Weekly Outlook: Gold & Silver Earn Top Scores in Breakout as the Dollar Clings to Life Support

As we transition from August to September within the course of this trading week, we very well could have just experienced the Black Swan event over the weekend, and its name is Harvey. Gold & silver are breaking out right now, and the dollar, well, look out below…

After spending last week in “consolidation”, the metals are already making their moves.

We have been saying a move is imminent for weeks now, and while we have not seen the rises we have seen set up on the charts, we have not seen the big drops either, and this consolidation looks exhausted considering the lack of any on the year.

The smashing of late have had little effect on the gold price and silver price in the short term. Yes, they have been able to knock down prices, as evidenced by last Friday, but the prices have not stayed down for long.

On the daily, gold looks to be holding up and ready to punch through the stout resistance:

$1300 has acted as resistance, or the line in the sand, three times so far in 2017. The battle is not finished there, however. Going back a year, we can see that gold could have some more trouble in the $1310 – $1315 range. What we should really be hoping for is a break-out through that level, then coming back to bounce off it if we must. For this week, however, I guess we could settle for a close above $1300, but at this point, we should really be expecting more, unless the smashing will continue. There was calm overnight and no sneak attacks.

Silver is fighting resistance of its own:

Silver is having to deal with the 200-day moving average. Once we can take out the 200-day, next stop is $17.50. It seems like so long ago that we have seen that price. In fact, it was June 6 when the white metal closed at $17.70. Could we get to that level by the end of the week? Seeing as we have been “consolidating” with silver just like with gold, we will have a move, and if we set our sights on an up-week, we would be putting in another round of higher-highs, and then the technical traders would want to get in on the action, further adding to the move up. 

Moving on to the strongest performing metals of the year, copper and palladium, well, the hater-aide in both the MSM and the alternative media is strong. The two metals, however, have converged and they are moving in unison:

Granted, Texas is not even out of emergency mode. It is worth mentioning, however, that rebuilding in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey is going to be very copper intensive. Most people don’t realize how much of the Internet relies on the base metal. Sure, there is fiber-optics and laser, but those are not cost effective, especially when we are talking about rebuilding and recovering from losses, not upgrading from normalcy. The bottom line is that based on fundamental issues, we could see continued strength in copper.

It is too early to tell the effects on crude. The technicals look ugly as crude is about to go down and test the 50-day moving average, and a close below $46.45 would put in a new lower-low, however, once damage assessment is done on the oil industry in Texas and in the Gulf, we could begin to see major movement to the upside.

RBOB (gasoline futures) traded up 7% at one point overnight, and if, for example, we see a 10% move in crude on the week, we are talking about a close above $52. If we combine a weak dollar, and increased consumption from the heavy machinery rebuilding in Texas mire than offsetting any drop in consumption from personal automobiles, it is not far fetched to see much higher prices from here.

The stock market is barely clinging to life. Perhaps in an effort to keep it propped up for last week’s Fedstravaganza, but the S&P is barely holding on to the 50-day moving average:

Bullish for gold is a drop in yields for US Treasury paper. The 10-year Treasury Note is dropping in yield even with all the “interest rate hiking cycle” hype:

In fact, the 10-year is clearly looking like the next move in yield is lower, not higher. There would be some support if indeed we find ourselves in a downward sloping channel, that would be around 2.4%, but we shall see how yields are doing by the end of the week.

Not helping the “America is great again” cause is a continued weakening dollar:

The last time we were below 92 on the DXY was the first week in May, 2016. In the second six months of 2014 is when the dollar took off. Within a year the dollar was at 98. Now, the dollar peaked out on the weekly nearly at 104, but what has happened in the first six months of 2017? We have gone steadily down hill all year. If we see continued dollar weakness, is the next stop 82 and A full 10 points lower than where we are now?

On the calendar this week, this one is going to be action packed. There will be no time to prepare for the Non-farms Payrolls, at September 1st is this Friday. Here are some of the highlights on the economic calendar to be watching for:

• Monday: International Trade in Goods & Dallas Fed MFG Survey
• Tuesday: Case-Shiller HPI (20 city home price index) & Consumer Confidence
• Wednesday: MBA Mortgage Applications, ADP Employment Report & 2nd Estimate of Q2 GDP
• Thursday: Challenger Job-Cut Report, Jobless Claims, Personal Income, Chicago PMI, Pending Home Sales, EIA Nat Gas Report
• Friday: Motor Vehicle Sales, Nonfarm Payrolls Report, PMI Mfg Index, ISM Mfg, Consumer Sentiment, Baker-Hughes Rig Count

As we can see, in just this small sampling of data to be released this week, there is a ton of stuff going on this week. Analysts will also be looking to see what effects the hurricane will have on the oil rig count on Friday. We can rest assured that everybody will be scapegoating the hurricane for poor economic data. This is very valid, and not to say there is not impact on the economy, but just watch the government statisticians try to blame weak data in West Virginia on the hurricane in Texas. Either way, government statisticians will have to be on the ball more than ever if they are to produce the results of a vibrant, expanding economy.

Then again, it could all just fall apart too, and that would be the Black Swan that started it all. His name was Harvey.