Silver Refuses To Break/Gold Shares Hold Their Ground
Bill Murphy
April 2 - Gold $422.40 down $6.20 - Silver $8.12 up 1 cent
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew to serve your turn long after they are gone, and so hold on when there is nothing in you except the will which says to them: 'Hold on!'...Rudyard Kipling ( from the poem "If" )
GO GATA!!!
When I awoke very early yesterday morning, I made the mistake of peeking at the computer to see what the precious metals were doing. Gold was down $1.70, but silver was up 28 cents, similar to Thursday's opening calls. Massive Swiss buying had taken silver all the way up to $8.46, up 35 cents over the Thursday Comex close. Naturally, my excitement over the silver action prevented me from going back to sleep. It was jumping and down with joy time, for about three hours that is. Then, we got the miraculous job report, just what the Bush re-election campaign needed to quiet his adversaries' criticisms over the lack of job creation in the US:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. employment rose last month at the fastest pace in nearly four years as hiring increased across a wide array of industries, the government said on Friday in a report that stunned financial markets.
The report offers comfort to President Bush as the jobs market -- a hot political issue in the U.S. presidential campaign -- finally made a decisive break out of a long slump. Nevertheless, U.S. jobs lost since Bush took office still number a hefty 1.8 million.
Non-farm payrolls climbed 308,000 in March, helped a bit by the return of workers after a labor dispute at California grocery stores ended, the Labor Department said. This was the biggest gain since April 2000 and well above the 103,000 rise expected on Wall Street.
The unemployment rate ticked up to 5.7 percent from the two-year low of 5.6 percent seen in January and February.
-END-
What blows me away is how anyone could believe such a perfectly timed, positive report after what these same people have dished out on Iraq and the PPI! If the jobs picture is picking up that much for American workers, great. Seems a real stretch to me.
The dollar rocketed on the news. By day's end the dollar jumped to 88.85, up 1.32, and the euro lost around 2 full points.
Gold was all over the place. Reacting to silver's climb, it disregarded its early call and immediately rose $2 on the day before the jobs number was leaked. It then cratered to $417 before climbing back $3 near the close to finish the day only down $6 and change. Not too bad as it turned out in the end. Gold rose from $395 to $430 the past three weeks. Technically, it was overbought and due for a setback. In one day it came close to correcting nearly 50% of that move. The Gold Cartel will go all out in the days to come to enhance the correction, but they are liable to run into heavy buying. More and more of the investment world can see what is happening in the US as far as our credibility is concerned and they want "in" on the coming gold move.
The gold open interest leaped once again, up 5237 contracts to 307,277. This is a huge number and now the large fund specs may have been bagged by The Gold Cartel who is surely going to do all they can in the days ahead to create as much liquidation as possible.
Once again we see how crooked the gold market is by observing gold drop over $10, yet while rallying for 3 weeks the most The Gold Cartel would allow gold to rise was within their $6 rule decree. Gold's low this morning was $417, down $10.60. Incredible how this can go on month after month, year after year, and no one says anything except the GATA ARMY.
While gold was hit hard in dollar terms, it held its own in foreign currencies, closing near its recent HIGHS. On a weekly basis gold closed in new high ground for the move in terms of the euro.
Silver was trashed from $8.46 to $7.91 for what? What does good economic news have to do with bombing of the price of silver? Of course, silver was hit hard in sympathy with the huge drop in the gold price. However, by day's end, silver accounted for itself with aplomb:
*It strengthened technically as it filled its gap to the penny it left the day before at $7.91. The silver bears lost that price point to shoot for.
*It closed higher, surviving a potential key reversal to the downside, jumping 5 cents on the close to do so.
*Has the shorts talking to themselves. "What is it going to take to calm the silver price down?" they must be querying this weekend.
The silver open interest FELL 1127 contracts to 119,201. This is further proof that some of the big shorts have woken up to what is going on and want OUT before they capsize into oblivion.
