Briefly: in our opinion, full (300% of the regular position size) speculative short positions in mining stocks are justified from the risk/reward point of view at the moment of publishing this Alert.
The USD Index declined yesterday, while the precious metals market moved higher, possibly due to the relatively "turbulent" pre-election debate in the U.S. But still, did anything actually change regarding the outlook?
Not really.
As we have stated in our previous analyses, while gold and the rest of the precious metals market will probably decline significantly in the following weeks, and that a short-term correction would not be surprising at all. The same holds true for the USD Index, except that the direction of any possible moves could be considered the opposite.
Regarding the USD Index's short-term chart, we've indicated the following:
Last week, the USD Index was just starting to break above the declining resistance line. We wrote that the situation doesn't become crystal-bullish, unless we see a confirmation of the breakout in the form of either a significant move above the resistance (it's not significant so far), or three consecutive daily closes above it.
That's exactly what we saw. The breakout is more than confirmed. We didn't saw a corrective decline, but rather, we've witnessed a pause. So, will we see a pullback soon? That's quite possible, but definitely not inevitable. Such a decline could trigger a rally in gold, but we don't think that any of these moves would be significant.
As it turns out, that's precisely what we've witnessed this week.
The USDX moved a bit lower, while gold, silver, and mining stocks moved slightly higher. However, the sizes of these moves were not particularly significant.
In the chart above, we see that the USDX has barely moved to the August highs, and then moved back up again (in today's pre-market trading) - above these highs. What does that mean? It means that the pullback might already be over.
At the moment of writing, we can see that gold erased most of yesterday's upswing (during the pre-market trading), which would support the theory above about the corrective move being over.
If we take the intraday prices into account, gold moved slightly above its August low, but that would not be the case if we consider the daily closing prices. In the latter case, we could even speak of a breakdown's verification below the August low.
Silver corrected based on a relatively weak support level created by the local August lows. We've predicted that this move is not likely to be anything significant, and indeed, it wasn't. Silver corrected a smaller part of the downswing, and it didn't even manage to move back to the rising support line that it had broken earlier this month. Therefore, the outlook remains bearish.
But, did it became bullish in the case of the mining stocks? After all, they just closed above their August low...
In short, we're not buying the bullish narrative because of the following three reasons:
- It doesn't fit the indications from the USD Index, gold, or silver.
- GDX corrected to the rising resistance line, based on the previous lows (red, dashed line) without breaking it.
- Gold is already back to where it was 24 hours earlier, and since miners closed above their August low for just one day, it seems that this was somewhat accidental and that they will follow gold's bearish lead that we've already detected in the pre-market trading.
In other words, practically everything that I wrote yesterday and in Monday's extensive analysis still applies - the outlook for the precious metals market remains bearish for the next several weeks.
Overview of the Upcoming Decline
As far as the current overview of the upcoming decline is concerned, I think it has already begun.
During the final part of the slide (which could end later than in 6 weeks, perhaps near the end of the year - just like it happened in 2015), we expect silver to decline more than miners. That would be aligned with how the markets initially reacted to the Covid-19 threat.
The impact of all the new rounds of money printing in the U.S. and Europe on the precious metals prices is incredibly positive in the long run, but it doesn't make the short-term decline improbable. Markets can and will get ahead of themselves and then decline - sometimes very profoundly - before continuing their upward march.
The plan is to exit the current positions in miners after they decline far and fast, but at the same time, silver drops just "significantly" (we expect this to happen in 0 - 5 weeks). In other words, the decline in silver should be severe, but the decline in the miners should look "ridiculous". That's what we did in March when we bought practically right at the bottom. It is a very soft and broad instruction, so additional confirmations are necessary.
I expect this confirmation to come from gold, reaching about $1,800. If - at the same time - gold moves to about $1,800 and miners are already after a ridiculously big drop (say, to $31 - $32 in the GDX ETF - or lower), we will probably exit the short positions in the miners and at the same time enter short positions in silver. It will be tempting to wait with opening the short position in silver until the entire sector rebounds, but such a rebound could last only a couple of hours, so it would be challenging to successfully execute such a strategy.
The precious metals market's final bottom is likely to take shape when gold shows significant strength relative to the USD Index. It could take the form of a gold's rally or a bullish reversal, despite the ongoing USD Index rally.
Summary
Summing up, considering gold's breakout invalidation above the 2011 highs, it's clear that the rally (that ended $4 above our upside target) is entirely over. Given this invalidation and the confirmed USD Index breakout, gold will probably slide much lower over the next few weeks. That may (based on miners' breakdown) or may not (based on gold's triangle-vertex-based reversal) happen right away. Or, it will take place after several days of pause or a small correction, but it will most probably happen.
