Technical difficulty (updated 315 pm)

 FAZ returns to the lower megaphone range, but for how long? 

FAS in a near-term pennant/flag with room to go higher? 

10:28 am (Hawaii) Price still matters.

There's really no reason why technicals need to be discounted in a market as schizo as this. Almost everything is subject to headline risk, more on the bear side than bull, and today's move up in the indices - Dow +272, +2.5%, 11,043; Nas +33, +1.35%, 2,516; S&P 500 +25, +2.3%, 1,162) - was no shock. Yet I tried to trade against it early in the day even while it should've been clear that selling FAZ and buying FAS was best in the financials.

I finally quit on FAZ as a daytrade at 65+, taking a second small loss on the day. Totally avoidable, and even my own chart with megaphone patters and the fairly recent pennant/flag pattern, FAZ looked ready for some profit-taking. FAZ is at 61.71 after hours, off the intraday low of 60.86.

FAS climbed 11.3% to 11.72. Once it gapped up at the open (while FAZ gapped down), it should've been clear as day. The machines that own this market often trade on patterns and technicals, particularly when there is no headline risk in the near term. Gap up, finishes strong. Gap down, closes weakly. That's just what happened in FAS and FAZ.

One true oddity is that AGQ and ZSL finished in the red. AGQ hit a near-term low this morning at 96.75, but rallied and is at 114.74 after hours (-3.3%). ZSL is down 7% to 17.99. How can a bull ETN and a bear ETN on the same metal (silver) each be down that much? Yes, there is something fucking rotten in Denmark. That's paper silver. No regrets about steering clear of paper silver for weeks and months now. I'm still convinced that the puppeteers are generally long gold and short silver. The price action says it all. Bear Stearns' massive short position was left on JPMorgan's lap, and with the backing of govt power, they keep shorting silver and/or covering shorts.

AGQ 1-year

ZSL 1-year

That's not going to cause me to unload a single ounce of physical metal. I just like to know what the realities and probabilities are.

Gold spot price

Silver spot price

Gold at 1520 or so earlier today must've been painful for some people. DGP is well off its day low of 49.66, now at 52.79 after hours. That's still -2.2% for the day, putting DGP at early July levels. After four down days in a row with massive gap downs, can this support level hold? The practical reasons for owning gold are still in play. Whether people believe price is manipulated by puppeteers or we've simply had a massive profit-taking run, gold may not get any cheaper here at the 1600 level. 

DGP 1-year

DZZ 1-year

This just might be a good time to average in with the physical rather than try and time a grand slam homer. If spot silver keeps selling and later bounces off 21, it'll make some sense to me based on the snapback/rubber band theory I posted recently. It's more fantasy fun than concrete and factual. But it's enough to make anyone think about what could happen if all the stars lined up and gold sold at an untethered, unleashed price. Silver would become the tail of that comet. 

My Regular watch list is 62% green, 37% red, 1 neutral. Many of the leaders traded on solid volume today. FAS was atop the list with strong volume and FAZ closed at the bottom on fairly soft volume. In other words, there are still a lot of traders holding FAZ, probably since the recent dips to 55, 53, even going back a month or two to 50. Whatever dips happen (maybe as low as 40-44), I still see FAZ at 100 eventually due to Euro and US debt crises.

Noticed that GSVC is off the board or something right now. Basic info on my trading platform is "n/a" though Yahoo Finance has it at 14.15 for its last trade. It's going through a secondary offering real soon, not my cup of tea though I tried trading this a couple of months ago. It was a classic case of buying high and selling low. Sure the market was going through effed up gyrations, but price does still matter. Any buy of GSVC below 12 and any sell above 18 would've been Basic Trading 101 regardless of whether you believe in this company (the next CMGI?) or not.

Winners on my Regular watch list were WNR (+10.4%), YOKU (+9.1%), CRR (+8.1%), EXK (+7.5%), TSO (+7.4%), C (+7%), STR (+5.3%), SWY (+5.2%). A load of big winners (above 2%), even NFLX (+2.4%).

My Metals watch list was 43% green, 56% red, 1% neutral. AVL (+17.2%), SVM (+7.5%), EXK, GSS (+4.9%), DZZ (+4.8%) were the leaders.