Talk about invaluable input. MIDAS has relayed information from one of GATA's top sources that a huge buyer of physical silver allowed its supplier until sometime in April to make good on a 20 million ounce order. It was supposed to have been delivered in March, but the supplier did not have the physical then. The transaction was to have taken place in Switzerland. So, here we are in April and the price of silver spikes as a result of enormous Swiss buying. I am not privy to any details on this buying. Yet, I will be very surprised if we don't see more of it in the days and weeks to come.
It is important to keep in mind that this is just ONE major silver buyer. There are other funds out there lurking for silver and then you have the Chinese, who are all over it also. Recently MIDAS mentioned it looked like silver was going into its acceleration phase. It sure looks like that phase is here, or close at hand!
The silver close, ANOTHER new weekly high one, was nothing less than sensational. Look for some fireworks next week. Silver could go $9 bid in a heartbeat.
Now you know why the gold shares traded so mysteriously poorly the past few days and WHY the bullion dealers were willing to sell all the bullion the funds wanted to buy as gold approached $430. Surely The Gold Cartel knew a big jobs number was coming and what it would do to the gold price. New Café members, welcome to knowing that the New York and Washington establishment is nothing more than white-collar MAFIA, ready and willing to fleece you for your money at every opportunity they can.
CARTEL CAPITULATION WATCH
All is well suddenly on the US economic scene. The DOW reacted accordingly gaining 97 to 10,497, while the DOG leaped 42 to 2057.
Word has it this stunning jobs increase was leaked minutes before it was announced to the public. Bonds and gold sunk sharply right before the number was announced. This should be of no surprise to any Café member, not when you have the most corrupt enterprise in America's history running our government.
It's not just me ranting and querying. From Jesse:
In response to a question from the Bloomberg interviewer about a possible leak of the economic news from the BLS, and the huge bond action about a minute or two before the official release, which many traders noted, Elaine Chao said that any television station who makes such charges faces possible 'serious legal action.'
When the interviewer pointed out that it wasn't the television station making charges, but traders pointing out some very suspicious and significant trading action ahead of the release, Elaine Chao said it wasn't true.
Interviewer: "Could there have been a leak?"
Chao: "No. We have many procedures in place."
Interviewer: "Will you be investigating this incident?"
Chao: "No. It did not happen."
-END-
Just like it could not be possible the US has rigged the gold market for many years.
It's not so cut-and-dried Ms. Chao:
ODJ CFTC `Looking Into' Unusual Mkt Moves Before Jobs Data
GATA's Mike Bolser:
Hi Bill:
The Fed added $3.25 Billion in repos today April 2nd 2004 against a fairly large expiration of $11.25 Billion. This action caused the repo pool to fall to $25.83 Billion but left intact the up swing in the pool's 30-day moving average.
At this hour (11AM) the DOW tracks up at 10,450 and as predicted it has begun to claw its way back from what appeared to be crash mode although its 30-day ma has yet to turn back up. But we know from the repo pool data that the Fed was standing by during the last dip to gently catch the DOW and steer it back up to its "appropriate" trend line.
Having this information greatly reduces the level of anxiety that would otherwise burden our analysis. We know where the DOW is going but we also know where the dollar is going and they are destined to move in opposite directions so our task is to choose investments that are enduring in this inflationary climate.
Precious metals, natural resource firms with no debt and low P/Es (especially energy and natural gas in particular) are good selections for the prudent investor these days. However, I am a bit worried that the Fed's primary dealers may be shorting the PM equities in a sizable way thus creating the oddly weak trading pattern seen lately in the HUI. If one has the metal in hand that possible issue is avoided. Alternatively, if one chooses the higher risk, smaller exploration firms you may find a more natural precious metals trading pattern.
Now that the LBMA silver mystery has been solved we can continue to look for a firm and sustained up-tick in daily volumes as the marker for an exhaustion event. I am heartened by the many reports of long delays in delivery of silver bullion, this would not be the case were there no problems at the major exchanges.
Mike
Chuck checked in with a fun one Friday morning :
These news driven reactions remind me of the road runner cartoons when the victim always falls for the bait. After a $45 run in gold, it is about what you would expect. Everyone head for the exits at the same time. I would expect to see some more bearish public statements over the weekend. Markets will do whatever they must do to keep the public from making anything. But today undoubtedly will be ugly.
