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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.
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Welcome to the Hotel California, No Exit, 1984-style (Stocks Go Up) Friday, June 16, 2023, 9:10 am ET
GARCIN: Second Empire furniture, I observe... Well, well, I dare say one gets used to it in time. -- from "No Exit" [PDF] a play by Jean Paul Sartre, 1944 The incendiary line, "L'enfer, c'est les autres" or "Hell is other people", references Sartre's ideas about the look and the perpetual ontological struggle of being caused to see oneself as an object from the view of another consciousness. - adapted from Wikipedia If indeed, "Hell is other people," then the current condition applies in spades and those other people are the ones in complete control viewing everybody else as mere objects. Just as Sartre's melancholic work depicted a life, or death, without choice, as George Orwell's "1984" painted a canvas of desperation and control, and Franz Kafka's "The Trial" depicted a nightmarish bureaucracy in which anybody can be branded a criminal just by being alive, the Western world is now ensconced within the most bizarre phase of the metaphorical "Great Reset," where little makes sense and any absurd or contrived narrative presented by the mainstream propagandists is to be accepted without question. Indeed, today, there seems to be "no exit." You either comply or suffer, and, even compliance does not forestall suffering. Most of the unquestioning people going about their daily routines cannot sense the dangerous conditions presented to them. Like the proverbial frogs in pots of gradually heating water, the so-called "normies" go about their activities without noticing that life becomes more and more unbearable - and unlivable - every day. Like the frogs, they will end up boiled alive. Those who can see the forest for the trees are menaced by the ongoing, increasing repression, their choices being those of every thinker throughout history: flight or fight. Fighting makes one a target; fleeing is an option afforded only those with the means to escape. Most are just plain trapped. As another week of mayhem draws to a close, it appears that Wall Street has the situation well under control. The Fed has interest rates right where they want them. Stocks continue to rise, no matter what. For the week, through Thursday's close, the Dow is up some 531 points (+1.57%), the NASDAQ, having strung together six straight winning sessions, is ahead 524 (+3.95%) and 32% year-to-date (the AI bubble looking more and more like the dotcom boom), and the S&P is higher by 127 (+2.95%). It's officially a party. Stocks, like prices, will proceed higher, Weimar-style, until the US$ is absolutely worthless. Straight ahead is another banking crisis, brought on by a variety of factors, but mostly because of commercial real estate. In 2008 it was residential property that nearly brought the economic world to its knees. This time, it's empty stores, unoccupied office buildings, and vacant workspaces. But, that's OK. Stocks will just keep going up, making everybody feel wonderful. This seems appropriate:
"You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."
At the Close, Thursday, June 15, 2023:
Thursday, June 15, 2023, 9:50 am ET As the leading financial authority of the world (for now), when the Fed takes action - and even when they don't - there are always reactions in markets as diverse as FX, equities, commodities, and fixed income. On Wednesday, June 14, the FOMC of the Federal Reserve did nothing in terms of rate policy, neither raising nor lowering the federal funds target rate, keeping it at 5.00-5.25% while alternately sending out dovish and hawkish signals, utterly confounding global markets. Response to the Fed standing pat on rates was most prominent in stocks, which initially sold off, then rallied, and ended the day's session with the major indices in a mismatch: the Dow lower, NASDAQ higher, S&P near unchanged. While the Dow was negatively affected by its most heavily-weighted component, United Health (UNH), which was responsible for almost all of the Dow's decline. Taking UNH out of the index equation renders the overall market reaction somewhat more muted. Effectively, post the policy release and Chairman's press conference meandering, stocks ended up fairly flat and unresolved. Given time to digest the rate indecision, stocks will likely offer more in the way of direction on Thursday, as has been the usual case on post-FOMC meeting sessions. Early indications are still murky, with Asian stocks mixed, Europe lower and US stock futures diving an hour before the opening bell. With the Fed having paused for the first time since its rate-hiking regime began at the 2022 March meeting - a string of 12 straight - a directional change might seem appropriate, especially since all markets were stretched through the debt ceiling media marathon, equities continuing to climb over the past two weeks in a relief rally. What's carried the NASDAQ recently has been anything associated with the AI movement, the nascent Wall Street mania characterized as the latest technological advancement promising to change the world. That sector may already be played out - at least it should be - and ripe for profit-taking. The Fed's pause will have lasting effect, particularly if the FOMC stands firm at the July 25-26 meeting. Without a meeting in August, the subsequent confab won't be until September 19-20, giving markets and investors ample time to wade through the summer doldrums. 