BullMarketRun.com

1. Happy Memorial Day to our American friends, as the United States honors the men and women who gave their lives in service to enable a great nation to live freely and fully…this special observance began in the years following the Civil War and was originally known as Decoration Day…it gradually came to be known as Memorial Day…

SpotGold has traded between $1,719 and $1,731 so far today…as of 7:00 am Pacific the yellow metal is off $9 an ounce at $1,724…Spot Silver, which has been the best-performing major metal this month with a gain of nearly 15%, is down 13 cents at $17.07…Copper is flat at $2.38…Nickel has slipped 6 cents to $5.49 while Zinc is unchanged at 90 cents…Crude Oil has rallied more than 70% in May, putting it on track for its best month on record…prices are still roughly 50% below their January high of $65.65, however…an improving demand outlook as well as ongoing supply cuts have fuelled the recent surge in prices…as of 7:00 am Pacific, WTI is 20 cents higher at $33.45 while the U.S. Dollar Index is off slightly at 99.80…rising consumer debt was already acting as a drag on the Canadian economy before COVID-19…Canada Mortgage and Housing says debt levels are moving up thanks to a series of blows from rising unemployment, falling housing prices and deferred mortgage payments…those rising debts will depress consumer spending, economists say, while reckless government spending combined with over-regulation and high taxes will present another problem for the Canadian economy…CMHC boss Evan Siddall says consumer indebtedness starts hurting economic growth when it rises above 80% of GDP…CMHC is forecasting that gross household debt will peak at 130% of GDP by the 3rd quarter of this year, up sharply from 99% before COVID-19…business spending is unlikely to do much to buttress growth, with excess capacity in many sectors already leading to retrenchment, not expansion…meanwhile, the federal government’s debt to GDP is rapidly approaching levels not seen since the early 1990’s…Trudeau’s deficit spending since 2015 did little to spur economic growth in Canada the last several years…increased government spending along with excessive regulation and burdensome taxes, essentially a path toward socialism pursued by Ottawa, have only contributed to a smothering of the private sector in this country…

2. U.S.-China tensions continue to ratchet up: The U.S. government will likely impose sanctions on China if Beijing implements national security law that would give it greater control over autonomous Hong Kong, White House National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien said yesterday…the draft legislation represents a takeover of Hong Kong, O’Brien said, and as a consequence Secretary of State Mike Pompeo would likely be unable to certify that the city maintains a “high degree” of autonomy…this would result in the imposition of sanctions against China under the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019, O’Brien said…Pompeo has already called the proposal a “death knell” for Hong Kong’s autonomy…O’Brien warned that Hong Kong could lose its status as a major hub for global finance…

3. The White House has announced that the U.S. will bar entry of non-citizens traveling from Brazil, which has seen a sharp rise in Wuhan COVID-19 cases…the Trump administration “has determined that the Federative Republic of Brazil is experiencing widespread, ongoing person-to-person transmission” of the virus, according to a White House statement…officially, Brazil has more than 360,000 cases of COVID-19, according to health ministry data released last night, meaning it trails only the U.S. in the Johns Hopkins University tally…cases in Brazil, however, are widely believed to be vastly under-reported due to insufficient testing…Brazil also has recorded over 22,000 deaths, which would make it the 5th-most in the world…the ban on travel from Brazil is set to take effect late Thursday…the new restrictions would apply to any non-citizens who had been in Brazil for up to 14 days before trying to enter the United States…

4. U.S. spending on hotels, restaurants, airlines and other industries hurt by physical distancing remains low, but appears to be picking up…the number of travellers passing through Transportation Security Administration security screening checkpoints fell to 87,534 on April 14, 96% below the same day a year earlier…but by May 22, the figure had more than tripled to 348,673, although that is still down 88% from the same day a year earlier…meanwhile, data from online restaurant-booking company OpenTable shows diners are beginning to return in several states…“We’re past the trough in terms of peak damage,” said Gregory Daco, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, with high-frequency indicators showing “a burgeoning rebound in terms of how much people are spending. You can see that turn in the data, which is encouraging,” he said, “but you have to be cautious that we’re rebounding from extremely depressed levels”…

