Dull trading in gold today as most players remain hesitant to place any large bets ahead of this evening's speech by outgoing Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. Additionally, the bulk of market participants are waiting for the release of the actual FOMC minutes from their most recent meeting. The idea is that it will give them a better or deeper look into the thinking occurring among the majority of Federal Reserve voting and non-voting members and thus some clues into their next move in regards to the timing of any Tapering.
I think some shorts rang the cash register and took partial profits ahead of the speech/minutes just in case there might be some surprises although I personally am not expecting anything other than what we have already been conditioned to think based on the recent comments by some Fed governors.
Volume was mediocre at best; lackluster is another word I would use to describe it.
Wonder of wonders, we actually got a wee bit of downside follow through in the S&P 500 pit today. Maybe it was selling related to Maria Bartilomo's reported move over to the Fox Business Channel. Now, if Rick Santelli would make a move over there, we would have no reason whatsoever to watch CNBC.
Even with the follow through to the downside, there is no significant chart damage other than the most short term of signals, which is more for scalpers and other short-term oriented traders.
By the way, did any of you readers see the report talking about how the payroll numbers were deliberately distorted (upwardly of course) just prior to the presidential election back in November 2012? Some of us were marveling how it was nearly inconceivable at the time that the unemployment number would miraculously get down below the all-important threshold of 8% that Obama had set for judging the success of his measures to supposedly improve the economy. It undercut Romney's argument that the economy was flat and that job growth was anemic just in time for voters to make a decision before heading out to the polls. Pathetic isn't it....
Many talk about gold, silver, platinum being "PRECIOUS" metals meaning that they are relatively rare in comparison to more commonly found metals. Methinks the MOST PRECIOUS COMMODITY out there right now is the TRUTH. There certainly isn't any coming from the current administration about much of anything.
I am not going to post any chart of gold up today as it is basically meaningless until we get through the release of the FOMC minutes tomorrow. Barring any unforeseen developments elsewhere, I expect gold to tread water until then.
The Goldman Sachs Commodity Index (GSCI) continued to head lower today even with a bit of mild weakness in the US Dollar. The same theme of general selling across the complex continues.
The biggest move in the markets that I trade regularly that I noticed today was in the cattle which were slammed lower, especially feeders as high priced beef seems to be choking off domestic demand right now. Corn popped higher again, along with wheat as the usual chatter about low prices stimulating demand showed up once more. Beans continued to see selling as S. American planting weather seems fairly benign at this point. Traders are looking for large acreage numbers again down there. Demand for the grains/beans is going to be the big wild card and the big unknown. Compared to the prices of last year, both beans and corn are bargains right now. It is not a question of whether demand will pick up at these lower prices - It most certainly will. The question is whether this demand will be strong enough to absorb the big supplies of both and whether or not farmers are going to let go of stocks or hang on until after the first of the year.