Category: Uncategorized

• currencies rally but metals see selling on Wednesday
• Chuck gets on his Soapbox… You are Warned!

Good Day… And a Tum Thumpin’ Thursday to you! Another nice late game victory for my beloved Cardinals yesterday… Yes, it was a day game at Busch, but I’m still in no condition to get caught up with crowds… So, I skipped it and watched it on tv… It was a rainy day off and on yesterday, so I couldn’t go outside and read, UGH! You now, or maybe you don’t, but after years of taking chemo, my skin is as thin as Twiggy… And on Tuesday, I tripped in the kitchen and proceeded to tear the skin off my arm in two large places… OUCH! So, the wrap the nurse put on it is quite the contraption… The Doors greet me this morning with their song: L.A. Woman… I remember a night in Boca Raton years ago at the Garage and the band played this song for 20 minutes! 

Well, the dollar’s brief bout of buying in the overnight markets on Tuesday night, was wiped out yesterday, as the dollar got sold in the U.S. session, and the BBDXY ended the day at 1,292

I said yesterday that Kitco.com’s description of the Gold loss in the early trading was that it was “profit taking” And I said, I didn’t believe that one iota…  Gold ended down $50 on the day, and that to me doesn’t appear to be “profit taking”… Instead it appears that the SPTs were busy taking Gold below the $4,800 figure… Gold closed the day at $4,791.50

Silver found a way to gain 12-cents on the day and ended the day at $79.71.  The day went two different directions yesterday, but don’t worry, be happy (Marley) Gold will pick up the pieces today for sure! Well, don’t bet the farm on that, it’s just my opinion, and I could be wrong!

The price of Oil dipped another buck yesterday and ended the day at $91.44… The 10-year Treasury added another bp to end the day at 4.28%… 

In the overnight markets… Just as Tuesday night, last night the dollar saw a bit of buying, and the BBXY Gained 1 index point… No big deal! I don’t get what the overnight guys are thinking, but then it could just be the PPT doing some cliff maintenance! Hey, I just made up that term “Cliff Maintenance”… I’ll be able to use that a lot!  Down at my Winter Home on the beach, we have a day every winter called “Beach Maintenance”… I used to participate but walking on the beach is very strenuous for me, so Kathy participates! 

Gold saw some buying overnight and in the early trading today, as it climbed back over $4,800 to $4,853, up $62… And Silver is up a measly 19-cents…  But Silver nears $.80-cents this morning again… these are levels ($4,800 and 80-cents)  that keep getting taken out and then brought back down by the SOTs, until they grow tired of this game, and that’s when we’ll see the SPTs go away and to come back another day…  I’m just saying…

The price of Oil remained trading with a $91 handle overnight, and the 10-year Treasury, too remained steady Eddie trading with a 4.28% yield…

Well, it’s time for me to step up on my soapbox… So, if you don’t want to hear me opine, then I suggest you skip ahead… But for those of you who want to sick around… I’ve been thinking about when we went over $39 Trillion in national current debt. It had only been 3.5 months since we toppled $38 Trillion…  So, we as a country, are taking on debt faster and faster as it grows… Yes, the war should help with the dollar debt, as it will invite inflation into the picture and the Gov’t needs inflation to lessen our debt… What was now $ 5 is now $20 and you see where this is going… 

Speaking of the war, that was none of our business to start with, the costs of the war are doing two things… 1. It makes inflation a run-away bus, and 2. It gets the average American’s minds off the goings on in D.C and the awful data that’s getting printed nearly daily…  So, where are we now with the war that we were told a month ago that was “nearly complete”?  And the markets all fell in line with the Gov’t when those words were spoken, and now that it didn’t come to fruition, they are falling in line with his words again about a Peace Accord….  When will we ever learn, when will, we, ever, learn… (wood) and sung by Pete Seeger…. 

OK, I’m back now, to the regular programming…  Ok, did you hear what former Fed/ Cabal/ Cartel chairperson, Janet Yellen, said about the rate cuts that the POTUS wants? She said that “his push to cut interest rates has echoes of “Banana Republic”…  The POTUS recently said, “We should be paying the lowest interest rate of any country in the World”…  Yellen based her thought about a Banana Republic on the fact that inflation is high, and we don’t know how high it will go with the Iran War going on, and so  (cut rates) is something that a Banana Republic would do…. 

Isn’t Yellen calling out the POTUS something like the kettle calling the pot black? I shake my head at how the former Fed Heads think they were the gift of God to the economy, when they played along with this debacle just as much? 

The euro was back above the 1.18 figure when I checked the currencies before I retired for the night… This is a mirror reflection of the performance of the dollar, as the euro is the offset currency to the dollar…  But there are some other currencies that are on the rally horse, like the Brazilian real… The real is going through a harried election right now, but the is still gaining mostly on the back of the price of Oil… and their higher interest rate is 14.50%! The Euro Wannabes are moving nicely too, with the forint around 309zloty at 3.60 and koruna 20.45… if these three are moving against the dollar, then the dollar is getting well-entrenched in the weak dollar trend… 

I spent a lot of time yesterday on the big-time dive of the Consumer Sentiment report… and last night I came across a report that said Americans placed the sentiment so low was That Americans blame the Iran war for worsening economy… see what I was talking about above, as how the war gets Americans minds on something else besides the awful data prints and the direction of the economy?  

The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday had the Fed’s Beige book… as you know this book is comprised of each Fed District’s viewpoint on the economy in their region… The summary of each report said that: “Economic activity in the Seventh District increased slightly over the reporting period. Manufacturing demand rose modestly; consumer spending increased slightly; construction and real estate activity, employment and business spending were flat on balance; and nonbusiness contacts saw no change in economic activity. Prices rose moderately, wages rose modestly, and financial conditions tightened modestly. Farm income expectations for 2026 declined some.”

Chuck again… lies, and more lies… So, have we seen the economy improve this month? Not from the data prints, we haven’t… So, what are these folks seeing?

To recap… The Kitco.com version of yesterday’s selling of Gold $50 was “profit taking”… Chuck says balderdash! This was the SPTs way to put Gold back below the $4,800 level…  The dollar’s brief rally at yesterday morning was reversed and the dollar lost 2 index points on Wednesday…  Chuck Opines this morning, if you skipped ahead, you’ll be sooooorrrrryyyyy!

For What It’s Worth…  I found this on Zerohedge.com this morning, and it’s about how the IMF is warning the Treasury about their debt issues (Treasury issuance) and it can be found here: IMF Warns US Treasury Market Prone To “Sudden Repricing” Due To Soaring Debt, Overreliance On Bills | ZeroHedge

Or, here’s your snippet: “The International Monetary Fund warned Wednesday that the relentless US debt issuance is undermining the premium Treasuries have commanded from investors, with implications for government securities across the globe.

“The increase in the US Treasury security supply is compressing the safety premium that US Treasuries have traditionally commanded — an erosion that pushes up borrowing costs globally,” the Washington-based IMF said in its latest Fiscal Monitor report.

The US has been selling large volumes of debt because its budget deficit has averaged roughly 6% of gross domestic product over the past three years, an unprecedented shortfall outside of wartime or recession eras. The gap is expected to stay around those levels throughout the coming decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. In reality, it will only get wider.

As Bloomberg reports, the IMF pointed to a narrowing gap between the yields of AAA rated corporate bonds and Treasuries as a sign of reduced appeal for US government securities. While spreads have typically been viewed as a gauge of the risk investors estimate for corporate borrowers, the fund is flipping that analysis on its head to view it as a metric of how much extra buyers are willing to pay for Treasuries.

“A narrowing spread implies that the premium investors pay for the safety and liquidity of Treasuries (relative to high-grade corporate debt) is compressing,” the IMF said. The fund showed that AAA corporate spreads have shrunk to roughly 35 basis points from more than 55 basis points at the start of 2019.

Chuck again… Just another way of looking at how the Treasury is going to find a tough row to hoe in the coming months with debt issuance…  It’s coming to a head folks… are you ready?

Market Prices 4/16/2026: American Style: A$ .7167, kiwi .5989, C$ .7282, euro 1.1778, sterling 1.3541, Swiss $1.2761, European Style: rand 16.4004, krone 9.3850, SEK 9.1781, forint 309.50, zloty 3.6008, koruna 20.6760, RUB 76.20, yen 159.07, sing 1.2722, HKD 7.8247, INR 93.18, China 6.8223, peso 17.27, BRL $4.9927, BBDXY 1,193, Dollar Index 98.21, Oil $91.41, 10-year 4.28%, Silver $79.30, Platinum $2,141.00, Palladium $1,602, Copper $6.13, and Gold… $4,853

That’s it for today and this week… I need a break, so Friday won’t get here fast enough… No Pfennig on Monday folks… I have to see my doctor on Monday morning… UGH!   The Cardinals head to Houston now, and then onto Miami (but I don’t want to go to Miami! HA!)  I just don’t sleep like I used to, and it’s all tied to our family problem we have going on…  Who’da thunk that our family would have problems?  Marty Balin takes us to the finish line with his solo work song: Hearts… Marty Balin was the lead singer in the Jefferson Starship… I really enjoy his work… I hope you have a Tub Tumpin’ Thursday today and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• Currencies and metals rally on Tuesday
• Private Credit is a problem waiting to happen

Good Day… And a Wonderful Wednesday to you! Well, I got through yesterday unscathed if you will…. But that will bring bout more tests to see if they can figure out where the blood leak is that caused by Anemia…. Anemia isn’t fun folks… I slept the whole afternoon after returning from the hospital… I just couldn’t stay awake for more than 5 minutes! Steve Winwood greets me this morning with his solo song: Roll With It… 

Pfennig Tradition calls for this: One, two, three, four

One, two (one, two, three, four)

Let me tell you how it will be

There’s one for you, nineteen for me

‘Cause I’m the taxman

Chuck again… yes, it’s Tax Day…  I so dislike this day so much I almost gave up Pfennig Tradition today… 

Well, I never even looked at the market’s prices yesterday until late in the day, when I finally woke up! I did see the euro cross into the 1.18 level in the morning, but it couldn’t hold it even though the dollar was getting sold and the BBDXY ended the day at 1,193… Again, the dollar is teetering toward falling off a cliff, so don’t be surprised if you see a rally in the dollar, as the PPT will want to make sure that the dollar doesn’t fall of a cliff…. 