5. U.S. markets are closed today for the Memorial Day holiday…volume on Canadian markets is lower than usual due to the U.S. holiday…in Toronto, the TSX is up 148 points in early trading while the Venture, gunning for its 8th straight weekly gain, is unchanged at 537…the Venture is locked in a powerful uptrend channel (next Fib. resistance in the 580’s followed by 740) and any minor pullbacks toward the supporting EMA-8 (currently 525, slightly above the now-rising 200-day EMA) should be embraced…Clean Air Metals (AIR, TSX-V), which made its Venture debut Friday, is up 2.5 cents to 38.5 cents…AIR has commenced a 10,000-m Phase 1 drill program on the Escape Lake Intrusion portion of its Thunder Bay North Project…Phase 1 drilling will consist of approximately 15–20 holes of 500–600 m each, nominally on 50-m centers designed to test the Escape Lake High Grade zone target discovered in 6 holes by the previous project operator…Sona Nanotech (SONA, CSE) has jumped 16 cents to $1.80…the company has moved into the final validation process, engaging MRIGlobal, for its Rapid Response antigen-based COVID-19 test…PyroGenesis Canada (PYR, TSX-V) is breaking out to a new 8+ year high, up 3 pennies at 98 cents…Balmoral Resources and Wallbridge Mining (WM, TSX) have completed their plan of arrangement with Wallbridge acquiring 100% of Balmoral in exchange for consideration of 0.71 of a common share of Wallbridge for each Balmoral share (130.5 million Wallbridge shares were issued for the transaction, increasing WM’s outstanding share count to about 722.5 million)…”With the completion of the arrangement, Wallbridge now controls a district-scale land position along the Detour-Fenelon Gold trend, a major structure that hosts the Detour Lake Gold mine, the Fenelon Gold Project, and numerous other Gold exploration and development projects,” stated Marz Kord, President and CEO of Wallbridge…“The properties acquired from Balmoral dramatically increase our footprint in Quebec to 739 sq. km of under-explored and highly prospective ground that is clearly complimentary to our rapidly expanding Fenelon Gold Project. As announced earlier this week, our exploration team has begun evaluating the newly acquired properties and drilling to identify extensions of the Fenelon Gold system is planned to begin this summer”…

6. COVID-19 testing regimes are taking hold at big companies as they try to get back to business and prevent outbreaks on the job, the Wall Street Journal reported this morning…employees at Smithfield Foods, Ford and UnitedHealth have begun reporting to tents and clinics or getting kits in the mail for coronavirus testing…the tests, combined with mandatory face masks and physical distancing practices on the job, are intended to protect staff and provide managers with a real-time sense of the virus’s presence in their ranks…however, long waits for results – up to 72 hours – mean that companies’ grasp on workers’ health remains imperfect at best, even with costly testing…employers are puzzling over whom to test, and how often, particularly given that tests typically cost $100 or more each (all the more reason why Sona Nanotech’s Rapid Response antigen-based COVID-19 test, in the final validation stage, would be such a game-changer)…companies should test enough to catch problems early, but not so often that logistics outweigh the benefits, said Raj Behal, chief quality officer at primary-care chain One Medical, which counted Google among its pre-pandemic clients…he advises clients to consider the size of a worker population, and whether workers must be near others on the job…meanwhile, AngloGold Ashanti yesterday said it had found 164 workers with COVID-19 at its Mponeng Gold mine in South Africa, after conducting 650 tests since last Thursday…AngloGold Ashanti said operations were halted “as a precautionary step”…

7. Let’s stay home and trade stocks!…what else is there to do in a nation full of lockdowns and stimulus checks?…CNBC’s Maggie Fitzgerald wrote that securities trading has been one of the most common uses of U.S. government payments issued to ease the economic strain of the pandemic…individuals earning between $35,000 and $75,000 annually increased stock trading by 90% more after receiving their stimulus checks, according to software and data aggregation company Envestnet Yodlee…Americans earning $100,000 to $150,000 annually boosted trading by 82%…the money was supposed to be for necessities, but perhaps for many Americans, taking it to the stock market was like running to the racetrack to try to win the rent money…at least, the market had their backs…the Dow and S&P 500 are up nearly 35% from their March lows…

Rapid Response!

How This Pandemic Will Ultimately Help Copper

Wuhan COVID-19 Virus Update

The Cost Of Doing Business With China (The CCP)

“Silver Lining”: Innovative Vancouver Company Provides Help During Crisis

COVID-19 Update

Smithers Shakes Off Turmoil For A Major 3-Day Event Connecting Hockey And The Resource Sector

Turbocharged Nickel

Commodity Check!

The Nickel Mountain Magma Highway

The Dramatic New Chase For A Nickel-Copper-Rich Massive Sulphide Deposit In The Heart Of A Famous Gold Camp