My focus is still narrowed down to FAZ (and now FAS), paper gold (DGP, DZZ) with an eye on paper silver (AGQ, ZSL) and the leader of retail, AAPL, which rallied from its intraday low of 391 to 402 (-0.4%).

Maybe today was the only big-gain day of the week. Maybe we're in for choppy waters, but range bound. Maybe selling is mostly done for now. Maybe buying also done. I like FAZ below 60. Like it better at 55 or 50. I have more confidence that spot gold has hit a bottom than silver. All cash works fine right now. If the indices are up and precious metals still finish red overall today, I'm not going to fight facts, even with momentum in PMs late in the day.

Update 2:01 pm Could be a trap. Could be the bottom. Gold is going back up at some point. I'm willing to wager that the process has begun, so I got a handful of DGP before after-hours trading closed. 

The Apple effect is golden

Does someone here want an iPad?

7:35 am (Hawaii) You can probably remember the sight of AAPL going up dramatically - from 80 to 200 in one year, for example - only to sell off drastically. You made a great realized or paper profit, wondering what was the justification for a selloff. Sometimes, it was about profit-taking. Sometimes, it was about hedge funds on the verge of collapse, having to raise case (from profitable trade) immediately.

I think gold (down 2.1% to 1,776/oz) and silver (down 4.1% to 39.15) are selling off in this down session for that reason. The hedgies are desperate to raise cash, and they realize they can always go back into gold, particularly, at another time. I woke up a few minutes ago to find the Dow Jones down 255 points. Not a shock since futures were down more than 100 points when I hit the sack last night.

What is a surprise is that AAPL is at 408 after hitting an all-time high of 411. The only news I found in a brief search is that 1 in 6 Americans are now using an electronic reading device. I suppose that's bullish for AAPL and AMZN. But trading in this cut-throat environment means there will eventually - later today? - be immense profit-taking in those two. Last one out, rotten egg.

My Regular watch list is 20% green. TVIX, EDZ, FAZ (+8.7%), ZSL, TZA, VXX ... it looks like 2008 or '09. CMG, GMCR, TLT, AAPL and LULU are also up more than 2%. SBUX is 1.9% up.

My Metals watch list is basically the same, 21% green. FAZ, ZSL, SCO, are the few leaders. ZSL is up 6.6% and DZZ is up 1.8%. Silver continues to be shorted by the banksters, probably the same banksters who claim to be long gold. They are stuck with these immense short positions (JPM), so what else would they do?

I might actually turn on the TV this morning, but they were chattering about Greek default and yadayada yesterday. It's probably more of the same Euro debt crisis/contagion fear. US Dollar up 1.5% to 77.78 and Euro is down 1.1% to 1.36. The FOMC meets on the 21st (Wednesday). I do not want to be extended in any way until after that meeting. Staying all cash for now.

There goes AAPL, back up to 409.90.

Photo: MKT 300 Rodgers

Game Plan Redux

9:43 am (Hawaii) Now that I'm back to cash, what to do? My gut says stay put and see how things unfold leading into and right through Jackson Hole on Friday. Doing less will be doing more. So I remain bullish on physical gold and silver. I have all my coins superglued to my arms, legs, basically my extremities. Not really. But you get the idea.

I. Long/bullish physical PMs.
II. Cash, no equities.
III. Possibly will go short PM paper via ZSL, DZZ.
IV. Pending more Eurocrash news, short banks via FAZ.
V. By Friday (Jackson Hole), prepared to go long via QQQ, AAPL, BIDU, FAS.
VI. After QE3 momentum slows to a halt, riding DGP again. Maybe AGQ.

It'll be interesting to see, if Bernanke speaketh quantitative easing on Friday, how the miners do. They usually trade in tandem with the market, but this could be different. Maybe. I won't touch miners anymore, but I'm watching for entertainment value.

If BB does speaketh of QE3 Friday, I give it a week max of a rocket ride for the market. But it could fizzle out much sooner, maybe even in hours. Maybe on news that SocGen falters, triggering a domino effect across the continent. It's coming. Just a matter of time.

Like nothing ever changed

7:57 am (Hawaii) Just closed your eyes, breathe deeply and this could be a month ago, a season ago. LULU up 10%. GMCR up 9.4%. BIDU up 6%. NFLX, oh, Netflix, up 5.5%. AAPL up 2.5%. Just beautiful, mindless moves higher. YOKU up 5.1%. GOOG 3.5% higher. The effect of free monopoly money, printed to no end by Helicopter Ben.

