Futures market

The US economy and financial system are in worse condition than the Fed and Treasury claim and the financial media reports. Gold serves as a warning for aware people that financial and economic trouble are brewing. In the 21st century, US debt and money creation has not been matched by an increase in real goods and services. The implication of this mismatch is inflation. Without the price-rigging by the bullion banks, gold and silver would be reflecting these inflation expectations.

China is slowly moving to dominate the global gold market and it is important to join the dots regarding a few key recent developments in China relating to gold. When the International Board of the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE) was launched last Thursday September 18 during an evening trading session, it was notable that the first transactions were put through by a diverse group comprising HSBC, MKS (Switzerland), and the Chinese banks,  ICBC, Bank of China and Bank of Communications.  One encouraging factor about the SGE and the SGE international platform is that there is a lot of physical gold flowing through the Exchange. Therefore, price discovery is not just based on an inverted pyramid of mostly unallocated gold as in London or mostly cash-traded futures paper gold as in New York.

Just one guy's attempt to make sense of what is likely to happen in the coming days.

The world may be a big conspiracy and civilization as we know it may end soon, but if you care what the dollar may do next week, take a look at this post.

It has been quite an eventful week between Scotland's battle over independence, the Federal Reserve's FOMC announcement and the markets making new all time highs. The FOMC announcement was more comedy than anything else as the continued facade of the Fed's forecasting capabilities was revealed, it appears the biggest factor in the world of investing and for this weekend's list of "Things To Ponder" we have accumulated a few reads relating to the Fed.

• House votes to arm Syrian rebels (Reuters).... aka ISIS
• Fed Plots Cautious Course on Rate Rises  (Hilsenrath)
• Scots vote in independence referendum to seal the United Kingdom's fate (Reuters)
• Yes or No, the Winner of the Referendum Is Brand Scotland (BBG)
• Draghi Loan Plan Missing Estimates Hampers ECB Stimulus (BBG) - get with the spin, it simply means "Moar QE"
• Obama Plans to Tightly Control Strikes on Syria (WSJ)
• IMF warns of risks from 'excessive' financial market bets (Reuters)
• Russia Praises Ukraine's Autonomy Law for Rebel Areas (WSJ)

It appears today's weakness in stocks (most notably high-beta momo) and bonds (HY credit weakness) was triggered by two "ma"s - grandma Yellen and grand-poohbah BABA's Ma. Hawkish FOMC concerns took the shine off HY credit (and stocks) but Treasury bonds rallied modestly (5Y -3bps, 10Y -2bps). However, high-beta momo stocks dragged Nasdaq and Russell lower as 'smart money' proclaimed this was making room for the Alibaba IPO (which raises the question - if there is so much pent-up demand money on the sidelines just dying to be lost in the stock market, then why were so many high-beta, high-growth, momo names being sold today, theoretically in order to make room for the BABA IPO?) The USDollar ended marginally higher (GBP weakness, EUR strength) but most commodities gained on the day (Copper down on China) with WTI back to $93. Stocks did have a mini-melt-up on absolutely no news whatsoever into the last hour but gave most back. The Russell 2000 is -0.5% in 2014.

Simple review of technical condition of the capital markets.  Light on polemical zeal, and heavy on technical analysis.  

Quick update, and outline of reasons to suspect anxiety over Scottish independence has peaked. 

The euro has fallen an unprecedented eight weeks in a row.  The dollar set new five year highs against the yen before the weekend.  Here is an overview of the near-term technical outlook.  

Overview of the ECB meeting and likely outcomes.  More robust analysis than ideological fervor.

Eating out for the weekend brings home the idea that food and restaurant costs are only going up on the whole... 

Gold Bears Have Wind at their Backs as Technicals likely to fail to downside over Near-Term.

A dispassionate discussion of the technical condition of the dollar.  

CME halted trading on its electronic platform and said it was due to "planned software reconfigurations." CME, which owns the Chicago Board of Trade, New York Mercantile Exchange and other markets, made the reconfigurations over the weekend as part of ongoing upgrades to technology, a spokeswoman said in a statement. Market participants were left scratching their heads as to why the "planned software reconfigurations" did not take place prior to the commencement of trading.