by Clint Siegner, Money Metals:

Welcome to this week’s Market Wrap Podcast, I’m Mike Gleason.

Coming up we’ll hear a truly fascinating interview with Keith Weiner of Monetary Metals and the Gold Standard Institute.

Keith tells the story about a large cash sale he had a decade ago, how incredibly uncomfortable it made him to have such a big cash position and how it ultimately led him to begin thinking about and pursuing a new gold standard as a solution to our nation’s monetary problems. He also lays out a compelling case about why the dollar, or Federal Reserve Note, is deeply immoral. Don’t miss a wonderful interview with Keith Weiner, coming up after this week’s market update.

click HERE to listen

Precious metals markets are off to a strong start in 2019. Gold and silver both closed Thursday at multi-month highs as the stock market reversed sharply to the downside.

Investors were disappointed by manufacturing data showing a slowdown in industrial output. They dumped economically sensitive stocks and bid the U.S. dollar lower on foreign currency exchanges. Markets now expect the Federal Reserve to pause its rate hiking campaign and possibly even begin cutting rates later this year.

The weaker dollar helped boost crude oil and precious metals prices. The energy and mining sectors are among the only gainers in the stock market. The HUI gold miners index closed at a 5-month high on Thursday.

As for gold itself, it’s down a bit today with spot prices currently coming in at $1,284 per ounce, now up a mere 0.1% this week. The physical gold market is likely to tighten this year. Analysts at Refinitiv GFMS project gold mining output will decrease slightly – from approximately 3,282 tonnes in 2018 to 3,266 tonnes in 2019.

Physical silver could also see pressure from diminished mining capacity and rising investment demand as prices recover and attract more mainstream attention. Silver shows a gain of 1.9% this week to trade at $15.72 as of this Friday morning recording.

Platinum is up 2.6% to $817 an ounce. And finally, palladium continues to stay hot after putting in a record breaking 2018. It’s having a great day so far today and is now up 3.9% in the first week of trading of 2019 to come in at $1,308.

Well, as if investors didn’t already have enough to worry about, on Thursday Nancy Pelosi was sworn in as the new Speaker of the House. Of course, there’s nothing “new” about Nancy Pelosi or her ideas. She has been representing San Francisco and its values in Congress for over three decades.

What is new is the growing contingent of avowed socialists within her ranks who are pushing her to endorse Medicare for all, “green” jobs for the politically connected, and a long list of other giveaways…plus the impeachment of Donald Trump and amnesty for illegal aliens.

Read More @ MoneyMetals.com