2023 having already proven materially improved over the portfolio smashing of 2022, the next few months of data, geo-politics, and jabbering may offer some ideas concerning the second half of the year, as there are ill winds blowing from multiple directions that could produce nastier effects on investments. De-dollarization is well underway as emerging countries from Latin America to Africa to Asia rightly abandon dollar hegemony, seeking refuge from sanctions and a currency that has been weaponized by what many world leaders consider a rogue government in Washington, DC. The fatal blow to the dollar's dominance was a self-inflicted wound. When US authorities decided to force Russia's hand into a morass in Ukraine and seized or froze more than $500 billion of Russian reserves, the rest of the world took notice, accelerating the demise of the world's reserve currency. Russia, sanctioned out of the Western economic sphere, quickly shifted its focus from Europe and the US to what's generally known as the "Global South," advancing trade and cooperation with China, India, Turkey, Middle East countries, spreading its economic influence and exports of raw materials, energy, and good will from Jakarta to Buenos Aires. Spurred on by Western intransigence, Russia's mercantilistic adventurism has only grown larger in the past nearly 18 months since sanctions and military actions began and will likely continue to do so. Interest rates in the US, up, down, or indifferent, will have little effect on Russia and China's leadership roles around the world. By sanctioning Russia, stealing its reserves, and generally acting like a playground bully in world affairs, the United States not only shot itself in the foot, it probably blew off an entire leg and now the gangrenous after-effects threaten to kill the torso and the head. Change will be difficult for the US, UK, and EU. The world is moving away from the uni-polar hegemony that has dominated the global economy since World War II and towards a bi-polar or multi-polar environment wherein countries trade in their own currencies or in yuan, rubles, and eventually, gold. BRICS nations are poised to advance their own version of a reserve currency and the West may find itself on the outside looking in at the greatest development in economic since Bretton Woods. The implications for the West are all largely negative. The rest of the world is moving on, away from militarism, sanctions, threats, bullying, color revolutions, manipulation, and wealth disparity toward a more fair and mutual regimen, one which is actually respective of sovereignty and the rule of law rather than merely mouthing those promises and instead delivering death, disease, and disaster to trading partners. If a bi-polar or multi-polar global economy isn't enough for American, British Commonwealth, Japanese, and European investors to have concerns over, perhaps they should consider the erosion of their currencies and devastatingly-high interest payments on government debt as other nails being hammered into their collective coffins. The US Treasury, having used up almost all of its "extraordinary measures," delaying and deferring payments through the debt ceiling drama, is now playing catch-up, having to issue insane amounts of short-term funding to shore up its own account and supply the rest of the overfed agencies and departments with spending money. Treasury will be issuing copious amounts of short-term debt, mostly at some of the highest rates: 3, 4 and 6-month bills. The burden to the federal balance sheet is already over a trillion dollars ($1,000,000,000,000) annualized, and, with interest rates set by the Fed going nowhere fast, that number is only going to grow larger, eating up all of the revenue and borrowing that congress will authorize until January 2025. There will be a significant crowding out of markets by the outlandish size of government borrowing need to keep the grifters in Washington well enough fed. Financial conditions will notably tighten as liquidity flees the scene. Already overburdened with credit card, mortgage, student, personal, and medical debt, Americans are about to discover what the end of prosperity looks like. Between inflation, high interest rates, a slowing economy, out-of-tune government, and the flood of dollars headed back to America's shores, the currency death spiral will be like an Argentine financial festival, complete with plenty of money, but prices that just keep going up. This is not going to be fun.
At the Close, Wednesday, June 14, 2023:
Wednesday, June 14, 2023, 6:27 am ET There isn't much drama surrounding today's FOMC announcement. The Fed has widely telegraphed that they plan on "skipping" or pausing on increasing the federal funds target rate, currently holding at 5.00-5.25%. It makes perfect sense, since CPI for May, released on Tuesday, came in at a two-year low of 4.0%. Thus, the idea that in order to halt inflation, the federal funds rate should be higher than the rate of inflation, is already in place. Stocks should respond in a positive manner, extending the rally that has the S&P and NASDAQ at 13-month highs. More coverage to follow after the 2:00 pm announcement and subsequent press conference with Chairman Jerome Powell.