Gold & Silver fought back yesterday; after getting sold on Monday… Ed Steer tells me that these two metals got sold short immediately after the Sunday night open overseas…  Gold lost $7 on Monday and Silver lost 32-cents on Monday… But yesterday was turnaround Tuesday, and Gold gained             to close the day at $4,841 and Silver gained              to close the day at $79.68… Yesterday, Silver was up over $80 in the morning, and then saw the SPTs wittle it down to close below $80…

I can’t believe my eye! The bond boys and the Oil traders are falling for another ruse by the White House, as they are saying that peace negotiations will resume… Oh, Really? And what do these traders thingk will result of the negotiations?  The 10-year closed yesterday at 4.25%… And Oil saw the rug pulled out from under it as the price ended the day yesterday at $90.98… 

In the overnight markets last night… the dollar got bought a bit, with the BBDXY gaining 1 index point… I wouldn’t put too much stock in the dollar gain overnight, because every day session brings us more news of this, that, and the other thing that drives the dollar down… So, be patient is what I’m saying… 

Gold & Silver are seeing some selling overnight and in the early trading. Gold is down $31 and Silver is down 70-cents… The folks at Kitco.com say it’s “profit taking”… But I have my doubts… I suspect the SPTs saw yesterday’s performance of the two metals and said, “We must do something about that”… And they have… 

The price of Oil slid another buck overnight and starts today at $92.45. I think the boys are really going to rue the day they marked down Oil so much… I’m just saying… 

The 10-year starts the day at 4.27% yield… The same holds true for the bond boys… But I guess we’ll have to wait-n-see, eh?

OK, the other day I reported that the Consumer Sentiment had falled to a 40 year low, not seen since 1980…  And left it at that…  What I should have done is give you some reasons for this drop in Sentiment… And then I saw the Rude Awakening newsletter and James Rickads did that for me?  Here’s Jim…

The University of Michigan just reported a consumer confidence reading of just 47.6.

And is any of this surprising?

Consumer prices have been out of control for nearly 6 years now…

Meanwhile every traditional form of income in America is either stagnating or outright FAILING:

Salaries are flatlining and layoffs are on the rise…

Bonds and dividends only move the needle if you have millions to invest in them…

Social Security is just years from either depleting entirely – or, at the very least, seeing a massive cut to allocations…

And our politicians are doing NOTHING to fix any of this. In fact, it’s only getting worse…”

Chuck again…  yes, I spelled out the problems for the dollar a week or so ago, and now Consumers are seeing the problems piling up for them… This is getting really ugly folks…

With the dollar having so many problems and sinking like torpedoed ship, the Aussie dollar and New Zealand dollar/ kiwi  have been on the rally tracks… Last week the A$ climbed above 70-cents and kiwi lagged behind remaining in the 58-cent handle for what seems like a month of Sundays… But yesterday, currency traders are beginning to see the light and the A$ climbed above 71-cents and kiwi above the 59-cents handles… I’m telling you this now, so maybe you’ll listen to me later and that is that these two currencies are tied to commodities, and Commodities are en vogue right now… So, what are you waiting for?

And even if China isn’t involved in the U.S. Israel/ Iran conflict, they are feeling the effects of shipping problems all over the word…  this from Reuters: “China’s export engine slowed sharply in March as war in the Middle East triggered shocks to energy and transportation costs, hurting global demand and exposing the risks in Beijing’s strategy of leaning on manufacturing to sustain growth.”

Our POTUS is scheduled to meet face to face with China’s Xi I think next week or sometime around that frame… The U.S.’s decision to block ships entering the Hormuz heading for Iran… Yesterday, there were reports that 3 ships were allowed passage because their destination wasn’t Iran… And that the U.S. turned away 6 other ships… I can’t imagine that China’s Xi is happy about this and will no doubt lead off the meeting with President Trump when that takes place…

I only bring all that up because it slows shipping and with the recent halt in shipping, we just aren’t seeing trade going on right now, and that will slow everyone’s economy, folks… 

The U.S. Data Cupboard had the March print of PPI (wholesale inflation) and it didn’t show the big increase in PPI that was expected, so that’s a good thing for future inflation… Not that future inflation is receiving much good news these days… 

Today’s Data Cupboard has the Import Price index, and more importantly the most recent Fed Beige Book…  

For What It’s Worth…  I’ve talked about the problems with Private Credit before and I came across this article on Zerohedge.com and thought this was a good update on the building problem and it can be found here:  With Private Credit We See The Credit Cycle Hasn’t Been Repealed | ZeroHedge

Or, here’s your snippet: “Something cracked in private credit this month, and the men who manage systemic risk for a living are saying so.

Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon’s just-released 2025 annual shareholder letter warns that concerns about private credit – including “underwriting quality or exposure to software companies that may be negatively affected by AI” – are “a reminder that the credit cycle has not been repealed.” His predecessor Lloyd Blankfein went further on Bloomberg’s Big Take podcast: “I don’t feel the storm, but the horses are starting to whinny in the corral.” JPMorgan has already voted with its balance sheet, marking down software company loans held as collateral by private credit funds and reducing borrowing capacity for those funds, before any actual defaults. “I’m shocked that people are shocked,” said JPMorgan’s Troy Rohrbaugh.

The backdrop is three major liquidity failures in the space of six weeks. Blackstone’s $82 billion BCRED faced record redemption requests of $3.7 billion (7.9% of assets) and had to inject $400 million of its own capital to honor them. BlackRock gated its $26 billion HLEND after receiving withdrawal requests of 9.3% of NAV. Blue Owl permanently halted redemptions in OBDC II and sold $1.4 billion in loans to fund an orderly exit. Blue Owl shares have since fallen roughly 40% year-to-date.

These are not random liquidity events. They are the structural consequence of a capital concentration problem I have been watching build for a decade. In 2025 alone, the ten largest private credit funds captured nearly 46% of all capital raised, the highest concentration in over a decade. That tidal wave of capital forces mega-platforms into ever-larger deals, typically companies with $200 million or more in EBITDA, where they compete head-to-head with broadly syndicated loan syndicates and public high-yield. The result is spread compression, yield erosion, and the complete elimination of the pricing advantages that private credit was supposed to offer.”

Chuck again… This article goes on and on, but I think I gave you the gist of it… Private Credit isn’t a major problem now, but the problem is gaining strength and that’s what scares me… 

Market prices 4/15/2026: American Style: A$.7131, kiwi .5900, C$ .7252, euro 1.1777, sterling 1.3544, Swiss $1.2777, European Style: rand 16.3974, krone 9.4411, SEK 9.2121, forint 309.76, zloty 3.6032, koruna 20.6830, RUB 75.62, yen 158.99, sing 1.2724, HKD 7.8352, INR 93.38, China 6.8210, peso 17.29, BRL 4.9886, BBDXY 1,194, Dollar Index 98.25, Oil $92.45, 10-year 4.27%, Silver $78.96, Platinum $2,113.00, Palladium $1,619.00, Copper $6.13, and Gold… $4,810

That’s it for today… What a game last night for my beloved Cardinals! After falling behind by 3 runs in the 8^th inning, they found a way to tie in the 9th and win it in the 10th! This young team can frustrate one to no end and then elate the fans the next day! Things are really weird for me right now, but I’ll get through it… As Popeye used say: I yams what I yams… and that’s all that I yam! I still can’t believe that traders are falling for this peace scenario… I’m just saying… Our Blues won last night VS the Penguins… too late for their playoff hopes… 10CC takes us to the finish line today with their song: I’m Not In Love… I hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

April 14, 2026

No pfennig today folks..
I’m heading to the hospital this morning for a scope… more on that on Wednesday 

sorry about the late notice, but I have to get this done immediately…

Chuck

• Currencies rally on Friday
• Oil climbs back over $100

Good Day… And a Marvelous Monday to you! A very nice day on Thursday turned into rainy days Friday and Saturday… UGH!  But, I did get caught up on my lost sleep over the weekend, so that was a good thing! … This is TAX Day week… I just filed my taxes… Always at the near to last moment for me! I don’t like taxes, and can imagine that no one does, except the taxman… Rain filled our day Friday, but the baseball game that night was able to get in, with my beloved Cardinals winning…. The Righteous Brothers greet me this morning with their song: You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling…

Sappy, yeah, I even like those kinds of songs… OK, well, the dollar got sold a bit on Friday, with the BBDXY ending the week at 1,198… On its way lower I feel, but it won’t be a ONE-WAY street… I know I didn’t need to remind you of that, but what the heck!  The data on Friday didn’t give anyone a good feeling about the dollar, so there was that…

Gold & Silver had a day on Friday… As they tried to rally but was snuffed out by the SPTs… Gold us up until it wasn’t, and ended the day/ week at $4,747.20… Gold was down $18.50 on the day, but that was $46.20 away from where it was before the SPTs entered the market.  That’s a $64 difference folks… And that ticks me off a bit, but what can I do about the SPTs?  

Silver saw the same kind of movement on Friday but, actually ended the day/week up at $75.75… up $54-cents, but was 95-cents away from its high… Silver could have been up $1.49 on the day if it weren’t for the SPTs… I associate the SPTs to the hackers of this country… They sure would do us all a favor if they quit what they are doing and did some productive with their talents….  I’m just saying…

Well, the STUPID CPI showed that the annual inflation rate had risen to 3.3%… And that’s with their STUPID hedonic adjustments! So, real inflation is probably around 8%… And what did that report to do those bets on Fed/Cable/Cartel rate cut? I had read just last week that “the Fed’s rate cut was back on the table”…  I had reacted to that headline, with: Really? They thought that the negative Durable Goods Orders would prompt the Fed Heads to cut rates in December…   

Well, the price of Oil briefly went back over the $100 price on Friday, and remains very high… There is no end in my site for this war, and all those that think that the Peace Agreement between the U.S. and Iran is going to hold, are going to have to go back to the drawing board…  The two sides couldn’t be more far apart right now…  Sure, we could see some miraculous Peace Agreement that’s ironclad, but then pigs would have to learn how to fly…  in my opinion…

And in the latest news, the Peace negotiations ended yesterday with no accord… The two sides couldn’t be farther apart on what they want…  

So, what will the Fed Heads do? They’re going to have the White House all over them like white on rice to cut rates, but they just can’t… and need to hike them… Over the years, I’ve had many a reader write me and tell me that I should be the Fed Chairman…  I’m so glad I’m not!

