http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-secret-bull-market-in-gold-2013-03-06?link=mw_home_kiosk Anyone make sense of this? He talks about "bull markets" in countries that he admits the currency is declining, (thus making international imports of everything more expensive), but says it doesn't have anything to due with their currency declining, then declares himself a PM "agnostic" and saying its a "ridiculous currency", then turns around and talks about how wonderful gold is. Dude, my head is spinning. My only takeaway guess would be its written by a PM bull who doesn't want anyone to call him that, therefor he is not writing a "biased report". Anyone else have a take?
He just needed to get something to the editor of a certain number of words by a certain time. They run it through a spell check and grammar check, post it, people read it, and they sell advertising.
Howdy medoraman, I think he's referring to how the POG is actually up in terms of most other currencies around the world. It's down in terms of US dollars and that's pretty much where we play. Most all of the Central Banks are engaged in Quantitative Easing [read: printing currency with abandon] and that's debasing their currencies. We have the 'fortune' of basing our transactions in dollars and the dollar is both the int'l reserve currency and in the sense that it's the least smelly pair of dirty socks in the hamper - store of value. This has resulted in a pretty much permanent backwardation situation in the precious metals highlighting the divergence between the paper price of bullion vs. physical bullion on the street. Alas, you can't really play this arbitrage unless you've got foreign accounts. All that us peons can do is buy, take possession and hold physical bullion. peace, rono
The USD (the world's #1 reserve currency) has benefited from the latest bout of currency malaise: Uncle Buck is still the leper with the most fingers. The record-highs in Gold in other countries' Paper signals NO END TO THE GOLD BULL (despite the correction in USD) Actually, you don't need millions like Mitten Romney; just open a cheap offshore bank account. I opened one in 2006 for $0. ; the annual charge was ~USD$125. and deposits cost me a $22. bank wire fees. That gets access to ~33 currencies at low (1.5%) forex rates for the key ones. Everything online now, ebanking with an electronic passkey... why are Americans still stuck in the mid 20th C., trapped in Dollars with no other choice(s)???
Hi Juan, You're correct that all you need is one or two offshore accts. However, it's still a lot harder to play this trade on a regular basis unless you devote an ungodly amount of time and energy and most folks aren't willing to put forth the effort. Besides, these days, our gov't wants records on everything. This isn't terrible if you're simply diversifying your wealth into other countries. Just report it and be done. This is where I can still see a use for an offshore account. Had a friend from another board, that opened a swiss account and bought bullion through it for storage in his SDB at that bank. It was his 'over there' stash, if you will. Playing the currency arb is a different kettle of fish. Other than ETF holdings in retirement accounts, I've never played the currencies. Where I used to have fun is with the market closing dateline arbitrage using mutual funds. That was a gas before they started using estimated NAVs. If we had a drastic move in our market after asia and/or europe closed, you could buy a mutual fund with stale pricing knowing that you had a lock gain. and so it goes, peace, rono
