- dollar gets bought yesterday and last night
- No bonus for you!
Good Day… And a Tom Terrific Tuesday to you! I think we’re getting somewhere on straightening out our distribution problems… Not ready for Prime Time just yet, but getting somewhere… And I jumped the gun a bit yesterday saying that the FDIC had given approval to Frank Trotter’s Battle Bank… Frank sent me a note and said it was a “temporary approval”… Whatever the heck that means! The NFL’s Conference Championship games will be played this Sunday, with the Chiefs at Ravens, and the Lions at 49er’s… Should be good games! Winter in S. Florida is coming to an end, and by Sunday this week we’ll be back in the mid 80’s… NICE! My kids have had all kinds of inclement weather in January back home… So, I’m not going to complain about 70’s here… The great Rev. Al Green greets me this morning with his song: Love And Happiness…
Well… the selling of the dollar in the overnight market ended Sunday night once the NY traders arrived at their respective desks… And yesterday the dollar got bought, not at breakneck speed, but got bought, nonetheless. The BBDXY gained 2 index points from Friday’s close… Gold & Silver fought back big time yesterday to turn negative overnight prices to positive prices on the day… Gold gained, are you ready for this? 20-cents! But it had fought back from $24 down overnight… And Silver gained 9-cents, after being down 19-cents overnight. Gold closed at $2,022.40, and Silver closed at $22.24…
The European Central Bank and the Bank of England both are meeting later this week to discuss rates… I don’t expect either of them to move one way or the other. But knowing that these two were going to meet this week, probably kept a lid on the dollar’s upward movement yesterday…
The price of Oil remained trading in the $73 handle yesterday, and Bonds didn’t get sold further with the 10-year’s yield remaining at 4.10% on Monday. I do believe that Oil’s $2 bounce over the weekend was a result of the fire at the Russian Oil refinery, that was caused by Ukrainian drones… Speaking of the war between Ukraine, and Russia, I do believe that it will peter out this year, and become a non-factor by year’s end… It’s not like we can all celebrate world peace then, though…
The Japanese yen is really feeling the strain of not having a rate hike in its back pocket, like it had before… Yen, is back to moving toward 150 again, and knowing that, I truly expect the Bank of Japan (BOJ) to start jawboning in an attempt to stop the bleeding in yen… But what will they say? That they are looking toward hiking rates? When the last inflation report pretty much put the kyboshes on that thought!
In the overnight markets last night… They (traders) continued to push the dollar higher, not with conviction, but higher, as the BBDXY gained 1.70 index points overnight. Before I retired last night, I checked the markets, and the dollar was getting sold, so I went to bed thinking that this morning would show a currency rally… But that was not to be, as something spooked the markets overnight, and they bought dollars… Gold is up a tiny bit this morning (+$2) in the early trading… And Silver is up 7-cents to start the day…
The price of Oil remains trading in the $73 handle, and the 10-year saw 3 more basis points added to its yield overnight and starts the day with a 4.13% yield.
I read a report last night that talked about how Copper is better prepared to perform in 2024, than Gold… Wow! I thought, seeing the headline, because I’m of the opinion that Gold is going to have a very good year… So, I read the report and it’s all tied to the supply issue in Copper that I’ve talked about many times in the past. There’s a HUGE demand for Copper from the industrial side, and the ability to deliver the needed copper supply is dwindling… So, while I agree that supply and demand should dictate price, we’ve seen these past years of the “everything bubble” that supply and demand is pushed to the wayside… But if it comes into play here, I agree that Copper should have a very good year…
The Chinese renminbi saw a huge increase by the Peoples Bank of China (PBOC) last night… There were reports that China was implementing another large sum of money to stimulate the economy, and I guess the PBOC decided that that the renminbi was too weak, so they corrected that!
Well, according to Janet Yellen, U.S. Treasury Secretary, the U.S. is doing just fine, and there’s no need to worry… And then there was this article on Bloomberg.com, that indicates that she might not be speaking the truth… let’s listen in: “US workers are getting smaller bonuses, a sign that belt-tightening employers aren’t as concerned about losing talent as in recent years.
The average cash bonus paid to employees last month was $2,145, down 21% from the previous year, according to payroll software company Gusto, which tracks payments made by more than 300,000 small businesses. Every industry posted a decline, ranging from 3.8% for technology firms to 36% for tourism and transportation companies. Not only were bonuses smaller, but fewer workers got them in most industries.”
Chuck again… You know, back in the late 60’s or early 70’s, $2,145 bonus wouldn’t be something to turn your nose up to… But, more than 50 years later? I can see where that would have busted my buttons for sure!