Well, if history is any indication, the Fed Heads will do the wrong thing for us and the economy… I’m just saying…

In the overnight markets last night… the dollar was getting bought bit time, when someone said, “What the heck are we doing?” and the dollar saw some profit taking bringing back to where it started the night with the BBDXY at 1,201… 

Gold & Silver start the week down…. UGH!  Gold is down $33 and Silver is down $1.75… I read a report that said that Wall Street’s feeling toward Gold & Silver has improved with the cease fire going on…  Well, if that’s true, what’s up with the start of the week?   I shake my head in disbelief that some things get printed, as if no one took the time to read it before sending out…  I’m just saying… 

The price of Oil climbed back over the $100 level overnight, starting the day/ week at $103… I guess Oil traders are buying what the Peace Agreement is selling… 

And the bond boys are seeing the data prints and running for the hills, marking up the yields in the bonds… The 10-year starts today at 4.34%, and trust me on this… if the Fed Heads would keep their hands out of the cookie jar with their yield control, the 10-year’s yield would be much higher… 

The dollar didn’t rally on the news of higher inflation last Friday, because… Everyone believes that this will be a one and done inflation rise, and soon that everything will be back to normal… I say, balderdash… higher prices never seem to come back down… But, let them believe what they want to believe, they’ll be sorry they traded accordingly in the future… Again, I’m just saying…

The currencies all look heathier this morning… The euro is over the 1.17 handle, and the Petrol Currencies of: Norway, Russia and Brazil are kicking tail and taking names later… With the price of Oil hovering around $100 these currencies are really into play right now…  Even the Mexican peso and British pound sterling are getting looked at. No one is buying yet, just looking… 

Well, did you see the U of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Report? the March U of M sentiment survey was completed before the start of the Iran War, and showed a drop to 47.7, a drop from 53.5… This is the lowest this data set has seen since 1980!  And this was taken before the start of the War! 

This report had some additional data that I found interesting: One-year expected business conditions plunged about 20% and is now 6% below last April. Assessments of personal finances declined by about 11%, with consumers expressing a substantial increase in concerns over high prices and weaker asset values. Year-ahead inflation expectations surged from 3.8% in March to 4.8% this month, the largest one-month increase since April 2025…  None of this gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling about where the economy is going… But, then what data print has done that lately?

The U.S. Data Cupboard had another piece of data on Friday, that will most likely cause more confusion at the Eccles Building… Factory Orders for Feb. Were not good, not awful, but not good, and New Orders were down as they have be 3 of the last 4 months…

There’s not a lot in the Data Cupboard this week, so we’ll just move along now…

To recap…  the dollar got sold a bit on Friday, with the BBDXY ending the week at 1,198… Gold & Silver were on their way to a great day, when a funny (not funny, ha ha) thing happened on the way to greatness… the SPTs showed up and caused Gold & Silver headaches… Gold lost ground while Silver gained, but not as much as it would have without the SPTs… The data on Friday was awful… just plain awful, and Chuck is concerned about the direction of our economy… 

For What It’s Worth… I saw this headline on Friday last week on Kitco.com and knew then it was FWIW worthy… This is about how foreclosures are rising and it can be found here: U.S. consumer stress rises as foreclosure activity spikes, LegalShield data shows | Kitco News

Or, here’s your snippet: “America continues to face a widening K-shaped economy, as equity markets remain relatively healthy but households are under increasing financial pressure. Now, new data points to a growing risk of foreclosure and bankruptcy in the months ahead.

According to LegalShield’s latest Consumer Stress Legal Index (CSLI), foreclosure-related legal requests surged sharply in the first quarter, rising 20.3% year-over-year and reaching their highest level since the onset of the pandemic.

The report said the spike reflects a shift from financial concern to concrete distress, as more households seek legal assistance to manage housing-related issues.

The broader index—which tracks more than 150,000 monthly legal consultations—remains elevated at 72.9, up 11.6% from a year ago, signaling persistent strain across multiple fronts of household finances.

In an interview with Kitco News, Matt Layton, senior vice president of Consumer Analytics for LegalShield, said the data gives little indication that conditions will improve in the near term.

“Nothing in our data is currently leading us to expect improvement going forward,” he said.

Layton said the surge in foreclosure activity appears to be driven in part by rising housing-related costs—particularly insurance. The report, quoting data from the Dallas Federal Reserve, said insurance premiums are up approximately 70% since 2019 and now account for 14% of the average monthly mortgage payment.”

Chuck again… And that mortgage payment is a non-negotiable expense…  Another housing meltdown?  Not yet…  but when these housing expenses cause the homeowner to cut back on other expenses, there goes the economic growth….  I’m just saying…

Speaking of economic growth… Did you see that the revision for 4^th QTR GDP, that printed last week, showed a rise in growth of just .50%… YIKES! That’s a rounding error away from negative growth, folks… And if it weren’t for Gov’t spending, it would be negative!

Market Prices 4/13/2026: American Style: A$ .7046, kiwi .5831, C$ .7227, euro 1.1698, sterling 1.3439, Swiss $1.2664, European Style: rand 16.5380, krone 9.4750, SEK 9.3030, forint 313.60, zloty 3.6337, koruna 20.8347, RUB 76.16, yen 159.73, sing 1.2756, HKD 7.8323, INR 93.37, China 6.8316, peso 17.3670, BRL 5.0055, BBDXY 1,201, Dollar Index 98.90, Oil $103.93, 10-year 4.34%, Silver $74.26, Platinum $2,034.00, Palladium $1,547.00, Copper $5.92, and Gold… $4,717

That’s it for the day… I was quite wordy today, giving my point of view on a lot of things… I hope I didn’t offend anyone!  And if I did… I apologize… Sunday brought us a cloudy day, but at least it was a warmer day… My friend, Dennis Miller, sent me a note yesterday: I just had to share with everyone… “I’m not saying I’m old… But the oldies station isn’t playing my parent’s jams anymore… They’re playing mine! The Kinks takes us to the finish line today with their song: All Day and All of the Night… I hope you have a Marvelous Monday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler 

• The dollar gets sold on Wednesday and drifts throughout the night
• The RBNZ gets rewarded

Good Day… And a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday to one and all!  A nice, neat 6-1 win for my beloved Cardinals yesterday in D.C. And now they come home to play the Red Sox this weekend, Our Blues saw their chances of making the playoffs fade into the distance Tuesday night with a loss on home ice… UGH!  I’m feeling much better this morning, as the effects of the infusion are beginning to fade… I even ate a cheeseburger last night with no problems! And it has been quite chilly here this week, but warmer weather is on the way, hopefully! Edwyn Collins greets me this morning with his 80’s song: A Girl Like You

The soothing words that the POTUS laid on us on Tuesday, really hung over the markets yesterday… The dollar got sold and the BBDXY lost 9 index points on the day to 1,201. The euro, which had climbed over the 1.17 level, fell back to a 1.16 level… And the rest of the currencies all backed off their lofty figures from yesterday morning. 

Gold backed off it’s early morning $83 gain, yesterday at first… Then it gained again… A Classic example of the SPTs coming in and attempting to turn the tide with Gold only to have the physical demand win out and that left Gold gaining $114 on the day…. Gold closed at $4,721… Silver saw the same kind of action as Gold did, getting sold off its high of $77.33 to end the day at $74.26 , up $1.14 

As usual the SPTs went after Silver much harder than they went after Gold… Silver is the poster child for abuse from the SPTs…  The weekly checks of how many days of production of Silver it would take to equal the amount of ounces of Silver that is sold short. The total number has gone down in recent times, but still remains high, at 98 days…. Those 98 days that the Big 8 traders are currently short, represents 3.3 months of world silver production, or 219.970 million troy ounces/43,994 COMEX contracts. 

That last bit was taken from Ed Steer’s Saturday letter… www.edsteergoldsilver.com

The price of Oil bumped higher after seeing it sold down to $93 yesterday morning, and ended the day at $98.05… 

And the 10-year Treasury saw its yield rise to 4.30%…  And here’s the reason why per Bloomberg.com “An auction of 10-year notes Wednesday drew a yield only slightly higher than anticipated, a sign that demand nearly matched expectations.”  

Chuck again… to me, this is not a good sign, because these auctions used to be oversubscribed! And the fact that they had to increase the yield offered is significant…  the fact that the Fed Heads are considering a rate hike didn’t hurt the rising yield any instead helping it. I have more on that in the FWIW section today, so stayed tune, same bat time, same bat channel!

In the overnight markets last night… The dollar was sold just a bit, but enough to get the currencies going again… The BBDXY starts the day at 1,201… The Petrol Currencies waited until the dust cleared on the soothing words from the POTUS, and now that the price of Oil is recovering, so too are the Petrol Currencies… The Norwegian krone, Russian ruble, Brazilian real are looking much healthier… 

I don’t think that traders are convinced that the Peace Accord is going to hold, and therefore they aren’t as euphoric as they were on Tuesday…  I think this is prudent of them to back off from where they were on the Peace Agreement…  There’s no guarantee that it will hold, especially with the hot tempered POTUS and the Iranians… 

The price of Oil proves what I’m talking about, as it has recovered to trade with a $98 handle this morning, inching higher each day… 

And the 10-year saw some buying overnight and starts today with 4.28% yield… 

While I’m thinking of what’s going on today, I have to say that some of the trepidation is due to the fact that the STUPID CPI will print today… As I’ve said before, while I don’t put much credence in the STUPID CPI, the market seems to always swallow it hook, and sinker….  So, there’s that could of the STUPID CPI hanging over the markets this morning, but it won’t be too long before the data set prints and then all the fun begins! 

In New Zealand, where the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) left their OCR (Official Cash Rate) unchanged, they were rewarded when the next day after their announcement, the latest inflation printed and showed a blip up… Now, that’ s what I call being on top of inflation and not behind the eight ball with inflation like the Fed/ Cabal / Cartel is…  I’m just saying… 

OK… Well, according to the stock jockeys, all is clear and you can come back to stocks now…  Well, as long as they say so…..  (NOT!) This 2-week peace trial run hasn’t gone a day and the U.S. attacked two Iranian posts…  So, as long as the Peace is sort of a suggestion and not a rule, there are still questions to be answered and so I wouldn’t be jumping back in with both feet…  Rather tip toe through the tulips…. 

Now that’s funny… me tip toeing… Like a cartoon of a Bull on its hind legs dancing! Put those down as things you’ll never see! 

And you can file this under the heading of: We were wondering if The would be problems at the Fed…

This from Reuters.com ” Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams said on Tuesday that U.S. Federal Reserve ​Chair Jerome Powell would remain in charge of the central bank’s key monetary policy function even if Kevin Warsh ‌has not been confirmed as the new Fed leader by next month.

“There’s no issue of continuity. There’s no issue of anything” when it comes to the leadership of the central bank’s interest-rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, Williams said on Bloomberg’s television channel.

Williams was commenting on the unsettled succession process for Fed leadership. U.S. President ​Donald Trump this year named Warsh, a former Fed governor once known for his hawkish views on monetary policy, to ​succeed Powell when his term as leader concludes in May.”

Chuck again… Whew! I was sweating bullets wondering what was going on at the Fed (NOT!) Just the point of Williams pointing out that there were no problems, leads me to believe there are some problems! I shake my head in disbelief that these guys run our economy…  Chuck, is that run, or ruin?

And, finally… The choking of the trade ships going through the Strait of Hormuz is more than just an Oil problem…  Here’s YAHOO Finance with their thought: “Around one-third of the world’s seaborne fertilizer trade moves through the Strait of Hormuz. Countries exposed to instability in the Persian Gulf export nearly half of the global urea and 30% of the ammonia, two nutrients essential for crop growth.”

