GCG17 – February Gold (Last:1189.20)

We’ve stayed cautiously bullish lately, lest gold disappoint us for the umpteenth time.  Accordingly, I posted a modest, 1221.30 rally target in the chat room this morning that has taken fully six hours to reach. Actually, it has yet to be achieved, since the so-far high as we went to press is 1220.10. Remember, we don’t want these Hidden Pivot levels merely to be reached, but to be exceeded with bold panache. Were that to occur now, we could raise our sights a skosh — to 1226.90, a Hidden Pivot target drum-rolled here yesterday.  This is all little stuff, I realize, but if the futures were to vault the 1236.10 ‘external’ peak from mid-November that I also mentioned, especially without much of a pullback first, the rally would start to look like the real McCoy. For now, however, let’s cross our fingers as February Gold steals up on the hidden resistance at 1226.90 noted above. _______ UPDATE (Jan 24, 4:49 p.m. EST): Gold disappointed us yet again– but in a so-far small way, by head-faking to a high marginally above Monday’s and then relapsing. This generated a bearish a-b impulse leg on the intraday charts, but we won’t know how potent sellers are until we’ve seen how the c-d leg plays out.  Traders can use A=1198.20 (1/20 at 6:00 a.m. on the 240-minute  chart) to set up a potential counterintuitive’ buy for any rebound that may be coming. _______ UPDATE (Jan 25, 11:25 p.m.): This morning’s failed ‘counterintuitive’ trigger implies more weakness ahead. We can gauge the strength of the selling by how many prior lows are exceeded without an upward correction. _______ UPDATE (Jan 26, 9:46 a.m.): Punitive selling has taken out two prior lows overnight — one an ‘internal’ low at 1192.60, the other an ‘external at 1187.50 (1/13). Both can be seen clearly on the hourly chart. The immediate downside target is 1177.40, based on a=1217.50 on 1/24. Just a smidgen more would breach Jan 11’s key low at 1177.00, imputing still more power to the selloff.