Gold was under pressure right from the open of Globex trading in the Far East on Wednesday morning. It bottomed in Hong Kong and clawed its way back to unchanged by the time the Comex opened…but there was always someone there to make sure that the price didn’t get over $965 all through London trading. Every time it tried, it got shoved down. Its attempt to break through that price shortly after the Comex opened, met with a wall of selling that dropped the price by $25 in less than 90 minutes…and all of Tuesday’s gain of the same amount, disappeared. A rally attempt at the London close ran into big resistance at precisely 1:00 p.m. New York time yesterday. And as you might have expected…volume was huge as well…128,000 contracts, net of switches.

The shares got creamed.

Headquartered in Hanford, California, Thresher Industries is a provider of aluminum and metal matrix composite alloy castings. The Company started as a perm-mold casting enterprise, but later expanded their manufacturing capabilities to include low pressure, high pressure, and Nautilus Core manufacturing. The Nautilus Core manufacturing is a unique method of producing cores for use in aluminum and magnesium casting. The core is easily removable through high-pressure steam or water, is biodegradable, and can be located in areas not viable for sand or foam core.

Thresher Industries offers full engineering, metallurgical, and sales support along with designs and prototype development. The Company prides themselves on offering rapid response to customer needs as well as regional customer support from their sales and engineering team members. Thresher Industries has manufacturing sites near their diverse markets. Along with their full engineering services, they have a group of fully audited outside service providers for x-ray, machining,

New benchmark to track companies getting aid from TARP and President-elect Obama's proposed multibillion-dollar aid package.

Less than two weeks before President-elect Barack Obama takes office, a new index is coming out that will track stocks tied to companies participating in the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

The NASDAQ OMX Group said on Thursday that its Government Relief Index will follow not only those getting financial backing through TARP but also any firm receiving direct government investments from other programs. Presumably, that could include President-elect Obama's proposed $775 billion in additional bailout support to boost jobs and the economy.

Potential benefactors in business from such moves could include industries focused on infrastructure improvements and alternative energy sources, among others. 

"We believe the NASDAQ OMX Government Relief Index will be useful in helping investors evaluate the government's investments and the impact of the relief plan on the economy during this period of

The base metals were all deep in the red on Wednesday. Copper fell from the pre-dawn hours straight through the New York day, finishing at its intraday low of $1.4696/lb., down more than 6 cents.

Nickel also plunged daylong, just coming off its intraday lows late to close at $5.4242/lb., down 42¼ cents. Zinc was steady until mid-morning, but then sagged to its intraday low of $0.5538/lb., down 2¾ cents. Aluminum dropped slowly but steadily, ending at $0.705/lb., down just under a penny and a half, while lead also plummeted, giving up nearly 2 2/3 cents, to $0.5139/lb.

Copper skidded the most in two weeks after the weak jobs data generated some major cracks in the optimism that had been lately felt about a possible economic recovery. The recent rally, which was linked to the rebalancing of commodity indices, was stopped cold, analysts said.

“Index rebalancing is not going to be a

And this, together with the economic disaster that is already out there, only proves the utter, utter failure of the Federal Reserve to ‘preserve the value of the dollar’, which is their freaking mission in life. Morons!

The front of a recent issue of Barron’s asks, “Are Treasury Bonds Safe?” which is actually a really stupid question since every doofus knows that Treasury bonds are perfectly safe because a fiat currency and a lapdog Federal Reserve means that they can print up all the money the Treasury needs with which to pay bondholders!

So… Safe? Hell yes they are safe! You’d think that Barron’s would know that! Jeez! If I had been there at Barron’s, I would have suggested using this week’s cover for what I actually suggested for the cover of the employee newsletter.

At the meeting, I floated the idea of suggesting a splashy cover page with words in blazing red

In the energy market on Wednesday, oil plummeted to the biggest one-day percentage loss in 7 years, with crude for February delivery closing at $42.63/barrel, down $5.95. February reformulated gasoline fell 11.28 cents, to $1.0764/gallon.

