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The Signs were out there, that’s for certain. They glow more balefully–frighteningly, perhaps — by the day.  Soon you will find that their light will transform into warmth, and voila! — you are out of the cold.  This week we saw the $HUI:$Gold ratio approach it’s late 2008 nadir, despite the lack of any similar shade of trouble in the SPY or any other major index for that matter.  For many who have been suffering through this mind searing mini-bear in the miners, it was only one more pencil in the vile jellies.  For me, it was the light at the end of the tunnel.

Adding reassurance were the hairshirt boys and the plungers.  The hairshirt boys talked about “$21 dollar silver” and gold “heading back to $1200” this week.  More music to my ears.  Then the dear plungers.  Those who can always be counted on to ring the bell at the exact wrong time were actually starting to short stocks that had been pummelled for months now, quality be damned.   Again, the scent of ambrosia, the ply of relief. 

Can anyone predict the future?  Only in Tom Hanks movies involving haunted vending machines, my friend.  But there are time tested truths for all markets, and for the precious metal markets especially.   Perhaps the hardest and truest is that both the bulls and the bears will suprise the hell out of you in this space.  Such is the lot of a smaller capitalized, politically sensitive commodity group not exactly known for it’s GE-like management style.  But an ancillary truth resides in the recovery from both a bull and a bear… namely, the harder the band is pulled either up or down, the greater the snap back to the up or downside.

Recently we’ve seen near-unprecedented disintermediation between the price of the miners and their underlying commodity in both gold and silver.  Some of this is a result of input (cost) prices rising while commodity prices are remaining stagnant or falling off.  Some is the result of rational hedging, and some the result of anticipatory momentum trading.  It’s this last that has brought us to our most recent state, where one might say the blood in the streets approaches the door-level on our three-step brownstones.

But make no mistake, things are not going to be “different this time.”  We’ve seen this all before, and the results have been similarly spectacular.   We may have one more final “terrier shake” to throw the last remaining weak hands off the bus, but I have little doubt that the Fidelitys, the Blackrocks and the other large funds are right now gobbling up even more SLW and RGLD and AEM and AUY than they were last quarter.   And AG…. oh my yes, AG.

I expect one more pullback today and perhaps into early next week, but I will initiate buys in AEM at any price under $40, if I am so lucky.  Get yourself a dividend while you enjoy the rebound, why don’t you?  You can always use the extra beer money, no?

As for our friends in the smaller silver market, I would think next week the safer bet, but if we see some pullback today, I wouldn’t gainsay your taking some risk.  After all, for EXK to get back to a mere $7.00 (!!) is an almost 21% move from here.  EXK will be $10 before next Christmas, if my predictions weigh out properly.

Best to you all.  

 

 

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Moober can vouch for this.  Woodshedder and Fly as well.  Back in 2009, after one of the worst precious metal (and overall market) meltdowns in my lifetime, I started to plow back into the precious metal markets in the middle to third week of February.  I was early.

Oh boyo, those were a painful two weeks plus, I’ll tell ya.  But as I recall, we bottomed right around the end of the first week of March (the sixth or seventh?). It was glory days for the PM’s after that, right into 2010.

So I was feeling real good about getting back in during the first week of February.  Real good.  I guess I should have held off maybe two more weeks, eh?  Ah well, let’s just say that we are running into the same exact kind of  egregiously oversold market conditions we saw back then.  Given the tenor of the rest of the market, and the gobbets of fake money-digits entering the global economy via the cake-batter hoses of the world’s central banks, this is an insane and untenable condition.

It will not continue.

I will not add here, but wait until the turn is in.  I’ve saved a little something for the insanity.

You should too…

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Here’s a stock I’ve purchased quite a bit of in the last week, pal.  North American Palladium (PAL) caught my eye because it showed a bit of a sea change on the long term chart, and this past week, it’s established itself up above that long term trend line. Check this out:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can it get to $3 bucks from here?  Pal, I wish I could tell ya for sure.  Alls (sic) I know is that’s a lot of buying in 2013 (black volume sticks), and the trend has changed.  I’m holding onto my stack until at least June, so let’s see.

I also like AUY right now, and of course, you should be accumulating RGLD at these ridiculous prices, and SLW on every opportunity.

Best to youze guys.

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Sorry I haven’t been around to keep company.  I’m being kept by many companies.   At first glance, if you look at my favorite universe, it seems like it’s hand holding time.  However, I’ve looked over my long term charts tonight and I can’t believe how cheap some of these miners are trading right now.  SLW has held up reasonably well, but AG and EXK are Christmas presents here.  Get them for your kids.  RGLD continues to take hits, but mein gott it’s tasty here.  I like AUY and even BAA, as well.

I held off the whole month of January, and did not spend any “year end funds.”  That changes tomorrow.  I’m getting more of “all of the above,” but will keep some dry powder for further Crazy Eddie liquidation sales.  Everyone is printing folks.  Every one is racing to the bottom.  If you think that will hurt the precious, you need to have a look at how much Blackrock and Fidelity own of RGLD, and how much they’ve accumulated recently.  If you think they are the dumb money, well… God bless.

Best to you all.

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Depending on whose figures you credit, increasing marginal taxes on “the rich” — otherwise known as every schmuck “fortunate” enough to make more than $250,000… including you suckers who live in the Northeast U.S.  and metropolitan California, where this amount will get you a second car and maybe a third bedroom — will raise anywhere from $75 to $90 billion dollars next year.

