What occurred on Friday was as dramatic a market manipulation as we have ever seen. It defied common sense and cut across both the gold and dollar markets. The dust has cleared from Friday’s market nonsense and what we can now observe is the strongest of suggestions the US is under enormous financial market stress. As a result, they have pulled out all the stops to keep potential chaos from kicking into becoming reality.
Let us lay out the scene first:
*President Bush’s popularity poll numbers keep shrinking and are in the high 30’s across the board. Should the US stock and real estate markets be nailed, his numbers will disappear.
*Unending problems in Iraq, the developing scandal why we went there in the first place, and growing deficit problems are finally seeing the light of day in toto and finally having their effect. The US stock market was propped up by the PPT last Friday and caught fire for an entire week. However, US intermediate/long-term interest rates are on the move higher. Efforts by the Fed and others to keep these rates from rising to problematical levels are failing as the rates of the key 10-year T note and 30-year bond have blown decisively through strong resistance. The move up in both has been orderly. Should they blow out from here, the ensuing higher rates are going to affect both the stock and real estate markets in a meaningful way, which will be anything but constructive.
The US is desperate to keep the foreigners financing our debt. Without their support, our goose is cooked. There is an important US Treasury debt auction next week. To make sure the foreigners stay in the game, it is imperative they retain their confidence in the US and in our markets … not an easy task with what is going on in Washington. One simplistic way for the US to achieve its short-term goals was to ramp up the dollar and knock gold down. The scenario for the coming Treasury auction was laid out brilliantly by Mike Hartman at http://www.financialsense.com. From Thursday’s MIDAS:
"Overall I don’t expect to see much from gold and silver over the next week or so until the Treasury auctions are out of the way. I have yet to see any noteworthy price movements during the three days of "quarterly refunding." Keep a close eye on gold to see a re-test of $460. In the past, the Friday and Monday just prior to the auctions have seen the short sellers come into the gold pit with guns blazing! I’m not saying it’s going to happen, just noting patterns from prior auctions…they have a tendency to repeat! It is absolutely imperative for the Treasury to sell all its debt…just watch next week while the markets appear to be in a coma until the debt is sold."