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Another Bear Raid On The Metals Overnight…

April 19, 2023

* Currencies and metals rally on Tuesday

* Metals get whacked in the overnight markets

Good Day… And a Wonderful Wednesday to you!  Everything has gone wrong for my beloved Cardinals, so far this spring… It’s a long season, and while there’s plenty of time to get things worked out, I have a very uneasy feeling that it’s going to be a loooooonnnnnggg year!  I saw my heart doctor yesterday, and he was quite concerned that I suffered that stroke in January…  He was quite happy that I had no ill effects from the stroke, and then looked at my pacemaker’s report, listened to my heart, and told me that I was doing well… And there were no changes, and he’ll see me in 6 months!  So, one DR. Appt. down, and two more to go… Thursday and Friday this week… So, this will be the last Pfennig this week, and I’ll pick it back up next Monday…  Steve Winwood greets me this morning with his song: Arc Of A Diver…  I saw Steve Winwood in concert at our Muny outdoor Ampitheater… It was a great concert!   
Well, there was all kind of weird stuff going on yesterday, that I’ll get to after the markets reports, you’re not going to want to miss these goings on, I mean it! 
The dollar fought back after losing 3 index points overnight, the dollar won back 1 of those lost points, so in the end the BBDXY lost 2 index points yesterday… No biggie… But there was selling of the dollar, keep that in mind, for the rest of the week… Gold was up nicely at one point in the day, and had to settle for being up just $10.30 to close at $2,006.10… Silver too was up nicely at one point yesterday, but had to settlle for being up just 18-cents, to close at $25.28…  Yes, the short paper traders were back this time with just some “trimming”…  The price of Oil kept the $80 handle throughout trading yesterday, and the 10-year added 1 basis point to its yield at 3.58%… 
Who’s afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? I thought it to be very important that the currencies and metals got back on the rally tracks yesterday, proving that while the price manipulators can take down these asset classes, they can’t keep them down… Very important to traders and investors to see that, the coast is clear, and it’s ok to get back in the water…  But the short paper traders saw to it that their trip back o the water was not safe… 
In the overnight markets last night…. Well, the dollar wasn’t bought or sold overnight, and its trading in the same clothes as yesterday, at this point… The short paper traders (manipulators) showed up and performed yet another engineered takedown of Gold & Silver… Gold is down $32 this morning, and I can tell you what I think happened… The short paper traders saw Gold gain yesterday, and they didn’t like the talk that all was clear, and so they decided to hit it hard once again, and cause some real damage and concern to investors… Silver is down 44-cents this morning, and it looks like its going to be a very ugly day, which it is already!  
The price of Oil slipped another buck and now trades with a $79 handle… lack of demand is outweighing the news that the U.S. Oil supplies are dwindling… And the 10-year just keeps getting sold, with its yield rising to 3.62%… 
I just can’t get these short paper traders out of my mind this morning, they have gone and ruined a nice rally in Gold & Silver, and they have no qualms about doing it again and again… I know that I shouldn’t get upset with these bas&*^$ds…  I own Gold and I’m not selling it, and so it doesn’t matter to me if Gold gets whacked, because I know that eventually all that will be behind us… Gold is a store of wealth… not a commodity that gets bought an sold willy nilly… so price movements like this shouldn’t get me upset… beathe Chuck, count to ten… now isn’t that better?  I guess… 
OK… this wierd story is going to lead us off today, because it could very well be the wierdest!  So, we all know that the N. Korean Chairman is a nut case, correct? I mean he keeps shooting off Balistic Missiles getting closer and closer to Japan… And now, he has issued a proclomation that he will confiscate all forieng currencies being used…  The bulk of those in use in N. Korea are dollar and renminbi… While I doubt that his confiscation of dollars will amount to a hill of beans for dollar issuance, it could bring about other countries implementing the same kind of laws…  For instance, I could see China banning dollars, Russia banning dollars, India banning dollars, Brazil banning dollars, and then other countries following their lead…  I just think this is something we need to keep an eye on  going forward, don’t you? 
Next up is this story about war mongering…  here it is: “Senior U.S. Defense official Douglas Macgregor said politicians who support Israel are driven by money & the pro-Israel lobby in the US is trying to drag America into war… ‘John Bolton has become very, very rich and is in the position he’s in because of his unconditional support for the Israeli lobby. He is their man on the ground.” 
 
Well, the next story comes from the leaked documents, and that is that the U.S. already has some special operations on the ground in Ukraine…  Now, I’m sure Russia has heard about this, and that could lead to escalation … Don’t you think?  Scares the bejeebers out of me… 
 
And finally, this isn’t so wierd… China reported that their 4th QTR GDP grew 4.5% from a year earlier, when they were shut down for Covid…  They also reported that  Retail sales jumped 10.6% in March from a year earlier, the highest level of growth since June 2021. In the January to March months, retail sales grew 5.8%, 
 
A long time ago, i was told by a client that used to do business in China that I should believe only 1/2 of what the Chinese report…  But even doing that, they are on the right track to get back to where the were previously! 
I have more weird stuff going on, but I don’t have the time or space to include them all… So, let’s move along… 
 
The Chinese renminbi has been gaining VS the dollar too during this time… The currency has been pretty Steady Eddie around 6.96, but recently is has moved to 6.87… Not a super-duper strong move, but when the currency is only allowed to move so much during a day, it’s a nice move, and one that is being noticed by traders and economists, and me! 
 
I also surprised at the strength of the Swiss Franc… They just recently got back to positive rates, it’s not like they are New Zealand and have 5% rates! But any time the franc sees buying like it has recently, it’a a sign that investors are nervous, and are seeking a safe harbor…  
 
The Brazilian real has been on the rally tracks recently, and just this week the real fell below 5.0, for the first time in a month of Sundays.. .Interest rates are high in Brazil, and I mean high at 12.25%, to combat thier own inflation… And those high rates are attracting investors… I’m just saying…
 
The U.S. Data Cupboard today has the Fed’s Beige Book, which is a combination of the regional banks reports on how the economy is doing in their neck of hte woods… This used to be a very watched piece of data, that now just flies under the radar each month, and gets very little notiice… 
 
To recap.. .The dollar got sold yesterday, but did fight back to win back 1 of hte 3 index points it had lost in the overnight markets yesterday… But it was sold, and Chuck thinks that the fact that it got sold was HUGE to investors and traders that want to get back into the water…  N. Korea does their own version of dedollarization…  And Chuck is not happy that the war in Ukraine could see escalation… And finally, China’s 1st QTR GDP was 4.5%… 
 
Before I head to the Big Finish today, I have a funny for you… This link will take you to a page and on the page will be a short video that you should click on to see how Banking is done… here’s the link; Watch “how the banking system works three stooges the 20 bucks i owe you” – LewRockwell
For What It’s Worth… I found this on Bloomberg, and its’ written by Stephen Jen, someone that I used to read his stuff all the time, but in recent times he had evaporated…  It’s about the dedollarization going on around the world, that a lot of analysts are ignoring… And it can be found here: De-Dollarization Is Happening at a ‘Stunning’ Pace, Jen Says – Bloomberg
 
Or, here’s your snippet: “The dollar is losing its reserve status at a faster pace than generally accepted as many analysts have failed to account for last year’s wild exchange rate moves, according to Stephen Jen.

The greenback’s share in global reserves slid last year at 10 times the average speed of the past two decades as a number of countries looked for alternatives after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered sanctions, Jen and his Eurizon SLJ Capital Ltd. colleague Joana Freire wrote in a note. Adjusting for exchange rate movements, the dollar has lost about 11% of its market share since 2016 and double that amount since 2008, they said.
“The dollar suffered a stunning collapse in 2022 in its market share as a reserve currency, presumably due to its muscular use of sanctions,” Jen and Freire wrote. “Exceptional actions taken by the US and its allies against Russia have startled large reserve-holding countries,” most of which are emerging economies from the so-called Global South, they said.
Jen is the former Morgan Stanley currency guru who coined the dollar smile theory.
 
Last year, Bloomberg’s gauge of the greenback surged as much as 16% as the conflict helped fuel a rise in global inflation that triggered widespread interest rate hikes which sank bond and currency markets alike. It finished the year up 6%.
Biden’s Dollar Weaponization Supercharges Hunt for Alternatives

Smaller nations are experimenting with de-dollarization while China and India are pushing to internationalize their currencies for trade settlement after the US and Europe cut Russian banks from the global financial messaging system known as SWIFT. There’s also concern the dollar may become a permanent political tool, or be used as a form of economic statecraft to put extra pressure on countries to enforce sanctions that they may disagree with.”

 
Chuck Again… Well, I think I was way ahead of the crowd in saying that the dedollarization would eventually come back to hurt the dollar… The pace this is going is unreal though… 
 
Market Prices 4/19/2023: American Style: A$ .6699, kiwi .6184, C$ .7443, euro 1.0941, sterling 1.2429, Swiss $1.1117, European Style: rand 18.2847, krone 10.5554, SEK 10.3311, forint 345.44, zloty 4.2467, koruna 21.4523, RUB 81.62, yen 134.85, sing 1.3371, HKD 7.8499, INR 82.23, China 6.8948, peso 18.13, BRL 4.9855, BBDXY 1,224.07, Dollar Index 102.03, OIL $79.40, 10-year 3.62%, Silver $24.75, Platinum $1,060.00, Palladium $1,616.00, Copper $4.04, and Gold… $1,972.70
 
That’s it for today, and this week, sorry about no Pfennig tomorrow, but I’ve got to be at the hospital bright and early in the morning… And then Friday I go right back there to see my oncologist, who hasn’t seen me for 4 months, and to tell you the truth, I miss her! Well, our Blues are playing Golf, instead of hockey, our Cardinals have started the year with a dud, but…. We still have our St Louis City SC team that’s in first place, and has scored the most goals of al lthe teams in the league, while being an expansion team! Day game at Busch Stadium today, and I’m not going! UGH! I tried, but couldn’t get any of my working friends to play hooky to go to the game with me… 🙁  It’s tough being the only retired guy that wants to go to day games! We’re in for a cold front to move through this weekend, and I won’t like it, but I’ll have to wear long pants! And sweatshirts! with hoods! YUCK!  The Stealers Wheel takes us to the finish line today with their great 70’s song: Stuck In the Middle With You…  I hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday today, and please, pretty please with sugar on top, Be Good To Yourself!
 
Chuck Butler

 

It’s Tax Day!

April 18, 2023

Pfennig tradition calls for this recognition of Tax Day… 
 
Let me tell you how it will be

There’s one for you, nineteen for me
‘Cause I’m the taxman
Yeah, I’m the taxman
Should five percent appear too small
Be thankful I don’t take it all
‘Cause I’m the taxman

Yeah, I’m the taxman

 
those lyrics come from the Beatles… 
* Currencies & metals rally in the overnight markets
* A Patriot Act 2? 
Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you! My poor beloved Cardinals, they seem to be so overmatched early this year… I remember grandson, Everett, telling me after spring Training that the Cardinals had won the Grapefruit League, with the best spring training record… He said, “That should be good for this year, right? ” I told him to not get too attached to their Spring Training record, as it doesn’t mean anything… After the next two games at home, the Cardinals go on a very long West Coast trip… That will either make or break them this year, in my humble country boy opinion!  I have an oldie but goodie today, the Drifters greet me this morning with their great song: Under The Boardwalk… 
Well, it was another day of wackiness in the markets yesterday… The dollar got bought once again, this time though, at a watered down pace, and Gold got sold again, brining it back below $2,000…  So… I think the paper traders (manipulators) did that just to show me how wrong I was… In case you don’t recall, I had made a point of saying that once Gold closed firmly over $2,000, that it would not be looking back any longer…But I was wrong, oh so wrong, I got caught in the rush hour, fellows started to shower you with love an affection, No wait! C’Mon Chuck, no time to be singing songs from the 60’s… I was wrong, and I apologize for that… I really was under the thought that once Gold started going higher, there was nothing that would stop it for some time to come… The price manipulators made sure that I was proven wrong! 
So, Gold lost $9.20 yesterday and Gold closed at $1,995.80, and Silver lost 32-cents to close at $25.10… The BBDXY gained 4 index points on the day… You know that just last Thursday the BBDXY had fallen to 1,216… And yesterday ti closed at 1,226…   On Thusday last week the euro was trading 1.1050, and yesterday it ended the day at 1.0931,,, So, the PPT’s protection of the dollar, worked, for at least a day or two… We’ll see just how far that goes, eh? 
The price of Oil lost a buck yesterday, and closed the day wtih an $81 handle, while the 10-year continued to get sold, and watch its yield rise to 3.59% yesterday… 
In the overnight markets last night… Well, we returned to the dollar selling after all the dust had settled on the brazen price manipulation last Friday… The BBDXY lost 3 index points overnight… The usual suspects of currency gains were in play, with the euro leading them through… Gold is up $9 in the early trading today, bringing Gold back above $2,000, and Silver is flat as a pancake (Head East)…  If the markets turn completely around from Friday, and begin to move in the direction they were moving before Friday, then the price manipulators will be exposed once again for their fraud… 
The price of Oil slid another buck last night and right now is barely hanging onto to an $80 handle… Demand or better, lack of demand still weighs on the price of Oil… But remember, the summer driving season is quickly coming toward us… I’m just saying…  I said something yesterday, that I thought would get more of a reaction… I said that the 10 year & 30 year Treasury Bonds would see their yields rise if the the Fed Heads do decide to pause, and let inflation sit at 5%, instead of 2%, (they said they would get it down to 2%) … Apparently, the Fed Heads are thinking that the people of the U.S. will be OK with inflation here, and interest rates here too… I’m not one of those that they called, were you? No, I didn’t think so… I won’t be happy with inflation here, and the costs of everything higher, but then I see things for what they truly are… And this is in the vocabulary of the 70’s… A Cop Out…  And I for one wouldn’t be proud of my country’s Central Bank for Copping Out…   
 I have to give credit to a reporter that reported the facts of the documents thing… He talked about how… well, I’ll let him tell you:” I can’t think of an incident, Tucker, that reveals more vividly the real function of our nation’s largest media corporations than what just happened here. If you’re a real journalist, somebody who’s devoted to transparency, shining a light on the most powerful government actors when they lie to the American people and informing the public, you would be celebrating this person who stepped forward and risked his security to show his fellow citizens that the government was lying about this incredibly important war with a nuclear-armed power, that we have actual troops deployed on the ground in Ukraine, there’s going to be no diplomatic resolution through at least 2023, that Zelensky is planning on using our weapons to strike deep into Russia — which we were told would never happen — risking escalation.”
 
