Oil falls after two sessions of gains… Israeli offensive goes into fourth day…  OPEC output set to fall further in December

Gold hit two historic milestones in 2008. First, in early March, the “yellow metal” hit its all-time high of $1,030 an ounce. Just three months later, the price of gold for December delivery had plummeted to $681 an ounce, a 21-month low and 33.9% drop from its record high. Most gold bugs were equal parts puzzled and broken-hearted.

Toyota Motor Corp. (ADR:TM) may not need a government bailout, but it’s hurting badly. The world’s top automaker said it will announce a revised 2009 sales forecast at its end-of-the-year news conference Dec. 22. The company is expected to slash at least 1 million cars from its original forecast of 9.7 million units, Reuters reported.

Since gold has fallen so far, so quickly, for so little reason, the future for gold looks increasingly good, too, as the future of the dollar and the economy looks increasingly bad, and asset-type things (like houses and stocks) falling in value certainly looks deflationary, like the $30 trillion that has been lost in the world’s stock markets in the last year, which may have been what prompted Howard Ruff of the The Ruff Times newsletter to say, “It is axiomatic that deflation is the spawning ground for inflation, as the government doesn’t know how to fix deflation, depression or recession other than to throw money at it. The creation of all the money floating through the economy will eventually…

Gold surge fuelled by inflation fears… Deflation seen short-lived…  Platinum boosted, helped by auto sector optimism

Oil rallies after near $100 drop since July…  OPEC’s Khelil says possible no output decision in Cairo…  U.S. shares higher

There wasn’t a lot of activity in Thursday’s trading in gold in the Far East. However, at 3:00 a.m. New York time, there were some signs of life…but even the slightest attempt at a rally was met by equal bouts of selling. This ‘up-down-up-down’ activity went on for eight hours.

The China good feeling dissipates…  Currencies lose their edge…  Fannie Mae needs more!  Silver manipulation? And Now… Today’s Pfennig!

With an estimated $4 trillion daily, forex trading dwarfs other markets in terms of volume. And stock market chaos is driving more investors to the currency markets. Frank Hemsley says forex trends are prone to overshoot. That means the British pound could fall much further against the US dollar in the coming months. It may be a bold call, but Frank says pound-dollar parity by the end of the year is a real possibility.

The bear market has taken its toll on hedge funds so far this year. In the first half of ‘08 average hedge fund performance was a negative .75%. This from Bloomberg: