Golden Cross' For Gold and Silver Signals Further Gains

Silver is trading at $34.31/oz, €26.61/oz and £21.28/oz. Platinum is trading at $1,619.50/oz, palladium at $663.50/oz and rhodium at $1,225/oz.

Gold fell $0.10 or 0.01% in New York yesterday and closed at $1,770.50. Silver hit $34.958 in Asia and fell to $34.27 in early New York trade and it then bounced back higher, but finished with a loss of 0.49%.

Gold edged down today due to dollar strength and profit taking as speculators and some investors booked profits on 16% price gains from this year’s low.

Gold continues to see smart money diversification as central banks from the ECB and the Fed to the BOJ have all announced ‘stimulus’ or money debasement measures which has led investors to seek gold as an inflation hedge.

All eyes will be on China as perhaps the next to announce action after today’s data showed further contraction in its manufacturing sector for the 11th consecutive month. 

The UK will then follow and then other central banks may announce their own measures as competitive currency devaluations or currency wars intensify in the coming months. 

We have seen consecutive weeks of bullish strength in the gold and silver markets. Gold has completed what is known as a ‘Golden Cross’ and silver is poised to complete one in the coming days.

A ‘Golden Cross’ occurs when not only the current price, but also shorter-term moving averages such as the 50 day moving average “cross” or rise above the longer term 200 day moving average.

Gold’s 50 day moving average (simple) has risen to $1,651/oz and is now comfortable above the 200 day moving average (simple) at $1,645/oz and accelerating higher.

Silver’s 50 day moving average (simple) has risen to $29.86/oz and will soon challenge the 200 day moving average (simple) at $30.47/oz.

These are important indicators of longer term technical strength and in conjunction with the recent positive technical picture are bullish.  

The 18 months of sideways-to-lower price action has “built a base”, a very large foundational base, in markets that are in the middle of two of the longest and strongest bull markets in history. 

It is another indication that both markets are capable of moving higher in the coming months.

John Bollinger the president of BollingerBands.com said in January that “the golden cross is a great tool in a big, roaring bull market, like the bull market from 1982 to 1998, when it tells you when you’re supposed to be in the market and tells you periods in which the risk is somewhat higher of corrections and such,” he said.

Gold and silver are in such secular bull markets and the combination of these long term bull markets, the recently trending higher markets and the 'Golden Cross' is important technically.

The last time there was a 'Golden Cross' for gold was in early February 2009 (see chart) and gold subsequently rose 103% in the next two years.

Similar gains are quite possible today given the strong fundamentals. Were gold to replicate those gains, it could see gold rise to double today's value of $1,756/oz or to over $3,500/oz.

Silver, too, saw a ‘golden cross’ in late February 2009 when silver was trading at under $14/oz.

It subsequently surged 257% to over $49/oz in April 2011 for a 257% increase in just 2 years and 2 months. Given silver’s very strong fundamentals similar gains may be seen in the coming months.

As ever physical bullion should not be bought in expectation of capital gains. They have the potential to reward with massive capital gains but they should be bought for diversification and financial insurance reasons.

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10 Shocking Quotes on the effects of QE3

Ready or not, QE3 is here, and the long-term effects of this reckless money printing by the Federal Reserve are going to be absolutely nightmarish.  The Federal Reserve is hoping that buying $40 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities per month will spur more lending and more economic activity.  But that didn't happen with either QE1 or QE2.  Both times the banks just sat on most of the extra money.  As I pointed out the other day, U.S. banks are already sitting on $1.6 trillion in excess reserves.  So will pumping them up with more cash suddenly make them decide to start lending?  Of course not.  In addition, QE3 is not likely to produce many additional jobs.  As I showed in a previous article, the employment level did not jump up as a result of either QE1 or QE2.  So why will this time be different?  But what did happen under both QE1 and QE2 is that a lot of the money ended up pumping up the financial markets.  So once again we should see stock prices go up (at least in the short-term) and commodities such as gold, silver, food and oil should also rise.  But that also means that average American families will be paying more for the basic necessities that they buy on a regular basis.  The most dangerous aspect of QE3, however, is what it is going to do to the U.S. dollar.  Most of the rest of the world uses the U.S. dollar to conduct international trade, and by choosing to recklessly print money Ben Bernanke is severely damaging international confidence in our currency.  If at some point the rest of the world rejects the dollar and no longer wants to use it as a reserve currency we are going to be facing a crisis unlike anything we have ever seen before.  The real debate about QE3 should not be about whether or not it will help the economy a little bit in the short-term.  Rather, everyone should be talking about the long-term implications and about how QE3 is going to accelerate the destruction of the dollar.