No, it’s not right to steal documents, and then put them online… but, I do believe that most people would give him a pass for exposing the truth… Don’t you?  Edward Snowden, Wikileaks, etc. 
 
So…  it’s been reported by the number crunchers with the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the government is borrowing roughly $6 billion a day.  Let’s see… 6 x 365 = 2,190… Trillion!  Now that’s some spending, eh? And since we don’t know what the tax receipts will be yet, this is all deficit spending…  So, put that in your pipe and light it up! 
 
I found this on www.blacklistednewscom  “It’s estimated that the amount this country owes is now 130% greater than its gross domestic product (all the products and services produced in one year by labor and property supplied by the citizens).

According to the Committee for a Reasonable Federal Budget, the interest we’ve paid on this borrowed money is “nearly twice what the federal government will spend on transportation infrastructure, over four times as much as it will spend on K-12 education, almost four times what it will spend on housing, and over eight times what it will spend on science, space, and technology.”

In ten years, those interest payments will exceed our entire military budget.”

 
Chuck again… And to think that I began pointing out our growing debt back in 2002!… Twenty two years later, we as a country continue to rack up debt that will not ever be paid back…  The burdens on our kids and grandkids will be enormous… mark my words on that! 
 
Oh, but just one question that should follow that piece, and it is: Got Gold? 
 
The reason I keep saying that “Got Gold?” is I want to make certain that everyone I talk to is aware of the fact that our debt is unsustainable, and the future of our financial system is in question, and that owning Gold wil protect your investment portfolio from a meltdown… I’m just saying… And besides that… Gold is s store of wealth…  nothing more needs to be said… 
 
OK… how about some real strange news? Something to test our bite on… Dave Gonigam who is the editor of the 5 Minute Forecast, had this to say about the RESTRICT ACT that’s beeing bandied about in Congress right now, Take it away Dave!  “Ostensibly, the legislation would give the president the authority to ban the TikTok app. In reality, it grants the executive branch the authority to “enforce any mitigation measure to address any risk” to national security, broadly defined. Indeed the language is so broad that U.S. citizens could be designated as “foreign individuals” who pose a national security threat.”
 
Chuck again… So, basically we’re giving away more freedoms… no wonder Dave called it Patriot Act 2… 
 
The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday had some housing data, and in it was the Home Builders Confidence report, which last month’s report showed Confidence had fallen below 50, at 44…  And this month’s report showed it came in at 45… So both are very negative outlooks for Home Builders…   Hmmmm…. 
 
Today’s Cupboard just has some more housing data, and a couple of Fed Heads out speaking… No biggie… 
 
To recap… the dollar continued to get bought yesterday, not on the same pace as Friday, but bought nonethelesss… Gold lost $9 on the day and fell back below $2,000, which made Chuck do a mea culpa, and Silver lost 32-cents yesterday… Chuck goes to bat for the Truth!   The U.S. is reported to be spending $6 Billion per day… Oh My! And now we have to deal with an ACT that may get passed in congress that would ban Tik Tok, and any web site that has damaging information about the Gov’t… A Patriot Act 2!  
 
For What It’s Worth…  OK… longtime readers know that I truly admire James Grant… His newsletter, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, is one of THE best letter out there… And any time I can get a free sniipet from his letter, I jump at the chance, and so it is that way today… This is about Gold, and it can be found here: Gold can protect investors from the Fed’s monetary mayhem – Grant’s Interest Rate Observer | Kitco News

 

 
Or, here’s your snippet:” Despite gold’s failed attempt to break to new all-times, the precious metal still has room to move higher, according to one market strategist.

In an interview with Kitco News, James Robertson, an analyst at Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, said that the potential for the Federal Reserve to end its most aggressive tightening cycle is creating a lot of volatility in financial markets and gold remains an attractive hedge against monetary policy mayhem.
He added that last month’s banking crisis with the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank along with the collapse of Credit Suisse, one of Europe’s largest banks, shows that pressure in the global economy is starting to build and the “rivets are starting to pop.”
“The monetary disorder that we have seen is far from over, and right now, we are just waiting to see how it will spread,” he said. “This will continue to support gold prices.”
Robertson’s bullish outlook on gold comes as the precious metal is holding support just above $2,000 Friday after falling from a 13-month high posted Thursday. Heading into the weekend, June gold futures last traded at $2,019 an ounce, down 1.77% on the day.
Robertson said that gold has room to move higher as Western retail investors are just starting to jump back into the gold market. Speculative positioning in gold remains below the August 2022 highs, even as bullish momentum has increased in recent weeks.

According to monthly data from the World Gold Council, March was the first time the gold market saw net monthly inflows into global gold-backed exchange-traded products ending ten months of consecutive outflows.

Chuck again… Ok, so that wasn’t James Grant himself speaking, but his right hand man is good as far as I’m concerned… 
Market Prices 4/18/2023: American Style: A$ .6742, kiwi .6220, C$ .7474, euro 1.0973, sterling 1.2438, Swiss $1.1159, European Style: rand 18.1446, krone 10.4438, SEK 10.2934, forint 338.76, zloty 4.2092, 
koruna 21.2981, RUB 81.58, yen 133.88, sing 1.3319, HKD 7.8499, INR 82.04, China 6.8765, peso 17.98, BRL 4.9433, BBDXY 1,223.19, Dollar Index 101.69, Oil $80.69, 10-year 3.57%, Silver $25.11, Platinum $1,075.00, Palladium $1,611.00, Copper $4.08, and Gold… $2,004.30
That’s it for today… Hopefully my beloved Cardinals can find a way back in the win column tonight! I fired up my Big Green Egg yesterday, and got all the junk out of it, and then smoked some Pork steaks, (they are popular in St.Louis only) and when I was finished the meat was falling off the bone… Yum Yum! This Saturday, I will cook for my oldest son’s water polo tournament… Chicken breasts and bratwurst… So sandwiches can be made and easily dealt with by the referees and coaches at the tournament… I’ll have the Big Green Egg working as a gril, and my Weber kettle both going at the same time… I’ve done this for a number of years now, so It’s old hat for me!  Today, I had my heart doctor make my appt for later in the day, so it wouldn’t interfere with writing! Aren’t you glad? HA! Well, The Climax Blues Bank take us to the finish line wih their song: Couldn’t Get It Right… I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today, and please Be Good To Yourself!
Chuck Butler

A Bear Raid On Metals…

April 17, 2023

* Gold & Silver get whacked on Friday… 

* The IMF introduces a globalist currency.. 

Good Day… And a Marvelous Monday to you! WOW! I don’t mean to start the letter today with a raging coment about the Commerical Traders in metals, but I will… They brazenly took down Gold ( & Silver) on Friday, and it got very ugly… More on that later, but first… I went to my first StL City SC soccer game Saturday night. Major storms blew through the St. Louis area, tornados, Hail, damaging winds and tons of rain… Alex and I had made into the stadium before the shut the gates and didn’t allow anyone else in. We then spent the fist hour in the storm shelter, with hundres of other fans… Then the next hour we sat in the concourse and watched it pour… But then two hours after the orginal game start time, the game started. My seats are amazing! And the STL City SC team won big time! I got to meet up with good friends, Jack and Ty, but Frank was a late arrival and never made it to the stadium… I did have to stand a bit, during the game, but everytime my hip began to bark at me, I sat down so it wasn’t  big pain…  Billy Joel greets me this morning with his song: Stranger… 
So, I’m going to start today’s letter with a comment from Ed Steer… Take it away Ed! “I was disappointed, but not overly surprised to see that bear raid manifest itself yesterday…being Friday and all…plus the bearish setup in gold. As I mentioned further up, it’s my opinion that the rally in the DXY was as equally manufactured…especially between 8:30 a.m. and 11:05 a.m. EDT — and was used as cover for the commercial shorts of whatever stripe as they went about their business.

All of gold’s gains since Tuesday, plus a bit more, vanished yesterday — and it’s RSI trace is approaching market neutral. Almost all of silver’s gains since Tuesday have vanished as well” Ed Steer in his Saturday letter… 
So, Gold got sold to the tune of $36.10 and finished the week, just above $2,000, at $2,005.00, and Silver saw 49-cents off its value on Friday, and ended the week at $25.43… As Ed mentions above, the dollar was also manufactued upward, after falling all week, the BBDXY gained 5 index points on the day. The euro lost the 1.10 handle, and the rest of the lot came in much weaker to close the week.. .
I just have to say that I was leery of this happening, and then it did… The price manipulators made sure there were no short term profits taken, and they brazenly flauntered their short paper trades… Geez, I wish we had a Presdient, Congress, somebody to stop this from happening, but when, as I keep telling you, the Gov’t is behind this, then that’s not going to happen… 
So, all the gains in the currencies and metals that were booked before Friday last week, were wiped out in one day’s short paper trading… That just makes me sick! 
In the overnight markets last night…  There was a little more dollar buying but not much, as the BBDXY gained 1 index point overnight… The dollar strength isn’t holding back the Swiss franc… The franc has now moved into the $1.11 level!  Gold is up $3 in the early trading this morning… I can see Gold traders, sheepishly going into the market and placing buy orders this morrning and looking around and over their collectve shoulders for the men that  hang out in the dark alleys, and prey on Gold & Silver… 
The price of Oil remains steday with an $82 handle, while the 10-year Treasury’s yiedl has suddenly gotten the urge to combat inflation… The yield has risen from 3.38% last week to 3.54% this morning… I have to say that I truly believe that the 10-year and 30-year bond’s yields will react o a Fed pause by rising quickly… So… All you Fed Heads out there, have you thought about that? I doubt it they don’t have a clue as to what moves bonds… There’s not one former bond trader among them… 
Well, one of these days… I’ll laugh as the price manipulators are all hauled off to jail… I had just watched a video from Mike M. where he discusses the his thoguht that Gold is going to $8,000… Now, We’ve all heard these cries for $5,000, $8,000, 10,000 Gold, and the ATM in our head begins to explode… But seriously, how high do you think Gold or Silver would be at this point in our lives, IF there were no price manipulators? Think about all the times they’ve had their engineered takedowns, or just caps on high points of a day… I would say that we would be talking about Gold at least at $4,000, and Silver at $75… But, that’s all pie in the sky stuff, and it doesn’t do us any good to discuss it further… 
And the dollar… every time it seems the dollar is ready to go into a long term weak trend, the PPT comes in and makes any trader scared to sell dollars untl the pain is forgotten… I just shake my head in disgust, folks… I dont’ know what else to say about how dastardly these manipulations are… 
Well, how about the kid, I call him a kid, as he’s only 21, that got arrested for distributing those secret documents, that apparently aren’t secret any longer?  All I know is that if the St.Louis Prosecuter had his case, he would go scott free, with a wrist slap!  And that’s all I have to say about that!
So, we pick up the pieces and start over again… UGH! momentum just never gets a chance!   
On a lighter note…. Ahem…  get this information: “A new global currency just launched, but 99 percent of the global population has no idea what just happened.  The “Universal Monetary Unit”, also known as “Unicoin”, is an “international central bank digital currency” that has been designed to work in conjunction with all existing national currencies.  This should set off alarm bells for all of us, because the widespread adoption of a new “global currency” would be a giant step forward for the globalist agenda.  The IMF did not create this new currency, but it was unveiled at a major IMF gathering earlier this week…”
 
That was taken from “theeconmiccollapse.com” site… if you want to learn more about this move to a globalist agenda… Me? I’m still thinkin’ and wishin’ and hopin’ and prayin’ that I don’t see this happening in my lifetime… 
 
Have you ever read 1984 by George Orwell? Tha book scared the living daylights out of me… To think that a nation could end up like that? And then I compared it to what’s going on in the world today, and OMG!  
 
I was talking to good friend, Dennis Miller last week, and he said something to me that made the light bulb go on over my head… Let’s see how this works…  He had sent me a link to a letter that JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon wrote to his clients after the Bank failures…  In it were these bullet points from Dimon:
· We should want a system in which a bank failure does not cause undue panic and financial harm.