In its weekly inventory survey, the Energy Information Administration reported that the nation’s crude stocks shot up by 6.7 million barrels in the week ended January 2. Gasoline inventories increased 3.3 million barrels, while distillate stocks rose by 1.8 million barrels. Refineries were operating at 84.6% of capacity last week, up from the prior week’s 82.5%.

“The stock build should be enough to chase the bulls back into the barn,” said James Williams, of WTRG Economics. “The substantial builds in crude oil, gasoline and distillates ought to bring the bears back from a short hibernation.”

Also helping oil lower was an easing of Middle East tensions after reports of a temporary truce in the Gaza Strip to

he economic news continues to bring bad tidings…consumer bankruptcies were up 33% in 2008…The financial crash is causing an economic crash, which will cause a worse financial crash…and around and around we go…Who will spend their savings in ‘09?…the CBO puts the budget deficit at $1.2 trillion for this year - and that’s not counting stimulus programs…and more!

“Psst…we’re breaking out of this joint…Saturday night…pass it on….”

Yes, dear reader…we’re breaking out… We’re not going to let these prison bars stop us. A whole generation of American investors is being fattened for slaughter…we’re not going to be among them.

Let’s look at yesterday’s headlines just to see what is going on.

The Dow rose 62 points yesterday. Oil held steady at $48. Gold went up $8. Yields are rising…but you still get paid nothing when you lend money to the U.S. government.

The economic news tells us that things are getting worse. Alcoa said

WWA Group Inc. is a company that trades and auctions transportation and industrial equipment worldwide. Through their wholly owned subsidiary, World Wide Auctioneers, Ltd. (WWA), they are one of the largest auctioneers of heavy equipment in the world. They focus their operations on under-served regions outside of North America. Founded in 1996, their corporate headquarters for the United States is in Tempe, Arizona. They also have a corporate office in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

WWA auctions items that include mobile, stationary, earthmoving, and construction equipment. These include crawler tractors, excavators, wheel loaders, cranes, trucks and trailers, generators, compressors, agricultural tractors, and forklifts. WWA Group Inc. also sells light vehicles and related items, including boats and motorcycles. The company also owns and charters a shipping vessel called the M/V Iron Butterfly.

WWA Group Inc. has a market share of more than 65 percent of all industrial equipment auction sales concluded in

Less than two hours ago, Hunt Gold Corp. provided shareholders with a comprehensive update covering a variety of issues.

Regarding its continued drilling at the “Mockingbird” Dandy Mine, the company currently has two holes planned and will update shareholders as additional drilling and exploration plans are finalized. Drilling operations will resume by TonaTec no later than January 10.

The company reported that a substantial amount of core from the first 6 drill holes at the Great West and the Pocahontas Gold Mines has been split. The core has been shipped to an independent assay laboratory located in Tucson, Arizona. The remainder of the core will be split and shipped this week. The independent assay laboratory has designated the Company’s core samples as a priority project, with the first assay results anticipated before the end of the month.

Although Hunt Gold recently increased its Authorized Share Capital to facilitate any possible deals and

In the currency market, the dollar slipped against the euro. Late Wednesday, the euro was trading at $1.3618 vs. $1.3529 on Tuesday.

The buck was undermined by the day’s horrendous job number. The ADP Employment Services report, generally seen as a leading indicator for the official Labor Department data due on Friday, said yesterday that private companies cut 693,000 jobs in December, far more than the 500,000 economists were projecting.

The report paints “a shockingly weak picture of the labor market,” said economists at RDQ Economics. The labor market is on track for the largest quarterly decline since 1945, they added.

In addition, for all of 2008, companies announced a total of 1.2 million job reductions, the most since 2003 and 59% more than in 2007, according to outplacement firm Challenger Gray & Christmas.

Analysts now await with trepidation the Friday nonfarm payrolls report, with many predicting a jump in unemployment from 6.7