Stocks were slumping and the precious metals caught a bid as an exclusive story at Bloomberg said that China is considering curtailing or even halting its purchases of US Treasuries.

Bloomberg’s own spokesmodels were snickering the mere possibility of that aside, as just a rumour, and unthinkable to boot.

And the markets seemed to join in as stocks recouped most of their losses, and the precious metals back off. Bonds had an interesting ride as well as the US dollar.

The gold inventories in Hong Kong CME warehouses remain markedly low.