· We want proper transparency and strong regulations.
· Regulation, particularly stress testing, should be more thoughtful and forward looking.

· We should decide a priori what should stay in the regulatory system and what shouldn’t.

 
And that got me thinking about what would I ask Mr. Dimon if i were a reporter in the room when he gave that talk….  it would go something like this:  Ooh, ooh, call on me, call on me!  And Mr. Dimon would say, Ok, let’s give this Chuck Butler a shot at a question for me, go ahead… And I say, ” Mr. Dimon, sir, in looking at these bullet points, I get the feeling that you’re calling for the reurn of Glass/ Stegal, is that correct?”   Crickets… no reposonse from Jamie Dimon, and that leaves the crowd wanting…  But i really wanted to know what his answer would be! That’s not fair! He answered every other reporter’s questions!  
 
Well, I’m going to take his no answer as a Yes… he is in favor of bringing back Glass / Stegal….  
 
OK, that didn’t really happen, but… if it had, this is how I see it playing out.. 
 
The U.S. data Cupboard on Friday last week was a humdinger!  We saw the color of March Retail Sales, which were down or negative -1.0%…  What ever happened to the Spring Surge? Not happening this year, adn the folks at Zerohedge.com see it this way: “Looking at the components, the biggest drop by far was in gasoline stations which is the result of the drop in gas prices in March, which have however since rebounded strongly. Additionally, we saw a big drop in motor vehicle stores, furniture, clothing, food & beverage, general merchandise, and of particular note, electronics and appliance stores, which have had a very rough time since the pandemic. Also note the -10.3% drop in nominal retail sales for the category: when adjusted for inflation this means that retail sales for electronics are plunging more than 15% in real times.
Bottom line: the ‘lag’ from monetary policy, coupled with the hit to spending following the bank crisis is starting to catch up.”
We also saw Industrial Production, which was trumped up by the increased Utility Output to Heat the March Freeze up north… So I’m not buying the thought that the economy is just fine….   And above all the laughter at that last comment, the stupid Consumer Confidence for March showed an increase in confidence! Wait! What? Yes, apparently they only surveyed folks that have been living under rocks…   I’m just saying… 
 
I read this past weekend the  number of insurance derivatives that protect against a U.S. default, have hit reford amounts!   C’mon… you know how this game is played, and there will be a spedning increase in the 11th hour… But, if you really think about what a default is… one could argue that the U.S. has already been in default for years, as they have to issue new debt to pay the interest on the old debt…   
 
That thought is picking at needles in a haystack… but it is what it is… 
 
To recap… It was Black Friday for the currencies and metals last week… When Black Friday comes, I’ll stand down by the door, And catch the gray men when they Dive from the fourteenth floor…. Steely Dan… The price manipulators came into the markets with both guns blazin’ and they didn’t stop with metals, they included proping up the dollar, and all other sorts of devilry…   The IMF intorduced a Global currency….  Chuck’s spider sense says that they have done this with a globalsist thought in mind… Bas%^$#ds…  And overnight has been basically a dud… 
 
For What It’s Worth…  Ok, this article came to me from the good golks at GATA… And is about how Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, has finally realized that the sanctions that the U.S. has placed on Russia and other countries, may not have been such a good idea… And it can be found here: Yellen says sanctions may risk hegemony of US dollar | Al Arabiya English
Or, here’s your snippet: “Economic sanctions imposed on Russia and other countries by the US put the dollar’s dominance at risk as targeted nations seek out an alternative, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Sunday.

“There is a risk when we use financial sanctions that are linked to the role of the dollar that over time it could undermine the hegemony of the dollar,” Yellen said on CNN.
“Of course, it does create a desire on the part of China, of Russia, of Iran to find an alternative,” she told the network’s Fareed Zakaria in an interview. “But the dollar is used as a global currency for reasons that are not easy for other countries to find an alternative with the same properties.”

The robust US capital markets and rule of law “are essential in a currency that is going to be used globally for transactions,” she added. “And we haven’t seen any other country that has the basic… institutional infrastructure that would enable its currency to serve the world like this.”

Chuck again… Well, she talks like a two handed economist, right? on one hand we have this and on the other hand we have that… Worthless dribble, from our Treasury Sec….. 
Market Prices 4/17/2023: American Style: A$ .6706, kiwi .6195, C$ .7483, euro 1.0976, sterling 1.2411, Swiss $1.1183, European Style: rand 18.1808, krone 10.3547, SEK 10.3386, forint 338.42, zloty 4.2171, koruna 21.2171, RUB 81.54, yen 134.04, sing 1.3314, HKD 7.8499, INR 81.97, China 6.8706, peso 18.01, BRL 4.9086, BBDXY 1,223.37, Dollar Index 101.64, Oil $82.11, 10-year 3.54%, Silver $25.40, Platinum $1,051.00, Palladium $1,503.00, Copper $4.09, and Gold… $2,008.64
That’s it for today… My beloved Cardinals could only gain a split of 4 games at home VS the Pirates… The Pirates don’t just roll over and let you scratch their bellies any longer! They are scrappy! I just can’t get over the experience at the brand spanking shining and new soccer park, besisdes the game was awesom, the fans wer awesome, the food was great, and the only thing that wasn’t good was the Damaging storms that came before the game and delayed the start over 2 hours! i had lots of fun with my youngest son, Alex… Many of you are longtime readers that may recall him sitting on my lap in 1998, and helping me write the Pfennig… Well, he’ll be 28 this June… Amazing, right? And he has a Doctorate in Physical Therapy… From what I hear, everyone loves Dr. Alex! Today is the Boston Marathon… It’s been 10 years since the horrific ending of the marathon…  Well, I’ve gone on too long today, it’s time…. The Strawbs take us to the finish line today with their great 70’s song: Autumn… I hope you have a Marvelous Monday today, and please Be Good To Yourself
Chuck Butler

Opposites Rule The Day, Wednesday!

April 13, 2023

* Currencies & metals rally on Wednesday & overnight!

* Spend, Spend, Spend… The Deficit just keeps growing! 

Good Dayl… And a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday to one and all! A modest 2-game win streak brings the Cardinals home to play the Pirates this weekend… Downtown St.Louis will be hoppin’  with a Cardinals game and a City STL SC soccer game going on… Parking will be crazy! I’ll have Kathy drop me and ALex off and then we’ll catch an Uber after the game… So, no partking problems for me! Another picture perfect, Chamber of Commerce day here yesterday, so I fired up the outside TV, and a couple of my friends came by to watch the game with me, it was good to see good friend Mike againn, for I hadn’t seen him since December before i left for the winter!   Golden Earring greets me this morning with their mega hit song: Radar Love… 
Well, Wednesday was not a wonderful day for the dollar… The BBDXY lost 5 index points yesterday! on a day that should have been good for the dollar, the opposites trading kicked in, and the dollar got sold instead. The euro ended the day within spittin’ distace of 1.10!  Gold pushed higher during the day yesterday, gaining $11 to close the day at $2,025.70.. And Silver pushed higher even more (percentage wise), gaining 44-cents on the day, to close firmly above $25 at $25.50… I was reading an article yesterday about how the writer thinks that the next test for Gold is to close out the month above $2,000, which it has never done, but if that were to happen, the writer thinks that Gold won’t be visiting sub-$2,000 again any time soon….. I thought that that idea played nicely in the sand box with my idea that once Gold closed above $2,000 it would be off to the races, and not be looking back…  
Speaking of opposites doing Gold a favor yesterday, Brian Lundein of the Gold Newsletter and the head of the New Orleans Investment Conference (The grandaddy of all conferences) had this to say in his weekly newsletter yesterday: “While I may roll my eyes at the dynamic that sends gold higher on higher inflation readings and tighter credit conditions, I won’t argue too vociferously against it. Because not only does that crazy logic send gold higher, but it also supports my prediction that the Fed will have to pause without getting inflation anywhere near its 2% goal.

 
As I noted in my Money Morning Live segment today, you couldn’t have written a better script for gold. Not only will the Fed be forced to halt its rate hikes with inflation remaining persistently high, but the Saudi-led oil production cuts beginning next month will pressure inflation higher.
 It’s going to be a great time to be positioned in gold, silver”
Chuck again…. Of course, the wolf is always at the door with Gold & Silver… The price manipulators lurk in the dark alleys, wating for the right time to take down the metals… I’m hoping that they have seen the light, that they are doing nothing but giving Russia and China buying opportunities that the U.S. sure doesn’t take advantage of!  
The price of Oil bumped higher by $2 again on Wednesdsy, ending the day trading with an $83.00 handle… Damn the lack of demand, eh?  And the 10-year’s yield saw some downard movement, and buying of the bond will do, and it ended the day at 3.40%… 
In The overnight markets last night…. There was some follow up of the dollar selling, and this morning the BBDXY has lost 2 more index points to trade 1, 220… Gold is up a whopping $29 in the early trading today, and is looking forward, taking no prisoners, today… Silver is up 33-cents this morning, so, unless the price manipulaters get their panties all bunched up and decide to enter the market, this is going to be a good day for the anti-dollar asset classes… The price of Oil slipped a buck overnight, and trades this morning with a $82 handle… And the 10-year just keeps getting bought, as its yield has dropped to 3.38%… 
The best performing currencies ovenight include the A$, kiwi, BRL, forints, euros, and Swiss francs… with the Swiss Franc the winner, winner chicken dinner!  You know, I did point out to you some weeks ago that the Hungarian forint was moving in the right direction, I’m just saying… 
The Pfennig is a little later this morning, as I just couldn’t answer the bell! But something inside of me has changed… I don’t feel guilty any longer when I oversleep… I guess that means my mind and body has finally admitted that I’m retired!  
The Fed’s/ Cabal’s/ Cartel’s Meeting Minutes yesterday reall upset the stock jockeys… These guys were looking for signs in the minutes that would tell them that the FOMC is ready to pause at the next meeting in May… But that wasn’t to be.. instead, the FOCM minutes outlined a mild recession that they see coming, and that inflation is not going away, so another rate hike is believed to be in the cards…  Just how much of  rate hike will there be?  The pundits that follow the Fed Heads say thqt 25 Basis Points will be the hike in May… But I’m not a regular pundit, here, and I think if would behoove the FOMC to hike 50 Basis Points, and then they could say that in June they will look at it again to see if a pause is needed… Rather than hiking 25 Basis points in May, and then again in June, just go the 50 Basis Points in May! And if you feel the need to hike more in June, so be it, but most likely things in the economy and stock market will be in shambles by then, and you’ll want to pause in June… I’m just saying… 
Well, leave it up to the French…. I’m not stereotyping anyone here, just a saying… OK?  Alright now that we’ve extablished that, what is it that you’re talking about here Chuck? Chinese leader, Xi, and French leader, Macron, met last week, and Marcron didn’t endear himself to anyone in Washington D.C. with his comments. He later backtracked those comments to make them sound like he was misquoted, and that he supports the U.S.   Ok, so in my strange mind, here’s the phone call Macron received from an anyonmous called from Washington D.C. …. “Hello? Yes, it’s me, Presdient Macron, who is this calling?  Don’t worry about who I am, Macron, just know that I am your worst nightmare!  You know those words you spoke about the U.S.? Well, if you don’t backtrack those words, we’ll freeze all French assets in the U.S.,and throw you out of SWIFT, just like we did to Russia… Got it? Oui, oui, I’ve got it, and just so you know, I was misquoted… I don’t care… just do as I ordered or France will be in a bind… .   hang up…. 
Speaking of worst nightmares… The federal budget deficit reached $1.1 trillion in the first six months of fiscal 2023, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated in a report released Monday…. That’s way ahead of last year’s Budget Deficit, so that means this year could be a record year deficit… Of course, the Budget deficits get rolled into the National Debt, that’s already $31.6 Trillion! Spend, spend, spend, and worry about paying for your expenditures later, and then kicking the can down the street.. This game has been played for far too long… And one day, Alice…. I’m just saying… 
The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday, had the above mentioned FOMC meeting minutes, but the thing that got everyone riled up was the printing of the stupid CPI… Ok, it pains me to report this data, but the markets still genuflut in its presence…  So, month to month inflation increased .1%… but annually it fell to 5%… Core CPI annually rose to 5.6%…  So, confused? Yeah, I know, me too… These reports have been through the gauntlet, and when they come out, they make no sense whatsoever! 
Just know that inflation is sticky, will remain sticky, and if the FOMC decides to pause their rate hikes, inflation will get evern stickier!  And never reach the Fed head’s goal of 2% inflation… So much for their credibility… I have something on that (fed Credibility in the FWIW section today, you won’t want ot have missed that!)
Today’s Cupboard has the usual Weekly Initial Jobless Claims, and in addtion to that, we’ll also see the color of the March PPI (wholesale inflation)… Remember we see rising inflation here, first… 
To recap… The dollar got sold yesterday, and the BBDXY lost 5 index ponts on the day…   The euro is within spittin’ distance of 1.10, and Gold gained $11 while Silver gained 44-cents!   it was truly another day of opposites in the markets, but that’s how they work these days, and so we just have to roll with it… Chuck plays a game with a phone call to Frence Leader Macron… It’s how he sees it happened! 
For What It’s Worth… Good friend, Dennis Miller sent me this article from Pam and Russ Martens of wallstreetonparade.com  and it tells a story of a loss of credibility of the Fed/ Cabal/ Cartel, that’s now falling into a loss of credibility for U.S. banks! And the article, while long, but well worth the read, can be found here: A Growing Lack of Confidence in the Fed Is Spilling Over into a Lack of Confidence in U.S. Banks (wallstreetonparade.com)
Or, here’s your snippet: “A Growing Lack of Confidence in the Fed Is Spilling Over into a Lack of Confidence in U.S. Banks