Problem is, the market is up today without provocation. It was due for a bounce in the midst of this 2 or 3 week slow-motion crash. Gold is down into the 1860 area after flirting with 1915 or so overnight. Silver has backed up to 42.50 after visiting 44.00 again. All natural, as they say. I don't suspect CME mafia involvement this time. It feels like normal profit-taking. Come on. AAPL shouldn't be below 350 anyway. It's up more than $10 to 366+.

When Helicopter Ben alludes to any form of QE3 on Friday, the indices will race higher than today's gains (DJ +1.8%, Nas +2.5%, S&P +1.8%). It could be good for 1,000 points on the S&P 500 (currently 1,142). But there probably won't be another run like QE2. The general public is past the point of fantastical whims and lies. More people know the fractional reserve banking system is the real bubble. Video of riots in major cities across the globe do not lie. So I expect plenty of turbulence and roller coaster action.

I'm trying to leave my modest position in DGP alone, whether it hovers near its high (72.25) or today's low (69.15). I got up around 7 am Hawaii time, so it was much too late to ride today's momentum on the bullish route. Keeping my eyes on AAPL, FAS, DZZ, ZSL. Also QQQ, BIDU. More than likely I do nothing. With DJ up 180 points, maybe it catches fire into the close, or maybe it fizzles a little.

Update 8:08 am CNBC reporting that an earthquake hit Virginia and was felt as far as headquarters up near New York City and far west as Detroit. Market remains near its highs for today. It was a 6.0 quake.

Tail end

8:43 am (Hawaii) Instead of waiting for spot gold's margin-induced decline to bottom, I entered DZZ to ride the bear train. I worked for awhile. I entered at 4.94, 4.95 and chased at 4.98 thinking the momentum of today's fall in gold would trigger more selling. DZZ hit 5.00 momentarily, then gold began a rally from 1731 to 1745.

I got out of DZZ at 4.88, my mental stop trigger. I missed the ride down even though I knew the CME mafia's margin hike yesterday would eventually take effect. In fact, I doubt it's the only hike coming. As long as gold rallies back to 1775 or 1800, there will be more hikes. JP Morgan needs more time to accumulate, short, accumulate, short, etc.

I've been using wider ranges lately, but from this point, I'm going to sell earlier like I used to and at least break even if a trade goes against me. It was a very small loss, small position. DZZ is back at the level of 1-2 hours ago when I started watching it at 4.88. I'm guessing gold goes as low as 1700, maybe back to 1660, but only if there are one or two more margin increases. Not interested in re-entering DZZ for awhile. I caught the back end of this move. Smells like the run is done until the CME mafia acts again.

All in all

The Golden Rule:

Eventually, he who has the gold makes the rules

11:09 am (Hawaii) All in all, my teeny amount of sedentary physical gold did far better today than my active thumbs and fingers in trading. Something to be said there. I tried to outguess the market, the algo machines, and lost on the GSVC trade. Is S&P 500 heading back to 1,333? If it is, GSVC is going back up to 19 and beyond. Even with the ridiculously wide spreads. (Btw, GSVC is now at the original pullback area 15.55) I was hoping for on the move last month to near 20. Lesson is clear: let price come back to your level of conviction instead of chasing!)

But that's the big question, is it not? Are we just going to whipsaw in this range until Jackson Hole on the 26th? Or is this just a dead cat boingboing?

I'm gray area about this, so a small position in AAPL is on deck. BIDU.

Update 11:18 am (Hawaii) Doug Kass on Fast Money says the lows for the year are in. Maybe he and a lot of people really believe this is a repeat of last year. Maybe he knows QE3 is coming. For sure.

"We're now as oversold as we were when Germany invaded France (in WWII)."

If the market rallies from here to New Year's in rip-em-a-new-one fashion, it begins here. Or rather, it began two hours ago — one hour after the FOMC's statement. If the market tanks, I don't want to be 100% long and stubborn.

Which of these possibilities happens first?

