Tuesday, February 7, 2012

The lesser charts are in an impulse-leg duel that portends nothing special over the next day or two. Bulls held a small edge early Tuesday morning, but short-term potential would likely be limited to 34.085, the 'D' target of the pattern shown.

Gold's downtrend stalled yesterday between two minor, bearish Hidden Pivots, but not before the June contract had taken out three more external lows. This is discouraging action for the near term, and it suggests the 1702.00 target given here earlier remains a good place to look for a tradable low. Alternatively, we can set the bar at 1747.50 (see inset) today to signal a meaningful resurgence of bulls. ______ UPDATE (2:33 p.m. EST):  The April contract has rallied nearly $40 from this morning's fake-out low, creating a bullish impulse leg on the hourly chart. Now, assuming 1752.60 holds as 'B' of the current impulse leg, Gold will need to pull back by at least $12.50 (0.625 of $20 k-A segment) to be considered fully re-charged for a C-D follow-through  leg of as much as $40.

A lot of effort went into yesterday's failure to surpass last Wednesday's 79.57 peak, implying the dollar is in no hurry to go places -- including, probably, significantly lower.   Dueling impulse legs on the hourly chart look sufficiently conflicted to put this vehicle into a state of tedium for perhaps another 3-4 days.  Regardless, a print at 79.80 would signal a revival of buying enthusiasm.

Early Tuesday morning, the futures were receding from a high-water mark just above the previous  day's peak. This has generated a fresh, bullish impulse leg on the intraday charts, along with the prospect of a C-D follow-through to as high as 1344.25. The target is predicated on a so-far 'C' low at 1338.25 holding, and the implied camouflage opportunity looks sufficiently compelling to at least reach the 1341.25 midpoint pivot. The trade would be good for chasing boredom but perhaps little more, since there doesn't appear to be sufficient "news" to drive a short-squeeze in the wee hours. _____ UPDATE (3:55 p.m EST):  I'm more and more liking....loving a 1353.00 target that has come into focus as the futures have ratcheted higher on the hourly chart. Here are the coordinates:  A=1272.75 on January 13; B= 1329.75 on January 26; and C= 1296.00 on January 30. We'll want to short the bejeezus out of the target when it's reached, albeit as cautiously as our "camouflage" bag of tricks will allow.  If you know nothing of camouflage but would like to try shorting there anyway, do so with a stop-loss no narrower than 1354.25.

It’s a sad time for America when a firm that does what Facebook does is on track to become one of our largest companies. Based on capitalization, the web-based lubricator of social interaction could be in the top 50 within a few years, or even in the top 25 if analysts’ wildest expectations pan out.  Facebook’s IPO promises to top Google’s $27 billion offering, reaping early backers a giant windfall.  But wouldn’t it be far better if a company that actually made something were to enjoy such extravagant enthusiasm on Wall Street?  Facebook of course makes nothing, and what it sells is of little economic value to anyone. And yet its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, is about to become one of the wealthiest men in the world. A gushy tribute to his impending monetary success appeared on the op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal yesterday. Written by a Rutgers anthropology professor named Lionel Tiger, this paean to the biggest time-waster in the galaxy saw Facebook’s inventor as “bestrid[ing] vast business numbers once dreamt of only by toothpaste and soft-drink makers. This reflects a new commercial demography in which the consumer is not someone who wants something necesssary, but rather one who seeks to assert simply what he is. And the tool he uses in order to become nothing more or less than an efficient, interesting and socially propsereous primate is the Facebook page.” Hefner’s ‘Genius’ Karl Marx himself could not have come up with a more powerful indictment of capitalism or of the soulless craving it would seek to create for things we don’t really need. And yet, although he doesn’t say so explicitly, Prof. Tiger would seem to place Zuckerberg – whom he labels “the world’s richest primatologist” -- in the Pantheon of human genius with DaVinci, Einstein and

Lurkers sometimes come into this forum to take potshots at my forecasts, evidently unaware that the techncial analysis they might find in my commentaries is often less precise, timely and finely nuanced than that which paying subscribers receive every day. One such lurker was ‘Steve,’ who culled an $18.355 target for March Silver from a list of "Predictions for 2012" I’d published early in the New Year. Steve questioned how this very bearish forecast could differ so dramatically from a $30.35 target featured shortly thereafter in the Touts section and in this forum. Because Steve himself blogs professionally (I gather) on the subject of Silver, one might infer that he had an ulterior motive for bashing my forecast.  Whatever the case, I have reprinted his comments and my response below so that lurkers can better understand what they are missing by not paying for the good stuff that subscribers receive daily.  (Click here to access the original discussion, or to add to it.) Steve's post: Rick, I had a few questions. I recently wrote [an article] where I discuss that the majority of analysis on the Internet is contradictory and frustrating. I have been following your articles for some time. I remember you DEC 30, 2011 TEN PREDICTIONS for 2012. Here was one of them: Gold will stage a powerful rally after bottoming at $1445 in January, but the buying spree will fall well short of $2000. Silver will fare relatively worse, falling to $18.35 before finding traction and recovering into the low $30s. ——————————————————– A little more than a month ago you were predicting $18.35 silver in JAN. Today, in your most recent article, you are now seeing “AN EASY MOVE TO $35.53″. What I would like to know is this. How on earth can you have that much