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: April 5, 2023
Millions of Americans are beginning to ask themselves this question: Is the Federal Reserve (the “Fed”) a competent central bank or a terminally compromised regulator that simply does the bidding of Wall Street’s mega banks to the peril of average Americans and the U.S. economy? Millions of other Americans have already made up their minds on this point.
These persistent doubts about an institution with an $8.8 trillion balance sheet – that is backstopped by the U.S. taxpayer – is very bad for confidence in the U.S. banking system, especially when the Fed pivots from one banking bailout to the next. (What was the size of the Fed’s balance sheet prior to its serial bailouts? On December 26, 2007, the Fed’s balance sheet stood at $929 billion. It has soared by 847 percent in just over 15 years of serial bailouts.)
Let’s look at the evidence that’s been stacking up against the Fed since the financial crisis of 2008 – the worst economic collapse in America since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
In response to the 2008 financial crisis, the Fed introduced a hodge podge of emergency lending programs to Wall Street’s biggest banks, as well as cranking out its traditional discount window loans. While the Fed released general details of what the programs were created to do, it did not release the names of the Wall Street firms that were doing the bulk of the borrowing, or the sums borrowed by each institution.
A tenacious investigative reporter at Bloomberg News, the late Mark Pittman, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Fed for the names of the banks, the amounts borrowed and the terms. Under the law, the Fed had to respond in 20 business days. The Fed stalled Pittman for six months, leading to the parent of Bloomberg News, Bloomberg LP, filing a lawsuit against the Fed in the Federal District Court in Manhattan in November 2008. Bloomberg won that suit. The Fed then appealed the decision to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. A large number of other mainstream media outlets and groups filed an Amicus brief in the matter, in support of the release of the information.
The Fed also lost at the Second Circuit. The Fed was, apparently, too embarrassed to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, because President Obama’s acting Solicitor General, Neal Katyal, planned to file a brief contrary to the Fed’s position, so a group called The Clearing House Association LLC, made up of some of the very same Wall Street banks that were being bailed out by the Fed, filed their own appeal with the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case in March of 2011, leaving the decision of the Second Circuit standing.

The financial reform legislation known as the Dodd-Frank Act (which was signed into law by President Obama on July 21, 2010) had forced the Fed to release the transaction details of its seven emergency lending facilities in December of 2010. When the Supreme Court declined to hear the court case, the Fed finally released the discount window transactions in March 2011.”

 
Chuck Again….The article gives many more examples of how the Fed Heads have ruined their credibility, so if you want to know them all, click the link above, and read away! 
 
Market Prices 4/13/2023: American Style: A$ 6753, kiwi 6271, C$ .7468, euro 1.1034, sterling 1.2521, Swiss $1.1254, European Style: rand 18.1068, krone 10.3774, SEK 10.3001, forint 339.25, zloty 4.2004, 
koruna 21.0992, RUB 81.77, yen 132.67, sing 1.3233, HKD 7.8500, INR 81.85, China 6.8753, peso 18.09, BRL 4.9314, BBDXY 1,220.98, Dollar Index 101.14, Oil $82.90, 10-year 3.38%, Silver $25.91, Platinum $1,004.00, Palladium $1,550.00, Copper $4.09, and Gold… $2,045.10
That’s it for today and this week… Next week is chock-full-o-doctor appts, so I have that going for me! I’ll let you know my schedule for the Pfennig on Monday… I think now that only Thursday’s letter will not be sent as I know for sure I’ll be at the hospital for a check up… no scan, at least not now… I’m still leery of those scan machines even though I know they didn’t cause my anaphalaxis shock back in December… I just have bad memorie of that day in the scanner, when I had to start banging on it and yelling for them to get me out of there, that something was wrong… And something was wrong indeed! When I see my oncologist next week, I’m sure she will want to get me scheduled for a new scan… UGH!   Well, same gig as last year when I came home from my winter home… I had gained 20 lbs last year, and I gained 20 lbs again this year!  Too much of the good life I guess, eh? Now I have to be diligent and get those gained lbs off! The Marshall Tucker Band take us to the finsih line today with their great 70’s song: 24 Hours At A Time….  I hope you have a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday today, and Fantastico Friday tomorrow, and all the while keep Being Good To Yourself! 
 
Chuck Butler

Are We Going Back To ZIRP?

April 12, 2023

* currencies & metals rally on Tuesday

* Looking at the stupid CPI all wrong… 

Good Day… And a Wonderful Wednesday to you! This is getting serious folks… The Cardinals starting pitchers are just plain awful… This is not what I saw in Spring Training, but then, is it just Spring Training… But.. the bats came alive last night and the Cardinals rallied for a 9-6 win… Maybe this team can be like the 75 Big Red Machine, who didn’t have any great starters, but their bats could outslug any team… The day here yesterday was picture perfect… Can’t say anymore about that!  I’ll be heading to City field this Saturday, for my first game in my seats… Youngest son Alex will go with me, I hope I can keep up with him!  I think I’ll be able to see good friends, Frank Trotter, Ty Keough, Jack Stapleton, at the game!  It’s a real barn burner at the game I’m told, so I’m excited to go! ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) greets me this morning with their great song done live: Can’t Get You Out Of Head… 
Well, when I left you yesterdy morning, the dollar was getting sold, and the BBDXY was down 3 index points… and it looked as if there would be carry over to the U.S. markets, but that didn’t happen, and the rest of the day was just back and forth trading, with the BBDXY ending the day down the same 3 index points it was down that morning… Gold did have a good day though, and gained $12.20 to climb back above $2,000, at $2,004.70… And Silver gained 18-cents to climb back over $25 at $25.14…  the price Oil got a bump yesterday, and gained $2 on the day to end hte day with an $81 handle…  The 10-year’s yield stayed in a range at 3.43$… 
Ive got to say that I think the dollar has just about had its run of the roost… It may have a day or two where it get bought becuase the Gov’t wants it be bought, but other than that, I really think that the markets have resigned themselves into thinking that the Fed Heads rate hikes are just about over, and being forward thinking.. that leaves them with no other choice but to sell dollars… A lot the economy has been like a Chinese water torture, slow… slow… and slower, but it’s arriving nonetheless, so if you’re cut from the same cloth as I am, you’ll be looking to buy a currency soon… or build your Gold & Silver chest… I’m just saying… 
In regards to that thought of mine…. here’s something I pulled from Bloomberg this morning: ‘“We expect the US dollar to weaken as the US growth and interest-rate premium relative to the rest of the world erodes in the coming months,” Solita Marcelli, chief investment officer Americas at UBS Global Wealth Management”
In the overnight markets last night… It was a big fat dud… There was no movement in the dollar overnight, and we start today with the BBDXY at 1,228…  Gold is up $4 in the early trading today, and Silver is flat… I’m still of the thought that no matter what the price manipulators decide to do, Gold is ready to move upward, and that taking out $2,000 level was key…  And the dollar? I think it’s hanging on by the skin of its teeth…  So, do with those thoughts as you wish… I know what I’ll be doing, but you?  Hmmm..    The price of Oil remained above the $81 handle last night, and the 10-year is range trading still this morning at 3.45%… 
I was reading an article on Bloomberg this morning that really had me shivering with fear that the Central Banks of the world would return to zero interest rates, once this nasty inflation abates… Are you kidding me?  Isn’t that stupid zero interest rate policy the cause of our nasty inflation now?  I shake my head in total disgust that Central Banks would even think of doing that again…   here’s a snippet of the article on Bloomberg.com that I’m referring to: “The International Monetary Fund has caused some consternation with the long-range forecasts in its April World Economic Outlook. It predicts that once the current bout of nasty global inflation abates, interest rates will return close to zero. If the IMF is on the money with this big-picture call, it will shred whatever is left of central bankers’ credibility.”
 
Good friend, Dennis Miller, sent me a link to an article yesterday, and was asking me quesitons about it… Here’s a snippet of the article that he sent me: “The reality is that the 25 largest domestically-chartered commercial banks in the U.S. have been bleeding deposits for most of the past 12 months, shedding more than $700 billion in deposits between April 13, 2022 and March 29, 2023. To put that in even sharper focus, all U.S. domestically-chartered commercial banks have lost a total of $970 billion during the same time period. That means that the largest 25 banks account for a whopping 72 percent of the plunge in deposits over the past year.”
 
His premise was that this wouldn’t be a big deal becuase the Gov’t would just bail them out if push came to shove… And I thought, well, if all of these banks had problems at the same time, there’s no way the Gov’t could bail them all out at the same time, and if they tried, we would have the biggest fiasco on earth… The financial system that we’ve all come to know would fail to exist, and the introduction of digital bank acounts would come to a theater near you! 
 
The U.S. Data Cupboard has something for us today, besides Fed Head speakers out in the field… The stupid CPI will print for March… i don’t care much for what it will print because the Gov’t added so many hedonic adjustments to the data that it’s no recognizable any longer! So, whatever it prints, it doesn’t make a bit of matter to me… To the markets, those dolts take the CPI as if it came from the Bible… Idiots all of them… and people pay these guys to make decisions? Give me a break!  
 
All the stock jockeys will be like a kid on rollercoaster, with their arms in the air, and screaming with delight, that inflation, per the stupid CPI, eased a bit in March… I’ve got my arms in the air, and I don’t care!  Go for it you idiots… inflation is not going away that easily… And no matter what hedonic adjustments the BLS adds to the CPI to make it look like it’s going away, it’s not… 
 
To recap… The dollar got sold on Tuesday, but there was no follow thru in the overnight markets… Gold has added $16 after Monday’s engineered takedown… So, just proves you can’t keep a good asset class down!  The IMF thinks Central Banks will go back to ZIRP once inflation is tamed…  And I say, you’ve got to be kidding me!  Banks are bleeding deposits… This is getting very interesting, folks… 
 
For What It’s Worth… Boy or boy, do I have a FWIW worthy article for you today… This is about secret progam run by the BIS, and how it will take over everything and only deal in CBDC’s (digital currencies)… And it can be found here: Project Icebreaker: The Beginning Of A One World Digital Currency System? (blacklistednews.com)
Or, here’s your snippet: “In my investigations of various CBDC programs and how quickly they are progressing I came across an interesting program called “Project Icebreaker” being run by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). For those not aware, the BIS is a globalist institution with a clandestine past known as the “central bank of central banks.” It is the policy making hub for most of the central banks in the world. If you ever wondered how it was possible for so many national central banks to operate in tandem with each other instead of acting in the interests of the countries they reside in, the BIS is the answer. In other words, organizations like the Federal Reserve are not necessarily loyal to Americans or to American officials, they are loyal to the dictates of the BIS.

The BIS is at the forefront of the movement towards the adoption of CBDCs. They have been funding a vast array of projects to test and refine CBDC technology and as of this year they estimate that at least 81 central banks around the world are in the midst of introducing digital currency systems.

Project Icebreaker in particular grabbed my attention for a number of reasons. The BIS describes the project as a foreign exchange clearing house for Retail CBDCs (retail CBDCs are digital currencies used by the regular public and businesses), enabling the currencies to be traded from country to country quickly and efficiently. This is accomplished using the “Icebreaker Hub”, a BIS controlled mechanism which facilitates data transfers for an array of transactions while connecting banks to other banks.

 

nvestigating further I realized that the Icebreaker Hub in theory functions almost exactly like the SWIFT payment system used currently by governments and international banks. More than 10,000 financial institutions in 212 different countries use the SWIFT network to transfer funds overseas for their clients; it is an incredible centralization bottleneck that gives its shareholders considerable power.

As a point of reference, after the start of the war between Ukraine and Russia, the expulsion of Russia from the SWIFT network was used as a weapon in an attempt to crash the Russian economy. Russia has found ways around using SWIFT because of their trade relationships with major economies like China and India, but some damage has still been done to their financial structure.
Consider this, however – What if all monetary transactions were centralized through CBDCs and the BIS controlled the hub in which all retail CBDCs are exchanged globally? This is what Icebreaker is.

Now imagine that you operate a business that relies on overseas transactions; say you need to pay manufacturers in Vietnam or Taiwan to produce your products. With CBDCs in place you will most likely be completely dependent on a system similar to the Icebreaker Hub to move than digital money to Vietnamese banks and into the accounts of your manufacturers. Say officials at the BIS, for whatever reason, decide they don’t like you and they initiate Russian-style sanctions denying your access to the hub. Your business is now dead.”

 
Chuck Again… longtime readers of the Pfennig know that I absolutely adore a clandestine theory, story, idea… And this fills the bill for me! C”mon you didn’t really think that once the U.S. introduced their digital currency that the rest of the world would just bow to them and say, ok? 
 
