Gold and Silver prices lifted with Gold up 2% in the past 5 days at $7140 CAD still up 3.5% month over month. Silver is down 12.5% this month and up 7.5% from the last 5 days now $125.60CAD. Silver is still up 170% Year over Year. US Dollar index DXY is flat this week at 97.75 and down 8% YOY. SP500 Volatility Index VIX rose 4%. SP 500 ES futures fell 0.75% and are now trading 6858 having failed to trade above 7000 for the 2nd week this year. The Dow Jones 30 is below 50,000.
Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) plan to force a vote on the possibility of war against Iran next week. The war powers resolution would limit the President forcing him to seek congressional approval before engaging in further activity in Iran. Last week, Gulf News reported “About one third of the US Navy’s deployed fleet” is ready for battle in the Middle East.
Trump received a standing ovation during Tuesday’s State of the Union when he called on Congress to pass the Stop Insider Trading Act. More than 80 percent of US voters support banning Congress from trading individual stocks.
Crude WTI futures are up 2% at $67.24 and now down only 4% YOY. NYMEX NG natural gas futures which spiked over 100% above $7 in January are now trading $2.85 USD per Million BTU, near the 52 week low of $2.62 printed in August.
Crypto is still very soft with BTC down 3% this week to $65,800 and ETH down 1% at $1944. The crypto crash originally started on Oct. 10 when Trump threatened to impose an extra 100% tariff on Chinese imports
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Ai powered Government Contractor Palantir is up 2.75% - PLTR currently trades at $136.10, and up 42% YOY after falling from a 52 week high of 207.52. NVDA is down 3.25% in the past 5 days at $180.54 despite trading up to $197.62 following Wednesday's announcement of record quarterly revenue and record full year revenue up 65%.
S&P AeroSpace and Defense ETF XAR fell 1.5% in the past 5 days to $279.88. XAR is up 71% in the past 12 months.
Polymarket odds that “Trump invokes War Powers against Iran by March 31st” has fallen from 60% to 42% on $144,000 volume.
Weekly Jobless Claims rose 4,000 to 212,000 for the period ending Feb 20th. The Gold/Silver ratio fell 5% now at 56.90 up from a low this year of 43.52 after falling steadily since late October and from its March high of 107. Longer 20 yr and 30 yr US government bonds are down 8 and 6 bps to 4.58 and 4.64% respectively.
Japan's 40-year bond yields which surged to 4.21% in January have fallen back, currently trading flat from last week at 3.56%.
The Polymarket quoted probability of a total 100 bps in cuts coming in 2026 is currently 12%, 75 bps in cuts in 2026 stands at 19% and the probability of 50 bps is 27%. Short term rates are down 8 bps in the 2yr at 3.40.
US Comex Copper Futures HG, a leading indicator of economic growth, rose 3.5% to $6.08 usd/lb after hitting a new all time high in January of $6.58 usd/lb.