Gold

​Much of the U.S. has been pummeled by a winter storm, cold weather, snarled travel. Northern Europe is getting it, too, but even worse. Many, many minds are on the mid-week Christmas holiday and much of the rest of the world will have to wait while the Christian (and not-so-Christian) societies celebrate.

Gold moved up today, taking back a decent chunk of yesterday's decline, mostly on what traders saw as bargain-basement prices and a slightly softer dollar.The trade seems to have been - at least as the day began - to sell dollars and buy gold or silver.Now that the December FOMC meeting is behind us and the tapering executed on QE3 is modest, we can get back to looking at other statistics and c

There is an old comedy routine in the movies where one actor is asked to go for a ride in another's new car. The former becomes excited, dresses up nicely, slicks up his hair, and eventually hops into the car. The owner of the new vehicle drives up about 20 feet, then backs up and parks.

​In a mild surprise - and a largely symbolic move - the FOMC today decided to trim monthly asset purchases they have been making through the QE3 program by $10 billion per month.

The equities markets love it. The dollar bulls love it. Bond bulls sort of love it. Oil likes it quite a bit.

Gold, however, seems to dislike the whole idea fairly heartily.

In the 1987 film classic, Moonstruck, a character says to her philandering husband:

"I just want you to know no matter what you do, you're gonna die, just like everybody else."

Will Wednesday be THE day that tapering is announced? And, even if it is, what will it mean for gold prices?

First, it probably will not happen. Too many stars are aligned (or misaligned, as the case might be) for this to be the correct moment.

As we have maintained recently there is going to be a lot of volatility in the precious metals markets through the holidays.

The volatility will continue to be related to small volumes, interrupted trading weeks, and fewer players in the game, as well as fewer analysts hard at their grindstones.

Laozi, the 6th century B.C. scholar knew about the future. His view of it concludes today's fundamentals section of our email.

 One set of stellar data for the U.S. economy and one set of moderately negative data, but traders and investors focus on the former while ignoring the latter. From a world composed of 1's and 0's, we have moved to a world of only 1's.

There are only 20 days left in 2013. We can look into some of the baseline reasons that gold's price has dropped now, and then review the year in further detail as time goes on.

With all the gyrations and with all the verbal pyrotechnics coming out from, and about, the Fed, it's no wonder we've seen a spike in prices this week. Traders and analysts have been spinning themselves into a tizzy over the prospect of tapering or not tapering for eight months now.