Morning Call [6:21am ET] The first hour and the last in yesterday’s trading session in New York were the worst of the day. During the evening and early morning today, the damage has spread. On every battlefield you look, from Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Sydney, Singapore, Mumbai, and now (at least to this point) to London, Frankfurt, and Paris, the results are apparent; the average seems to be that for every 100 soldiers, 78 are down or wounded, seven missing, and 15 still vertical. You can smell the black powder. This is war.

Morning Call [7:55am ET] The Davos Conference was summed up nicely by News Corp’s sister companies, The Times and Wall St Journal, in stating: (i) bankers don’t get it, and (ii) how low can the Dollar go to continue flooding US taxpayer money into emerging economies in the hopeful pursuit of ‘Monkey See, Monkey Do’?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB4000142405274870410720457503901397884223...

Morning Call [7:11am ET]

The dictionary defines posturing as the striking a pose for effect, and a posturer as one who assumes an artificial or pretended attitude. Thus it follows that if you accept the goings on at Davos 2010, you have been attitudinized, which is to say you have assumed an affected mental attitude, precisely what consensus the gathering in Davos is there to build.

People, don’t fall for that stuff or else you will lose your shirt.

Morning Call [7:31am ET] From Davos 2010, Soros warns that gold is the ‘ultimate bubble’.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/davos/7085504/Davos-201...

Is George talking his book again or is the USD ready to break out to the upside, dropping gold a further 100 or 200 Dollars from its present 1090, already down -$139 (-12.3%) from the Dec 3 high of 1229? The charts clearly show a bear trend developing, which makes sense given that major central banks have begun tightening.

Morning Call [8:05am ET] Today is expected to be the most revealing of the year to date in terms of possible actions and reactions from Washington and Wall Street. Traders ought to be focused. Stay tuned.

Yesterday, we provided this framework, which several people commented positively on, so we may continue it periodically.

US: Dow Jones Industrials $INDU 10,194.29 -2.57 -0.03%
Recommendation: Lighten into rallies
Support: 10,160 – 9,913
Resistance: 10,500 ‐ 10,729

US: SP500 $SPX 1,092.17 -4.61 -0.42%
Recommendation: Lighten into rallies
Support: 1,083 – 1,064