Right on Pic! I agree with your assessment in that this was a contrived hit. I believe the reason behind this whacking has to do with PM seasonality. In a previous posting I mentioned that we could see a nice run into the first half of July when Gold & Silver tend to rise and that's exactly what's happenned. Otoh PMs tend to weaken in the second half of the month. So this makes an opportune time for the Cartel to take advantage of the situation. Push hard down at a time when the non-thinking blackboxes go short due to blind faith in seasonality. I don't expect any large takedown will transpire over the next 3 weeks when the current PM cycle of weakness ends, but rather a slow drift down followed by sideways action all centered around $1550.