million dollar question

Good morning and welcome to HUMP DAY! I’m either going to be short and sweet or late (maybe a combination of both) today. My grandsons Sean and Conor are coming to spend the day with grandpa! Wahoo!! Edison Lighthouse greets me this morning with their 1970 hit, “Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes).”

The New York Spot Prices showed weak gains yesterday with Gold closing up $3.90 settling for $1,287.50, Silver was up $0.15 to $17.10, and Platinum gave us the strongest gains closing up $16.00 at $931. In overnight trading Gold is up an additional $1.30, Silver is unchanged, and Platinum has lost $4.00. The million dollar question is if the PM’s can continue their upward trend?

To answer that question, let’s first look to the U.S. dollar. The Fed has insisted that a 2% inflation is “core” to our economic stability. I think this group of academic economists are wrong, but that’s a whole other story for another blog. Suffice it to say that I see a 2% annual inflation rate extended over the average person’s life cutting the purchasing power of his/her paycheck by 75%! Anyway, Janet Yellen and her crew set the target at 2% and almost achieved that last December. But we seemed stuck at 1.6% through July 2107 and in August we achieved a measly 1.3%. With the 33,000 job decline in September, I can’t see inflation even achieving that. Couple that with the fact that Janet Yellen’s last Fed meeting is in December and her intense desire to leave a positive legacy as reason that I don’t anticipate seeing another rate hike this year. With no rate hike in the remaining quarter of FY17 I don’t expect a PM damper from the dollar.

The next news item that I believe positively effects precious metals is North Korea. Reuters is reporting that North Korea is preparing a long range missile test in the coming week(s). It’s being reported that this missile is expected to be able to reach the continental U.S. Whether this is accurate or not, continued testing and belligerent communique between the White House and North Korea aren’t calming the markets, so I anticipate a certain amount of safe-haven precious metal buying.

Finally, in investment news, Wall Street will begin reporting 3rd quarter results starting tomorrow with JPMorgan and Citigroup. However, overall trading has dropped from the same period last year and top executives with JPMorgan Citigroup, Bank of America and Goldman Sachs are struggling with what is anticipated as a 15-20 percent decline. This does not bode well for the rest of the exchange as I expect the rest to follow in their footsteps.

In a nutshell, I’m seeing positive indications as to why owning a bit of gold, silver, and platinum are sound if not great ideas!

The grandboys are here and waiting on grandpa to come play! So play I will!!!

Well, I’ll let that be it for today. Go out there and make a difference! See ya’ll later!

*Disclaimer: Precious Metal Musings™ is written for entertainment and news purposes only and should not be used in making purchases and/or sales of precious metals.