After a rough spell recently that saw it almost 14% off its recent high, Apple (AAPL) enjoyed a moment in the sun this week, bouncing 8% Wednesday as it once again announced earnings that made it a huge winner at Wall Street's favorite game: beat-the-number.

With that out of the way, we can turn our attention to whether its stock price can make a new high, or if this rally turns out to be of the failed variety.

Again, I have no position in Apple, but since it is leading the Nasdaq ($COMPX) around by the nose, I believe it merits our continued attention. For more of my thoughts on Apple, take a look at "Is it time to bet against Apple?"

Looking for work

Somewhat more germane was this week's Federal Open Market Committee meeting, as well as Chairman Ben Bernanke's news conference afterward.

I was especially curious to see to what extent, if any, the committee members would recognize the signs of economic weakness that I see percolating beneath the surface. In particular, given the Federal Reserve's current focus, initial jobless claims -- which have been creeping higher after bottoming out at around 350,000 in February -- and, as of April 26, were not all that far from the supposedly important level of 400,000 (at 388,000).

(Column continues below video.)

(I say "supposedly" because I don't think any specific number means that much. In fact, initial claims, as well as jobs data, probably get more scrutiny than they deserve, but that is the environment we are dealing with.)

Given that we are basically three years past the low in the economy, you would think those claims figures would be declining regularly, even if the recovery wasn't all that potent. Unfortunately, that isn't the case.

The reason I bring this up is because, as we know, the Fed is now quite focused on jobs and the lack thereof. Thus, as we approached this week's FOMC meeting, my expectation was that the Fed would give itself enough to room to maneuver (i.e., it would hint at a third round of economic stimulus via quantitative easing) in the event that jobs data were not as "accommodative" as Fed monetary policy.

Fed tries on its poker face

As it turned out, the committee's communiqué was pretty much as the masses had expected. The net of it was not a tilt toward easing, as I had suspected.

In hindsight, I realize that I had given the Fed too much credit to be able to take the pulse of the economy. Considering the track record, that is not too surprising, as the Fed is often wrong in its assessment of what the economy is liable to do. So I suppose it's par for the course that it doesn't realize that the economy is weaker. (Just like no one at the Fed saw either the stock or housing bubbles, etc.)

Thus, it will react to the weaker data at some point and have to deal with that implied U-turn when it happens.

Dutch bonds 'in Dutch'

Checking in on Europe, the latest wrinkle in that continent's political Rubik's Cube was the Dutch Cabinet submitting an offer to resign to Queen Beatrix due to a disagreement regarding its proposed austerity package.

The reason this is worth pointing that out is because the Dutch are considered to be one of the more prudent financial entities in Europe, and one of the few countries left with a triple-A debt rating. If they can't (or won't) pursue the austere policies that Germany wants, how will Spain, Italy or even France manage to do so? Expect more activism on the part of the European Central Bank.

The beneficiaries of worldwide money printing, however, continue to be punished. In fact, the mood in the metals market is currently so wounded that, while stock bulls seem to have no fear, participants in the metals have nothing but fear.

As gold and silver continue to test people's convictions, and the worse psychology gets, the bigger the rally will be once folks finally get it in their heads that QE3 is coming, or they wake up to the already problematic rate of inflation.

On the air

I participated in an impromptu interview with Eric King on Wednesday, just after Bernanke's news conference. He wanted me to weigh in on the Fed, and I agreed, since I was pretty disgusted with all the hoopla. And, apparently, it showed. Interested readers can find it here.

At the time of publication, Bill Fleckenstein owned gold and silver, as well as gold and silver mining stocks.

You'll can find Bill Fleckenstein's latest columns on this page.You can still find his older columns here.