• AAPL from 370 to 400
• GSVC from 15 to 20
• Spot gold from 1750 to 1650
• Spot silver from 38 to 35
• FAS from 15.50 to 20
• FAZ from 60 to 40
• FAZ from 60 to 100
• S&P 500 from 1172 to 1333
• Dow Jones from 11239 to 14000
• Nasdaq 2482 to 2700
• AGQ from 188 to 382 vs ZSL from 14.66 to 24
• DGP from 61 to 80 vs. DZZ from 4.90 to 7.25

And finally ... spot gold from 1725 to 2000.

To boot, how about this:

• US credit downgraded by another major rating agency
• US Dollar from 74 to 70
• US Dollar from 74 to 78
• Euro (vs USD) from 1.43 to 1.50
• Euro (vs USD) from 1.43 to 1.35
• Geitner resigns before Labor Day vs. Geitner survives to the end of Obama's term
• Bernanke installs official QE3 by Jackson Hole vs unofficial stimulus after Jackson Hole

They can't milk gold and silver dry this time

12:54 pm (Hawaii) Charts and ETFs don't mesh often times, but with Spot Silver and Gold prices locked in a range, it's possible, just possible that we see certain patterns remain for the coming weeks.

• ZSL has run from 17 to 19+, back to 17, and up to 19.58, all in the past two weeks.

• DUST ran to 52, down to 44, then up to 48.92 since June 16.

• QID went from 54 to 57, back to 54, up to 56 since June 14.

• MCP pure kookoo in two weeks. 46 to 52 in two days, then down to 47 and up to 54 in another two-day span. then 52 to 56 between yesterday and today. It's one of those you can trade like a madman, or just pocket it and forget about it for a year. Rare earths are here to stay and the Chinese are going to make sure supply (they control 97% of the stuff) is limited.

• Other rare earth princes like REE have been roller-coaster nauseating. REE went from 9.00 to 11.40 in two days. Sank to 9.40, rode up to 11.10 and is at 10.67 after hours today. All in two weeks.










• Puppet masters knocked gold down as it was about to break to new highs, which means DZZ went from 6.35 to 6.89 since Wednesday. Same move for GLL, from 22.40 to 24.12 in the same time frame.

• FAZ is hovering between 46+ and 52. As more and more banksters (and insurance companies) announce huge writedowns and losses in the coming weeks due to Euro debts, fear of bank collapses and closings should drive FAZ much higher. Nothing would surprise me, though, including some devious plan that would keep the banksters solvent and maintain their current levels of stock price and Monopoly currency.

• JJC, the copper subindex ETN, has been stuck between 53 and 55. Currently 53.83. If stagnant, almost predictable action is your thing, let 'er rip. China's not coming to a complete standstill anytime soon.

• AGQ is a sight. From 165 to 186 in steady action for almost two weeks, then blindsided by the CME mafia the past two days. By CME mafia, I do mean all the powers that manipulate the "Free Market" of commodities, such as crude oil. I am NOT for blatant naked shorting, but I don't see the point of kneecapping any price discovery, especially when the LONG-TERM effect will be negligible at best.







Same goes for all the silver plays that were hammered the past two days, even though MINERS SHOULD BE GAINING DUE TO DECREASED ENERGY COSTS! It's mind boggling to see it all play out. I'm not advocating a full swan dive into miners (gold and silver) here, but AGQ is among many  metal plays now near YTD lows. At 160, AGQ is only a couple of bucks higher than its low a month ago.

It all comes back to what Mike Maloney has said for years and years: The Fed, that private entity that runs our finances, may not have any gold and silver in its vaults. Meanwhile, central banks across the globe have wizened up in recent years and started to accumulate mass quantities of metals to hedge against their valueless US fiat currency/IOUs. So how does the Fed respond? By holding gold and silver hostage.

It ain't pretty. They've got one, maybe two bullets left and they're up against Justice. You can't fuck over the world this long, borrow to the hilt, and not pay back WHILE STILL ASKING FOR MORE FUNDS TO BORROW. It would be best to restructure and concede rather than drag out the hostage crisis. By doing this to us, the Fed and banksters are simply prolonging the inevitable. I have no doubt that they are personally stocking up on all the gold and silver they can at these levels, and I would not be surprised if this is also a way to benefit all our debt masters, particularly China. This gives them ample opportunity to stock up at low prices.

