Gold Seeker Closing Report: Gold and Silver Fall Over 1% and 3%

	Close	Gain/Loss
Gold	$926.80	-$11.80
Silver	$13.26	-$0.48
XAU	138.97	-2.76%
HUI	335.34	-2.69%
GDM	1024.53	-2.59%
JSE Gold	2250.96	-2.77
USD	79.52	+0.64
Euro	140.31	-1.43
Yen	105.28	-0.48
Oil	$63.35	-$3.88
10-Year	3.664%	-0.024
T-Bond	116.46875	+0.515625
Dow	9070.72	-0.29%
Nasdaq	1967.76	-0.39%
S&P	975.15	-0.46%

Gold and silver traded mostly slightly lower in Asia and London, but they then accelerated their losses in New York and gold ended near its low of $925.00 with a loss of 1.26% while silver closed near its low of $13.167 with a loss of 3.49%.

Euro gold fell to about €661, platinum lost $22 to $1169, and copper fell over 4 cents to about $2.47.

Gold and silver equities fell roughly 3% in the first hour of trade and remained at about that level for the rest of the day.

Report	For	Reading	Expected	Previous
Durable Orders	June	-2.5%	-0.6%	1.3%
Durables, Ex Trans.	June	1.1%	0.0%	0.8%

The fed’s Beige Book said that they see retail activity as sluggish with some improvement in manufacturing, but lending is seen as stable or weak. Overall the fed said that the economy continues to be weak, but the pace of decline is slowing.

Tomorrow at 8:30AM EST brings Initial Jobless Claims for 7/25 expected at 585,000.

Oil fell nearly 6% after crude inventories built a much larger than expected 5.1 million barrels.

The U.S. dollar index rose on cash raising/safe haven buying after today’s worse than expected Durable Goods Orders report reignited lingering worries over the economy and sent the Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P modestly lower.

Treasuries reversed early gains and ended just slightly higher after today’s $39 billion 5-year note auction drew weak demand. The bid-to cover ratio of 1.92 was pretty paltry compared to a recent average of 2.2. Tomorrow’s $28 billion 7-year note auction will be closely watched as it closes out this week’s record high government issuance of $115 billion of debt that appears to be getting harder and harder to sell.

Among the big names making news in the market today were Microsoft and Yahoo, Time Warner, ConocoPhillips, Sprint Nextel, WellPoint, Nissan, Honda, Qwest, and Coca-Cola Enterprises.

In what is a continuation of yesterday’s deflationary trade, the US Dollar moved sharply higher today with crude oil getting whacked along with most of the rest of the commodity complex, including ol’ Dr. Copper. That allowed for further long liquidation in gold which as those of you who follow this site regularly understand, always tends to occur during rollover week as funds move positions out of the front month to avoid delivery issues. The perma bears generally tend to time their gold takedowns in association with these rollovers – no surprise there.

Open interest readings reveal sizeable long liquidation occurred in yesterday’s sharp plunge lower in gold. The recent Commitment of Traders report has shown the momentum following trading funds with a rather large net long position which caught the attention of the predatory bullion banks who dug in their heels above $958, sucked up all the bids and then rammed the market lower after which they stepped aside and let the computerized black boxes of the funds do their work for them as they are now covering those shorts put on above $955.

The only way to short circuit this rather simpleminded strategy of the bullion banks is for some of the big funds to simply stand for delivery and insist on taking the gold out of the warehouse but no matter how often we lay out a clear strategy for victory over the Comex gold goons, the hedgies simply cannot bring themselves to taking the necessary steps to prevent their own plundering at the hands of the bullion banks.

Open interest is shifting to the December contract which is now 4 times that of the August.

With the short term technicals having now turned in favor of the gold bears, the market will need to find support near the next level of $920. Failure there and it is back down below $910. Resistance is now $940 on the topside.