Chuck again… and if those shipments are held up at planting time, which it is now… Uh-Oh…   

The U.S. Data Cupboard today, has the Personal Income and Spending, the PCE, and the 2^nd revision of 4^th QTR GDP… So, it will be a busy day for the Data nerds…. Me, I’ll probably be sleeping when they print, as I didn’t get much sleep last night..  Tomorrow’s Data Cupboard will have the STUPID CPI for this month, and Factory Orders from Feb…  So, we’ll end the week with the markets living and dying from the data…

To recap… The dollar’s selling the previous night, saw some backing off, and the dollar ended up down 9 index points… Gold & Silver both saw their lofty levels of the early morning get sold, but then the two metals made a comeback, and both ended the day up… The latest Treasury auction of the 10-year wasn’t as bad as the previous auctions of other maturities… But Chuck still thinks it was not good…  Chuck goes to the heart doctor tomorrow… Lets see if he has any ideas…. 

For What It’s Worth…  I told you above that I had something on the Fed Heads changing horses in the middle of the stream and now foresee a rate hike. This article can be found here: https://apnews.com/article/inflation-federal-reserve-iran-gas-7c37bba877cd039c56ebe3d73bb867a5

Or, here’s your snippet: “The number of Federal Reserve policymakers willing to consider an interest rate hike this year rose between the January and March meetings, as higher gas prices stemming from the Iran war threatened to worsen inflation in the coming months.

Minutes of the Fed’s March 17-18 meeting, released Wednesday, showed that “some” of the central bank’s 19 policymakers on its rate-setting committee supported changing their post-meeting statement to reflect the potential for a future rate hike. That is an an increase from “several” in January. The Fed doesn’t disclose precise numbers of how many officials supported each position, but in Fed jargon, ‘some’ is considered more than ‘several.’

And “many” of the officials pointed to the risk that higher oil and gas prices could keep inflation elevated for “longer than expected, which could call for rate increases” to push inflation back down.

For about 18 months, the Fed has leaned toward cutting rates, and in its meetings has alternated between cuts and no change to rates. The slow shift toward considering potential hikes marks a major change from that trend.”

Chuck Again… Well, If they only read the Pfennig, they would already be prepared to hike rates… I said that the Fed should be considering rate hikes and not rate cuts…  Yes, the rate cuts helped the price of Gold rally, but in the end, what was good for the economy was a rate hike and not a rate cut! 

Market Prices 4/9/2026: American Style: A$ .7044, kiwi .5839, C$ .7388, euro 1.1627, sterling 1.3425, Swiss $1.2650, European Style: rand 16.4291, krone 9.5144, SEK 9.2958, forint 322.44, zloty 3.6826, koruna 20.8769, RUB 77.72, yen 158.88, sing 1.2742, HKD 7.8350, INR 92.66, China 6.8360, peso 17.43, BRL 5.1028, BBDXY 1,201, Dollar Index 98.87, Oil $98.36, 10-year 4.28%, Silver $74.71, Platinum $2,058.00, Palladium $1,599.00, Copper $5.70, and Gold… $4,756

That’s it for today… And this week… Man, I need some time off! Well, you’ll get 3 days here, Chuck, so stop whining! The Fed Auction yesterday didn’t give me a strong feeling for changing my view that the U.S. economy is in trouble…  Enough of that talk, you’re supposed to finishing off the letter today, not carrying it on! I will meet with my heart doctor tomorrow… Should be interesting…  I’m going to get outside and clean up my BBQ Grills and Big Green Egg smoker this weekend… Then I’ll head to the meat market and tell the guy there that I’m trying to get interested… I’ll pick something out to either grill or smoke. First time this year!  The Allman Brothers take us to the finish line today with a live version of their song: Statesboro Blues… This is from their great album Live from the Filmore East! I hope you have a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• the dollar drifted around yesterday and last night
• More bad stuff for Treasuries…

Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you!  I’ll be heading to the hospital for my oncologist appt, and infusion as soon as I hit send this morning… I hope it all goes off without a hitch… Which is not usual!  I don’t feel like a million dollars this morning, but I’ll get through it…  When I was a young man, I used to watch my dad get up in the morning and try like the dickens to loosen up his back to no avail, and go ahead and go on to work in major pain… That image has stuck with me all these years…  And I’ve attempted to model my life after him, in that ever since 2007, I answer the bell no matter how awful I feel..  I may be a bit later in the distribution of the Pfennig, but better late than never! If ever I don’t answer the bell, you can bet your sweet bippie that I’m so sick that getting up would make me sicker. Cat Stevens greets me this morning with his song: If You Want To Sing Out… 

Yes, I want to sing out the fact that the BLS lies, and cheats, and cooks the books! I want to sing out that The Fed Heads lie to us… I want to sing out that there are just a handful of Congressmen that would actually cut deficit spending, and they are not friends of the POTUS…  And the Gov’t lies to us… 

I’ll stop there… The dollar saw some minor buying as the BBDXY gained 1 index point and ended the day at 1,214…  You could also say that the dollar lost 6 index points, if you go back to the ending price of Friday… Yeah, that sounds better, so I’ll stick with that!   Gold & Silver started the week on a down note yesterday… Gold ended the day down $29 to close a $4,649 and Silver lost $1.02 to close at $72.13

The 10-year Treasury remained in a tight range, and ended the day with a 4.33% yield…  I would caution against buying the 10-year as I truly believe that yields will be going much higher …. Of course, in 10-years the bond might be back to current levels, but in the meantime, you’re carrying a loss… 

The price of Oil continues to rise, yesterday it gained $5 to end the day at $115…  The Oil price is not as high as suspect it will go… but then I don’t subscribe to “Polly Anna’s book of everything is rosy”… 

The rise in the Oil Price has really put a damper on economy… Here’s CNBC with their take on Oil…. ““Discretionary spending is typically where the cycle starts. Consumers pull back from items which are discretionary first,” said MassMutual Wealth chief investment officer Daken Vanderburg.

Vanderburg says higher energy prices act as a tax on consumers because they ripple across so many goods and services. If the war and its disruption is short, consumers will dip into savings and weather the higher costs. But a longer-duration conflict will cause consumers to cut back. “That slows growth and hits spending, and does it quite quickly,” Vanderburg said. 

Chuck again… yes, if you go back to the first day that I wrote after my spring vacation, I said that the conflict with Iran would go longer than the pundits were calling for…  And now we’re in for one month…  and probably longer… 

In the overnight markets last night…  there was little movement in the dollar overnight, but it did get sold a bit and starts today with the BBDXY at 1,213…  Gold is up a smidgen, but Silver is down to start our day today… Gold is up $12 and Silver is down 60-cents…  I have something for you on Gold in the FWIW section today, so stayed tuned, don’t touch that dial! 

The price of Oil slipped a but overnight and starts today at $114.71…  And the 10-year Treasury saw some light selling overnight, and the yield rose to 4.34%… 

Well, I tried to go back to sleep yesterday after sending out the Pfennig… But too much noise in the house kept me from falling asleep…. UGH!  

The currencies all are looking a bit better these days, especially the Petrol Currencies… It’s been a month of Sundays since we last saw the Russian ruble below $80… The Norwegian krone is playing catch up with the Swedish koruna… And the Brazilian real quietly gains a bit here and there…  

I wonder when the People’s Bank of China are going to allow the renminbi to gain big chunks VS the dollar? I know that’s not the “Chinese Way”…  but at least they don’t have to worry about the lack of energy reaching them to harm their economy…  The Iranians are allowing Chinese shipments of Oil to flow through the Strait of Hormuz, if they pay for the Oil in renminbi… No problem! The Chinese would love to pay with renminbi!  

And a quick look at the currencies this morning I saw the renminbi was moved to a 6.86 from 6.88… that’s a big move for the Chinese…  You know the more I think about this conflict with Iran, the only way to get them to open the Strait of Hormuz, is to get the Chinese and Russians involved in the peace talks, they are the only two countries that Iran will listen to, in my humble opinion… 

And the Euro-Wannabes are not in rally mode right now. I’ve told you before that when you really want to know if the dollar is selling, first look at the euro, and then the Euro-Wannabes of Poland, Czech, and Hungary…  These 3 always tell me if the dollar is really getting sold… 

OK… That was back when we used the Dollar Index to check the pulse of the dollar, but now we use a more up-to-date index the BBDXY to see how the dollar fared against their major trading partners…  But I still look at the Euro-Wannabes as a quick take on the dollar… I don’t know why, just old habits are hard to break, eh?

Back to bonds and their yields rising for a minute…  The Fed hasn’t even raised rates yet, and the 10-year gathers yield thus making the pricing of mortgage loans even pricier…  Mortgage rates hit 6.46% after climbing for fifth straight week. The average rate on the 30-year fixed rate mortgage averaged 6.46% as of Thursday, according to Freddie Mac. So much for a housing revival…  I’m just saying… 

The 30-year or the “long bond” that used to be the cat’s meow of bond traders, crossed over the 5% yield rate the other day…  Well, it’s a good thing that they don’t use the 30-year to price mortgages! 

And with a housing revival on circling the bowl, Housing as a whole should get cheaper…   And with a lot of Americans using their home as at ATM or collateral on debt, this could get real ugly quickly…  We’ve been through a housing debacle already in 2007-08… Don’t tell me we could heading back there again…. Nah, I don’t think so, but we could…   The margin calls on debt are going to be the thing that makes people have to sell their most precious possessions….. 

Hey, Chuck! Just because you feel awful this morning, doesn’t mean you have to make the rest of us ill with all this doom and gloom talk!  I’m sorry, I just started typing and really just now saw what I wrote! Oh-No!  Sorry about that… But I have just one question: Got Gold?

The U.S. Data Cupboard today has the Feb print of Durable Goods Orders, of which I think they’ll be negative… See more doom and gloom!  I’m still fuming about the lie that the BLS told us about jobs created in March…  116,000 jobs created difference between the BLS and the ADP Employment Report…  I know who’s flag I’m pinning my colors to! 

For What It’s Worth… Well, I’ve been seeing headline printed a lot lately, so I thought that I’d give you a FWIW article that explained it… it’s about Central Banks selling Gold, and it can be found here: Some central banks have been selling their gold. That doesn’t mean you should too. – MarketWatch

Or, here’s your snippet: “Gold suffered its biggest monthly drop in nearly 13 years and some central banks have shifted from being buyers to sellers — but that actually proves the precious metal can be more valuable to investors than it’s ever been.

“The narrative that central banks have abandoned gold is just not supported by the data,” said Jan Skoyles, the U.K.-based head of marketing at precious-metals dealer GoldCore. The data, instead, show a “crisis-driven liquidation by a handful of countries under severe currency pressure. It is not a structural shift away from gold reserves.”