Chuck
Houston's Dan Norcini:
Additionally, since the release of the Tuesday data, Open Interest has further increased another 12,000+ contracts as of yesterday (Thursday 4-1-2004). My guess is that in next week's report we will see further short fund liquidation taking place and to no one's surprise, another obscene build in new commercial short positions. We have already exceeded the open interest totals that we saw back in January of this year when gold was at $430 by some 3,000 contracts. Today's action analysis will have to wait until the release on Monday by the exchange to see if we had the funds lightening up some of their huge long positions or actually increasing and buying the dip. I am expecting a drop in the open interest but would not be all that surprised to see it remain relatively unchanged judging by the late day price come back that took gold $4.00 off the low.
People should also keep in mind that there still remains plenty of room for new longs, both funds and small specs, to enter this market. My thoughts are that a close above the $430 level will see both categories piling into the gold market. The little specs are actually now some 20,000 contracts short of their recent cumulative total back in late January. What do you think will happen with this category once gold closes above $430? They will be swarming like flies into gold. The funds on the other hand are still chasing yield in a yield starved environment and will not hesitate to pile on once the momentum indicators flash breakout and buy signals.
The shorter term gold charts sustained some damage due to today's action so we should not be surprised to see some further back and fill action as there is another gap on the pit session daily just above $414.70 that will probably be targeted. Whether or not it gets there depends a great deal on the geopolitical events leading into next week. Beneath that we have the uptrending support line which comes in near $412 or so for Monday and various support levels under that.
While today's jobs report was indeed a huge surprise, one month does not a trend make and we will have to watch successive monthly releases to see if those kinds of numbers can continue. A good portion of the jobs were in construction which can usually be expected as the winter weather recedes and projects begin to gear up. The service sector however contained the bulk of the new jobs and I will be interested in seeing a further break down of that category.
Gold supply on the wane:
JOHANNESBURG, April 2 (Reuters) - South African miner Harmony Gold said on Friday it might close some of its mine shafts after a weak local gold price due to a strong rand made some of its operations unprofitable.
"We have seen our cash operating profit levels decrease substantially," Chief Executive Bernard Swanepoel said in a statement. "Some of our older marginal shafts...are nearing the end of their economic life and may unfortunately be closed," it said. Harmony Gold Mining Company Ltd is the world's sixth biggest gold producer.
-END-
The cabal's cheerleader is at it again:
Hi Bill,
The Gold Neutron bomb must be close to detonation. CNBC World had Andy Smith on a 4:20am EST today. Smith sees the Gold price under $400 by year end, doesn't think there's much upside potential left in the market and feels the Gold shares are at their highs. I didn't know who I was watching until after he gave his bearish pronouncements on the market. The Cabal must be desperate to hold the Gold price under $430 by rolling out this clown. The only positive comment he gave was that the market could go up to $450 in a day or two based on jobs report or a geo political event.
Regards,
John C
Andy Smith popping off like this publicly is good news for us. About a month ago he mocked silver and those in the silver bull camp. The price has rallied 33% since then. Thanks Andy. With these kinds of calls you will be joining Robert Prechter and Mike Norman (TheStreet.com and Fox guest commentator) as the ones who got the gold and silver markets the most wrong.
The gold shares held up very well. Then again, they should have, having never followed gold up in the first place. The XAU was down 1.05 to 104.30 and the HUI lost 1.59 to 236.50.
While gold could do anything over the next few days, especially from a technical point of view, it seems to me the "structural market change" in gold will continue. More and more investors around the world want "in." As silver goes bonkers, its price action will entice that many more gold buyers to take a bullion plunge, making the cabal's task of holding gold down a tough one.
The silver shares perked up on Friday, as well they should have. The gold shares ought to anticipate the coming gold boom and begin to firm up sometime this coming week. First stop for the HUI is to take out 240 and then head for the old highs above 258.
GATA BE IN IT TO WIN IT!
MIDAS
April 3, 2004
www.lemetropolecafe.com
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