I could care less about options expiration, etc as the driving force for gold moving lower. As of today:

- we are in a seasonal strong period for gold

- the FED is exploding it's balance sheet

- there is no competition from the 0% Treasury market as the one excuse for not owning gold was that it didn't pay interest

- there is serious and legitimate talk from our biggest creditor, the Chinese, to scrap the USD as the world's reserve currency

- the financial paper markets are still in crisis mode

Based on the above, if the cartel can still push gold under $900 then I have grossly underestimated their continuing staying power.

stateside