“Gold is the asset that has held its value well enough to be worth liquidating,” Skoyles said in a YouTube video posted on April 2. “That is not a weakness in gold. That is the entire point of gold.”

Central-bank gold buying was one of the strongest “pillars” underneath gold’s bull market, Skoyles noted. It was a big part of the reason why gold prices began a relatively steady climb in 2022 to repeatedly reach fresh record highs.

Gold futures, based on the most active COMEX contracts, reached their latest all-time on Jan. 29 of this year, trading as high as $5,626.80 an ounce.

Central banks purchased over 1,000 metric tons of gold each year in 2022, 2023 and 2024 — roughly double the average over the preceding decade, according to the World Gold Council. Buying slowed a bit in 2025, but remained high at 863 metric tons that year.”

Chuck again…. this article is behind MarketWatch’s paywall so unless you have a subscription to Market Watch, you’ll have to be satisfied with the snippet this morning… sorry… 

Market Prices 4/7/2026: American Style: A$ .6933 , kiwi .5705, C$ .7185, euro 1.1556, sterling 1.3243, Swiss $1.2504, European Style: rand 16.8790, krone 9.6809, SEK 6.4663, forint 330.15, zloty 3.69.79, koruna 21.7232, RUB 78.83, yen 159.83, sing 1.2845, HKD 7.8360, INR 92.90, China 6.8645, peso 17.75, BRL 5.1445, BBDXY 1,213, Dollar Index 99.99, Oil $114.71, 10-year 4.34%, Silver $72.31, Platinum $1,958.00, Palladium $1,494.00, Copper $5.57, and Gold… $4,661

That’s it for today… I have to run out of here to the hospital for my appt with my oncologist and infusion… I know I said last week that I wouldn’t write today, but I did, so now you’re stuck with me! HA! 

Congratulations to Michigan for winning the NCAA Basketball Championship last night…. My beloved Cardinals fought back and went ahead in the game las night only to blow it the next inning! UGH!   They lost to the Nationals… They should have won against the Nationals but didn’t!  Well, the Iranians have rejected our Peace Proposal, so the the new round of strikes against Iran will be devastating. They will begin at 20:00, Washington DC time on Tuesday… Geez, I hope it doesn’t have to come to that… Carlos Santana takes us to the finish line today with his song: Samba Pa’ Ti… It’s an instrumental so I’m not singing along with the song.. I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• The dollar gets sold on Friday and in the overnight markets last night
• 178,000 jobs out of thin air….

Good Day…  Well, did you have a Blessed Easter? I do realize that all of my readers aren’t of that faith, but give me a break here, as I am, and to me, when I’m writing that’s all that counts! HA !   I speak from the heart folks; you should know that by now….  I attended Alex’s catholic confirmation and baptism Saturday night… I got home to watch the last part of the Michigan / Arizona game, of which Michigan was way ahead and won…. Son Alex remined us yesterday, that our St. Louis U. Billikens were the only team in this tournament to be within 10 points of Michigan… Yes, Michigan is THAT good! The Doobie Brothers greet me this morning with their song: Another Park, Another Sunday…

Well, after recovering nicely on Thursday, Gold & Silver were subjected to the SPTs on Friday, and ended the week down… Gold closed the week at $4,678, and Silver at $73.15…  Ed Steer had this to say about Silver in his Saturday letter; “the gold/silver ratio remains at a farcical 64.1 to 1 as of Thursday’s close. The ‘normal’ and historical ratio is around 15 to 1…which would put silver at around $310 based on gold’s closing price on Thursday. And if priced at the ratio of 7:1 that it comes out of the ground at, compared to gold…that would put silver at around $670 an ounce.”

You can find Ed at www.edsteergoldsilver.com

Now those are some lofty prices for Silver dont’ you think? I really don’t see Silver returning to a 15-1 ratio, but if it did… There would be whole camp site of happy Silver owner campers… 

The dollar ended the week with the BBDXY at 1,215… The PPT must have been in to manage the price higher for the dollar, as on Thursday the BBDXY had fallen 5 index points to 1,212…  The currencies all look tired from all the attempts to get out of their respective sick beds…  There’s been a ton of talk going around about how the paper currencies are all going to fold…  This has been going around for years now, but got a lot louder, lately…   I say, that we will know in plenty of time when to get out of the currencies….  And I’m sticking to that!

The price of Oil remained trading with a $111 handle and remained that way throughout the weekend, while the 10-year Treasury was its yield trade at 4.35% …

In the overnight markets last night… There probably weren’t any senior traders around, on Easter Monday, and there wasn’t much movement in the asset classes that I follow… The dollar saw a dip lower and the BBDXY lost 2 index points to start our day/ week at 1,213…  Gold & Silver are positive, but the move higher is watered down this morning. We start the day/ week with Gold up $1 and Silver up 9-cents…  Hey! It’s better than a sharp stick in the eye that the SPTs use on the metals when they get into the markets… 

The price of Oil dipped a buck overnight and starts the day / week at $110… And the 10-yeare Treasury was its yield dip lower to start our day/ week at 4.33%

I found this over the weekend, and it’s from Barron’s.com, “The 10-year yield rose as high as 4.337% when ADP earlier this week, reported private employers added more jobs than expected.

Taken together, the two reports tell traders to reprice the value for bonds; if the labor market isn’t as weak as previously thought, they should be paying less for bonds, a haven asset that doesn’t perform well in good times.

Chuck again… another friendly reminder that when bond prices go down, the yield on the bond goes up and vice versa…

And here’s another tidbit on Treasuries that is scarry… The U.S. has over $10 Trillion in bond maturities in the next 12-months…  Now, if we look back for a moment at the bond auctions of last week, we find that the U.S is dire need of buyers for their debt… That doesn’t spell tranquility in the bond markets going forward, now does it? No… it doesn’t, and that means that someone is going to have to buy the bonds that the markets wouldn’t absorb… And that Someone is most likely the Fed/ Cabal/ Cartel…  And to buy the bonds (it used to be called Quantitative Easing)  they’ll have to print the money to pay for them… 

We’ve seen what that did to the money supply and inflation previously, right… Well, imagine bond buying on steroids…  I’m just saying… 

U.S. Treasuries have become the hot potato that no one wants to hold…  This is going to be a  real problem for our economy folks… I can’t stress this enough folks…  And all this means that the Gov’t has chosen higher inflation for us… Not for them of course, but for us… Are you ready for all of this? And in another question…. Got Gold?

I overslept this morning… I was up sick during the night, so I said, ” to hell with getting up before dawn” and turned off the alarm…  So, that means you’re in  luck this morning, because this will be a short-n-sweet Pfennig…. 

The U.S. Data Cupboard last Friday, was the cause of all the euphoria in the markets, as the BLS created 178,000k jobs in March…  Wait! What? The ADP Employment Report only that only 62,000 jobs were created in March… So, where did the BLS find another 116,000 jobs?  Out of thin air, folks… The BLS is up to their old tricks…  That report from the BLS was bad enough, but there were some sticking points in the report on for that I’m going to Forbes.com… 

“Don’t get too comfortable, said Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG.

“The unemployment rate dropped, but for the wrong reasons: a loss in labor force participation,” Swonk told Fortune. The declines were concentrated among prime working-age men (twenties to thirties); young women between ages 20 and 24; and men over 55. In other words, the unemployment rate fell not because people found work, but because they became discouraged and stopped looking.

The broader U-6 measure of unemployment, which captures exactly those discouraged workers plus those stuck in part-time jobs when they want full-time work, actually edged up to 8%, even as the headline rate improved.”

Chuck again… this was under the hood, and the markets failed to look under the hood… Once again, they had a knee-jerk reaction to the report…  I shake my head in disgust… 

This week’s Data Cupboard has Durable Goods Orders, Personal Income and Spending, a second revision of the 4^th Qtr GDP… As if we care about what happened 4 months ago?  We’ll finish the week with the STUPID CPI and that will print on Friday, when I’m not writing… Thank goodness!

To recap… The dollar got sold to send the week and then saw some selling overnight, so people are seeing what’s going on I do believe…. Treasuries have become persona non gratis… And that’s a bad thing for us… And the BLS said that they created 178,000 jobs in March… Chuck disputes this number, as he normally does when the BLS makes these unbelievable reports up…. 

For What It’s Worth… I’ve mentioned on a couple occasions that the Private Credit market in the U.S. was having problems… this is getting worse folks… and the size of the Private Credit markets is on par with the housing collapse in 2008…  So, keep an eye on this..  This  article can be found here: Barings’ private credit fund limits withdrawals after redemption requests surge | Reuters

Or, here’s your snippet: “Asset manager Barings capped redemptions at one ​of its private credit funds at 5% ‌of shares after investors sought to withdraw 11.3% in the first quarter, according to a ​regulatory filing on Monday.

Private credit ​funds have grappled with high redemption requests ⁠in recent months as jittery ​retail investors bolt for the door amid ​concerns over transparency, valuations and artificial intelligence-related disruption.

Non-traded funds, like Barings Private Credit, offer quarterly ​liquidity to investors through tender offers ​typically of up to 5% of shares.

Barings has ‌accepted ⁠to purchase on a pro-rata basis roughly 44.3% of shares tendered in its offer, according to the filing.