Market Prices 4/12/2023: American Style: A$ .6672, kiwi .6192, C$ .7415, euro 1.0922, sterling 1.2406, Swiss $1.1086, European Style: rand 18.4333, krone 10.5025, SEK 10.3905, forint 344.42, zloty 4.2693, 
koruna 21.4405, RUB 82.40, yen 133.70, sing 1.3310, HKD 7.8500, INR 82.08, China 68830, peso 18.12, BRL 5.0028, BBDXY 1,228.44, Dollar Index 102.10, Oil $81.46, 10-year 3.46%, Silver $25.15, Platinum $1,009.00, Palladium $1,449.00, Copper $3.99, and Gold… $2,008.15
 
That’s it for today… I received a notice from Omar Ayles from the Gold Charts R Us fame yesterday… He’s going to be at the Las Vegas Money Show later this month… That got me thinking about all the shows that I used to attend and speak at… I have a coat rack that I always hung my lanyard with the show, on it, and through the years, I’ve got quite a collection of lanyards with shows info on them… When I left EverBank, I took my coat rack with me, and it sits in my basement right next to my writing desk… My favorite trip through the years was Vancouver…  But San Francisco wasn’t far behind… So, if you go to the Las Vegas Money Show, raise a glass to my long time there…  Wild Cherry tqkes us to the finish line today with their song: Play That Funky Music   I hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday today, and please Be Good To Yourself! 

A One And Done For Dollar Buying…

April 11, 2023

* Currencies & metals get sold on Monday

* dollar gets sold in the overnight markets… 

Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you! A Chamber of Commerce Day here in my little river town yesterday, I stayed outside all day until dinner time… I sit out back at our house, and no one sees me, I and I dont’ see anyone either. When we first bulit our house the back yard wasn’t finished, and so we sat out front, and talked to the neighbors as they walked by… We used to call them “mailbox parties”… During the plandemic I would invite as many people that could fit on my driveway to come, bring their lawn chair, and sit outside to talk face to face, which to me was far better than those darn Zoom get togethers! Maybe I should change and start sitting out front again, just to at least wave to neighbors! The Yardbirds greet me this morning with their song: For Your Love… 
Well, I told you yesterday that Monday looked like it was going to be an ugly day for the currencies and metals, and that’s exactly what it turned out to be… At no time during the day was there any sign of a rally in either asset class. The BBDXY gained 5 index points on the day… .Gold lost $16.10 to close at $1,992.50, and Silver lost 11-cents to close at $24.96…  There was no rhyme or reason for the selling in the metals, and since it was such a large downward move, it smelled like, it walked like, it talked like, price manipulation…  
The price of Oil finally gave up the $80 handle yesterday, as it slipped to a $79 handle… Demand, or more fittingly, lack of demand, seems to be on the minds of Oil traders… We are coming into the summer driving season, where the demand usually picks up (sans 2020) …  So, hopefully, the Oil traders are taking that fact into the equation when they are pricing Oil…  And the 10-year Treasury’s yield bumped higher to 3.40%, no biggie… just a little bump up… 
In the overnight markets last night… The dollar went back on the selling block… now it really appears to me to be price manipulation yesterday, beause there was no follow up… Hmmm…  b83*%$^&ds  The BBDXY lost 3 index points overnight, and Gold is up $8 in the early trading today, with Silver flat as a pancake (Head East)… No change in the price of Oil, and the 10-year’s yield is 3.41% this morning…  
How long do we have to be subjected to these price manipulators? It’s just not right, that they are allowed to do what they do, which brings me back to my original theory that the price manipulators are given the green light to proceed with their short paper trades, by the U.S. Gov.  They need to protect the dollar somehow, and this is the battle they’ve chosen… 
It’s all going to came back an bite the U.S. Gov’t in the rear… Why? Well, in my mind, the U.S. keeps giving the wink and nod to the JPMorgans to bring Gold down, thus giving the likes of China and Russia great buying opportunities, to amass large quantitites of Gold… And one day, he who has the Gold will rule…  I’m just saying… 
I  got to thinking yesterday about something that I talked about previously, and that is the refinancing of our debt at higher rates…  I do believe that I saw a HUGE amount of Treasuries coming due in 2025… They will have to be rolled into new bonds, with higher yields… That means more of the U.S.’s tax receipts will go toward financing our debt… Now, in the voice of the church lady, “Isn’t that special?”…
 But before then, we’ll have Corporate debt beginning to come due… and that, well, will bring about a lot of defaults, but don’t let that thought get in the way of a stock rally!  Can you tell I was being facetious?    Well, I was….  all these things will lead us to a recession that’s not going to only last 2 months…  Wil that be a bad thing? Well, for some it will be, but for the economy, it’s just what is needed…  I’ll lget Bill Bonner explain:
“Things that are out of whack have a way of getting back into whack.’ This is just another way of saying that there is a ‘normal’ state of affairs…and that when they go too far afield, it’s a fairly good bet that they will soon be headed home. Economists call it ‘regression to the mean;” it’s one of the most powerful forces in finance.

And now, the US economy needs to back up…it needs to go ‘back into whack.’  The Fed’s negative (below inflation) rates affected almost every financial transaction in the whole economy. Low mortgage rates caused a bubble in housing…and commercial real estate. They also caused a huge boom in borrowing – household, corporate, and government. They financed businesses that never should have been started…and allowed zombie enterprises to squander billions in real capital. They helped the feds fund programs that never should have made it to the drawing board…much less to the launching pad…made it possible for them to give pensions, grants, loans, and stimmies that they couldn’t afford.”

 
Chuck again…  Thanks to Bill Bonner for that piece… his newsletter can be found here: Back Into Whack – by Bill Bonner and Joel Bowman (substack.com) 
 
I’ve been watching the Aussie dollar (A$), and it just can’t seem to stop stepping on its own feet… The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has halted rate hikes for now to asess the situation with inflation, and that has some money managers thinking the A$ is on the way down… But not so fast Tim!   I found this on Bloomberg this morning: “Real-money investors are at odds with analysts on the outlook for the Australian dollar this year, and data this week may provide the next cue for the currency.

The Aussie has lagged most of its Group-of-10 peers this year, losing 2.5% versus the greenback. The decline has come against a backdrop of US banking turmoil, falling Treasury yields and the Reserve Bank of Australia’s decision to pause its rate hikes to assess the outlook.

However, this is not stopping researchers from predicting the Aussie to strengthen, forecasting the currency will end the year at 72 US cents per dollar, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey. ANZ Banking Group Ltd. predicts it may even rise to 75 cents.”

 
 Chuck Again… The A$ an kiwi have alway had a special place in my heart, as they were the first two currencies I ever really tracked and was told they were too small to deal with, but I persisted, and we began trading them, and they became our flagship currencies for commodity currencies…   
 
The U.S. Data Cupboard today still is lacking, and won’t get with the swing of things until tomorrow, and even then it will still be lacking of sorts… The stupid CPI will print tomorrow, along with the FOMC Meeting Minutes from their last meeting… I wonder if the minutes will have the names of the Fed Heads that voted for a 50 Basis Point rate hike?  
 
To recap… Monday was a bad, ugly day for the currencies and metals… There was no rhyme or reason for the selling, so Chuck believes it was price manipulation… Chuck is concerned about all the debt Gov’t and Corp that will be coming due, and needed to be rolled over at higher rates…. Defaluts… There I said it!  The Data Cupboard is lacking again today, and Chuck is rooting for the A$! 
 
For What It’s Worth… This article came to me from longtime reader Bob… And it’s about how the U.S. is going to crackdown on nations that aren’t complying with the Russian sanctions, and….  more…  This can be found here; Treasury Officials Planning EU and Central Asia Extortion Trip to Target Countries Evading Western Sanctions Against Russia – The Last Refuge (theconservativetreehouse.com)
Or, here’s your snippet: “The United States Treasury Dept is planning to send officials to key parts of the globe to act as enforcers for western sanctions against Russia. Essentially, it’s a blackmail and extortion tour, where Liz Rosenberg and Brian Nelson will visit non-compliant nations and central Western banking hubs to threaten foreign nations against continued noncompliance.

Whether any nation complies with the pressure campaign threats is still unknown. However, against the backdrop of various geopolitical alliances now cleaving the global economy, and with a larger network of non-western nations now forming their own trade partnerships without regard for Washington DC opinion, the effort to draw “with us” or “against us” lines could backfire.

Treasury officials Liz Rosenberg and Brian Nelson — specialists in sanctions and terrorist financing — will travel to Europe this month to meet with leaders of financial institutions in Switzerland, Italy and Germany. They plan to share intelligence on potential sanctions evaders and to warn of the potential penalties for failure to comply with international sanctions.

Rosenberg will also make a stop in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan to urge the country’s private businesses not to provide material or intelligence support to the Kremlin. Earlier this year, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Kazakhstan to pledge U.S. support for its independence and to stress the importance of respect for “sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence.” (read more)
Chuck again….   I can hear these gangstas saying….. “Nice country you got there…. it’d be a shame if anything happened to it.”   
 Market Prices 4/11/2023:  American Style: A$ .6623, kiwi .6200, C$ .7398, euro 1.0912, sterling 1.2427, Swiss $1.1049, European Style: rand 18.3159, krone 10.5792, SEK 10.4653, forint 344.14, zloty 4.2868, koruna 21.4873, RUB 82.15, yen 133.23, sing 1.3321, HKD 7.8499, INR 82.12, China 6.8843, peso 18.15, BRL 5.0669, BBDXY 1,228.80, Dollar Index 102..15, Oil $79.57, 10-year 3.41%, Silver $24.96, platinum $997.00, Palladium $1,434.00, Copper $4.01, and Gold… $2,000.35
That’s it for today…  my oh my, the Cardinals pitching is worse than all the prognostications said they were! This is supposed to be a pennant Contending team, but with pitching like we’ve seen in the first 10 games, that’s a hope and a prayer, at best… But then it is early, only 10 games into a 162 game season, so Carinals fans can hole onto that, and hope for a turnaround… Funny thing happened on the way to the forum for our Blues… Ever since they were eliminated from the playoffs, they’ve played better… So… the Cardinals start the fist 10 games at 3-7… not a mountain to climb, but a small hill to climb to get bsck to .500…   My cold is still holding on… My wife had it for a day last week, and then it was gone! Darn chemo takes me longer to heal… So, it’s 10 days now, should be gone by Friday!   Procol Harum takes us to the finish line today with their song: Conquistador… I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today, and please Be Good To Yourself! 
Chuck Butler

The dollar Fights Back!

April 10, 2023

* currencies & metals start the week getting sold

* Ready for a James Bond Thriller? 

Good Day… And a Marvelous Monday to you! Easter Monday that is… not exactly a good weekend for my beloved Cardinals who only only won 1 of 3 in Milwaukee… But yesterday was an absolute beautiful day here in my little river town. The sky was an umbrella blue all day, and me and my oldest son, Andrew, sat outside and listened to the game so we could enjoy the beautiful day. Andrew was feeling a little sore, as he had particapated in an Alumni water polo game on Saturday. Water Polo is such a demanding game, physically, and he was reminded of that!  Supertramp greets me this morning with their great song: Hide In Your Shelll… (one of my all-time faves!) 
The markets, for the most part, were closed last Friday, to celebrate Good Friday. The bond market was open, but most participants were not taking any positions long or short on strict instructions from the senior traders, who had ventured off to the hamptons for the long weekend… The BBDXY went untouched on the day and ended the week at 1,225…  Gold ended the week at $2,007.60, after losing $12.40 on Thursday. Silver closed the week at $24.97, after losing 7-cents on Thursday.. There wasn’t much going on Friday, and so it eneded up a “nothing day”… The price of Oil ended the week trading with an $80 handle, while the 10-year Treasury’s yield saw more buying, and it ended the week at 3.47%
The bond boys sure are taking a risk here.. they are taking a posiiton that the Fed Heaes have run the gauntlet of rate hikes, and have come to an end… I think they are barking up the wrong tree here, and that the FEd Heads will indeed hike rates again when they meet in June…. But that’s just me… Thinking… and probably will be right!
In the overnight markets last night… It’s smells bad… The dollar is getting bought, and the BBDXY has gained 6 index points! Gold and Silver are getting whacked (again!) and the whole day seems like it’s going to circle the bowl at any minute now. The price of Oil is steady Eddie with an $80 handle, and the 10-year’s yield continues to drop, with it trading this morning at 3.38%…  The spread between the 10-year and the 30-year bond has inverted even more folks… I’m just pointint that out… 
I have nothing else for you today… this is supposed to be a holiday for me! HA!   The one thing that keeps coming up on the newswires was reported by Reuters: “Classified documents that appeared online, with details ranging from Ukraine’s air defenses to Israel’s Mossad spy agency, have US officials working to identify the leak’s source. The breadth of topics addressed in the documents suggests they may have been leaked by an American rather than an ally.”   
 
