The short squeeze is in

• Silver has a day for the ages!
• Economic data is not good

Good Day... And a Marvelous Monday to you! I hope everyone had a very Blessed Christmas, and if you don't celebrate the Good Lord's birth, then I hope you had a wonderful weekend. How was your Christmas? Mine was grand as all the kids were here along with the grandkids... Family is what matters to me, and I enjoy having my family around me all the time... The Marshall Tucker Band greets me this morning with their great song: Heard It In A Love Song.

Well, I was all prepared had it cued up and all to send you a Pfennig last Tuesday that alerted you to how the Big Bullion Banks and The COMEX were in cahoots to cheat Silver holder and buyers to be... I had seen a YOUTUBE explaining it all, but then I got to thinking.. No one else was writing about this cheating, and so I didn't send it out, and later found out that it probably wasn't true... at this time.

But the COMEX did raise the margin on futures contracts in both Gold & Silver last week, just not when I thought they had. Gold to $22 and Silver to $27... I'll let Ed Steer explain how this all plays out math-wise: here's Ed "So if you're short on one COMEX contract, your margin call requirements that month worked out to $135,000 per contract...$27x5,000 troy ounces. That doesn't include the approximately 70 cent roll-over/switch charge per ounce from December into March that the CME imposes...so tack on a further $3,500 on top of that per contract. We're talking about serious money here...especially if you're a smaller trader.

The Big 8 commercial traders are short 59,180 contracts/295.900 million troy ounces -- and I'll let you do the math on that. It's a frightening number.

The icing on the cake for all the shorts...small, medium and large...was the margin call they got on that $7+ rally in silver yesterday."

Yes, so the Silver $7 rally on Friday to end the week at $79.39 was so full of short covering by the SPTs and then sprinkle in some new long buys and you have a rally for the ages Remember when I told you after Silver traded above $70 the first time? I said, "That Silver will reach $80 much faster than it took it to reach $70 from $60" And lookie here.. I couldn't believe my eye when I first looked at the metals screen and saw the $7 rally in Silver.. I mentioned before I went on vacation, that the SPTs are caught in a trap, on one side they have these HUMONGOUS margin calls for their shorts, but if they go to close the shorts out, that means they have to buy Silver and that will cause an even larger rally in Silver... And that's exactly what we saw last week.

Gold also rallied on Friday and ended the week at $4,533... One month ago, Silver was $52... So, a $27 rally in a month... Pretty crazy, eh? Well, onto $100 I guess.

The dollar spent last week getting sold, and ended the week with the BBDXY at 1,200... Gold at $4,533, Silver at $79.27, Oil at $56, and the 10-year at 4.13% yield. It was not a "Santa Rally" for the dollar.

In the overnight markets last night... What the heck went on here? Silver is down $4 to start the day/ week this morning, and Gold is down $70! Just when you think the SPTs have had their day, and have gone away, they come back with a vengeance.

And the dollar saw some buying overnight, and the BBDXY is up 2 index points this morning... Last night before I retired, the BBDXY had fallen to 1198... But I guess the PPT came in and intervened to get the dollar from falling further. 

Goldman Sachs, aka Lola says that "Gold is our favorite long commodity"... And Kitco.com reports this morning that 57% of people polled are of the belief that Silver will get to $100 this next year. So, I wanted to include those things to even out the selling going on in Gold & Silver.

The price of Oil bumped higher to a $57 handle this morning, and the 10-year Treasury's yield saw some buying and the yield starts the day today at 4.12%.

So, when I was on the trading desk at EverBank World Markets, and I would go on vacation, the remaining crew on the desk would claim, "When Chuck's away, the currencies and metals rally"... And they would be really screaming it now, because while I was away, the dollar sunk, Gold & Silver rallied as if they were going out of business, and all was right in the world of markets again.

The dollar has really sunk, especially after the 3^rd QTR GDP showed that, once again, if your Gov't spends enough, they can pump up the GDP.... 3^rd QTR GDP printed at 4.35%... So, now, all the town criers that were calling for another rate cut at the next meeting, have slunk back into the caves, like Snuff The Magic Dragon, and all bets are off now... Now to me, that GDP print was utterly ridiculous! Factory Orders are down, Industrial Production is down, Capacity Utilization hasn't moved, but... Money Supply is soaring... GDP has officially become a piece of data that I don't care about any longer, because of its falseness.

The Chinese renminbi was traded below he 7 handle for a brief time on Friday, It hasn't been this strong VS the dollar since Sept 2024... So, the main competition for exports for the U.S. is allowing their currency to strengthen... I guess they aren't worried about how expensive their currency is for their exports.

The BBDXY when I left you on 12/17 was 1,208... This morning the BBDXY is 1202 ... The dollar had already begun its drop before I went on vacation... The BBDXY had reached as high as 1,213, and on 12/15 I even headlined a Pfennig with " The Dollar Returns To Its Underlying Weak Trend"...  So, this wasn't just a "Chuck's away" rally for the currencies, but it was a bit of: "Chuck's away" so let's play some more for the currencies.

The price of Oil has fallen to a $56 handle... I have changed my outlook for the price of Oil... With weaker demand, and all the tanker shipping problems, I see the price of Oil falling below $50 in the new year...  The 10-year Treasury's yield ended the week at 4.13%... You would think that if the thoughts of an additional rate cut next month were put on the back burner, that the yield would go higher.... But the Fed Heads were there to prevent that from happening, I suspect.