At the Close, Tuesday, June 13, 2023:
Tuesday, June 13, 2023, 9:25 am ET Other than the people who think they know how you should live, this morning's CPI reading of +4.0% year-over-year is about as meaningful as the number of spots on a leopard. While Wall Street celebrates the idea that the cost of everything - in general - only rose by four percent, or, rather, that the US$ has devalued by "only" four percent over the past twelve months, regular folks may notice that even as oil hangs around $70 per barrel, gas at the pump is still absurdly high, the national average roughly $3.57 per gallon, with the states of California and Washington approaching $5.00. Four percent inflation is not something to be celebrated, it is a sign that the overlords at the Federal Reserve and their agents on Wall Street are fully in control of the narrative that keeps people from disgorging their last meals or otherwise throwing up their hands in complete surrender to the fully distorted economy. Four percent inflation means anything costing $10 today will cost $12.17 five years from now, but that's OK, because you are sure to get a four percent raise every year so to keep pace. However, you probably won't get a raise equal to the CPI, even the tamest estimate of inflation. Wages have not kept pace with CPI for two years running, and they didn't keep pace for many years beforehand. People in the 20s, 30s and 40s only hear about the single-earner household of the 50s and 60s from their parents or grandparents. There was a time in the United States in which men worked and women raised families. The "women's lib" movement of the 1970s was a widespread media campaign designed to hoodwink the masses, destroy the family unit, lower the birth rate, and keep people from realizing how badly their standards of living were being destroyed. It all goes back to Nixon polishing off the gold standard in 1971. Funny how that coincided with making women believe they belonged in the workplace. American values were then beginning to turn on their heads. Now, it's so over-complete that people in government don't know what a woman is and transgenderism is the newest mantra. Only the money moochers of the world will benefit from the destruction of American values. Everyone else will suffer. Futures are booming higher as the opening bell approaches. You slaves, buy stocks. That's an order.
At the Close, Monday, June 12, 2023:
Sunday, June 11, 2023, 1:50 pm ET It was easy to doze off this past week and miss nothing. Stocks see-sawed along the unchanged line, eventually posting tiny gains, except for the NYSE Composite of small caps, which led all indices with a gain of 1.01% for the week. The laid-back nature of the week can be attributed to it being caught between the relief of the debt ceiling suspension and apprehension over the upcoming FOMC meeting Tuesday and Wednesday in the week ahead.
NASDAQ has posted weekly gains in each of the past seven weeks. The S&P 500 put on a small gain, its fourth straight week in positive territory. There simply was no significant positive or negative news to move markets. The week was simply a dud.
This week was a tale of two markets, as bills of one year or shorter maturity were in demand, with yields falling as prices rose, especially on 3-month bills, down 13 basis points. Over in the notes and bonds department, selling was prominent in threes and fives, up 10 and eight basis points respectively. Yield on the 10-year note was up seven basis points, to 3.75%. Overall, the market was sluggish even as Treasury begins making up for lost time with fresh issuance. The entirety of the curve continues to cut back on inversion, down to 136 basis points from 1-month out to 30 years. 2s-10s remain stubborn, 84 basis points inverted.
$70.35 was the closing price for WTI Crude in New York on June 9th, lower than the prior week's close on June 2nd of 71.87. Over last weekend, OPEC+ announced production cuts and extended those already in place. The impact from the meeting was nil, as the world seemed to be already drowning in excess crude supply. It's all the cartel can do to keep prices from falling off a cliff. Gas prices move a bit higher, the national average for a gallon of unleaded regular up five cents from a week ago, to $3.57, according to gasbuddy.com. Prices remain lowest in the Southeast. For the third straight week, Mississippi is the only state averaging under $3.00, currently at $2.94. Bordering states were next lowest with Louisiana ($3.07), Alabama ($3.09) and Arkansas ($3.11). California prices moved higher, averaging $4.87, up eight cents on the week. Prices in the West, particularly coastal states, continue to rise with Washington posting an average price of $4.77, up from $4.62 last week, and Oregon up to $4.41, an 18-cent rise from just a week ago ($4.23). Arizona ($4.31) dropped six cents, while Utah ($4.14), and Nevada ($4.24) both rose slightly. Prices in Illinois were up by 11 cents last week ($3.96), remaining the highest in the Northeast/Midwest and threatening to joining the $4+ club. Other than Illinois, prices in the region are more reasonable, ranging between Virginia ($3.29) and New York ($3.66).
This week: $25,774.80 Bitcoin and other cryptos were battered by regulators. The SEC filed lawsuits against the two largest crypto-exchanges, Binance and Coinbase, sending bitcoin to its lowest level in nearly three months.
Silver:Gold Ratio: 80.97; last week: 82.91 Per COMEX continuous contracts:
Gold price 05/12: $2,015.60
Silver price 05/12: $24.13 Gold and silver were better-performing assets on the week, both posting gains off what appear to be support levels of $1,964 for gold and around $23.45 for silver. Central banks have been shown to be steady gold bidders above $1,960 for nearly three months. It will be instructive to view gold price levels over the summer months to see if support is persistent or the trend lower since May 5th ($2,055.70) remains in play. Here are the most recent prices for common one ounce gold and silver items sold on eBay (numismatics excluded, free shipping included):
The Single Ounce Silver Market Price Benchmark (SOSMPB) was flat, dipping slightly to $37.46, a loss of just six cents from the June 4 level of $37.52.
Brevity is said to be the soul of wit, but there was nothing funny about the dull week just past and maybe that's a good thing.
At the Close, Friday, June 9, 2023:
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