“The fund’s ​liquidity framework ​is ⁠designed to protect the long-term interests of all shareholders. By ​applying this approach consistently, we ​seek ⁠to balance near-term liquidity needs with prudent”

Chuck again… Blackrock, and other Big Casino Banks that offer this service are finding that the goings on is not so easy… I’m just saying… 

Market Prices 4/6/2026: American Style: A$ .6929, kiwi .5722, C$ .7188, euro 1.1553, sterling 1.3248, Swiss $1.2543, European Style: rand 16.8384, krone 9.7198, SEK 9.4655, forint 331.05, zloty 3.6926, koruna 21.2076, RUB 78.87, yen 159.34, sing 1.2839, HKD 7.8368, INR 93.06, China 6.8822, peso 17.78, BRL 5.1563, BBDXY 1,213, Dollar Index 99.89, Oil $110.25, 10-year 4.33%, Silver $73.24, Platinum $2,004.00, Palladium $1,523.00, Copper $5.65, and Gold… $4,678

That’s it for today… A strange night for yours truly… Man, the confirmation and Baptism celebration on Saturday night was a very long, affair… I am proud of Alex for a number of reasons, but he made this decision as an adult, which I feel is the right way to do it… Don’t send me messages telling this is wrong, this is what I feel… And that’s that! Did I tell you that Alex and his wife Grace, are expecting a baby at the end of June? I’m sure I did, but isn’t that great news?  When he was just 3, he used to sit on my lap while I wrote the Pfennig, his input looked like this: @#23&^%$$…  Gerry Raferty takes us to the finish line today with his song: Get It Right Next Time…  I hope you have a Marvelous Monday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• the dollar rallied overnight to offset the losses the previous sessions
• The POTUS has some strong words for his enemy

Good Day… And a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday to one and all! Well, it took 11 innings to get the win, but my beloved Cardinals did it and beat the Mets 2-1…Of course the game could have gone on and on if MLB hadn’t come up with he stupidest rule ever, and that is putting a runner at 2^nd base to start the 10^th Inning…  He didn’t have to earn his way there; he just was the last person to make an out the previous inning! DUMB, DUMB. DUMB! I used to kind of like extra innings because they added drama… Not any longer… UHG! Crowded House greets me this morning with their 80’s song: Don’t Dream It’s Over

Funny that song is playing after my scenario yesterday that I painted for you talked about traders waking up from a bad dream…  The data that printed yesterday showed that the economy isn’t as bad as the markets thought is was, and that brought on dollar buying, and Treasury selling…  The dollar recovered 2 index points yesterday, but in the overnight markets has gone hog wild again… 

Gold, which was up $86 in the early trading yesterday, saw the STPs enter the market and attempt to take Gold & Silver down… Gold, which was up $159 the previous day, saw the SPTs sell Gold short to keep it from getting out of hand, as far as they are concerned, and Gold ended the day up $89 to close at $4,759. Silver saw the same type of action. Yesterday morning Silver was up to $75… and strained and strained to go higher, but the SPTs were there to cap off the gain, and Silver lost 2-cents on the day to close at $74.98… Obviously, the SPTs had more success getting Silver to drop some value, while Gold just didn’t get to get as strong as I would have thought it would have given its early morning rise… 

The Price of Oil got a POTUS Shock last night when he vowed to hit Iran extremely hard to put back in the stone age in the next 2-3 weeks…  Oil gained $6 to $104 yesterday evening… 

And the 10-year saw the bond boys reestablish control over the bond market, and the 10-year added yield to the tune of 6 basis points to end the day at 4.36% yield…  The data yesterday didn’t help bonds as it showed that no rate cuts are coming and that helped get the yields going higher again… 

In the overnight markets last night… This is getting weird, just plain weird, the previous night the dollar got taken to the woodshed, but last night, the dollar rallied big time, with the BBDXY gaining 7 index points…  The U.S. Data Cupboard was better than the average bear yesterday, but C’mon! This is over buying to the nth degree…. And Gold and Silver are being subjected to the thought that the better than average bear will cause the Fed Heads to hike rates instead of cut them later this year…

That thought alone gave the SPTs the green light to short the snot out of Gold & Silver this morning…. Gold is down $157, and Silver is down $4.98…  There’s nowhere to hide for Gold & Silver this morning, and maybe some physical buyers will enter the market and stem the losses…  I really don’t have words that I can use right here without being shut down, that explain how I feel about the SPTs and what they are doing this morning… 

The price of Oil continued to gain overnight and starts our day trading with a $109 handle… And the 10-year Treasury’s yield starts today at 4.35%

So, the POTUS told everyone that the war will end in 2-3 weeks, but in the meantime, he’s going to hit Iran extremely hard and send back to the sone age…  And those words were not what the markets were expecting to hear… I like when a POTUS talks strongly… But only if he carries through with his strong words…  So, I guess we’ll have to wait-n-see…. 

The markets will no doubt react negatively to those words… I’m just saying… Until it’s all over for good, and then the markets will settle down… Until then we’ll continue to see the dollar get whipsawed up and then back down, the price of Oil goes up and down, the yield on the 10-year tries to figure out which way to do, and the metals be up one day and down the next…  

Well, Alasdair MacCleod was at it again and this time he’s saying that we’re in big dookie… let’s listen in: “he explains why the real story is not only war or oil, but the chain reaction from energy disruption to higher bond yields, collapsing credit, and a broader monetary crisis.”

Chuck again… The collapsing credit is the thing I’ve been tracking… much like ai did for the housing crisis in 2007/08… The whole financial system that we use is based on credit… So, keep an eye out for articles that talk about the collapsing credit… 

You know, I get the willies every time I head the Fed/ Cabal/Cartel, or the Treasury, or even the White House laud that they have defeated inflation….  Because that’s all lies….  Sure, inflation came down from near 9% to the 3% figure now, but that’s taking out this, that and the other thing when calculating inflation… what they should do in my opinion is use Money Supply as an inflation measure…  And the Money Supply in the US. Is soaring! In February of this year, we saw the all time record size of Money Supply as Money Supply reached an all time high of 22667.30 USD Billion in February of 2026.

Here’s Doug Casey with his thoughts on this: “People have a natural inclination to blame the producers—the butcher, the baker, and the gasoline maker—for higher prices. But that’s a huge mistake. Higher prices (barring a natural catastrophe that destroys real wealth) are 100% caused by increases in the money supply. It’s perverse that producers are blamed for price inflation while the Fed and the government are lauded for fighting inflation. The public’s perception is the exact opposite of reality.”

Chuck again… Thanks to Doug and his International Man newsletter…  

What’s the reason for the increase in Money Supply? The economy is stagnating and the Fed Heads continue to say that their are in a tightening time…  As I’ve always said to you… They lie to us… 

I have a further discussion on Money Supply in the FWIW section today… so stay tuned same bat time, same bat channel…

The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday had the delayed Feb Retail Sales, that I said would be good, not great but good… Well, the data printed at +.6% better than the average bear… The ADP Employment Report showed that 69,000 jobs were added in March… That’s not really a great number, but it was better than the Feb print of 39,000 and that got the markets all lathered up…  Not me, but I don’t count…  And the ISM manufacturing Index printed a good number for the data set as it was 52.7%… Remember any number above 50 represents gains in Manufacturing.   I scratch my bald head over this data set… Factory Orders, and Durable Goods Orders printed bad numbers at last print…  So, how did Manufacturing be so strong? Don’t tell me that now even this data set is being manipulated! 

The Petrol Currencies have hung in there VS the dollar this morning on the rise in the price of Oil… This dollar strength is giving me a rash… Someone out there in dollar bug land come to your senses! Serenity NOW!

We have the usual weekly Initial Jobless Claims today in the Data Cupboard…  And the Trade Report for Feb… This report was from a period prior to the Supremes telling the POTUS that he can’t place the high tariffs on imports…  I think that the POTUS is continuing to implement the tariffs, but that’s a story for another day…

To recap… Well, yesterday it appeared that all was back to normal again with the dollar getting sold and the metals gaining… But that didn’t last overnight, as the dollar was bought hand over fist, and the metals are getting sold to start our day today…  The Data that printed yesterday was better than the average bear, but that was enough to lather up the markets to thinking that interest rates are going up instead of down later this year and that thought caused some major moves in the markets… 

For What it’s Worth… this was taken from a posting by the Mises organization, and therefore I don’t need to tell you that it’s real economics… and it can be found here; Money Supply Growth Surges to Multi-Year High as The Fed Loosens Policy | Mises Institute

Or, here’s your snippet: “In recent months, Federal Reserve officials have repeatedly referred to monetary policy as restrictive. In September, Jerome Powell said policy was “clearly restrictive,” and in November, New York Fed President John Williams stated “I still view the current monetary policy level as moderately tight…”

Well, it may be that current policy is “restrictive” compared to, say, the policies of Bernanke and Yellen. But recent data on the money supply suggests that the money supply in recent months is finding plenty of room to increase rapidly, in spite of what Fed officials say.

For example, the money supply has increased every month for the past four months, and as some of the highest rates we’ve seen in years. Moreover, when measured year-over-year, the money supply has accelerated over the past three months and is now at the highest rate of growth seen in 40 months—or since July of 2022.

While the money supply largely flatlined through much of the mid-2025, growth has clearly accelerated since August of this year.

During October, year-over-year growth in the money supply was at 4.76 percent. That’s up from September year-over-year increase of 4.06 percent. Money supply growth is also up sizably compared to October of last year when year-over-year growth was 1.27 percent.

In October, the total money supply again rose above $20 trillion for the first time since January of 2023, and grew by half a trillion dollars from August to October.

In month-to-month growth, August, September, and October all posted some of the largest growth rates we’ve seen since 2022, rising 1.18 percent, 1.4 percent, and 1.14 percent, respectively. topping off four months of growth.

The money supply metric used here—the “true,” or Rothbard-Salerno, money supply measure (TMS)—is the metric developed by Murray Rothbard and Joseph Salerno, and is designed to provide a better measure of money supply fluctuations than M2. (The Mises Institute now offers regular updates on this metric and its growth.)

Historically, M2 growth rates have often followed a similar course to TMS growth rates, but M2 has even outpaced TMS growth in eleven of the last twelve months. In October, the M2 growth rate, year over year, was 4.63 percent. That’s up from September’s growth rate of 4.47 percent. October’s growth rate was also up from October 2024’s rate of 2.97 percent.

Although year-over-year and month-to-month growth rates moderated during the summer—and even fell substantially during 2023 and early 2024, money-supply totals are again rapidly heading upward. M2 is now at the highest level it’s ever been, topping $22.2 trillion. TMS has not yet returned to its 2022 peak, but is now at a 34-month high.”

Chuck Again… it would have taken me eons to explain all that, so I thank the Mises Institute for doing the heavy lifting here..

Market Prices 4/2/2026: American Style: A$ .6872, kiwi  .5709, C$ .7189, euro 1.1526, sterling 1.3208, Swiss $1.2512, European Style: rand 17.0006, krone 9.7469, SEK 9.5021, forint 333.41, zloty 3.799, koruna 21.2955, RUB 80.37, yen 159.61, sing 1.2871, HKD 7.8256, INR 93.10, China 6.8985, peso 17.94, BRL 5.1822, BBDXY 1,217, Dollar Index 100.16, Oil $109.81, 10-year 4.35%, Silver $70.62, Platinum $1,924.00, Palladium $1.475.00, Copper $5.52, and Gold… $4,608

That’s it for today… Well, they got the game in after all the morning rain and then threats of more rain as the day went on… My Cardinals start the season 4-2 and now go to Detroit for 3 games… We’ll see how they play on the road in an unfriendly environment!  Tomorrow is Good Friday… I recall always taking that day off, and now I don’t have to! Our Blues lost in OT to the Kings in LA last night… Thus, weakening their chances for a playoff run..  And The FINAL FOUR play tomorrow, should be good games as the favored team in each game have 1.5 pts in the betting rooms… That’s Tight!  I really haven’t been sleeping too well lately, I guess I have a lot on my mind…  I’ve got to change that ! Well, it’s 80’s day on the iPod as the Outfield take us to the finish line today with their song: Your Love I hope you have a Tub Thumpin’ Thursday today, and a very Blessed Easter on Sunday… And Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• The dollar gets sent to the woodshed
• Gold & Silver are back!

