Friday wrap

market vibes

March 21… )

“Everything looks nicer when you win.” Billy Martin

This note will be mercifully brief because there was so little activity to write about today. Copper traded lower early in the session and settled unchanged at $5.11, which is an impressive price for an economically sensitive metal in the shadow of a looming recession. Silver went down.

Gold traded $60 lower early in the session on moderate volume and rallied after the pit close as usual. June Comex settled down $20. Notably sparse open interest fell 5k as of Thursday's close. The CFTC reported Spec length (net non-comm positions) rose 26, 537 after falling 68 k lots in February and March as gold rallied $268/ toz in the same period. Gold is not long on the Comex.

NYMEX WTI Crude Oil came in lower and traded in a very narrow range on the lightest volume in a month. May closed ca +20 cents.

Most FX pairs did nothing this week (except TRY chart below)…

Bonds dropped coincidentally with a hard rally in stocks. This is the second time in two days the bond and stock markets have moved down and up in concert. I'm a little surprised Powell's un-QT didn't nothing for the long end.

BBG just posted: “Specs short the dollar first time since before the election -turn bearish as of March 18.” Not the best location but the void looks ominous.

Bitcoin of course did nothing (no chart needed to display nothing).

my vibe

Bloomberg says the EU is considering deploying its most powerful retaliatory "anti-coercion instrument" to deter Trump's reciprocal tariffs on April 2. No one knows what that powerful instrument is, but the Ursulas and Macrons seem to be sending a message. The Wall Street Journal says Trump could use a Forced Labor Prevention Act (Biden used it in 2022) that bars imports of almost all goods linked to Xinjiang, an expansive region in the west of China.

As Trump and his MAGA team work for peace, the edge of the abyss comes closer every day. I wonder if markets would be busier, people would be wealthier, jobs would be plentiful, politicians would be trustworthy, genders would truly be binary, and so much more to ponder.… if the banks didn’t rule the world, especially the Central banks.

One day we may find out.

Powell and the press and inflation last Wednesday

Happy first Friday of Spring 2025!

JJ

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Charts and data CQG and Bloomberg

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