Note KL, FNV, WDO, SSL all down more than GDX & GDXJ Friday What these have in common is that they are STRONG businesses, that have predictable growth coming over the next 24 months, and in particular growth that can/will come without need for external funding or dilution. These are in particular the miners who dropped the hardest on Friday.
It's possible that the drop was merely profit-taking, by a large investor(s); the sharews of all 4 were up in the recent past. But there were a number of other, weaker miners who's shares were also up, but who didn't get smacked down as hard yesterday. So, still IMO unclear what was driving KL and these others to go down.
Personally, I was surprised; when gold reached 1345, I expected my PM portfolio to be hitting new highs. When an experimental result turns out to be NOT what is expected, is when one can learn the most; because it means some previously-unknown factor is acting. IMO, Friday's US jobs number was important. The global economy is crashing. Last week, Japan, already at NIRP, just lowered rates even further into the negative. The ECB held rates constant, at 0.25%, 0%, and -0.4% (if memory serves). Australia lowered rates to 1.25% (if memory serves). The last hope for the helicopter money school was that the US consumer would pull the global economy out of it's deflationary spiral - however that hope is gone now, IMO, as of Friday's jobs number.
I don't think the sell-down of the strong 4 miners (KL, FNV, WDO, SSL) was just people jumping to safety (cash), because GDX & GDXJ were down much less (-0.1% and -0.6% respectively). If it were a move to safety, these strong companies would have declined less, not more, than the indicies.
Further, note we can rule out manipulation of the miners, down, via selling the indicies, for the same reason; the indicies were down much less than the 'strong 4'.
Occam's Razor says it's just profit-taking by smart money, ahead of a plunge in gold prices/miners; brought on by hold hitting the 1350 ceiling, and/or a future SP500 run brought on by a solution to the tariff idiocy. Personally, I find that I cannot 'buy' this explanation.
One last factor: the two top members of the US's 'Plunge Protection Team' were suddenly replaced last week. (Simon Potter - aka the Father of Low VIX - and one other who's name escapes me, announced May 28 effective June 1). I try to keep the paranoia to a low rumble, but it's worth keeping in mind nonetheless.
Any ideas as to what happened?