Good Day… And a Wonderful Wednesday to you! Not that this is a sports page, but my beloved Cardinals won 3-0 last night over the Mets… Day game today, but I’m in no condition to go downtown… I told you that I’ve been having with short breath… It seems to get better and then relapses over and over again… I see my oncologist first next week, and then the heart doctor, so we’ll get to the bottom of this soon… The Patti Smith group greets me this morning with their song: Because The Night

Well, maybe a dollar bug or two read the Pfennig yesterday and saw all the things stacked up against the dollar and they quit buying dollars yesterday… The BBDXY lost 7 index points, quite a big move in one day, but the dollar was deserving of it… The euro is back above 1.15, and the Chinese renminbi was allowed to go to a 6.88 handle VS the dollar.  It might take us some time to get back to the 1,888 the BBDXY was before the PPT came in and rescued the dollar from falling further… But in my humble opinion, the dollar will return to that level and sink even further going forward…  

Gold & Silver had good days… It’s interesting to me that is, that when the metals rally, all the pundits out there start printing articles about how Gold is going to the moon…  Now, it may, and they’ll look like geniuses… But, again in my humble opinion, I said at the beginning of the year that while I suspected Gold to continue going higher in 2026, certainly not with the OOMPH that it held in 2025…  So, more higher moves, but at a slower pace…. that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!  Ahhh, yes, did I tell you that my first wife was a young Elizabeth Taylor?  HA! 

The great John Lovitz on SNL many moons ago, when the show was actually funny…  I took that last line from a skit John used to play about the habitual liar…. 

Ok, Oil did some aerobics yesterday… first up, then down, and finally back to where it started the day… You see the POTUS said some soothing words for the markets, but in the end the Oil traders didn’t believe him and began to markup Oil again… Oil ended the day trading with a $102 handle. 

The 10-year saw some more buying… The Fed Heads must really be serious about this bond buying, because the 10-year lost some yield yesterday and ended the day trading with a 4.30% yield. 

In the overnight markets last night… it was as if the currency traders woke up from a dream and said, “What the hell are we doing buying dollars?” The dollar is getting taken to the woodshed, and rightly so, in my opinion… The BBDXY has lost 6 index points overnight.. That makes 12 index points the dollar has lost since Monday… The POTUS said yesterday that the U.S. will bring everyone home in 2-3 weeks… Really? Are we going to swallow that bait hook, line and sinker like we always do? Oh, well, it’s not for me to question the POTUS, on the war, but for other pundits…  But these words have taken the “safe haven” status from the dollar and we’re back to the underlying weak dollar trend…  It seemed like forever that the dollar was rallying, but in reality, it was just about 10 days… 

Gold is kicking tail this morning and taking names later. Gold is up $86 to start our day, and has climbed past the $4,700 level again… Silver is trying to participate in Gold’s rally, and is up 42-cents… This is really as if currency and metals traders woke from a horrible dream and had a come to Jesus event and realized what hell they had done and are in the process of correcting it…. 

The price of Oil has dropped $4 overnight… I guess if the war ends in 2-3 weeks but wait! There was no mention of the Strait of Hormuz opening to anything that isn’t paying renminbi for Oil… (China)  So, why is the price of Oil dropping?  I guess the euphoria of a war ending overtook everyone’s psyche and caused them to make rash decisions… Oh well, it is what it is… 

The bond traders have acquiesced to the Fed Heads… I didn’t think I would ever see the day the bond boys cowered but we have now… the yield on the 10—year has dropped to trade with a 4.28% yield, and the Fed Heads and the yield control are winning…  

Well, the selling of bonds wasn’t just the bond boys, telling the Fed that they were behind the eight ball regarding inflation… Foreign Central Banks were also the culprit… here’s the FT.com with their take on that thought: “Foreign central banks have slashed their holdings of Treasuries at the New York Federal Reserve to the lowest level since 2012, as countries sell the U.S. government bonds to prop up their economies and currencies in the wake of the Iran war.

The value of Treasuries held in custody at the New York Fed by official institutions — a group that is largely made up of central banks but also includes governments and international institutions — has dropped by $82 billion since February 25…to $2.7 trillion, according to Fed data.”

Chuck again… So? What happened to that selling? Have Foreign Central Banks decided that the war is over, and they can come out from their hiding places now? I doubt it… But it sure looks like that, as the yields on the bond curve have dropped… 

In yesterday’s Pfennig I reminisced about how I used to have to take the bus 25 miles to downtown St. Louis, to my job… They weren’t good memories for sure! But I was referring to my thought that the price of gas was turning the Average Joe away from the gas pump and he would have to resort to taking the bus!  Well, in relation to that thought I found this from Reuters, “Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese warned the economic shocks of the war in the Middle East would be felt for months and encouraged citizens to take public transport.”

Hey! A government official that agrees with me! It’s the new me, I guess… NOT!  

And in my comments about not questioning the POTUS’s war comments, I found this article that got my mind thinking of China taking over the world…  check it out: “Beijing and Islamabad issued a joint 5-point peace initiative to “restore peace and stability” in the region, according to statements by Pakistan’s and China’s foreign ministries on social media.”  I wonder if Iran will ignore this peace plan like they did the US.’s plan?  Oh well, I guess we’ll see, eh? But I have to question China’s involvement…  

The U.S. Empire is dying… I’ll just state that and move along because that would require a lot of words typed that I don’t have space for…   But think about it… the dying began in the year 2,000…  

The currencies have gotten out of their sick beds again, and hopefully this is the last time they have to visit the sick ward, at least for the next couple of years…  The euro is back above the 1.16 handle, and the rest of the currencies are following the Big Dog euro, off the porch to chase the dollar down the street…  Shoot Rudy, even the Japanese yen has rallied away from the 160 level…  And the Chinese renminbi is getting marked stronger VS the dollar again… Yes, the dollar has returned to the underlying weak trend… the dollar’s fate is not a ONE-WAY Street, it will have times like the last 10 days when it rallies, but we need to keep in mind that the dollar is in an underlying weak trend, and it will get back o it in time…  So, your diversification with currencies and metals is doing just fine…. 

The U.S. Data Cupboard finally has some real economic data for us today… First up is the ADP Employment Report for March… Then a delayed Retail Sales print for Feb… The BHI indicates to me that this will be an OK month, not good, not bad…  And finally, the ISM Manufacturing Data will print for March and it will show that Manufacturing is healing… I don’t know how, but it’ll be a better report than previous ones…  I feel it in my bones… 

To recap…  Chuck thinks that maybe a dollar bug or two read is Pfennig yesterday where he dissed the dollar big time because the BBDXY lost 7 index points yesterday… The currencies have peeked out from under their covers but still aren’t ready to get out of their respective sick beds…  The POTUS had some more comforting words for us yesterday, and yet the bombing continues…  And the Fed Heads are really serious about this yield control plan that they have… 

For What it’s Worth… I have a special treat for you today… I’ve quoted stuff that Dave Gonigam has said in his 5 Bullets newsletter previously, but this time I’m brining you one of his 5 Bullets from yesterday, and you can find it here: Paradigm Pressroom’s 5 Bullets

Or, here’s your snippet:”Fed chief Jerome Powell has begun his farewell tour by saying everything that happens from here on is NOT. HIS. FAULT.

From the front page of today’s Wall Street Journal…

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Monday the central bank is inclined to hold rates steady and look past the energy shock from the war in Iran but cautioned that it might not be able to sit on the sidelines if rising prices shift the public’s expectations about inflation over time.

Powell, speaking to students at Harvard University, laid out the textbook case for patience: Energy disruptions tend to be short-lived, and monetary policy works too slowly to counteract them in real-time. He added a critical caveat, however, by noting how five years of above-target inflation made it harder to assume the public would simply shrug off another round of rising prices.

“You can have a series of these supply shocks and that can lead the public generally — businesses, price setters, households — to start expecting higher inflation over time. Why wouldn’t they?” Powell said.

On the one hand, Powell is right. Monetary policy can’t offset rising energy prices. It’s that old saying about how the Fed can’t print barrels of oil.

But c’mon. It’s plain as day. Powell is using the Iran war as cover to slough off responsibility for every boneheaded decision on his watch for the last eight years — decisions you’re living with right now.

Powell has about six weeks left as Fed chair — maybe more if there’s a struggle in Congress over the nomination of his successor.

Time flies: The narrative surrounding Powell when he ascended to the chairmanship in 2018 was that he’d be different from his predecessors.

Janet Yellen and Ben Bernanke? They were haunted by the 1930s and the Great Depression — which is why they printed money to a fare-thee-well and kept short-term interest rates pinned near zero for seven years once the 2008 financial crisis reached critical mass.

You wanted safe, reliable income in T-bills or CDs? Go pound sand they said — we’ve got to do a solid for our cronies on Wall Street.

Powell, we were told, was haunted instead by the inflation of the 1970s. He’d be a more responsible steward of monetary policy.

Powell raised short-term interest rates in baby steps for the first several months of his term — until Wall Street threw a hissy fit at the end of 2018, sending the S&P 500 down 20%.

And that was the end of his first rate-raising cycle. It went down in history as the “Powell pivot.”

He started cutting rates a few months later. Then he started printing money anew in the fall of 2019 amid a crisis in financial instruments called repos, or repurchase agreements.

Once more the Fed was riding to the rescue — fixing a crisis made on Wall Street, at the expense of everyday Americans.

Coming barely a decade after the 2008 bank bailouts, there was real potential for a torches-and-pitchforks moment — until COVID conveniently came along.

The Fed could bail out the system once more — this time with the excuse of You don’t want a financial collapse on top of a pandemic, do you?”

