"When misguided public opinion honors what is despicable and despises what is honorable, punishes virtue and rewards vice, encourages what is harmful and discourages what is useful, applauds falsehood and smothers truth under indifference or insult, a nation turns its back on progress and can be restored only by the terrible lessons of catastrophe." … Frederic Bastiat


Evil talks about tolerance only when it’s weak. When it gains the upper hand, its vanity always requires the destruction of the good and the innocent, because the example of good and innocent lives is an ongoing witness against it. So it always has been. So it always will be. And America has no special immunity to becoming an enemy of its own founding beliefs about human freedom, human dignity, the limited power of the state, and the sovereignty of God. – Archbishop Chaput

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Tuesday, October 22, 2013

Are we Beginning to see a loss of Confidence in the US Dollar?

Based on the price action, the answer to that question is it is certainly looking like that. The Dollar is within a hair's breadth of a strong region of support. If it does not hold, we will know the answer to this question is "YES".

I have also noticed that in conjunction with this move lower in the Dollar, interest rates at the long end of the yield curve are also beginning to drop once again. That is not good for the Dollar.


The catalyst for this was today's stunningly poor payrolls number for the month of September. Forecasts were for 180,000 jobs being created. Instead we got a pathetic 148,000! With that, it was a big "KERPLUNK" for the US Dollar and that sent gold careening higher as once again any notion of a slowdown or "taper" in the Fed bond buying program was immediately shelved.

It has been my opinion for some time now that gold will not mount any sort of SUSTAINED move higher unless there is a loss of CONFIDENCE in the US Dollar, which is in effect the same thing as a loss of confidence in the US political leadership and to a certain degree, monetary authorities. Trying to maintain an objective view of this when it comes to my own beloved nation is difficult at times to do but after watching the President's 1-800 INFOMERCIAL on the failed rollout of his healthcare law, it does not take a big stretch of the imagination to say that he looks like a cheap carnival barker pedaling a batch of snake oil instead of the responsible and serious leader of the free World which global investors expect.

Global investors are not stupid nor are they reckless with their capital. One shudders to think what would be happening to the US equity markets were it not for the fact that most of the $85 billion being created each month by the Fed is being stuffed into them. That is the only reason that they have not plummeted along with the Dollar.

All I can add to this is to say "Watch Out" if the US Dollar Index cracks chart support. That is far more important than any public opinion poll citing favorability numbers because it is a poll in which investors are voting and telling you exactly what they think about the current leadership of the nation.