Price Action

A.M. Kitco Metals Roundup: Gold Drops Below $1,700 Following another Mysterious Price Drop in Asian Trading

Gold set for dramatic correction: hedge fund manager

In a sharp turn around from the open, Italian and Spanish 10yr government bond yield spreads over German bunds trade approx. 10bps tighter on the day, this follows several market events this morning that have lifted sentiment. Firstly from a fixed income perspective, both Spain and Greece managed to sell more in their respective t-bill auctions than analysts were expecting and thus has eased concerns ahead of longer dated issuance from Spain this Thursday. In terms of other trigger points for today's risk on tone the December headline reading in the German ZEW survey was positive for the first time since May 2012 coming in at an impressive 6.9 M/M from previous -15.7 with the ZEW economists adding that Germany will not face a recession. Finally, reports overnight have suggested that Italian PM Monti could be wooed by Centrist groups which means that if he wanted too the technocrat PM could stand for elections next year albeit under a different ticket. As such yesterday's concerns over the Italian political scene have abated and the FTSE MIB and the IBEX 35 are out performing the core EU bourses. Looking ahead highlights from the US include trade balance, wholesale inventories and a USD 32bln 3yr note auction, however, volumes and price action may remain light ahead of the key FOMC decision on Wednesday.

All that glitters...

In order to make sense of the price action COMING OUT OF the number, we first need to know what positioning was GOING INTO the number.

Romney's apparent victory in the first Presidential debate was the worst outcome for U.S. stocks, for it gave false hope to a Republican sweeping into the White House. A more gradual acceptance of the November result would give the market a better chance to absorb the news with minimal impact. We are presented with a similar scenario with Washington’s addressing the fiscal cliff.  Optimistic comments about resolving the crisis has spawned gains in equities that are sustainable while losses resulting from downbeat remarks have offered profitable short term buying opportunities.  While much of this price action the past few days has benefitted from typical calendar money flows that will disappear in the middle of next week, some of the positive sentiment arises from the overwhelming belief that both sides can consummate a deal on the budget ahead of the December 31 deadline. The longer investors anticipate such a compromise, the more violently shares will tumble upon recognition that assuaging the crisis with a comprehensive solution will take extra innings.

Harry Reid’s publicly displayed dismay at the lack of progress in the fiscal cliff negotiations finally injected a dose of realism into the process after investors threw caution to the wind and seized on the optimism offered by the Senate Majority Leader and Speaker Boehner on November 16.  We view yesterday’s sound bite as more negative than the aforementioned statement on the White House Lawn, for we now sit 11 days closer to the New Year’s deadline.  Despite this asymmetry, equities suffered only moderate losses giving up just a modicum of the gains from last week. The relative lack of a response to the comments seem puzzling given the price action from the prior several days; however with month end looming, enough buyers kept stocks from selling off violently. My November 13 “Missive” outlined a game theory exercise that suggests this rancor will continue until very late into December and/or the capital markets dislocate thereby ensuring either a falling over the cliff or a band aid solution to avoid the crisis temporarily.  Both parties unfortunately may assume that by agreeing to postpone the tough decisions, they will have prevented a rout in equities; however, the August, 2011 precedent of raising the debt ceiling out of desperation hints otherwise.

USDJPY has rallied 3.5% in 2 weeks on wide expectations that Abe will come into office on Dec 16 and force BOJ into aggressive monetary easing (target 2% inflation). Market as a result has seen one way demand for USDJPY higher options driving skew sharply higher to recent highs. The desk believes that there is significant risk in USDJPY in the next month given event risk (most notably Japan elections/BOJ meeting and US fiscal cliff), but the desk feel that with positions relatively stretched, holiday season looming and the long side of the equation almost solely dominated by short term spec guy that the PAIN TRADE is now likely USDJPY lower from here, at least much more so than what the vol curve currently indicates.

Bullish on metals. Here's why. 

Following this week's 'failed' Eurogroup meeting, leaked details suggest a debt-buyback is becoming the corner-piece of the 'new' Troika deal with Greece. The leaking of details (and anticipation by the market) has driven GGB prices up and reduced much of the benefit of the buyback 'boondoggle' but as Barclays notes, "even if the debt buyback enables the IMF and EU leaders to come to an agreement, leading to a Greek resolution in the near term, in the medium-to-long-term Greek debt is not sustainable on realistic macroeconomic assumptions without notable outright haircuts on official EU loans to Greece. Therefore, a successful debt buyback might resolve the Greek debt sustainability issue on paper in the troika report but it will most likely not resolve it in investors’ minds." While there are 'optical' advantages to the buyback, the four main disadvantages outlined below should be irksome to the Greeks (e.g. creditor benfitting over growth-empowering) - which is critical since, as ekathermini notes, a senior finance minister commented "God forbid we should not be close to an agreement on Monday."

An initial lower open in major European cash bourses has been pared despite concern over Greek and a lack of any progress in agreement between Eurozone officials and the IMF. Source comments early on in European trade helped provide renewed optimism that a plan for Greece is edging closer after it was reported that the German Chancellor Merkel told lawmakers Greece's financing hole through 2016 can be filled with combination of lower rates and increased EFSF. The FTSE is under-performing its European peers at the mid-point of trade today as several large cap stocks go ex-dividend, although strength has been seen following the latest Bank of England minutes which showed a less dovish than expected 8-1 vote split to hold fire on QE between the MPC meetings. Following the release of the minutes, a now reduced expectation for asset buys at the December meeting saw upside in GBP/USD in a move away from the 1.5900 handle, and Gilt under pressure, although short-sterling shrugged off the comment that the central bank is unlikely to cut bank rate in foreseeable future.

There are many questions on the minds of weary precious metals investors after enduring the volatile yet range-bound price action of gold and silver over the past year:

• Have the fundamentals for owning gold & silver changed over the past year? No
• What are they? currency devaluation/crisis, supply-chain risk, ore grade depletion
• How should retail investors own gold? Mostly physical metal, some quality mining majors (avoid the indices), and ETFs only for trading
• Is gold in a bubble? No
• Could gold get re-monetized? Quite possibly
• Where is gold flowing? From the West to the East. At some point, capital controls will be put in place

Jeff Clark and Chris Martenson believe everyone should have exposure to gold and silver as a defense for preserving the purchasing power of their weath. The key question is: how much exposure?