The following are 10 shocking quotes about what QE3 is going to do to America....

#1 Ron Paul

"It means we are weakening the dollar. We are trying to liquidate our debt through inflation. The consequence of what the Fed is doing is a lot more than just CPI. It has to do with malinvestment and people doing the wrong things at the wrong time. Believe me, there is plenty of that. The one thing that Bernanke has not achieved and it frustrates him, I can tell—is he gets no economic growth. He doesn’t do anything with the unemployment numbers. I think the country should have panicked over what the Fed is saying that we have lost control and the only thing we have left is massively creating new money out of thin air, which has not worked before, and is not going to work this time."

#2 Peter Schiff, CEO Of Euro Pacific Capital

"This is a disastrous monetary policy; it’s kamikaze monetary policy"

#3 Michael Pento, The Founder Of Pento Portfolio Strategies

"This is the nuclear option for them. This is a never-ending weapon that is being fired at the middle class"

#4 Donald Trump

"People like me will benefit from this."

#5 Economist Anthony Randazzo

"Quantitative easing—a fancy term for the Federal Reserve buying securities from predefined financial institutions, such as their investments in federal debt or mortgages—is fundamentally a regressive redistribution program that has been boosting wealth for those already engaged in the financial sector or those who already own homes, but passing little along to the rest of the economy. It is a primary driver of income inequality formed by crony capitalism. And it is hurting prospects for economic growth down the road by promoting malinvestments in the economy."

#6 John Williams Of Shadowstats.com

"That’s absolutely nonsense.  The Fed is just propping up the banks."

#7 Marc Faber

"I happen to believe that eventually we will have a systemic crisis and everything will collapse. But the question is really between here and then. Will everything collapse with Dow Jones 20,000 or 50,000 or 10 million? Mr. Bernanke is a money printer and, believe me, if Mr. Romney wins the election the next Fed chairman will also be a money printer. And so it will go on. The Europeans will print money. The Chinese will print money. Everybody will print money and the purchasing power of paper money will go down."

#8 Mesirow Financial Chief Economist Diane Swonk

"I think this will end up being a trillion-dollar commitment by the Fed"

#9 Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke

"I want to be clear — While I think we can make a meaningful and significant contribution to reducing this problem, we can’t solve it. We don’t have tools that are strong enough to solve the unemployment problem"

#10 Credit Rating Agency Egan-Jones

"[T]he FED’s QE3 will stoke the stock market and commodity prices, but in our opinion will hurt the US economy and, by extension, credit quality. Issuing additional currency and depressing interest rates via the purchasing of MBS does little to raise the real GDP of the US, but does reduce the value of the dollar (because of the increase in money supply), and in turn increase the cost of commodities (see the recent rise in the prices of energy, gold, and other commodities). The increased cost of commodities will pressure profitability of businesses, and increase the costs of consumers thereby reducing consumer purchasing power. Hence, in our opinion QE3 will be detrimental to credit quality for the US…."

We have reached a major turning point in the financial history of the United States.

It would be hard to overstate how much damage that QE3 could potentially do to our financial system.  If the rest of the world decides at some point that they no longer have confidence in our dollars and our debt then we are finished.

Sadly, the mainstream media does not seem to understand this, and most Americans gleefully believe whatever the mainstream media tells them.

So what do you think about QE3?  Please feel free to post a comment with your opinion following this article....

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