Doesn’t that sound like the plot from a James Bond movie? I’ll leave that there…
 
Last Friday was the Jobs Jamboree, and a jamboree it was! The BLS reported that there were 236,000 jobs created in March, and, are you ready for this? The BLS didn’t add any jobs out of thin air last month!  I guess the surveys were good enough for the propeller heads at the BS, I mean BLS…  The Average Hourly earnings were up .3%, so at least somebody out there got a raise!    The other piece of data that printed on Friday was Consumer Credit (read debt)… The total debt was less than it was in Feb, as it printed at $15.3 Billlion… The consumers really ran up the credit card debt in March… The revolving debt grew at 5% in March… 
 
Think about that for a minute… credit card interest is running about 17%… And debt figures in credit cards are growing at 5%…  That’s a lot of debt for consumers to have to deal with… But they’re all adults, and I’m sure they have a handle on their finances… so what, me worry? 
 
And here’s a headline that was buried in Bloomberg… The Chinese yuan replaces the dollar as the most transacted currency in Russia…   That reminded me of my old explanation about the Chinese currency… The official name of the Chinese Currency is the renminbi, the slang name for it is the yuan (like dollars/ buck) , and the media always uses the slang name, yuan,  becuase it easier for them to type and say! 
 
This week’s Data Cupboard offerings are lacking until we get to Wednesday… 
 
To recap… The dollar ended the week flat, but in the overnight markets last night, the dollar buying went into a frenzy, with the BBBDXY up 6 index points this morning… UGH! Gold is off $17 to start the week, and has slipped back below the $2,000 level… There’s not much going on as Friday and today is a holiday for a lot of the country… 
 
For What It’s Worth…  well, with nothing going on, the pickins’ are slim for FWIW article today, but thank goodness I found one that’s worthy… This is about how Texas is looking to create a gold backed digital currency, and it can be found here: Texas moves to create gold-backed digital currency | Kitco News  
 
Or, here’s your snippet: “As lawmakers in the U.S. introduce bills pushing back against the creation of a U.S.-dollar-based central bank digital currency (CBDC), Texas is opting to go a different route with the creation of a state-issued, gold-backed digital currency.

Based on the text of Senate Bill 2334, which was introduced by state Senator Bryan Huges (R), and House Bill 4903, which was introduced by state Representative Mark Dorazio (R), the legislators are looking to require the state comptroller to establish a digital currency that is fully backed by gold and fully redeemable in cash or gold.
“The comptroller shall establish a digital currency that is backed by gold so that each unit of the digital currency issued represents a particular fraction of a troy ounce of gold held in trust,” the bills state, adding that if needed, a private vendor can be enlisted to help establish the digital currency.
The comptroller would also be required to create a mechanism that would allow the new gold-backed digital currency to be used by citizens for their daily transactions. “In establishing the digital currency the comptroller shall establish a means to ensure that a person who holds the digital currency may readily transfer or assign the digital currency to any other person by electronic means.”

All gold reserves backing the digital currency would be held in a trust with the Texas Bullion Depository that is controlled by the comptroller or another entity appointed by the comptroller. “The trustee shall maintain enough gold to provide for the redemption in gold of all units of the digital currency that have been issued and are not yet redeemed for money or gold,” the bills read.”

 
Chuck again… Well, at least that’s a digital currency that would be worth something, and have something behind it besides mystery! 
 
Market Prices 4/10/2023:  American Style: A$ .6623, kiwi .6200, C$ .7329, euro 1.0848, sterling 1.2360, Swiss $1.0986, European Style: rand 18.4912, krone 10.5404, SEK 10.5275, forint 345.29, zloty 4.3216, koruna 21.5223, RUB 81.77, yen  133.37, sing 1.3329, HKD 7.8500, INR 81.98, China 6.8316, peso 18.23, BRL 5.0879, 
BBDXY 1,232.64, Dollar Index 102.64, Oil $80.24, 10-year 3.38%, Silver $24.91, Platinum $1,006.00, 
Palladium $1,526.00, Copper $4.00, and Gold… $1,990.90
 
That’s it for today… How was your Easter? I hope it was blessed, and full of love of family… Little Evie had the quote of the day… I asked her if she liked my Easter shirt (Easter lillies), and she said, “That’s not an Easter shirt, it doens’t have any bunnies on it!” I then started to explain to her that Easter isn’t about bunnies, but he’s only 3 and I thought this is wasted breath… This week should be very nice here in the Midwest, so I’m all in for that!  Dire Straits take us to the finish line today with their great song: Brothers In Arms…  I hope you have a Marvelous Monday today, and will try to  Be Good To Yourself!
 
Chuck Butler

A Banana Republic?

April 6, 2023

* dollar gets bought on Wednesday

* Short time holders sell Gold… 

Good Day… And a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday to one and all! Swept! My beloved Cardinals got swept at home, no less, by the Braves… UGH! The team’s pitching is shameful… I’m just saying… Stormy weather… My dad used to go through the house singing that song… That’s what we had yesterday mroning, but then the clouds moved on, the sun came out and it was a pleasant day… I only stepped out for a couple of minutes yesterday, other than that I basically slept all day… I woke up at one point, turned on the Cardinals game and saw they were losing 5-0, and turned it off, and went back to sleep… On Tuesday this week, I thought I had turned the corner with this cold, and Wednesday, not so much… UGH! Yes, greets me this morning with their song: Long Distance Runaround… 
 
Well, the selling of the dollar turned yesterday, and for at least one day, the dollar got bought, as witnessed by the 3 index points the BBDXY gained on the day. Gold was flat on the day, and Silver was only down one thin dime… So, it was really a non-moving day…  I find those kinds of days to be a BIG waste, of time, of effort, of attention, and of course, of money…  Gold was up $6 in the early trading yesterday, but as the day wore on, it slipped, problably from profit taking from the short time holders of Gold. Gold did manage to eke out a 30-cent gain on the day, but to me that’s just a flat day… 
 
I was thinking that the 50 Basis Points rate hike by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), might cause some ripples in Gold’s water yesterday, but seeing that it didn’t, I’m thinking that Gold will continue to move higher and take out its all-time high of $2,078… 
 
I mentioned the short time holders of Gold above… And these folks are “in for a minute”… They buy and sell Gold like it was marbles… They don’t understand that Gold is a store of wealth, and that once you have it you don’t willy nilly go around telling people you have it, and you don’t get the urge to sell it every time it bumps higher… When it bumps higher, you smile, and think that you’re sure glad you listened to someone in your early age and bought physical Gold! 
 
In the overnight markets last night… There was no follow through on the dollar buying yesterday, so that was as I suspected a one and done deal… The dollar didn’t get sold either last ngiht overseas, the BBDXY is trading in the same clothes it had on yesterday at 1,225.  Profit taking seems to be the rage these days in Silver… I wonder how many folks had a Silver story like I told you about the other day?  Gold is off $4 in the early trading to start our day, and Silver has lost 17-cents… I don’t believe that we’ve seen hide nor hair of the short paper traders this week, not that I miss thiem or anything like that, it just gives me the willies not knowing when they will show up at the COMEX with their arms full of short paper trades… 
 
The price of Oil is steady Eddie with an $80 handle… I read this morning that Oil traders are aware that the demand for Oil, black Gold, Texas Tea, is not what high priced Oil is made of… But they want to see what the oil production cuts that OPEC announced earlier this week, affects the reserves, etc.   Make sense to me… 
 
The line to buy the 10-year Treasury must go around the block! There’s been so much buyng of the bond this week, that the yield on the bond has drpped from 3.50% on Monday to 3.27% today… That’s quite a move in bonds, folks… I used to be a bond trader, and a move like that would have the bond desk up in arms, and the guy that was long the bond, would be strutting around like rooster! 
 
It’s a sign of the times… earlier this week, I read where Walmart will be closing a number of stores… Hmmm, I thought, the economy is showing signs of collapsing, when Walmart has to close stores… Then news came yesterday that the other Big Box Store, Costco, reported their lowest U.S. sales growth in 3 years! Uh-Oh! These are signs/ omens if you will, folks… You can either ignore them, or… pay attention, ane do something to protect your nest egg… Got Gold? 
 
 
Well this Tweet was well timed, as it came right after the ADP Employment Report showed only 145,000 jobs added in March… check this out: 

The Kobeissi Letter
@KobeissiLetter
Largest Layoffs of 2023, So far:
1. Amazon: 27,000 employees
2. Google: 12,000 employees
3. Meta: 10,000 employees
4. Microsoft: 10,000 employees
5. Goldman Sachs: 3,200 employees
6. Coinbase: 25% of employees
7. Zoom: 15% of employees
8. Glassdoor: 15% of employees
9. Twilio: 15% of employees
10. Indeed: 15% of employees
11. LendingClub: 14% of employees
12. Vimeo: 11% of employees
13. Docusign: 10% of employees
14. Salesforce: 10% of employees

15. Gemini: 10% of employees

 
Chuck again… Add to those numbers (330,000 in tech alone) the story I brought to your attention the other day, about Mickey D’s announcing layoffs… Those won’t be tens of thousands, but… they all add up! 
 
How would you like to be a Japanese yen trader? or Japanese hedge fund trader? These guys have been whipsawed  and turned around, inside out, and put out to dry… They get all lathered up when the rumor begins that the Bank of Japan is going to ease it’s lock on the 10-year Gov’t bond’s yield and they remove their short positions in yen, and yen rallies, but then word from the Bank of Japan is …. crickets… And so the yen gets sold again, and they are left holding the bag… 
 
Before I head to the Big Finish today, I have something to get off my chest… if you dont’ want to hear about it, and think it’s just Chuck whining about this and that again, then go ahead and skip to the FWIW article today, for those of you who stayed around, here we go!   You know, i’ve been watching and reading about this indictment of our former POTUS… 

I never want to bring politics into a Pfennig newsletter discussion, but… 
This whole thing reeks of bad politics…  I never, in my life, thought I would see a day when a 
former POTUS was brought to court and indicted… Shouldn’t these guys just be able to go off into the sunset
and leave them alone?  
I read this and thought to myself, Yes, they should think that way:   “South American leaders have responded by pointing out that the arrest of a former president means that the US is now in the same category as Banana Republics where each successor president arrests his predecessor. “
 
I’m also reminded of how my former Big Boss, and friend, Frank Trotter, would describe the U.S. as a banana republic back in the day… It’s all coming home to roost, Frank…  You were just ahead of your time… 
 
The U.S. Data Cupboard today, as the usual fare for a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday, the Weekly Initial Jobless Claims. Recall I said last week that we were sure to begin to see the number of claims rise again, and that’s what they did the previous week, so a continuation of that new trend is what I see for today… In addition today, we will hear what St. Louis Fed President, James Bullard has to say, he of the thought last fall that interest rates needed to go higher and reach 5.25% before any talk of stopping… I wonder if he’s still singing from that same song sheet… These Fed Heads do like to waffle… they should be called the Eggos, instead of Fed Heads! HA 
 
Tomorrow’s Data Cupboard will be all about the Jobs Jamboree…  The BLS’s last report showed that they had cooked the books to show a 311,000 gain in jobs in February… I called BS on that and showed you how I came to that decision… March’s forecast for job creation is 238,000… And I’m sure the BLS will go through hell and high water to make sure that forecast is met… I’m just saying… 
To recap… Yesterday was a non-moving day, with the dollar gaining 3 index points, but the feeling in the markets is that the selling of the dollar should continue…  Overnight we saw
layoffs and firings are begining to add up folks… this strong and resilient economy bs is about to be exposed… are you ready? 
For What It’s Worth… Well, today, to end the week, I have a longtime friend’s letter titled: The Wiggin Sessions, and in it Addison Wiggin talks about the Banking Crisis and it can be found here: The Wiggin Sessions: Real Experts. Real Conversations. Real Financial Insights.
Or, here’s your snippet: “The banking crisis is far from over. Don’t let the talking heads on television tell you otherwise. It’s a story developing in real time.

The big question we should be asking is: Who’s next? Which banks are most at risk of failing? And is your money exposed?
Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) fell because it hoarded uninsured deposits.
A large proportion of these deposits were invested into “hold-to-maturity” securities– long term bonds… There was no risk officer on staff to monitor and interpret the effects of rapidly rising interest rates on these holdings.
SVB is not the only one caught in this bind spun by aggressive Fed monetary policy.
Countrywide, US banks hold over $620 billion worth of unmatured bonds on their books.
This took SVB down in two days. Then we had what we’re now calling The Banking Crisis of 2023.
Signature Bank failed a week later.
Western Alliance Bank has seen a 115% change in deposits with 57.7% of deposits uninsured.
Goldman Sachs saw a 95% increase in deposits at the end of 2022 with 47.7% of them being uninsured.
Morgan Stanley … 97% increase and 29.8% uninsured …
JPMorgan Chase saw just a 31% increase in deposits, but they’re sitting on more than $2 trillion in assets of which 52.5% of deposits are uninsured.
The list goes on… unfortunately. The real point here is: a whole generation of entrepreneurs and bankers grew up in an environment where it looked like near-zero interest rates would last forever.
Even the banks– who ought to know better– were betting on a longer period of low interest rates than what the Fed planned when they started fighting inflation.
What’s left: A risk-tolerant environment like nothing anyone’s ever seen.
Imagine a run at any of these banks as depositors realize there are higher rates available in money market mutual funds.

The results could be catastrophic.

 
Chuck Again… yes, they well could be catastrophic, and when that happens, it’ll bring about the introduction of digital currencies to the masses… Are you ready for that?  Got Gold? 
 
