Fear?

So much for stock market complacency.. the VIX - Volatility Index - or as I prefer to call it, the Complacency Index, hit a 10 month high today. The bulls have pretty much had a one way market for as long as we can seemingly remember. Looks like that has changed some! We have gone from confidence to uncertainty to concern. We have not reached fear however.

By the way, further confirmation that those who have been preaching hyperinflation and currency induced cost push and whatever for so many years have been utterly confounded. The yield on the Ten Year Treasury hit a 16 MONTH LOW today!

The US Dollar managed to bounce right off of chart support near 85 and ended the week just below 86. It is essentially halfway between resistance at 87 on the top and support at 85 on the bottom. A push through 87 sets it up for a run to near 89.  Should it fall below 85, there is a band of support near 84 and with better support near the Fibonacci retracement level just below 83.

I have some further bad news for gold bulls unfortunately - GLD, that big gold ETF has been disgorging gold all week long even as the price has moved up from below the $1200 level. Simply put - investors/traders are moving money out of GLD and out of equities and putting that into bonds during this risk aversion period. Rallies in GLD are thus being viewed as selling opportunities. This is NOT what gold bulls want to see.

For this year, 2014, reported gold holdings are down over 38 tons from the start of the year ( 38.78 to be exact ) to 759.44 tons.  This is the lowest level in GLD since December 2008! That is NEARLY SIX YEARS AGO. Western-origin gold investment demand continues to disappoint.