It appears that the fundamentals of large supplies in inventory are taking crude lower and when coupled with the stronger US Dollar, is resulting in a buyer’s strike across the entire commodity complex. That has taken the CCI (Continuous Commodity Index) down near its 50 week moving average on the price charts which is also quite close to the 50% Fibonacci retracement level from last December’s low to this June’s high. One has to think that if the inflation argument is winning, the commodity complex will find buying support rather soon. If not, we could drift down to near 380 on that index which I suspect will see a large amount of index fund money making its way back into these markets.

Once again the bond market is trading in an extremely erratic fashion. Early in the session it was the recipient of safe haven flows on the heels of the lousy durable goods number and the weaker stock indices. Additionally, the Fed was in there buying $3 billion worth of bonds as part of their Quantitative Easing program. As soon as that buying was over, the bonds began drifiting well off their highs and were stabilizing there until the results of the $39 billion auction of 5 years became known. They then took a sharp dive as poor demand at the auction raised fears about the massive amount of supply that is coming at the market. Pity the unfortunate mortgage outfit attempting to get a read on this screwed up market so that they can set up some sort of hedging program!”- Dan Norcini, More at JSMineset.com

“August Gold closed down 11.9 at 927.2. This was 2 up from the low and 10.9 off the high.

September Silver finished down 0.482 at 13.258, 0.432 off the high and 0.093 up from the low.

The gold market seemed to be partly under a broad based wave of commodity selling on Wednesday. However, ongoing talk about limiting commodity speculation might have prompted some of the selling pressure. With a big range up extension in the US Dollar, currency related pressures were perhaps another source of bearish pressure. In the end, weaker US scheduled data, weaker equity prices and a sharply higher Dollar simply created a conclusively negative environment for the gold trade.

Silver saw a definitive range down move on Wednesday and in the process the market managed to reach down to the lowest level since July 17th. Like the gold market, a number of outside market forces were negative but the market probably saw some internally motivated selling interest. It goes without saying that silver was undermined by a sharp rise in the Dollar, and with crude oil prices under intense pressure, there was probably some spillover pressure from the energy complex.”- The Hightower Report, Futures Analysis and Forecasting

Note: Change in Total Tonnes from yesterday’s data: SPDR subtracted 3.36 tonnes.

The world’s 100 hottest gold stocks, Nevsun’s (NSU) satisfied project financing, Exeter’s (XRA) drill results, Great Basin’s (GBG) new vein discovery, and Hecla’s (HL) quarterly results were among the big stories in the gold and silver mining industry making headlines today.

Winners & Losers tracks NYSE and AMEX listed gold and silver mining stocks that trade over $1.

USEC to Pursue Discussions on Loan Guarantee - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Venezuela gold faces red tape, wildcat miners - "Crystallex was unable to obtain an environmental license and Gold Reserve had its license withdrawn.

In May Venezuela stripped Canadian miner Gold Reserve (GRZ.TO) of two concessions, including a part of the Brisas property next to Las Cristinas.

The government said it does not intend to renew mining concessions to private companies." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

World`s 100 hottest gold stocks - selection has been critical - "Seen as a global grouping, mining stocks touched nine-month highs on 3 June, before screeching down to a trough on 23 June, and then rising sharply to make 10-month highs on Monday this week, before taking a breather that has continued across Wednesday, particularly among Chinese mining stocks. On Tuesday, Chinese stockmarkets had made yet another series of 12-month highs." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Marathon District Summer Work Program Underway - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Canarc Resource Corp.: Shareholder Update and Second Quarter Review 2009 - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Virgin Metals Announces New Chief Executive Officer - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Armistice Resources releases Scott Wilson RPA review supporting deep drilling program at McGarry project - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Kria Resources' Preliminary Economic Assessment Results for Halfmile Lake Demonstrate Pre-Tax NPV of C$587 Million and IRR of Over 16% - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Corex Announces Drill Results Update Including 91.4m of 1.05 g/t Au - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Kinbauri Board Issues no Recommendation on Revised Orvana Offer - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Alexandria's Siscoe East Property Update - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Medoro Signs Letter of Intent to Acquire Colombia Gold plc - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Golden Goose files metalurgy report for its Lac Levac nickel deposit - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