Chuck Again… yes, you get his newsletter when you sign up for one of the Printing companies’ newsletters… That’s the only way you can get it…  So, what are you waiting for? Dave gives us professionally done analysis of what’s going on related to the markets that I don’t think you can get anywhere else!  Oh, and Dave referred to the Fed/ Cabal/Cartel chairman as “Pontus Pilate Powell”… 

Market Prices 4/1/2026: American Style: A$ .6959, kiwi .5776, C$ .7197, euro 1.1606, sterling 1.3319, Swiss $1.2627. European Style: rand 16.7749, krone 9.6588, SEK 9.3874, forint 329.29, zloty 3.6884, koruna 21.1216, RUB 80.23, yen 158.41, sing 1.2816, HKD 7.8376, INR 94.57, China 6.8749, peso 17.86, BRL 5.1805, BBDXY 1210, Dollar Index 99.45, Oil $98.63, 10-year 4.28%, Silver $75.42, Platinum $1,993.00, Palladium $1,514.00, Copper $5.61, and Gold… $4,756

That’s it for today… And welcome to April.., It’s April Fool’s Day… I used to do elaborate set ups for April Fool’s Day, but no longer do that… The weather for the last two days has been warm, but that’s going to start changing today, and by Easter Sunday it will only be in the 50’s… UGH! Rain off and on today, so no outside reading for me! Big day for college basketball on Saturday… I’m trying to lose the extra weight I put on while in Florida, and it’s very difficult… but I’ll do it! My PCP doctor told me at my last visit that I needed to stop dieting and losing weight… So when I see him later this month, I’ll tell him it was his fault! HA! The Guess Who take us to the finish line today with their great 70’s song: Undun… I hope you have a Wonderful Wednesday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler

• The dollar continues to rise… Why?
• Eurozone inflation rises on higher Energy costs

Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you! My beloved Cardinals couldn’t find their bats last night and lost to the pond scum, I mean the Mets… You have to have been around in the 80’s for the Mets/Cardinals rivalry to get that comment. It sure did warm up yesterday here, but by Easter Sunday, we’ll be wearing jackets again! And I didn’t get outside, I had not slept very good the previous night, too much on my mind, and so I fell asleep yesterday after lunch, and didn’t wake up until it was time for Jeopardy! UGH! Ambrosia greets me this morning with their 70’s song: How Much I Feel… 

Wanna know how much I feel about the dollar’s recent rampage higher? Not much… For me, it just doesn’t make any sense…  It really doesn’t, I don’t get the safe haven stuff, because if that was the reason for the upward move, then Treasuries would be rallying too, but instead Treasuries are getting sold… So, go figure!

The dollar gained 3 more index points yesterday and finished the day at 1,222…  The stock market is finding no bids, bonds are finding no bids, currencies are finding no bids, Oil and the dollar are the only things rallying right now…  

The price of Gold was going along all nice and easy yesterday, and then the BIG BAD WOLF showed up and that was that! I refer to the STPs as the BIG BAD WOLF because they are just that… Gold, which was up in the early trading yesterday saw the SPTs show up with arms full-0-short trades and pushed Gold down $28 on the day to close at $4,511… Silver saw the same kind of day unfold as Silver was up $1.73 in the early trading, but ended the day up only 35-cents to close at $70.72… 

Just when I was beginning to think that that the SPTs were about to go away, and I would have said, Just go away, you don’t have to go away mad, just go away! They’ve gathered up all their ammo an pooled it to get the most out of their ventures with the metals… 

The price of Oil bumped higher yesterday, gaining $3 to close at $102…  And the Fed Heads must have been in the bond market performing their pet tricks, I mean, yield control for there were some buyers of the 10-year and the bond ended the day trading with a $4.33%… 

In the overnight markets last night…  Well, the dollar stumbled a bit and lost 1 index point overnight, but the currencies and I mean all of them, remain in their sick beds with he covers pulled over the head, so that their hiding from the Big Bad Wolf… The Chinese said, “Let’s try this again” and Gold is up $72 to start our day today, and Silver is up $2.98!  The overnight markets have been supporters of the metals for some time now, and you have to wonder when they say, “no mas”… because of the SPTs… of course that’s the SPTs’ goal is to scary everyone away from Gold & Silver so that the dollar is seen as the only alternative.. But we know their plan… And as far as I’m concerned, their plan will not work in the long run… Just how much longer we have to deal with the SPTs is the question… 

The price of Oil bumped higher by another buck overnight and starts today trading with a $103 handle… Gas is just too expensive for the average Joe… And soon he’ll be opting to take the bus to work…  Hey! When I was a young man and working downtown, and lived 25 miles away, I reverted to taking the bus to work… What a royal pain in the arse that was!  I recall standing at the bus stop freezing to death… UGH! ”

The 10-year, overnight, has seen more yield control by the Fed Heads and starts today trading with a 4.31% yield… C’mon bond boys, show the Fed Heads who’s really the boss here! 

This is absolutely unbelievable to me, this dollar rally… I mean if we weren’t in the middle of a drawn out war in the Middle East, if inflation was cooling down, if we as a country weren’t insolvent, and if the economic data was issuing print after print showing the economy on a cliff, then… if stocks weren’t getting hammered daily… then I would say the dollar rally was justified…  But none of those items above are in a good place but the dollar is rallying… Go Figure!

Yes, last week we, as a country, crossed over the $39 Trillion mark in current debt… With the unfunded liabilities, more than $107 Trillion… Added together the total U.S. debt is $148 Trillion…  Don’t ask me how that’s ever going to get paid… Because even if we sold all our Gold (That is if we still have more 8,000 Tons of it) , and we reneged on all of our  current debts, and stopped paying social security and Medicare payments, we would have ticked off so many countries, that they would never lend us a dime again… And we would have to tax like there’s no tomorrow and not spend more than we take in…   Scarry eh?

Well, from what I saw from the most recent Treasury auctions, our lenders are beginning to say “no mas”…  Or up the ante on the risk of owning your debt…  in other words, raise the rates we are paying… I read this past weekend that If the 10-year’s yield reaches 5% our debt servicing will be $2 Trillion a year! How will we be able to pay that and still pay all our other expenses?  We won’t…  and our financial system collapses… Boy, I sure know how to lift everyone’s spirits early in the morning, don’t I?  NOT!

Fed/Cabal/Cartel  Chair Jerome Powell offered a sobering assessment of America’s fiscal health on Monday, telling a Harvard economics class that while the nation’s $39 trillion debt load is not immediately dangerous, the path the country is on demands urgent attention from lawmakers.

“The level of the debt is not unsustainable,” Powell said during a wide-ranging conversation before roughly 400 students, “but the path is not sustainable. It will not end well if we don’t do something fairly soon.”

Chuck again… in what universe is having $148 Trillion in debt “not dangerous”?  Whatever he’s smoking, he needs to share with the class! 

And if you need more proof that the dollar should be getting sold… I found this on the International Man site, so just click the link and read on… The Debt Spiral That Ends in Dollar Destruction: 6 Hard Truths America Can No Longer Ignore

Energy costs are not only fueling inflation here in the U.S. but also, all over the world…  Euro-Zone Inflation Jumps Most Since 2022 on Energy Costs, and hit 2.5% this month and doesn’t look like it will abate anytime soon…  That means rate cuts in the Eurozone are a thing of the past, and instead the policy shift to rate hikes will overtake it…  That will be good and bad for the euro…  But then as we all know that the euro’s direction is dominated by the direction of its offset currency, the dollar.

And the usage of the dollar and dollar denominated assets around the world has dropped  to 56.8%! This is the lowest level it has been at since 1994…  So, Global Central Banks have been dumping dollars and buying other currencies and Gold…  Someone in D.C. Needs to look at this and say, Whoa, there partner! Something has got to change, or the direction of this pulse for the dollar will continue to fall to 50% and lower… I’m just saying… 

Today’s U.S. Data Cupboard print the Case/Shiller Home Price Index for Jan… And we’ll also see the STUPID Consumer Confidence which is normally a check of the pulse of the stock market, and considering its current state of dismay, I would have to think that this data will show a huge drop… 

To recap… The dollar continues to defy gravity and rally in the face of many items that should be deep sixing the currency…  Gold & Silver lost their early morning gains to the SPTs as the day went along… The price of Oil continues to rise, and as long as the war carries on, we’ll see the price of Oil react the same way… And the Fed is buying bonds… I have to think that this qualifies as QE, but I head long ago that they were forbidden from every saying that phrase ever again… 

For What It’s Worth…  I mentioned this above but thought I’d feature it in the FWIW section today… This is about the drop in the usage of the dollar by Global Banks and it can be found here: Status of US Dollar as Global Reserve Currency: USD Share Drops to 31-Year Low as Central Banks Diversify into Other Currencies & Gold | Wolf Street

Or, here’s your snippet: “But they’ve been loading up on assets in other currencies, and their total holdings of foreign exchange reserves have ballooned, while their USD-assets have remained nearly flat for over 10 years. So the share of USD-denominated exchange reserves dropped to 56.8% of total foreign exchange reserves in Q4, the lowest since 1994, according to the IMF’s data on Currency Composition of Official Foreign Exchange Reserves, released on Friday.

It has been zigzagging down toward the 50% line for years. It does have consequences. And it has been there before.

USD-denominated foreign exchange reserves are US securities held by central banks other than the Fed. They include US Treasury securities, US mortgage-backed securities (MBS), US agency securities, US corporate bonds, and other USD-denominated assets.

After a long plunge from a peak share in 1977, the dollar’s share broke through the 50%-line in 1990 and dropped further in 1991. This period from the mid-1970s through 1991 was accompanied by waves of sky-high inflation and interest rates, four recessions, including the nasty Double-Dip recession, and high unemployment. And other central banks lost confidence in the US dollar.

But then the economy picked up, inflation calmed, the Dotcom Bubble began to perform miracles on a daily basis, confidence returned, and USD denominated assets became desirable again.

Enter the euro. European politicians were talking about “parity” with the dollar until the Euro Debt Crisis began in 2009. Since then, the euro lost share and then stalled, as central banks diversified into other currencies, and since 2021, into dozens of smaller “non-traditional reserve currencies,” as the IMF calls them. Throughout, the dollar’s share zigzagged down toward the 50% line.

Chuck Again… Let’s hope that all those bad things that went on in the 70’s don’t return, but… I’m afraid we can do all the hoping, wishing and praying and it’s not going to change the direction the U.S. is heading… I’m just saying… 

Market  Prices 3/31/2026: American Style: A$.6872, kiwi .5717, C$ .7173, euro 1.1472, sterling 1.3208, Swiss $1.2495, European Style: rand 17.1189, krone 9.7657, SEK 9.5489, forint 335.73, zloty 3.7427, koruna 21.3730, RUB 81.27, yen 159.57, sing 1.2899, HKD 7.8394, INR 94.81, China 6.9060, peso 18.05, BRL 5.2274, BBDXY 1,221, Dollar Index 100.35, Oil $103.81, 10-year 4.31%, Silver $73.20, Platinum $1,936.00, Palladium $1,492.00, Copper $5.53, and Gold… $4.583

That’s if for today… Well, our Blues are 4 points out of the playoffs with 10 games to go until the playoffs start… The Blues lost a heartbreaker last night to the Sharks… UGH!  Cardinals lost, Blues lost… a bad day at the OK Corral for my teams yesterday. It’s Holy Week, so I’m trying to be the best person / writer I can be without being facetious… Now that will be a monumental event if I can succeed!  The Final Four have survived the NCAA Basketball Tournament… UConn, Michigan, Arizona, and Illinois will duke it out this coming weekend… Saturday will be a day to veg out on the couch and watch the games to decide who plays in the championship game Monday… Bob Dylan takes us to the finish line today with his song: Knocking On Heaven’s Door… I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!

Chuck Butler