Market Prices  4/6/2023: American Style: A$ .6698, kiwi .6280, C$ .7426, euro 10915, sterling 1.2477, Swiss $1.1048, European Style: rand 18.2269, krone 10.4241, SEK 10.4293, forint 344.50, zloty 4.2834, koruna 21.4435, RUB 80.99, yen 131.50, sing 1.3288, HKD 7.8499, INR 81.99, China 6.8730, peso 18.26, BRL 5.0424, BBDXY 1,225.62, Dollar Index 101.84, Oil $80.93, 10-year 3.27%, Silver $24.93, Platinum $1.010.00, Palladium $1,434.00, 
Copper $4.03, and Gold… $2, 018.63
 
That’s it for today… And this week… I was supposed to see my heart doctor yesterday, but I had to postpone that appt. since I have this stupid cold! UGH! Well, tomorrow is Good Friday, and Sunday is Easter Sunday… A very holy week for most of the population. I can’t wait to see my darling granddaughters in their Easter dresses and bonnets! I sure hope I’m feeling better by then! I don’t have any doctor appts next week! YAHOO! The following week is chock-full-o-appts, though… But I’ll worry about them then! i really had a lot to say yesterday, didn’t I? I checked later, and it was over 2,700 words!  My average letter is about 2,000 words.. no wonder the letter was later yesterday than usual! HA!  Bob Marley takes us to the finish line today with his song: One Love/ People Get Ready… I hope you have a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday today, a Fantastico Friday tomorrow, and a Blessed Easter on Sunday, and don’t forget to Be Good To Yourself! 
 
Chuck Butler

New Zealand Hikes Rates 50 Basis Points

April 5, 2023

* Gold & Silver soar on Tuesday!

* The dollar continues to get sold… 

Good Day… And a Wonderful Wednesday to you! A very strange and eerie night here in my little river town, as storms blew through, and carried on through to morning… More storms are on the way this morning. My beloved Cardinals got their game in uninterrupted, and lost to the Braves…. Again!  Day game today at Busch, and I have tickets to the game, but… I just can’t answer the bell! I was up most of the night with that dang foot pain, and when it was time to get up and write, I said to hell with it!  Now, I know for the first time that I am actually retired! I would have never done that when I was working!  So, the letter is tardy today…  sorry…  Jimmy Cliff greets me this morning with his song: Hello Sunshine 

Well I guess were going to see if my take on Gold is going to play out, as Gold rallied $35 yesterday, and closed above $2,000 at $2,020.00… Silver… wait for it, wait for it… OK, Silver gained $1.04 on the day to close above $25! WOW! Gold’s next challenge will be to take out its all time high of $2.078… But first things first… it was NOT simply a case of the dollar losing ground, it did lose ground in the form of 3 Index points in the BBDXY, it was also a case of cash buyers piling into the metals, because…. Sounding like Alicia Silverstone, Because… Everyone has to access blame on something/ somebody, right? Well, yesterday’s culprit was the bad data in March Factory Orders, which followed up January’s print of -2.1%, with another negative print of .7%… Add them up and you get an average for the two months of -1.4%… And the people in Washington D.C. still believe this is going to be a soft landing?

The price of Oil slipped a bit yesterday after climbing above $81, it settled back in trading with an $80 handle to close the day… And talk about the safe haven buying in Gold & Silver, it was also seen in the 10-year Treasury’s yield, which dropped to 3.34%…  I want to circle back to Gold… Now is the witching hour/ day, when we find out if the price manipulators are going to take Gold down again, or if the buying momentum is so great that they can’t get a foot hold on the price, and Gold keeps climbing… If it’s the latter of the two, then I think Gold is off to the races, and not looking over its shoulder any longer… The same goes for Silver, as it has finally gotten back to $25…

I didn’t see Gold’s rally yesterday in real time, as I became quite sick to my stomach (no biggie, chemo reaction) and had to go sit down and rest, which led to a very long nap!  So, you can only imagine how pleased I was to see Gold close above $2,000… And Silver above $25…  I used to tell the folks on the trading desk at EverBank World Markets, that I had bought some Silver coins around $22 back in the 80’s, and that if Silver ever got to $25 I was going to sell them to break even after commissions…  But then when Silver went on its run in the 2000’s and it climbed to $50, I still didn’t sell, because I believed that Silver had become the “new Gold”…..   if only!

I wrote about how there were shortages of physical Silver and that to make the new Solar Panels, Silver would be needed, and then listed several other reasons for Silver to continue to rise…   If only!  My article, titled: Is Silver The New Gold? Was featured in a national publication, that for the life of me I can not recall the name… Shame, Shame, Shame… (best Gomer Pyle voice)

Our marketing group at EverBank used to keep copies of all the publications, news papers, magazines, etc. that I appeared in… But those folks have all move on to higher ground… So, I doubt contacting the new marketing people would do me much good!

In the overnight markets last night… The dollar was not the toast of the town, but it also wasn’t treated like Dr. Frankenstein’s monster! That’s a lot of words to say, there was not movement overnight in the dollar… Gold has added $6 to its value this morning in the early trading, while Silver is seeing some profit taking and is down 10-cents to start the day…  The price of Oil remains in the $80 handle, and the 10-year’s yield had dropped more to 3.30%…  Stranger than fiction, unless the bond boys know something about the next FOMC meeting that we don’t…

I’m still of the opinion that the FOMC will continue to throw peas at inflation, to show that they are true to their words… 25 Basis points  until something breaks… The Fed Heads are hoping that inflation I what breaks before something else does…  Now, there are a ton of writers and economists out there that believe the Fed Heads have hiked their last rate at the last meeting… And if that’s the case, then the bond boys are bang on… But let me remind everyone that the job of beating back inflation wasn’t completed, and that’s just going to allow inflation to run up once again, if all these people are correct that the last rate hike has been made…

The Big News last night came from the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), who hiked their Official Cash Rate 50 Basis Points to reach 5.25%!!!  That’s HUGE folks! And puts kiwi right up there with countries that boast higher interest rates, like the U.S. The rate hike news quickly got kiwi up and running higher, and within 1 hour after the announcement kiwi had gained 43 ticks… Look for kiwi to become the investment part of any carry trades…. I like it for that, and you should too!

Longtime readers may recall me making a BIG Deal out of the formation of the BRICS a trading pact among members: Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and said that one day they would make the calls in the world, as they had the largest populations… Well, that one day, appears to be coming very soon… The BRICS held a meeting among leaders of the respective countries, and they have decided to form a common currency… (A euro, if you will) One that could be used in trading amongst themselves, thus eliminating the use of dollars in the terms of transaction… 

I used to tell my audiences, that once Saudi Arabia drops the dollar for Oil transactions, the dollar would lose so much value that it’ll have to dig itself out of the hole it just dug for itself, with sanctions, shutting down SWIFT, and pushing its weight around… These countries see what the U.S. has done to Russia, and they know that it wouldn’t take much provocation to get their country on the “list”….  So, weaning themselves away from the dollar behooves them greatly, in my humble country boy opinion!

And we’ll be the ones, the common man/ woman (don’t start on me with pronouns, I’m not playing that game!) that has to suffer for our leaders mistakes, with high inflation that we can no longer export to other countries, and higher prices for commodities, like Oil, and higher prices for everything!  Thanks, remind me to send ya’ll a nice note thanking our numbskull leaders for putting us in this mess! At that point, it will be too late to say your sorry, and try to take back all the bad things you did to countries in the past…

So, yes, I think the BRICS new common currency, whatever it’s called, will quickly rival the yen, sterling, and eventually the euro, before taking over the dollar’s reserve currency status… For years, people kept saying, the dollar doesn’t have any challengers to its reserve status… The euro was created TO compete with the dollar, but after 10 year of its existence, the debts of the PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain were uncovered, and all hell broke loose for the euro… I called these countries: Club Med Back in the day, and whenever someone talks about any of the PIGS, I think ahhh… Club Med…

I know that a lot of people think that the Banking Crisis is over… Shoot Rudy, the stock jockeys act like it never happened!  I just think we’ve seen the tip of the iceberg… And remember what an iceberg did to the Titanic? Imagine what it will do to the U.S. economy? If the withdrawals continue out of banks, then banks will do what they always do when times get rough… They batten down the hatches, and hunker down, not giving out loans, not creating new financing for projects, nada, nothing, nil, zero, a big fat Goose Egg, of loan production, and that will bring pain and suffering to the U.S. economy…  I told you earlier this week that last week, ending March 22 (a great day indeed! HA) significant amount of withdrawals had been made from banks, so there’s no reason to believe they withdrawals will just stop on a dime!

The U.S. economy is heading to the stage to be the star performer of the Sh%^ Show!

I know, I know, I really sound jaded these days don’t’ I? Well after all the debt, the numbskulls unable to agree on a budget (read spending cuts) after all the manipulations, all the derivatives, and after a decade of zero interest rates, and people buying willy nilly stuff like cryptos, and NFD’s or whatever  they call them, and the everything bubble, how else am I supped to look at the markets?

The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday had the aforementioned Factory Orders for Feb, and another price worth mentioning… For the first time in over 3 years, the number of Job Openings in the U.S. dropped below 10 Million… Today’s Data Cupboard has the ADP Employment Report for March. ADP the payroll company for nearly every company in the U.S. thinks that March’s payrolls increased by 210,000… This report is supposed to be a harbinger for the BLS Jobs Jamboree, but that never happens, as the BLS has the last say on what gets printed, and they like to massage and cook the books quite a bit each month before the print that is due this Friday, is produced… 

But being tardy, allows me to get the early economic prints from the Data Cupboard, and this morning, the ADP Employment Report really disappointed the markets, with a print of only 145,000 jobs added in March… That leaves the BLS with a real problem come Friday… What to do, what to do? I think they’ll side with the folks that provide their paychecks… And add plenty of jobs out of thin air to make ADP look stupid…  But in my opinion, the BLS are the ones that are stupid… I’m just saying…

To recap… What a day for Gold & Silver! WOW! And what a day for the 10-year Treasury! WOW! I guess we know now where all those bank withdrawals that were made last week they went! The dollar lost ground all day yesterday, and once again looks like its ready to jump off a cliff, and any time in the past 10 years that we’ve seen the dollar have that look, the PPT and their treasure chest full of ESF’s funds come in to save the dollar… I just keep wondering how much of those ESF’s monies they have left ? I just want asset classes to trade on their own merits, and not be influenced by price manipulators!

For What It’s Worth… Ok, I’ve said this before, but for those of you new to class, Ted Butler (no relation that I know of) is a metals guru, he watches, he calculates, he sees what’s going on with the paper traders, and writes about it, and whenever his stuff is out there for me to grab for free, well you can bet your bottom dollar that I’m going to use it in the FWIW section! This article is about how JPMorgan has accumulated so much Gold & Silver and they still manipulate the prices, and it can be found here: JPM Again | SilverSeek

Or, here’s your snippet: “A major development last week was the large amount of gold issued by JPMorgan over the first two days of the COMEX April contract. Total gold deliveries by JPMorgan of 14,326 contracts, including 10,682 contracts (1.07 million ounces) by JPM from its proprietary house account were the largest by JPM in history. This is big news because it demonstrates clear and blatant price manipulation by JPMorgan. With more than 19,000 contracts of gold standing for delivery, what would have been the price of gold, had JPM not delivered more than 10,000 contracts from its house account? Even the dimmest of wits (say at the Justice Department or the CFTC) should be able to conclude that without JPMorgan delivering this many gold contracts, gold prices would have had to increase enough to attract others to take JPM’s place.

Price manipulation cannot occur without a concentrated position. That’s what we witnessed, in full view, by JPMorgan over the first two days of the COMEX April gold deliveries. Back in 2020, JPMorgan entered into a deferred criminal prosecution agreement (DPA) with the Justice Department for manipulating precious metals on the COMEX (and other infractions) and agreed to pay a headline-grabbing $920 million (a pittance for JPM). The fine and the DPA only scratched the surface of JPMorgan’s long-term manipulation of silver and gold, because the case focused solely on spoofing and the short-term manipulation of prices. It ignored the much more serious price suppression of silver (and gold) and JPM’s accumulation of massive quantities of physical silver (more than a billion ounces, plus more than 30 million ounces of physical gold) over a decade. They did this while functioning as the biggest COMEX short seller (in order to keep the price down). Spoofing was peanuts compared to what JPMorgan was actually guilty of.

I always acknowledged that should JPM choose to do so, it could depress prices by releasing a portion of its physical holdings. I argued that because of the massive amount of physical silver and gold it had accumulated over the years at dirt cheap prices, JPM would choose to let prices fly upward. The recent large gold deliveries may suggest otherwise. But all may not be lost. I did suspect that if JPMorgan decided to unload some of its massive stockpile of physical silver and gold for the purpose of containing prices, that fact would quickly become obvious. That is precisely what just occurred in the COMEX April gold deliveries. A new dynamic is in play; just how blatant and obvious can it get that JPMorgan is still manipulating gold and silver prices, in complete violation of the law and its own deferred criminal prosecution agreement (whether active or recently expired), before the DoJ or CFTC is forced to react in some way?”

Chuck again… thanks to Ed Steer for highlighting this article on Silverseek.com… To me, this is so obvious, and should be the writing on the wall to shut JPMorgan’s metals business down… But then, if I were the king, that’s what I would do… And the line of metals traders in orange suits lined up to go to jail would be quite long!

