The Metals: Gold traded mostly slightly higher in Asia, rose almost $10 in London, and popped to as high as $1215.13 at the open of trade in New York before it dropped back off a bit by late morning, but it then climbed back near its earlier high in the last minutes of trade and ended with a gain of 1.44%. Silver climbed to as high as $18.095 by late morning in New York before it moderated its gains a bit in the last couple of hours of trade, but it still ended with a gain of 0.73%. Euro gold rose to almost €947, platinum gained $11.50 to $1524, and copper gained 3 cents to about $3.28. Gold and silver equities climbed over 2% by midday and remained near their highs into the close. The Economy: Report For Reading Expected Previous Initial Claims 8/07 484K 465K 482K Export Prices July -0.2% - -0.7% Export Prices ex-ag. July -0.2% - -0.8% Import Prices July 0.2% - -1.3% Import Prices ex-oil July -0.3% - -0.5% Tomorrow at 8:30AM EST brings CPI for July expected at 0.2%, Core CPI expected at 0.1%, and Retail Sales for July expected at 0.5%. Excluding autos, sales are expected at 0.2%. At 9:55 is Michigan Sentiment for August expected at 70.0, and at 10AM is the Business Inventories report for June expected at 0.2%. The Markets: Oil fell again as the U.S. dollar index continued its recent rise on risk aversion/cash raising/safe haven buying after Initial Jobless Claims climbed to a five-month high. Treasuries remained lower after today’s $16 billion 30-year note auction drew a yield of 3.954% with a bid to cover of 2.77. The Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P fell on poor earnings reports and economic data. Among the big names making news in the market today were GM, Wendy’s, Sara Lee, AIG, GM, and Cisco.

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