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It was a bit of a quiet day in the precious metals market on Thursday.

Gold was down a bit, while silver traded higher. Both prices took a dip right around the COMEX open, and also when the retail sales report came in higher than expected (and also higher than last month) before rebounding throughout the afternoon.

I’m not entirely sold on the premise that gold and silver investors were sitting glued to their screens awaiting the retail sales data, and were then so blown away by the strength of the economy that they just had to sell gold and silver futures. Although it likely did have an impact in pushing the dollar index higher.

Here’s today’s gold chart.
 

Here’s the chart of the silver futures, where you can see the same early morning dip, although the price rebounded into positive territory unlike gold to finish at $38.45.
 

And here is today’s dollar index chart.
 

It was interesting to see that a rare earths metals company signed a deal with the US government.

Obviously not surprising given what’s been going on with the rare earths situation and China, who currently dominates the market, controlling both mining and processing capacities.
 

MP Materials unveiled a multibillion-dollar deal with the U.S. government on Thursday to boost output of rare earth magnets and help loosen China's grip on the materials used to build weapons, electric vehicles and many electronics.

This is just speculation, but if the available free-float of silver continues to dwindle, given silver’s importance in building weapons, electric vehicles, and many electronics, just like rare earths, will we see deals like this in the silver space?

This is just my own speculation. Although be aware that several silver mining executives did petition the Canadian government to list silver as a ‘critical mineral’ a few years ago. And in a conversation with Keith Neumeyer, the CEO of First Majestic Silver, he mentioned that they did talk with officials in the US as well.

Where a government official told him that it probably should be on there, and that it was likely an oversight that it hadn’t been included.

So just something to keep in mind as we continue to watch the ongoing commodity scramble, that I don’t see ending anytime soon.

With rumors swirling that Fed chair Jerome Powell might resign, while others continue to speculate that Trump will fire him (which Trump continues to deny), I’ve seen a lot of outrage by people concerned that this could impact the independence of the Fed.

Although it usually makes me chuckle, given how the idea that the Fed and the government have been independent has always been a little bit less than reality. And to understand why, take a look at this excerpt from former Fed chairman Paul Volcker’s book.

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