This battle between the Cartel and the buyers is going to dictate the trading for the entire sector in the next few weeks I think. In silver, the Cartel will try to force the appearance of a double-top, and then the twits that do all their trading on TA basis will do their work for them, and sell. If the buying demand is strong enough to overwhelm the efforts of the Cartel, then silver will confirm the action in gold with a breakout to new highs, and probably new money will flow into the sector.

ECU has been discouraging because it appears to be in the control of the traders and shorts. It will take new money flow to overcome this trading range. The resource update will help, but it will just establish a new level to short from if we do not see more participation in the sector.

A simple review of the SH forum will underline my point. For every 30 posts, there are maybe 28 that are utterly irrelevant, or purely bashing. If SH is where investors look for open discussion, then the state of the sector is fragile at best.

I do not think there is any force on earth that can prevent new highs for gold and silver. Worldwide depression, CB selling, clueless media reports, etc, etc. None of it will matter in the long term. So I continue to hold my PF of PM stocks, including ECU. But I am far less bullish on the short term now, because even with the big move higher for the metals, most of the juniors are not participating in the rally. The bigger cap stocks are seeing some inflow of capital, but the overall perception of the market is that the rise is not real, not sustainable. Until that sentiment changes, we are stuck in a range and will have to be patient or move on to something else.

cheers!

mike