17.16 g/t Au across 9.5m - Roxmark reports continued definition of high-grade gold at EP Zone target - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Affinity Gold Corp. Announces Reduction in Authorized Common Shares - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Golden Minerals to Open Markets at TSX Listing Ceremony - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Orvana Issues Reminder That Its All Cash Offer for Kinbauri Gold Corp. Will Expire on July 31, 2009 - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Trilliant Exploration Reports Gold Mining Revenue Estimates From Operations in June - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Northern Gold Mining Inc. Announces Closing of $450,000 Non-Brokered Private Placement With MineralFields - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

New Longhole Drilling Doubles the Length of La Mancha's Hassai Pit VMS Lens to 700 Meters - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Orezone Completes Drilling Below Surface Resources at Bombore - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Premier continues to define high-grade gold at EP Zone target 17.16 g/t Au across 9.5 - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Hawthorne Identifies High Grade Gold Zone at Taurus Deposit - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Dana Resources Acquires 1.17 Million Ounce Advanced Stage Collota Gold Deposit in Peru - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Lake Shore Gold Announces Details of Second Quarter 2009 Conference Call and Webcast - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Thunder Mountain Gold Identitifies New and Significant Gold Anomaly at Their South Mountain Project - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Sunergy Announces Finalization of Acquisition of Mining Interest in Ghana - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

East Asia Minerals Encounters 3.29 g/t Gold Over 66 Metres in Wider Interval of 1.71 g/t Gold Over 158 Metres From Initial Diamond Drill Testing of Miwah - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

General Metals Announces Finalization of the Sale of Its Ghana Mining Interest - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Molycor Gold Corp.: Private Placement - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

San Jose mine reserves increased by 8% in contained silver and 16% in contained gold between June 30, 2008 and December 31, 2008 - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Alix and Cloudbreak Acquire More Land in Yukon's White Gold District - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Northern Continental Cancels Special Meeting on July 30, 2009 and Schedules Meeting of Shareholders to Approve Arrangement With Hathor - More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Nevsun Resources Ltd.: Bisha Project Financing-Major Condition Satisfied - "Nevsun Resources Ltd., (TSX:NSU - News)(AMEX:NSU - News) is very pleased to announce that its Bisha Project in Eritrea has satisfied a significant condition of the recently announced $235 million debt financing." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Exeter Reports on 14 New Drill Holes at Cerro Moro - "Assays from a batch of 14 diamond drill holes on the Escondida vein include bonanza grades in drill holes MD475 and MD479, two holes that represent extensions to reported high grade mineralization in the Escondida Far West sector. This portion of the Escondida vein accounts for approximately 40% of the currently defined Escondida Zone resource." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Great Basin Reports New Epithermal Vein Discoveries at Hollister Property - "Great Basin Gold Ltd, ("Great Basin" or the "Company"), (TSX: GBG; NYSE Amex: GBG; JSE: GBG) announces the discovery of new epithermal veining adjacent to the Gwenivere and Clementine systems at its Hollister gold property on the Carlin Trend in Nevada, USA." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

Hecla Reports Record Silver Production, Strong Cash Flow and Reduced Cash Costs - "Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) today reported record quarterly silver production of 3 million ounces for the second quarter of 2009, a 24% increase compared with the same period a year ago. In spite of lower by-product metal credits in 2009 versus 2008, cash costs in the second quarter of 2009 were $3.38 per ounce of silver after by-product credits or 1.5% lower compared with the second quarter of 2008. Cash costs in the second quarter of 2009 were 28% lower compared with the first quarter of 2009, due to improved prices for by-product credits, increased productivity and lower consumable costs." More
- July 29, 2009 | Item | E-mail

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