Meanwhile, the value of the dollars we make by working every day (if we have jobs) is eroding by the day. A fucking candy bar at Safeway costs $1.29 now. This is like shopping for snacks at the movie theater. It's just getting worse. And it's been far worse in other countries for a much longer time.

I am not sweating the decline of spot price. I am just anxious to buy at the best discount I can get. That might come on Monday in two weeks or two months, but it's coming. I'm loading. I'm stacking. I'm not waiting for my bank to re-open after some strange "inventory" closing when one of our debt masters calls our bluff at the poker table. I think some of the experts are right. Jeff Christian is probably right when he says silver will drop to 26, then go up, up, up from there late in the year. Jim Sinclair is probably right when he says silver will rocket this year. Maybe not this summer, but eventually, yes.

By then, it won't be a question of how much we paid to protect our assets. It'll be a matter of how much protection we accumulated. I feel for the hard-working folks who were stretched to the limits, but there are also a lot of lazyass bitches who borrowed off their credit cards to the hilt. They bought stuff they couldn't afford for decades, and I'm not about to let them get me again. If they aren't ready this time, that's their effing problem.

Denise Milani

Not quite minus squared

9:37 am (Hawaii) Market is down (Dow -99.83/-0.8%, Nas -31.77/-1.2%, S&P -13.09/-1.0%), but it's not convincing of an onrushing disaster, either. Dollar is up 6/10th of a percentage point, crude oil down again (SCO up 1%). The Metals list is 27% green, 73% red with a majority on the plus side being bear plays. But the key is low volume up and down. Maybe it's a respite of sorts and Monday begins a bloodbath. Or maybe this market will remain choppy, indignant and petulant.

ZSL is up 5.3% to 19.46. DUST, QID, gold bears GLL and DZZ are among the leaders on the list. REE, MCP and AVL have kept rare earths near the top.

Meanwhile, the finnies faded. Three were in the green in the opening minutes today, but now all are in the red. NBG, which got up to 1.43 yesterday on the positive news of austerity psuedo-measures, is down 7% to 1.32. Pulling back is no surprise, but I thought there might be continued momentum after profit-taking. It's tough to make it when you're a bankster.

Silver plays are getting minced again, not a shock. AGQ down 5.4% to 161.54, EXK (-5.2%), SLW (-4.3%), PAAS (-3%), GPL (-4.5%), SVM (-5.1%) are among the bruised silver miners. XG (-2%), NUGT (-5.3%), GG (-3.7%), GDXJ (-3.1%), DGP (-3%) are among the gold plays getting stomped. DGP's descent is unusual; it's normally not a big mover up or down. It's my lone play, a small position, and Spot Gold has room to fall, maybe to 1450. Not fun, but the puppet masters will do what they deem necessary to justify implementation of the next bailout/quantitative easing/big lie.

My Regular watch list is 26% green, 74% red. AAPL is down 1.6% to 325.95. TVIX (+7.5%) and VXX (+3.7%) are up big, as is QID (+3.5%). No buyers, and it seems some hedge funds have emptied out. It's nice to rest easy on summer vacation.

It gets interesting on the Regular list. CMG (+1.1%), RLOC (+0.8%), CSTR (+0.3%) are up. Then it's red, red, red, red ...

Greecian formula?

10:17 am (Hawaii) Major momentum swings today. Jobs report bad. Greece austerity good. Looking over several charts from AAPL to NBG to AG, could it be remotely possible that this bullish vibe — increased volume, heavy momentum from lows to highs by the close — is the real deal? I would find that preposterous to conceive. This is late June, QE2 is almost done and the Fed is in no rush to usher in QE3. In fact, the Fed seems content to see the market tank, even crash, to justify any further fiat currency destruction, i.e. printing trillions more US Dollars.

Yet there are massive numbers in some of these equities/etfs. Are they spurred by high-frequency trading? Probably, but some of those are direct from the hedge funds, and moves on big volume don't lie in the near term. Usually.

I got out of FAZ despite my long-term pessimism about the debt crisis. I am not going to wait around and get cut to pieces by market momentum to the downside. But I am willing to re-enter FAZ once the financials' true colors show up vivid and bright again. Like maybe tomorrow morning. If Spain and Portugal opt for more austere routes, like Greece, that does NOT help US banksters one bit. So it can be possible for NBG to rocket higher on austerity measures while financials stateside swallow another plate of poison.