Naturally, everyone's trading is their responsibility. But in our opinion, if there ever was a time to either enter a short position in the miners or increase its size if it wasn't already sizable, it's now. We made money on the March decline, and on the March rebound, with another massive slide is already underway.
After the sell-off (that takes gold to about $1,700 or lower), we expect the precious metals to rally significantly. The final decline might take as little as 1-6 weeks, so it's important to stay alert to any changes.
Most importantly, please stay healthy and safe. We made a lot of money on the March decline and the subsequent rebound (its initial part) price moves (and we'll likely earn much more in the following weeks and months), but you have to be healthy to really enjoy the results.
As always, we'll keep you - our subscribers - informed.
To summarize:
Trading capital (supplementary part of the portfolio; our opinion): Full speculative short positions (300% of the full position) in mining stocks is justified from the risk to reward point of view with the following binding exit profit-take price levels:
Senior mining stocks (price levels for the GDX ETF): binding profit-take exit price: $32.02; stop-loss: none (the volatility is too big to justify a SL order in case of this particular trade); binding profit-take level for the DUST ETF: $28.73; stop-loss for the DUST ETF: none (the volatility is too big to justify a SL order in case of this particular trade)
Junior mining stocks (price levels for the GDXJ ETF): binding profit-take exit price: $42.72; stop-loss: none (the volatility is too big to justify a SL order in case of this particular trade); binding profit-take level for the JDST ETF: $21.22; stop-loss for the JDST ETF: none (the volatility is too big to justify a SL order in case of this particular trade)
For-your-information targets (our opinion; we continue to think that mining stocks are the preferred way of taking advantage of the upcoming price move, but if for whatever reason one wants / has to use silver or gold for this trade, we are providing the details anyway. In our view, silver has greater potential than gold does):
Silver futures downside profit-take exit price: unclear at this time - initially, it might be a good idea to exit, when gold moves to $1,703.
Gold futures downside profit-take exit price: $1,703
Long-term capital (core part of the portfolio; our opinion): No positions (in other words: cash
Insurance capital (core part of the portfolio; our opinion): Full position
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Please note that the in the trading section we describe the situation for the day that the alert is posted on. In other words, if we are writing about a speculative position, it means that it is valid on the day it was posted on. We are also featuring the initial target prices, so that you can decide whether keeping a position on a given day is something that is in tune with your approach (some moves are too small for medium-term traders and some might appear too big for day-traders).
Additionally, you might want to read why our stop-loss orders are usually relatively far from the current price.
Please note that a full position doesn't mean using all of the capital for a given trade. You will find details on our thoughts on gold portfolio structuring in the Key Insights section on our website.
As a reminder - "initial target price" means exactly that - an "initial" one. It's not a price level at which we suggest closing positions. If that becomes the case (like it did in the previous trade) we will refer to these levels as levels of exit orders (exactly as we've done previously). Stop-loss levels, however, are naturally not "initial", but something that, in our opinion, might be entered as an order.
Since it is impossible to synchronize target prices and stop-loss levels for all the ETFs and ETNs with the main markets that we provide these levels for (gold, silver and mining stocks - the GDX ETF), the stop-loss levels and target prices for other ETNs and ETF (among other: UGLD, DGLD, USLV, DSLV, NUGT, DUST, JNUG, JDST) are provided as supplementary, and not as "final". This means that if a stop-loss or a target level is reached for any of the "additional instruments" (DGLD for instance), but not for the "main instrument" (gold in this case), we will view positions in both gold and DGLD as still open and the stop-loss for DGLD would have to be moved lower. On the other hand, if gold moves to a stop-loss level but DGLD doesn't, then we will view both positions (in gold and DGLD) as closed. In other words, since it's not possible to be 100% certain that each related instrument moves to a given level when the underlying instrument does, we can't provide levels that would be binding. The levels that we do provide are our best estimate of the levels that will correspond to the levels in the underlying assets, but it will be the underlying assets that one will need to focus on regarding the signs pointing to closing a given position or keeping it open. We might adjust the levels in the "additional instruments" without adjusting the levels in the "main instruments", which will simply mean that we have improved our estimation of these levels, not that we changed our outlook on the markets. We are already working on a tool that would update these levels on a daily basis for the most popular ETFs, ETNs and individual mining stocks.
Our preferred ways to invest in and trade gold along with the reasoning can be found in the how to buy gold section. Additionally, our preferred ETFs and ETNs can be found in our Gold & Silver ETF Ranking.
As a reminder, Gold & Silver Trading Alerts are posted before or on each trading day (we usually post them before the opening bell, but we don't promise doing that each day). If there's anything urgent, we will send you an additional small alert before posting the main one.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Przemyslaw Radomski, CFA
Editor-in-chief, Gold & Silver Fund Manager
