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1. Gold has traded between $1,213 and $1,224 on this final day of the month as the Federal Reserve begins a 2-day meeting…as of 7:00 am Pacific, bullion is unchanged at $1,221…Silver is flat at $15.49…Copper has added 2 pennies to $2.83…Nickel is unchanged at $6.26 while Zinc has pushed 2 cents higher to $1.20…Cobalt remains steady at $31.75…Crude Oil, showing some volatility this week, is off $1.13 a barrel to $69.00…international benchmark Brent Crude futures are on track for their largest monthly decline in 2 years…for the month, Brent futures are set to drop about 6.5%, the most since July 2016…WTI futures are set to decline nearly 7%…a survey showed OPEC’s output hit a 2018 high in July, reigniting supply concerns…the Reuters survey released yesterday suggests that OPEC hiked production in July by 70,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 32.64 million bpd, a high for the year…meanwhile, Russian energy minister Alexander Novak said last week that Russia’s output will hit a new 30-year high of 11.02 million bpd in 2018…the U.S. Dollar Index is down one-fifth of a point at 94.50…

2. Fresh economic data just out, which gives the Fed more to chew on today and tomorrow…The Conference Board reports that its index of consumer confidence rose to 127.4 in July from 127.1 in June, beating expectations…meanwhile, U.S. households’ incomes and spending both rose at a solid rate in June, indicating consumers have the capacity to drive gains in economic output, while the price index for personal-consumption expenditures (PCE), the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure, rose 0.1% in June from May and was up 2.2% from a year earlier…excluding volatile food and energy costs, prices also rose 0.1% in June from May, and 1.9% from a year earlier…the Fed targets 2% year-over-year inflation and has been raising short-term interest rates to prevent the economy from overheating…for most of the past 6 years, annual inflation was running below the Fed’s target, but the headline price gauge has matched or exceeded 2% for 4 straight months…

3. Equity markets got a boost this morning with stocks opening higher after reports that the U.S. and China are seeking talks to defuse an escalating trade conflict between the two countries…Bloomberg News reported that the world’s largest economies are trying to restart talks in order to avoid a full-blown trade battle…the report said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He are speaking privately about the matter…Mnuchin told CNBC last week, “There continue to be some quiet conversations” regarding China…

4. The Dow is up 92 points through the first 30 minutes of trading…about 60% of the S&P 500 has released its quarterly results, with 82% of those companies posting better-than-expected earnings, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S…pundits who warned that earnings had peaked in Q1 were well off the mark…Q2 numbers for these 299 S&P 500 companies that have reported so far are better than last quarter in terms of year-over-year sales and earnings growth, according to Nick Raich, CEO of The Earnings Scout…there are also more companies beating estimates this quarter…in Toronto, the TSX has gained 48 points while the Venture is flat at 706…Juggernaut Exploration (JUGR, TSX-V) has commenced diamond drilling and IP programs on its Empire Property, 40 km northeast of Terrace…Amarc Resources (AHR, TSX-V) has started drilling at its IKE porphyry Copper-Molybdenum-Silver discovery located in B.C.’s southern interior…the $1.6 million, 2018 IKE program is being funded by Hudbay Minerals (HBM, TSX) which has partnered with Amarc to explore and develop the IKE Project…

5. Sokoman Iron (SIC, TSX-V), Daniel’s recent timely call at 6 cents (“A Cheapie Gold Play That’s A Walking Time Bomb“), has been been de-risked to a certain extent with the announcement following the close yesterday of a $3 million private placement at 15 cents – much of which, notably, is being taken by Eric Sprott…a second phase of drilling is scheduled to begin during the last half of September…meanwhile, results for an additional 12 holes from the Phase 1 program are still pending…technically, previous resistance at 13 cents is now clearly new support, bolstered by the 15-cent financing which puts a new floor on the share price…while the daily chart shows very overbought RSI(14) conditions at the moment, it’s now quite apparent with Sprott’s involvement that Sokoman’s potential upside for 2018 has increased significantly…SIC is up 3.5 cents at 24 cents through the first 30 minutes of trading…

6. Cannabix Technologies (BLO, CSE) has taken a haircut on the news – telegraphed for a while now – that the Justice Department is set to give its blessing to Canada’s first roadside saliva test…Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould has tentatively approved the Draeger DrugTest 5000, produced by a company based in Germany…the device is already approved in other countries, including the United Kingdom and Germany, though a Justice Department spokesperson noted it may be configured differently to meet Canadian standards…much controversy surrounds saliva testing as a way to effectively test the presence of THC, the main psychoactive ingredient in cannabis…nonetheless, the Liberal government now has a “stop-gap” measure in place for PR purposes so it can say it’s going to “get tough” on drugged driving as recreational marijuana is legalized in October…defense lawyers are already lining up against the Draeger DrugTest 5000, and the conviction rate is likely to be low…recently, the Vermont Senate Judiciary Committee rejected a bill authorizing the use of saliva testing in traffic enforcement, amid concerns of scientific validity, accuracy and infringement on civil liberties…yesterday’s news only reinforces the urgent need for a court-approved device such as the Cannanix Marijuana Breathalyzer, still in development but viewed by many in law enforcement as the Gold Standard of marijuana breathalyzers…the sell-off in BLO late yesterday should be viewed as a market overreaction but bargain hunters stepped up to the plate this morning at key support around $1.00…BLO opened at $1.05 and has rallied to $1.30, down 20 cents, as of 7:00 am Pacific…

7. No seat at the table!…Justin Trudeau’s grandstanding against President Trump at the recent G-7 Summit in Quebec may have gone over well with his domestic anti-Trump liberal audience but it didn’t advance the cause of Canada-U.S. relations during important trade talks…American officials have taken the “highly unusual” step of rejecting Canada’s bid to take part in senior-level North American free-trade agreement talks between the United States and Mexico later this week…The Post’s Tom Blackwell wrote that one source says attempts by Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland to get a seat at the table in Washington Thursday were either ignored, or spurned outright by the office of U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer…another source says the request to be at the meeting was made in a low-key fashion “so as not to spark a diplomatic incident” and was followed by “a retreat to diplomatic silence”…Lighthizer is slated to meet Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo of Mexico after similar bilateral meetings between the officials last week made significant progress, analysts say…Canada’s apparent sidelining follows Lighthizer’s recent comments that he hoped to strike a separate deal with Mexico, then use that as leverage against Canada…

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