Maduro's arrest, and Gold stocks'... reversal?
|The weekend brought dramatic headlines: US forces arrested Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise military operation, sparking immediate safe-haven flows into gold. The yellow metal surged about 2% to approximately $4,450 per ounce as I'm writing these words.
And yet, I'm looking at this rally with the same analytical lens I applied when US airstrikes hit Iran's nuclear facilities back in June. Remember what happened then? Gold barely moved. The ultimate chaos event failed to sustain precious metals rallies. Yes, the precious metals sector did move in the following months, but based on other reasons. The single-time military event didn’t trigger a sustainable rally, and it was very much in tune with how precious metals usually respond to geopolitical events – in a volatile, but brief manner.
Today's situation is instructive for the same reason.
The peak chaos framework remains intact
When I introduced the Peak Chaos thesis, the core idea was simple: when maximum geopolitical escalation fails to drive sustained safe-haven flows, it signals that markets have already priced in worst-case scenarios. From that point, even events that remain chaotic but are less than maximally destructive tend to trigger reversals rather than continuation.
The Venezuela operation is dramatic, no question. But consider the market's reaction:
· Gold is up about 2% — a meaningful move, but not the kind of sustained breakout that would suggest a trend change
· The USD Index is actually rising, hitting a four-day high near 98.80 despite the geopolitical turbulence
· Mining stocks soared initially but are already giving back gains — GDXJ traded as high as $120.46 earlier today but has since retreated to around $118-119
This pattern is exactly what we've seen repeatedly when geopolitical events create temporary spikes that don't translate into sustained trends.
The SLV ETF is trading close to its 2025 highs. Gold and the GDXJ are not.
The USD Index is after a short-term breakout.
Technically, this is yet another attempt to move the October high in gold that’s unlikely to hold. That’s what gold miners’ and silver’s relative performance to gold point to, that’s what’s likely based on the tendency for the single-time geopolitical to result in only temporary rallies, and that’s what’s likely on the situation in the USD Index.
Sure, silver’s strength has fundamental merit, but as I argued in my previous silver article, given the CME price hikes, silver might still decline in the near term.
China's response confirms controlled escalation
China's reaction to the Venezuela operation is worth noting. Despite Venezuela being "China's strongest ally in Latin America" (as Capital Economics put it), Beijing's response has been notably restrained: condemnations but no threats, diplomatic protests but no retaliatory actions.
Today's events are noise, not signal. The signal remains in the technical patterns, the USD dynamics, and the inability of maximum chaos to generate sustained precious metals rallies.
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