Thought this was worth sharing with you guys. So do you gents think 'crowd intelligence' is useful for such predictions? https://www.scoins.com/predictionsmarch.aspx Over all, I would say that the numbers look good, if a bit on the conservative/safe side of the fence.
Personally I think the numbers on this link are low, but nonetheless I would only use crowd intelligence as an indicator of sentiment, not to base my own planning on. It's typically a lot better than the mainstream media, but the best thing to do is your own research from as many sources of possible and make your own determinations.
I think the numbers seem relatively believable. But, I have my own method that seems to be working for buying PMs. As with any investment, I believe a good knowledge of what you are buying is essential.
Posting here since access may be limited somehow... The results are here. At the end of December 2011, we asked our customers what they believed would be the closing price of gold, silver, platinum, and palladium on March 31, 2012. They were asked to predict the future. Over 130 people responded. We averaged all the answers to get the following results: What will be the closing spot price for gold on Friday, March 30, 2012? $1,708.00 What will be the closing spot price for silver on Friday, March 30, 2012? $34.16 What will be the closing spot price for platinum on Friday, March 30, 2012? $1,591.57 What will be the closing spot price for palladium on Friday, March 30, 2012? $760.55 Will gold exceed $1,700 an ounce at any time between January 3rd, 2012 and March 30th, 2012 Yes=69% No=31% Will silver exceed $36 an ounce at any time between January 3rd, 2012 and March 30th, 2012 Yes=48% No=52% We at Scotsman wish to thank all those who participated in this survey. Those who come closest to the actual closing spot prices on March 30th will receive a free 2012 American Silver Eagle coin. Winners will be notified by April 4th.
I'm not too sure if the last two questions are more a reflection of sentiment and the idea that gold is more stable in general or if the fact that the questions contain a specific value may have biased the prior responses...probably a little of both.
Markets have too many variables affecting them to ever pay attention to what the crowd thinks, except as a contrarian indicator. The gold market is even worse because most investors don't understand what moves it. I feel I have enough knowledge of how it works to not predict what it will be 3 months from now, 6 months from now, or even a year from now. Simply because, in the short term, it is not responding to fundamentals. It's responding to psychology and manipulation. But one thing I do know, in the long term, as long as central banks keep printing money, gold will rise. From this chart you can see how gold has tracked US M2 money supply.
