- 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 2nd revision of 4th 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