who's erratic tweeting has contributed nothing but havoc into the market. Ethereum delirium seems to have subsided for now, at least. The #2 crypto by market cap peaked at $4,384 before beaing beaten back by more seasoned players. Despite the recent return to some level of sanity, it remains a real winner. A double bottom has formed at $3,648. Currently hovering around $3,850, ETH will remain in play and on the radar of most crypto fanatics. For the no-coiners of the world, it's now too late to call cryptos a fad, Ponzi, scam, scheme or other derogatory designation. Cryptocurrencies have been embraced by the financial world and accepted by authorities as a tradable, legal asset class. Talk of banning, confiscating, or otherwise destroying the market for crypto should rightfully be disregarded. It's arrived. Deal with it. Overall, precious metals fared better than all other asset classes. The two investment-grade stars, gold and silver, posted modest gains for the week, as just about everything else was lower. Gold hit a four-month high, rising from $1831.30 to $1,844.00. Silver bounced around but eventually squeezed out a small gain, starting at $27.48 and ending the week at $27.52. It wasn't much, but for silver stackers who've seen enough of the LBMA and COMEX futures rigging, any positive developments are welcome. The reddit horde at r/WallStreetSilver is nearly 80,000 strong. Many in the gang continue to buy copious amounts of physical silver, to which the retailers are more than happy to provide. A growing distrust of government and central banks has fomented the silver movement. It has always been considered something of a commoners coin, and younger generations seem to have caught onto the historical understanding of silver and gold as money. More power to them all. Here are the most recent prices for common one-ounce gold and silver items on eBay (numismatics excluded, shipping - often free - included):
Item: Low / High / Average / Median The weekly survey data confirms price stability, albeit at a slightly lower level than the prior week. Coins retain their preference to bars in both gold and silver. Money Daily's proprietary Single Ounce Silver Market Price Benchmark (SOSMPB) declined over the week to $41.16, a significant drop from the past week, but more reflective in weakening acceptance of ultra-high premiums, though one week's data hardly suggests a trend of any kind. Demand continues to be strong. Both gold and silver remain powerful market forces. In the coming week, a number of retailers will be releasing first quarter earnings, which may have a material impact on stocks. Tuesday, before the bell, Wal-Mart (WMT) and Home Depot (HD) report. On Wednesday, Target (TGT), Lowe's (LOW), and The TJX Companies (TJX) release prior to the opening bell. After the close, Cisco (CSCO) reports. Before the bell Thursday, Kohl's (KSS), BJ's Wholesale (BJ), Hormel (HRL), Ralph Lauren (RL), and Petco (WOOF) are up. Thursday afternoon, Deckers (DECK) and Ross Stores (ROST) announce. The week finishes up Friday prior to the opening bell with Deere & Co. (DE), and Foot Locker (FL). Finally, Congratulations to Rombauer, jockey Flavian Prat, trainer Michael McCarthy, and owners John and Diane Fradkin, winners of the Preakness Stakes over second-place finisher, Midnight Bourbon, and Medina Spirit, the Kentucky Derby winner, who finished third, putting to rest a considerable controversy involving the Bob Baffert-trained colt over trace amounts of a banned substance following the Derby victory. Thus, there will be no Triple Crown candidate heading to the Belmont Stakes in three weeks and the lingering media speculation on Medina Spirit can be relegated to the dustbin of thorobred racing history. Fearless Rick nabbed half of the $98 exacta and had a win wager on Rombauer, which paid $26.50, as forecast in his 6-minute video analysis. That's a WEEKEND WRAP.
At the Close, Friday, May 14, 2021:
For the Week:
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