I looked hard at NBG before the close and had an order at 1.41, but never got it filled. Bad timing. Or good, depending on how the market follows through tomorrow. It could easily pull back into the 1.30s after today's robust gain. A tiny position would be interesting, but a fast move up isn't in the cards. I can see NBG at 2.00 in a few months, but the constant downturns of other banks will keep it leashed. A move to 2.50 or higher could happen within a year. A double is never a bad thing.





Apple held high ground even when the market was still down big. AAPL closed is at 330.20 after hours (+2.3%). Today's candlestick is not exactly bullish, but it is not bearish either.

Baidu has been bullish, as well, with good news earlier in the week. It wasn't long ago that BIDU split 3-for-1 and was sitting at 70. If there's a "safe" play in China, this would be one. Big Brother protects its little brothers.

LULU and other stocks look bullish, but in this bizarro market, LULU could easily lose its recent gains. That small float cuts both ways.

Silver was a roller coaster ride today. Silver Wheaton, like AAPL, showed strength when it was a sea of red. Net-net, SLW had slightly more volume and is up 1% to 33.13 after hours.

First Majestic (AG) also had a positive day (+0.8%) despite the pummeling on silver. Like Silver Wheaton, First Majestic's fundamental numbers are impressive, particularly in profit margin. I think that gets tampered with as energy prices fluctuate, but AG is still a solid miner.

I still like EXK (8.49 after hours), which was down nearly 1% but is still among the stronger plays this week among silver miners. 7.50 is support, and some shrewd traders got in at about 7.60 recently for this elevator ride.










AGQ, GPL, PAAS, SLV for your viewing.

 

 

ZSL was a solid play on the short side, but was well off its intraday high (19.11). ZSL is at 18.49 (+6.4%) after hours.

If the CME mafia continue to pull strings on silver, a little ZSL would make good protection.

DGP (double gold bull) looked horrible on the chart, big gap down on increased volume. If the puppet masters knock gold down, as I expect, to further their argument in favor of QE3, so be it. They will not and cannot hold gold down for long, though. Eventually, the debt crisis will overwhelm all factors, and the US will have to take severe action one way or another. Every way benefits real money: gold and silver. So I will hold my little position in DGP and continue to accumulate hard assets.

Rangold (GOLD) was a rarity today, a gold play that finished green (80.03, +0.5% after hours). I don't trade it, know little about it.

There were a few gold plays that showed some strength, like NGD.

GLD was GLD.

I still like Extorre Gold Mines (XG), even with its huge run in the past several months. They are great marketers and have been successful as of late with their finds in Argentina.










DZZ is one way to play a downturn in gold. GLL is another way (+3.7% today). On the whole, however, I don't plan to short gold. If I bet against anything, it would be the financials or silver, maybe the Nas (QID). I've never played QID, and unless there's a complete breakdown, I won't touch it. But the Nas does fall apart in a big way from time to time, so QID is worth keeping an eye on.

 

I'm mostly cash, same as the last several months. Small, but growing pile of physical metals.

The next move

Update 11:40 am (Hawaii) Sure, Spot Silver and the rest of the PMs could continue lower. I'm thinking Spot Silver goes to 30 even though there's been enough correcting (i.e. carnage) and 34 should be the pivot point. But are physical silver buyers waiting? Looks like they aren't. I already wrote about one site running out of Johnson Matthey 10-ounce silver bars. Now another shop has gone out of stock of Silvertowne bars. This comes after the shop ran out of Academy bars and an "our choice" bar, both being the cheaper end of their collection. I still haven't talked myself into buying bars, especially since I decided yesterday to wait ... and prices declined huge today. 

If the physical buyers are right — and traders like Jon Najarian have already ended their SLV put/ZSL call trades — then Spot Silver may bounce soon enough. But there's also this: Spot could bounce here for a day or two, then sell off again next week. I wouldn't put it past CME and the Fed to shoot down commodities to square one, as a talking head said earlier. Nope, if I'm getting in it'll be with a very small position, both paper and physical. 

So what is the next move? I already missed the 'easy money' with ZSL. I'll project and reject out loud here ... if Spot Silver sinks to 30, ZSL will be around 30. If and when Spot Silver then rallies to 40, ZSL will pull back to 18 or 19. Then, if and when Spot Silver craters back to 25, ZSL would run to 35, closer to 40. I don't know exactly why Spot Silver will sell off more in empirical, fundamental terms. I do know human nature, and the metal bears in control will continue to devour without end, with a bit of a pause coming soon. 