On the other hand, next year’s budget deficit, depending on how you cost Obamacare, could amount to anywhere from $1.3 to $1.6 TRILLION and higher.   Despite their proposed tax increase delivering far less than 10%  of that proposed deficit, the Administration now seems to have little interest in bartering said tax increase for an agreement to cut spending to a degree that might provide actual deficit relief.  Of course many kind words have been uttered about a “future plan” to implement cuts, but Lord knows, we’ve seen such promises go up in smoke many times since the Reagan era, when that bait and switch was first used by the venerable Tip O’Neil.

So the question arises:  Could the Republicans be dumb enough to trample their long held principles about raising taxes in a recessionary economy, and accept a blind tax increase without defined, commensurate, and indeed exponential, cuts in spending in exchange?  Would they sell out their birthright and last bargaining chip merely to escape the glare of Ming the Merciless?

Well, I find it hard to believe, but I’ve seen some crazy stuff in the last month.   So who knows?  Maybe they will make it easy for all of us.

Perhaps in the end, the cynics are correct, and the only way out is to follow the wormhole to it’s very core, and burst out the other side at the dawn, once again.   One thing is for certain, however… “Things fall apart… the center cannot hold.”

Pax.

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PS — you who come here for an occasional discussion of PM stocks….  I really think the sell off in AUY is as much an opportunity as the sell off in RGLD  last week.  One of my favorites.  Also, I continue to like AG here.

Bless us all, every one.

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[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1U9CL8OXCQc 450 300]

 

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If there’s one thing this recent election has taught me, it’s that large money works, and especially so for incumbents. I have to admit, given the Obama Administration’s horrible economic performance ($16T in debt, 26 mm out of work, 47 mm on food stamps), its near-totalitarian interference in markets via regulatory and legislative fiat (EPA coal & oil policies, Obamacare) and the series of scandals so common to the Chicago Machine politics of post-electoral pay-offs (Solyndra), extra-judicial bullying (Fast and Furious) and outright criminal incompetence (Benghazi), I thought there was no way the American people could re-up for more. But I guess enough money was spent, in just enough critical counties, to sufficiently demonize a genuinely nice guy who was trying to play it “nice” (probably to his chagrin) right to the end. Kudos to the players – the pros – like Axelrod and Jarrett. They had a plan and it worked.

Mr. Romney, you will be second guessed to a fare the well, and your lack of even McCain-level support will surely continue to raise questions. Perhaps there were enough Cain Thalers out there who wanted to see the whole system washed out, the Dems hung with it, and the process begun a new. I think you could have been more aggressive in the final weeks, and you took too much from the first debate win. I will not gainsay you, however, as I know your 20 years of unpaid service to your fellow citizens stand as their own testimony.

Unfortunately, reality doesn’t need a vote, and reality is now coming on a fast track. The dismal economic performance we’ve endured these past four years– hoping they would end mercifully this past week– is now slated to continue, barring some sea change in the Obama Directive. Anyone want to bet on the POTUS changing his stripes any time soon? The President’s recent announcement that increased taxes on the employment engine were necessary for his ongoing cooperation with the “Fiscal Cliff” negotiations should be fair warning. Thus far the analysis seems to read that he has learned nothing.

I would take some solace in the possibility of a “Bill Clinton” final four years, if only the Senate had mellowed. It did not, however, and in fact got more radical with the addition of two new far left Senators from the States of Massachusetts and Wisconsin. Bewildering especially was the inclusion of Elizabeth Warren in the Hall of the Hundred Most Powerful. Apparently, after being annealed on the moral forge of vehicular manslaughter, long term race fraud was just a mere bagatelle for the majority of the Bay State’s citizenry. A “Blue State,” for sure.

Given that there will be no Gingrich Congress to arm wrestle the much more ideological Obama to fiscal discipline, I expect nothing but more fiat excess and Executive consolidation. As a result, businesses will continue to be reluctant to invest, capital will “hide,” and more unemployment, crime and municipal stress will result as our debts and long term liabilities continue to skyrocket. None of this will be good for the long term health of the Republic, if in fact a republic we still own. I know even the famed Mr. Franklin (“You have a republic, Madame, if you can keep it!) might harbor his doubts at this gray pass.
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It’s ironic, I guess, that despite my despondency, I’m still reasonably well situated for this turn of events. Do I own growth stocks like AAPL and DDD? Do I own hot retail like ULTA or CAB? Do I own… (ahhh, you get the picture!). NO! I own a bunch of commodity plays that I am using as a hedge against what I like to call Bernanke’s Despair and you can call “QE (n+1).” We are staring at unfunded liabilities out the wazoo, and entitlement spending alone that outstrips current tax receipts by hundreds of billions of dollars. Bad debt and mispriced assets remain on balance sheets, particularly on those of your resident Too Big To Fail Bank (no Dodd-Frank). There is only one way out of this mess, and it’s the same thing I’ve been preaching to you for the last five years of our journey. PRINTPRINTPRINTPRINTPRINT.

You know the usual suspects, so I won’t belabor them. In particular right now, I like the way ERX looks right now (for those of you asking me about the oil plays in the last comment section). I like it better than UCO, too, fwiw, as it is bouncing right now off its 200 week EMA ($44.72). I don’t think it has many days left to pop. I of course love RGLD below $90. A gift to your grandchildren, as I’ve been telling you since it was in its low $30’s. For the speculators amongst us, keep an eye on TC… I think it’s finally getting it’s mojo back.

The next four years should be interesting… in the way of the ancient Chinese curse “May you live in interesting times.” Unfortunately, I believe China will be the least of our troubles, and soon we will look nostalgically back on the times when all we had to worry about was burrito accounting fraud.

Peace be upon you all.
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