Friday…

Indian ex-duty premiums: AM $3.86, PM $3.51, with world gold at $897.85 and $902.80. Ample for legal imports. The stock market had a poor day, closing -3.42%, but the rupee was slightly firmer, closing at $1= R42.93, versus R42.97 on Thursday. Reserve Bank action was suspected.

Any doubt as to the posture of the gold market was dispelled by yesterday’s open interest data. Thursday’s dogged defense attempt of Wednesday’s gains brought in massive selling: open interest rocketed 12,714 contracts (3.2% or 39.54 tonnes): this for a gain of 10c. There is clearly an aversion in certain quarters to a gold price rise.

Today an overnight rally was blocked on the Comex open, followed by a couple of massive raids, Sill, Comex closed down by only 50c: a creditable achievement.

Today...

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Articl... http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt...

Indian ex-duty premiums: AM $3.22, PM $3.92, with world gold at $905.60 and $902.30. Ample for legal imports. The Indian stock market was down 1.91% but the rupee weakened only slightly, to $1=R42.965 (Friday: R42.93). The Reserve Bank is apparently defending R43.

Gold’s 50c loss on Comex on Friday subsumed a couple of attempts to go up and a serious bear raid at the usual early NY morning time. Open interest rose 2,572 contracts (8 tonnes) indicated resistance to a rise in the gold price was serious.

Today, of course, Comex gold saw a massive raid shortly after the opening, driving down gold four times the maximum move in the dollar on which it was blamed. More than half the day’s estimated volume had traded by 9AM, and very little recovery was allowed by the close.

This of course is very painful for The Gartman Letter, which went long on Thursday, and was looking to buy more on an hour’s trading above $905 even this morning. Some of gold’s friends will find this amusing, but that is foolish. The question is, what is present in the market which causes this very well-informed and alert technical/momentum player to go long immediately before unheralded and massive selling hits the market? This is the third time in a row.

The answer is undoubtedly that proposed in

and the reason is laid out in