Is that enough of a projection? 

So, if equities then follow commodities into the toilet in a week, maybe by mid or late May, what would be the short-term play, especially as June (QE2 coming to an "end") nears? There's always FAZ, which I haven't touched in at least a year. There's QID, EDZ ... and not a whole lot more. And DUST, DZZ, GLL, DGZ — all gold and gold miner bear ETFs. And there's UUP if the dollar keeps climbing, which I doubt will happen. But it all comes back to Spot Silver and ZSL. If CME and the Fed decide to punish Spot Silver to the fullest, it goes back to 19 and ZSL could go to 50, where it was last fall. 

Going into tomorrow's economic news and the end of the week, I probably will remain out of the market. Nothing is worth holding over this weekend. I could buy some Spot Silver and/or Gold plays, but I'd be forced to get some bear ETFs as a hedge. A net zero result, probably, which is a waste of time for peon retail traders like me. The thesis here is no thesis, and therefore no game plan. Yet. 

Update 1:19 pm (Hawaii) Leaning toward no physical purchases for now. Much as I love the look and feel of metal (granted I have a teeny collection of silver coins), it makes no sense to buy physical when it's still at a relatively high level. The time to get physical was a year ago, when Spot Silver was 18 or less ... when Spot Gold was at 1000. When a lot of people did not want to buy ... two years ago. The lack of access to trade for physical PMs is the deciding factor for me. Sure, there are dealers that will pay over spot for your physical. But that's worthwhile only while Spot prices are rising, not declining. So I'm holding off. Probably. 

Meanwhile, ZSL is up to 24.41 in afterhours trading. The volatility of PM tools like ZSL and SLV provide far more opportunity for profits (and losses) than hoarding gold or silver coins/bars. So the plan here for physical is to wait for continued bottoming, and if that means wait until Spot Silver loses another 30%, so be it. Until then, my focus will be on trading. 

And ZSL is now at 24.50 with 35 minutes left before afterhours trading ends. A lot of fear still in the PM market? Isn't the 5th margin hike already built into prices? Then again, this may encourage me to finally get my first silver bar or a few more coins. 

Update: 1:27 pm (Hawaii) I'd love to get both a few more coins and a bar. The Scottsdale Silver Stacker (10-oz) is beautiful and aesthetically appealing, but it hasn't come off its $394.99 price since the new price was posted earlier today. At that time, Spot Silver was roughly at 38 or 37/oz. With Spot Silver now at 34.40, I don't see the Stacker fairly priced until it gets to 375 or lower. I'm a little greedy that way. 

Same with the Scottsdale Silver Academy (hand poured 10-oz) bar. It's been at $397.99 since the price change earlier today. Needs to get lower. 

Sydney taking Spot Silver lower and lower ... Spot Gold, too. 

Silver American Eagles are murky to me. Sure, they're minted by the US, but paying $5 over spot ... I'm more interesting in accumulating PMs, not the collectible panache. That might sound hypocritical since I like the look of that Scottsdale stacker, but the American Eagle just isn't overly pretty to me. I'd take a few at a cheap price, though. 

Scottsdale Silver "stacker" = $394/10-oz bar

Update 2:02 pm (Hawaii) Spot Silver at 34.33. Sydney not bullish. Hong Kong opens shortly. 

Spot Gold at 1474. 

ZSL closed AH trading at 24.57. 

Update 2:54 pm (Hawaii) Avery Goodman's piece on the roiling silver market. He believes both silver and platinum will rise sooner rather than later. 

Hong Kong has opened. Spot Silver at 34.70. Spot Gold at 1486. 

Avery Goodman: The last great opportunity in silver and platinum (May 4 2011)

Update 7:31 pm (Hawaii) Always a welcome sight, a chart interpreted artistically by The Fly. I think this one should auction off in the six figures, minimum. 

But seriously, he has already indicated that Spot Silver is heavily oversold according to his in-house algo, the PPT. In fact, Le Fly has noted that there has never been a single vehicle as oversold as silver. Then again, when machines are running everything, there's no telling when the end of the carnage will happen. If ever.