From Ed Steer:

Gold broke above $942 just moments after trading began in the New York Access Market...where only the U.S. bullion banks are allowed to play. That was the high in Far East Trading on Thursday morning...and the high for Thursday as well. After that, every time that gold stuck its nose above $940 it got smacked...hard. Gold's third [and last] attempt to break through the $940 level came to a sudden end at the London p.m. fix [3:00 p.m. in London...10:00 a.m. in New York]. From there, gold got sold off $11...to its low of the day of $928.90 in electronic trading after the Comex had closed. Estimated volume...according to the usual N.Y. commentator...was a very low 77,652 contracts. He went on to say that..."Gold's late action did not please the gold shares. Both the HUI and the XAU lost ground mainly after the floor close to end down 2.56% and 1.6% respectively. This is ominous."

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Silver did virtually nothing throughout the trading day...but the shares of the major silver producers got smacked pretty good nonetheless.

Gold open interest for Wednesday's $14 rise in gold showed an increase in open interest of 3,839 contracts...which is a lot. Total open interest in gold is now 375,836 contracts...with 98,538 contracts traded. Silver's almost 50 cent rise saw an enormous increase in open interest...up a monstrous 4,177 contracts...bringing total silver open interest up to 108,158 contracts. Volume was a very heavy 43,451 contracts. I asked Ted what he thought of these numbers...and here was his comment..."The open interest changes for Wednesday were kind of strange, at least in silver. Probably spreads." I sure hope he's right!

The Comex Delivery Report for Thursday showed that only four gold contracts were delivered...but another 115 contracts in silver were delivered. That brings the June total for silver to 924 contracts. There were no changes in the alleged holding of either GLD or SLV yesterday...no changes at the U.S. Mint...and over at the Comex-approved warehouses, silver stocks rose 458,199 ounces.

The new Commitment of Traders report comes out this afternoon at 3:30 Eastern Daylight Time. For those of you who don't want to wait until my commentary tomorrow, the link to the CFTC report is here. But don't bother checking it until precisely that time...or later, as they never update it early.

The big gold news yesterday was the announcement of Congressional approval for the sale of 13 million ounces of IMF gold. Buried well down in a Bloomberg story entitled "Congress Backs War-Funding Bill, 'Cash for Clunkers' " was this paragraph..."Lawmakers agreed to Obama's request to include $5 billion to secure $108 billion in aid, primarily in the form of a line of credit, to the International Monetary Fund. The legislation would permit U.S. representatives to the IMF to agree to its planned sale of 13 million ounces of gold, one-eighth of the organization's holdings, to help finance aid to poor countries." Ordinarily, I'd link the story...but that's the only relevant paragraph in the whole thing. I'm sure we'll see more stories on this in the days to come.

Yesterday, Al Korelin of Korelin Economics Report was kind enough to interview me again for our regular weekly show. If you wish to listen to what I have to say, the link is here.

Today's first story comes courtesy of one of my daily readers in Australia...Pauline Roberts. It's from The Times of London...reprinted in the australian.new.com.au. A cashless society...it is an idea that's been around for a while, but now it's being seriously discussed in "Tokyo's corridors of power". Along with that comes the real possibility of negative interest rates. The story deserves your attention, and is headlined "How deflation could make Japan a cashless society"...and the link is here.

The next story is from The Telegraph in London. The headline reads "Ireland forces renegotiation of European Union laws". "Last June, Irish voters rejected the Lisbon Treaty which will increase powers for Brussels and create a new EU president and euro diplomatic service." This story is worth the read as well...and the link is here.

And lastly is this...the latest essay by F. William Engdahl. Having read most of Engdahl's writings over the years, he is one of a handful of writers that I have all the time in the world for. It's a long, but very worthwhile, read. It's a brief history lesson on Eurasia...and shows the reasons why the United States is actively involved in the area...militarily and otherwise. It's all part of the "Great Game" as it was called about a century ago...and it's still being played today. Ordinarily, I'd save a piece like this for Saturday...and if you find it too much to digest today...you can save it for the weekend. It's entitled "Ankara, Moscow and Washington in the Eurasian Pipeline Calculus" and the link is here.

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in our bloodstreams. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same. - Ronald Reagan

As I sit in front of my computer in the wee hours of Thursday morning, I must admit that I'm nervous. I can see every reason in the world why both gold ands silver should be moving much higher in price...but I can also see the '3 or less' U.S. bullion banks [backed by the Fed and the U.S. Treasury] ready to pound the hell out their respective prices. Will they use this IMF gold story as a club for that purpose? Who knows. But the story came out yesterday and had virtually no impact. Maybe 'da boyz' are saving it for today...or Monday. But as I've said before...sometimes I find myself looking for black bears in dark rooms that aren't there. Is this one of those times? We'll find out soon enough.

All of us at Casey's Daily Resource Plus hope you have a great weekend, and we'll see you here on Saturday morning

Casey Research correspondent-at-large Ed Steer is a keen observer of the financial scene and a board member of GATA.org