open my eyes...

Good morning and welcome to another Top-Shelf Thursday! The Hollies greet me this morning with their 1972 hit, “Long Cool Woman In A Black Dress.”

The New York Spot Prices began moving up yesterday with Gold closing up .90 at $1,277.20, Silver was up .02 to $16.93, and Platinum was up 1.00 to close at $922. In overnight trading all but one of the precious metals continued to gain with gold picking up another .30, silver .02, and platinum losing 1.00.

In other markets, the Dow was down 112.30 closing at 23,329.46 and currencies were mixed against the dollar with the Euro, British Pound, and Swiss Franc all losing ground to the dollar while the Aussies, Japan, China, Hong Kong, Mexico, and Russia all gained.

So yesterday, both the durable goods and new home sales reports were released with surprising results. If you read the blog. I mentioned that economists were expecting a gain in durable goods of 0.7%. What we got was an astounding 2.2%. The media called it “moderate,” but I say that if you get 3X what you’re expecting, that’s almost in the awesome category! It was the same with new home sales. Reuters had polled economists and the prediction was a 0.9 drop to 555,000 units after a spectacular August of 560,000 new home sales. What we got was a sales surge of 18.9% or 667,000 units. Folks, that IS in the awesome category! New home sales haven’t been this good since October, 2007. That’s 10 years! No wonder precious metals have been taking a back seat as of late.

I know…I know… you’re saying, okay then. If that’s the case, why were precious metals gaining yesterday and again in the overnight markets. If the economy is doing so well, why did stocks dip, the dollar fluctuate, and precious metals gain after all of that good news?

Investor’s Business Daily reported, “Preliminary data showed volume was higher on both the NYSE and the Nasdaq vs. Tuesday's trade. Investors focused on Wednesday's mixed earnings reports and concerns about tax reform in Washington, largely ignoring positive durable-goods-orders data and a spike in new-home sales for September.”

The Wall Street Journal reported, “A raft of downbeat earnings sparked broad declines in U.S. stocks Wednesday, sending the Dow industrials down 112 points in their worst day since early September.”

So let’s take a step back and look at this from the 30,000 feet level. We had good news from the government concerning durable goods and new home sales. Earlier this month the government had reported that unemployment was down to 4.2% which is technically 0.5% below what is considered “full employment.” Basically everything from the “Swamp” is awesome news! But apparently, with less than stellar earnings being reported coupled with tax reform concern and then icing it all with North Korea announcing their plans to proceed with an atmospheric nuclear test (that’s EMP folks) over the Pacific, all of the markets are strained at the moment.

But don’t let this get the best of you. Remember, today is a “Top-Shelf Thursday!”

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.