I guess it proves that something is better than nothing…
OK… onto to something else… Well, yesterday, I was treated to (and I use that word liberally here) to a video from Kitco that featured Harry Dent… There was a short time at the Sovereign Society that I worked with Harry Dent, and quite frankly, I thought he was a “little out there”… Then years later when everything under the sun and moon was getting sold (2007,2008) Harry Dent said that Gold would fall to $750… Well, it never got close to that, and so I just marked that down to an error, but not a biggie… His video yesterday, was pure gloom and doom stuff that if he has been right about stuff in the past, you would be shaking in your boots right now, after watching it… I’ll include it here in case anyone wants to hear what Harry Dent has to say… Mega crash is coming in 2024: This is the signal that everything is about to selloff — Harry Dent | Kitco News
I have to question myself as to why I even gave him the space I did in this letter… Well, there is something that he said in his spiel, that make abundant sense, and that is in the past it took 18 months for rate hikes to work their way through and show what they did to the economy… So, in March 2022 through June of last year… 525 Basis Points in rate hikes, and all of those haven’t even begun to work their way through the economy… I see this as a real problem for the economy, folks… Most people thing we skated through this rate hike cycle, like Michelle Kwan… But the best or worst as I see it, is yet to come…
The U.S. Data Cupboard yesterday had the Leading Indicators for Dec. I told you yesterday, that I thought that the report would remain negative, and that’s just what it did, which now makes it 18 months of falling leading Indicators… This is one of the two forward looking pieces of data that we get, everything else is backward looking, and in some cases the report is 2 months old by the time it prints… So, this is report is important, folks…
To recap… The dollar was bought yesterday, and in the overnight markets last night. Not frenzied buying, just buying and the BBDXY has gained 3 index points since Friday… Gold is up a tiny bit this morning, Oil is flat, and bonds are getting sold. Harry Dent says the sky is falling… will he be right? I guess we’ll see… And Company bonuses are down, and some were not given… Hmmm…
For What It’s Worth…Well, this article about tells it all… That the will of the people isn’t even a thought in our elected leaders’ minds… You see, that in New Jersey, the garden state, a bill was passed unanimously, without a single “no” vote, but when sent to the Gov. he vetoed it… Wait, What? yes, the article can be found here: NJ Governor Vetoes Popular Gold and Silver Sales Tax Exemption Bill (moneymetals.com)
Or, here’s your snippet: “New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has unilaterally killed a bill that would have exempted the sales tax on purchases of gold and silver.
Bill A5294 / S1825 had passed out of both committees and both chambers of the New Jersey legislature without a single “no” vote. This popular bill had more than a dozen co-sponsors and had unanimous approval in each legislative chamber. Despite this Gov. Murphy chose not to enact the bill into law through the use of a pocket veto.
According to Bloomberg, “a pocket veto only applies to bills that passed in the last 10 days of a two-year legislative session, and is the only kind of veto in which the governor doesn’t return the bill to the legislature for a possible override.”
Alabama, Tennessee, Virginia, Mississippi, and Ohio have all recently enacted legislation to exempt gold and silver from state sales tax, or extend their existing exemption on the metals. In total 43 states have ended sales tax on gold and silver — including all three of New Jersey’s neighboring states.
Levying sales taxes on precious metals makes no sense because they held for resale. Sales taxes are typically levied on final consumer goods. Computers, shirts, and shoes carry sales taxes because the consumer is “consuming” the good. Precious metals are inherently held for resale, not “consumption,” making the imposition of sales taxes on precious metals illogical from the start.”
Chuck again… Well, like I said above, so much for the will of the people, right? This country is becoming more and more like a banana republic in my opinion…
Market Prices 1/23/2024: American Style: A$.6578, kiwi .6089, C$ .7419, euro 1.0865, sterling 1.2705, Swiss $1.1503, European Style: rand 19.1499, krone 10.5226, SEK 10.4535, forint 354.52, zloty 4.0335, koruna 22.7272, RUB 88.47, yen 147.95, sing 1.3406, HKD 7.8229, INR 83.16, China 7.1708, peso 17.30, BRL 4.9849, BBDXY 1,237.71, Dollar Index 103.45, Oil $73.87, 10-year 4.13%, Silver $22.31, Platinum $899.00, Palladium $954.00, Copper $3.78, and Gold…. $2,034.20
That’s it for today… Not much went on yesterday down here… The wind really has the ocean angry and this morning, it looks even angrier! I’m reading a new/ different book now, having finished the last one in 3 days… The Reacher series on Amazon Prime ended last week for season 2… The new Reacher is more like the Reacher described in the books by Lee Child… Now I have to wait for Season 3! UGH! Our Blues play at the Flames tonight, late… I won’t be able to stay up to watch them… Go Blues! Same with my beloved Mizzou Tigers that play their game late tonight… UGH! Three Dog Night takes us to the finish line today with their song: Easy To Be Hard… The very first Album I every bought, as a kid, was Three Dog Night live at the Forum… I played that vinyl over and over again! I hope you have a Tom Terrific Tuesday today and will do your very best to Be Good To Yourself!
Chuck Butler