As in past years, the last week of the year all the forecasters come out of the woodwork and opine about how they see the new year going... I won't be joining them because my viewpoint is a long-term view.. But I will add that I really think that the rallies in Silver and Gold for 2025 are really impressive... Gold is up 70% this year, and Silver is up 140%!! But book those gains, and put them away... I feel that while Gold & Silver will continue to rally in 2026, that their gains in 2025 will be their best efforts.. I hope I'm incorrect in that thought, that Gold & Silver better 2025 gains in 2026... You won't be mad at me if I'm incorrect here, will you? I didn't think so... But basically, when you calculate the percentage gain from $2,000 to $4,500 it's astronomical, but... when you calculate the gain from $4,500 to $7000 since you're dealing with larger numbers the percentage gain isn't as lofty... That's all I'm saying here... The percentage gains will not be as lofty as they were in 2025.

Jim Rickards said that since Gold is on a bull run that it could very well be at 10,000 by the end of the new year... But before you celebrate, think about that for a minute, if Gold is $10,000 that means something is terribly wrong or already has gone wrong in the U.S. and its economy... I'm just saying.

I've said for some time now that I thought the U.S. Financial System would collapse and I still feel that way... When? Only the Shadow Knows.

The euro is stuck in the mud right now... you would've thought that the euro would benefit from a weaker dollar, and it has but not as strongly as I would have thought. The rest of the currencies are looking a little healthier this morning, with the Russian ruble standing out as the best performing currency vs the dollar... See what the talk of a peace agreement can do? So, how's that diversification going? 

The U.S. Data Cupboard last week had two reports (Oct & Nov) for each data print, with Rocktober's prints being much worse than the Nov print... You see, they can't go back and make adjustments once the data has printed, so they just said, oh well, we'll make up for it with the Nov. Prints...  

This week the Data Cupboard is basiclly empty, it will have a sprinkling of non-market moving prints but that's it... So, the dollar is on its own this week, and so far it doesn't look like it will be good week for the dollar.

To recap... Silver rallied by $7 or 10% on Friday, and in China it traded over $80... But here in the U.S. where the SPTs still have some say, Silver stayed below $80 into the weekend... Gold also rallied and ended the week above $4,500.. The dollar got sold like funnel cakes at a State Fair, and Chuck has changed his outlook for the price of Oil.

For What It's Worth... Well, this article comes to us from the Good Folks at GATA, and it's about the real story driving the prices of Gold & Silver higher and it can be found on the GATA site, but unless you're a subscriber you won't be able to see the entire article, but... I have the most of it.

Here's your snippet: "To hear mainstream financial news organizations and analysts tell it, gold and silver have been flying because of:

• The decline of the US Dollar.
• International disorder sparked by the war between Russia and Ukraine, or the West's war against Russia through its Ukrainian proxy.
• The seizure by the U.S. government and Western European governments of Russian foreign exchange assets.
• Heavy buying of gold by central banks seeking some independence from the dollar and U.S. foreign policy.
• The unstoppable increase in U.S. government and Western European government debt.
• Strong industrial demand for Silver.

Of course there is something to all those things. But the mainstream carefully overlooks what is likely the biggest cause of the stunning revival of the monetary metals: the long-overdue calling of the short derivatives positions in both metals that has been operated for decades by the U.S. government, its closest allies, and their bullion bank agents.

Delivery of real metal now is being demanded against paper claims on metal, claims that were issued by bullion banks that never had to deliver it, thereby allowing gold and silver supplies to be oversubscribed by as much as 90 or 100 to 1.

Only a short squeeze can plausibly explain the violent price action in silver today, when the metal rose in price by as much as $7 or 10%. One-day action like that in the metals has not been seen for decades.

The squeeze is evident in the huge discrepancy between prices in Shanghai, India, London, and New York. Prices in Shanghai and India are far higher, creating an arbitrage opportunity that has been draining metal out of the West, metal that in many cases has multiple owners and isn't readily available.

Examining this angle -- the creation of vast imaginary supplies of the monetary metals in order to protect the dollar as the world reserve currency, maintain faith in U.S. government debt, and impoverish the rest of the world -- might explode what's left of the world's political order, an unjust, imperialistic order that should be exploded.

Examining this angle also might fatally discredit the mainstream news organizations and analysts who aren't capable of honesty in a matter so important."

Chuck again... I would really like to see the look on the faces of those that told me not to write about short selling to manipulate Gold & Silver years ago... All those years ago... I was about ready to walk out the door because they wouldn't let me say what I wanted to say... But realizing that I had the best job I could have, and I needed to support my family, so.. I tucked my tail between my legs, and went back to my desk... I still alluded to the short selling, but never really came out and called the manipulation for what it was.

Market Prices 12/29/25: American Style: A$.6685, kiwi .5792, C$ .7300, euro 1.1760, sterling 1.3477, Swiss $1.2645, European Style: rand 16.6377, krone 10.0546, SEK 9.1909, forint 329.62, zloty 3.5954, koruna 20.6447, RUB 77.67, yen 156.36, sing 1.2859, HKD 7.7740, INR 88.98, China 7.0068, peso 17.91, BRL 5.6664, BBDXY 1,202, Dollar Index 98.14, Oil $57.96, 10-year 4.12%, Silver $75.05, Platinum $2,323.00, Palladium $1,740.00, Copper $5.60, and Gold... $4,464.

That's it for today.... Just today, tomorrow and Wednesday for writing this week, and then we say goodbye to 2025... And the next time I write to you, after Wednesday, I will be in my winter home, and it will be 2026... My beloved Mizzou Tigers laid an egg at the Gator Bowl game and lost... UGH! And Kathy celebrated her birthday (day after Christmas) by doing nothing! She deserved to do nothing, after all the Christmas stuff she worked on! It was 65 degrees on Christmas, so obviously, no White Christmas for us... Where was that 65 degrees the year I received a new bike for Christmas when I was a youngster? Marmalade takes us to the finish line today with their great 60's song: Reflections of My Life... I hope you have a Marvelous Monday today, and Please Be Good To Yourself!