Market Prices 4/5/2023:  American Style :A$ .6707, kiwi .6317, C$ .7436, euro 1.0943, sterling 1.2473, Swiss 1.1061, European Style: rand 17.9213, krone 10.3917, SEK 10.3420, forint 343.31, zloty 4.2802, koruna 21.4051, RUB 79.79, yen 131.04, sing 1.3288, HKD 7.8499, INR 82.00, China 6.8793, peso 18.17, BRL 5.0497, BBDXY 1,222.59, Dollar Index 101.65, Oil $80.48, 10-year 3.30%, Silver $25.00, Platinum $1,023.00, Palladium $1,536.00, Copper $4.00, and Gold… $2,026.60

That’s it for today… Well, the end of Lent is coming… this Friday, is Good Friday… I used to take that day and the day after Easter off… It’s time to be with family… Again, sorry for the tardiness today, but I need my sleep!  Well, college basketball is over, the hocky playoffs begin soon, the NBA playoffs begin soon, and then all that will be left is BASEBALL! It’s going to be a tough, grind it out year for my beloved Cardinals, their pitching isn’t what Championship teams have… But their hitting will win them a lot of games, at least that’s how I see the year playing out… Stevie Guitar Miller aka Steve Miller and his band take us to the finish line today with their song: Serenade…   Good friend, Kevin, aka Webbs, always wants me to play that song on the iPod…  I hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday today, and will Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

The Euro Wannabes Are Rallying Again….

April 4, 2023

* Currencies & metals rally on Monday

* JPM on top of the world with short paper contracts… 

Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you! Well, it wasn’t a good night for my beloved Cardinals last night, taking one on the chin, losing 8-4.  Difficult to come back after giving up 5 runs in the 2nd inning!  Yesterday was a gorgeous day here in my river town. I sat outside to eat my lunch and read a bit, until the day heated up to much for me, and I went inside, sat down in my recliner, and fell asleep… I’ve not been getting a good night’s sleet for a couple of months now. I’ve developed neuropathy in my left foot, and it only shows up in the middle of the night! UGH! So, it looks like I’m back on schedule for afternoon naps, after giving them up for Spring Training games… And on top of that! I have a slight cold, that is a pain in the ask me no more questions, I’ll tell you no more lies…  HA! Jefferson Starship greets me this morning with their great 70’s song: Miracles…

The dollar continued to get sold throughout the day yesterday. When I left you yesterday morning, the BBDXY had lost 2 index points, and then it continued to lose 3 more index points for a 5 point loss day. The euro is nudging up against 1.09, and the Swiss franc is nestling up to 1.10.. not yet, but it’s coming, in my humble country boy opinion!  Gold gained $ 14.60 on the day to close at $ 1,985.30, and Silver tried to come back yesterday and get out of red territory, but the paper traders saw to it that it didn’t, and so Silver lost 12-cents on the day, but retained the $24 handle at $24.06…..

The price of Oil remained well bid, and moved higher in the $80 handle… I’m very interested In the markets’ reaction to OPEC’s announced 1 Million barrels of Oil production cut… I just don’t see that as a large amount, sort of like a pimple on a …. No, no, no, Chuck, you can’t say that! There was more buying of the 10-year Treasury as its yield dipped to 3.42%…

The data yesterday was not good, but… in the past couple of years, what’s bad for the economy is good for the dollar, but not yesterday… The ISM Manufacturing Index slipped further down the greased pole and came in at 46.3% VS 47.7% in Feb… March’s below 59 reading was the 6 month in consecutive prints that the index was below 50… I know I’ve pounded this into your heads so many times in the past that I sound like a broken record, but just a reminder for those new to class.. 50 is the level that used as demarcation of whether the economy is expanding (above 50) or contracting (below 50)…

The reason I put the data out here front and center this morning, is it is what most pundits were writing about as to why the dollar got sold yesterday..  

In the overnight markets last night… The dollar bugs wrapped a tourniquet around the dollar, and stopped the bleeding, and the BBDXY gained 1 index point overnight. The BBDXY is still looking peeked… and that has the dollar bugs crying for more PPT help, which if the dollar had continued to weaken, we would have seen some intervention by the PPT…  The euro did move over the 1.09 handle this morning, so the dollar bugs work hasn’t stopped the euro from moving higher…  Gold is seeing some profit taking this morning, and is down $4 to start the day, while Silver is off 6-cents. The price of Oil bumped higher by a buck , and therefor trades with a $81 handle this morning… The 10-year Treasury’s yield is s strange bird these days, and has a 3.46% yield to pay…

I’m going to point out something, once again that I’ve viewed over the years… And that is, that whenever the Euro Wannabes, (Poland, Czech Rep, Hungary) start rallying, the dollar is in trouble… And that’s what we’re seeing right now, as all three have rallied VS the dollar, and I get a kick out of looking them up each day to see what they’re doing…  So, we have that going for us!  The Russian ruble has really been seeing some selling, which I understand, but then I don’t… Russian interest rates have plummeted from the 20% level they were paying when the markets went all armegeddon on the ruble… And you can’t get good rates of interest in Russia now, and that has a lot to do with the rubles problems… But with the price of Oil bumping higher, it should provide some cover for the ruble…

Well, I guess the markets believe that the banking crisis is over, because the Japanese yen has lost its shine, that was provided by an old title it once held…Safe Haven… Just 10 days ago, the yen was trading around 130 and getting all kinds of attention for finally waking up, but that was short-lived, and the yen soon returned to trading 133…  

Speaking of the Banking Crisis… it seems that the small banks added $6 Billion in deposits last week, while the 25 Biggest banks saw withdrawals totaling $90 Billion on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to the Fed. The total of withdrawals were $126 Billion, so banks everywhere were still seeing depositors withdrawing their money… This is a becoming a real problem folks… I’m just saying.

I received a nice note from a friend, and newsletter writer himself, Rich Checken, yesterday, he had copy and pasted what I had said about Gold hanging around $2,000, and once it got above it, there would be no looking back… And he then said, ‘I said those same words at the Investment U conference last week”, Does that mean great minds think alike?  I’ve known Rick for sometime, but I know his uncle even longer… Michael Checken is a cancer survivor like me, and he always reminds to be “live strong”…   

Well the pound sterling is at it again… What? I here you asking… Well, remember last year when sterling was rallying better than most currencies, sans the Russian ruble?   And I kept telling you to be careful here, because the U.K. had dept problems of their own, inflation problems of their own, and a currency that’s all their own, and so bad data can drive a currency downward quickly… And it did… But now sterling is back on the chain gang (Pretenders)  and is on the rally tracks again… And again, all I’ll say is be careful with this currency…

3 different people sent me this article that appeared on www.wallstreetonparade.com  and so when I received the 3rd one, I decided I had better read it… The article was about how After Being Criminally Charged for Rigging Precious Metals, JPMorgan Chase Controls 53 Percent of All Precious Metals Contracts Held by Banks, that’s all the short paper trades folks… held by one entity… how does that make you feel about JP Morgan as an entity?  I like the article so well, I highlighted it in the FWIW section today, so you won’t want to have missed that !

Well, with all of the layoffs that have been announced lately, this one seemed to garner the most attention…Micky D’s, is going to layoff a large number of workers, the number hasn’t been announced yet, but will be soon… That one kind of gets to you, doesn’t it? I mean what’s been the one common thing across America no matter where you went, you could find a McDonald’s, and 1/4  Pounder With Cheese would be the same in Portland as it is in Miami… McDonald’s isn’t going down, but this announcement sure makes me feel like they are… The have been a constant in our lives…

My wife made me stop eating my beloved 1/4 pounder with cheese sandwiches quite a few years ago now, and every now and then I think, “I could eat it before I got home, but then what would I do with the trash?, darn evidence!” HA! 

I once got a call from head of King World Publishing, telling me to stop pasting stories from their publication, which at the time was printing a lot of Richard Russell’s works… So, I did… But now this article talks about the derivatives in Gold that JP Morgan has, and is written by Stephen Leeb, and it can be found here: Leeb – JP Morgan’s Massive Gold Derivative Short Position May Be Larger Than The Bank’s Assets | King World News

Or, here’s the snippet: “March 25 (King World News) – Dr. Stephen Leeb:  “What I lose sleep over is how much exposure does a bank like JP Morgan have to the [gold] derivative market. This is not fraudulent but it’s an open secret. In fact [laughter] it’s no longer a secret because they’ve been penalized so much for it. They’re trying to control the price of gold. I mean when you sort through all of these derivatives, what’s JP Morgan’s short position [in gold]? I can imagine it being much more than the assets in the company. And if gold takes off and it gets out of control then it’s ‘Katy, bar the door.’ You don’t know what is going to happen. So that’s the real threat in my opinion. I doubt that JP Morgan even knows how much of a threat it is but they’ll find out if all the sudden you see the price of gold shoot up $1,000. But this is a vicious circle because when gold gets set to move, and it’s creeping up toward all-time highs all the sudden…”

Chuck again… I recall my former colleague, Neil George, always bowing down to Stephen Leeb, and dying to get into his publication…  Anyway… that’s that! What’s the one thing, I’ve always told you would break the paper traders backs?  If everyone lined up to buy physical Gold…  I’m just saying…

The U.S. Data Cupboard today, has March Factory Orders, and by the looks of other related data and how badly they had performed in March, I’ll have to go out a limb here (don’t worry it’s a big fat limb) and say that I expect Factory Orders to be negative in March… So there!

To recap… The currencies and metals (not Silver) rallied yesterday, and most observers believe the dollar was sold because of the weaker than expected IDM Index… Here’s the markets thinking on this: Bad data makes the FOMC think long and hard about another rate hike… Therefore the dollar loses some steam power… Mickey D’s is laying off workers, what’s up with that? And if derivatives are your cup-o-tea, then you’re in for a treat with today’s Pfennig!

For What It’s Worth… I told you above that I had the, as Paul Harvey would say, “Now the rest of the story”… And you can find it here: After Being Criminally Charged for Rigging Precious Metals, JPMorgan Chase Controls 53 Percent of All Precious Metals Contracts Held by Banks (wallstreetonparade.com)

Or, here’s your snippet: “According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), there were 4,706 federally-insured banks and savings associations in the U.S. as of December 31, 2022. Of those, according to the quarterly report released last Friday from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a little less than one-quarter found a reason to engage in derivative trading activities.

As of December 31, 2022, just 1,139 FDIC-insured commercial banks and savings associations reported trading of derivatives in the fourth quarter of 2022, according to the OCC. Ostensibly, instead of running a derivatives casino, the other three-quarters of taxpayer-subsidized banks were doing what taxpayers want federally-insured banks to do: make business loans; provide affordable mortgage loans to homebuyers; provide checking accounts devoid of hacking, identity theft and predatory overdraft fees; and not blow up the bank by getting in bed with derivatives, crypto or dodgy Wall Street IPOs.

As it does each quarter, the OCC report rang this alarm bell:

“A small group of large financial institutions continues to dominate trading and derivatives activity in the U.S. commercial banking system. During the fourth quarter of 2022, four large commercial banks represented 88.2 percent of the total banking industry notional amounts [of derivatives] and 62.5 percent of industry net current credit exposure (NCCE).”

Those four banks are Goldman Sachs Bank USA with $52.6 trillion in notional (face amount) derivatives exposure; JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. with $49.5 trillion in notional derivatives exposure; Citigroup’s Citibank with $47 trillion in notional derivatives exposure; and Bank of America with $19.4 trillion in notional derivatives exposure.

One area that particularly stands out in the current OCC report is data showing JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. held $200.12 billion in precious metals derivative contracts at its federally-insured bank as of December 31, 2022, versus a total of $378.12 billion for all banks in the U.S. holding derivatives. That’s one bank holding 53 percent of all precious metals contracts in the U.S. banking system.”

Chuck again… the article is long and should be read at the website provided for the full story…

Market prices 4/4/2023:  American Style: A$ 6754, kiwi .6297, C$ .7445, euro 1.0908, sterling 1.3494, Swiss $1.0944, European Style: rand 17.8432, krone 10.3057, SEK 10.3273, forint 345.28, zloty 4.2828, koruna 21.4819, RUB 79.41, yen 133.02, sing 1.3270, HKD 7.8499, INR 82.33, China 6.8833, peso 18.09, BRL 5.0649, BBDXY 1226.07, Dollar Index 102.03, Oil $81.09, 10-year 3.46%, Silver $23.94, Platinum $1,002.00, Palladium $1,480.00, Copper $4.05, and Gold… $1,981.66

That’s it for today… Congratulations to UConn for winning this year’s NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship… On Sunday LSU had won the women’s Basketball Championship!  I tore up my bracket after the first weekend of games in the men’s tournament! UGH! One of these days, I’ll get it right… And if you believe that, I’ve got a bridge to sell you! Things are just so darn crazy in the world these days, makes you want to just hunker down and close the hatches so you can ignore it all, and maybe, just maybe it’ll all go away… And then again pigs may fly, right?  Well, our Blues fooled around and didn’t make the playoffs this year, and that’s a real shame if you ask me… Time to get the golf clubs out boys… see you next fall… The Temptations take us to the finish line today with their great song: I Wish It Would Rain…  I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today, and will Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler