There appears to be a stealthy change in the PM market. Gold and gold stocks are making good technical progress and outperforming the overall market (year to date, gold is up 7.5%, GDX up 17%, S&P down 2%). Too early to declare the bear market over, but there are some promising technical developments in the short to intermediate term.

Gold – broke a major downtrend line from Oct 2012. Daily and Weekly MACD is positive – monthly is on the verge. Nice looking double bottom from November with the breakout / confirmation last week.

Silver – slightly weaker, but quite similar to gold. Since silver has a higher beta, I would expect a bigger move if the bear market is truly over.

GDX – actually looking better than the metal – same technical profile as the metal, with the bonus of monthly MACD already positive and with positive divergence.

GDXJ – similar to GDX, but without the downtrend break. The juniors were hit much harder during the 3 & 1/2 year gold bear market. If the trend has truly reversed, they have enormous potential for gain.

Silver stocks (SIL) – similar to GDXJ, but no monthly MACD cross yet.

Bottom line – large and mid cap gold stocks are leading with silver miners and juniors starting to wake up. If this continues, the juniors and silvers should begin to outperform.

I really can't say that the long bear market in PMs is over, but I have a suspicion it just might be. There's something about the timing of Peter G's throwing in the towel that makes me think this could be it. Not gonna bet the farm, but a few acres might be worth a gamble.

About a third of my Santa stocks are PMs, and most of them are just starting to move - I plan to keep them as long as the larger cap PMs are looking good. The rest of my Santa stocks have been disappointing so far, and I continue to sell them off. I'm using the cash to buy larger cap PMs on pullbacks.