The biggest news today came from the U.S. housing sector. Housing starts jumped sharply in September on surging demand for apartment rentals, the Commerce Department said in a report. Such a surge could be read as being hawkish vis a vis a Federal Reserve interest rate hike.

Gold struggled today, bumping up against a number of factors that combined to keep it from crossing the $1200 threshold, which would have meant fresh buying. Pushing past that level also would have also meant that speculative long buyers would have been crowded out by traders and investors who are true believers in the new bullish posture of the yellow precious metal.

Gold was pushed and pulled in two directions today, but nevertheless ended the week just off 3-1/2 month highs.

Indeed, the yellow precious metal eased on Friday as a recovering dollar tugged on prices and investors 
decided to take their portfolios into the weekend a little lighter in gold.

Reacting to stronger underlying inflation news in the U.S. economy, the dollar moved up today. The nominal notion is that the inflation data feeds the fire of the speculation about an interest rate hike by the Federal Reserve. We still find that scenario unlikely.

The Fed national Beige Book was released today and the data within reinforced what shrewd analysts have been saying all along. The US economy is not going anywhere until it gets some real inflation fires stoked.

A number of factors conspired today to drag most markets down or at least inhibit full-strength upward movement. The simplest to identify is gold, which continued to take losses because of fears that indeed, as we have been saying all along, the Fed will not be raising interest rates any time soon. We should also be mindful that transports lead the way in and out of recession.

Amidst welcome analysis from Bank of America that claims “the next big thing” in stimulus is going to be “massive” infrastructure investment, as well as other positive signs operating, markets tried to turn higher in slow trading today.

While Monday is not an “official” trading holiday, look for traders in New York to treat it as such. Junior crews will be working the desks while senior traders take a three-day weekend. (Schools; courts; most, but not all, banks; and other federal and state offices are closed in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.)

Some of the markets we are most concerned with (oil and the S&P500) started the day higher, then faltered on news of turmoil regarding the election of a new Speaker of the House in the U.S. Congress. Then the Fed released its minutes from the September FOMC meeting and things got very interesting. (Gold played its own game today, rising briefly and then falling back on the Fed minutes.)

One would think that in the day and age of computers, apps, continuous information feedback loops and other electronic means that keeping track of domestic U.S. oil supplies wouldn’t be that hard. At the very least you would believe that the estimates might be within 3–4% of reality.

Not so fast.