Monetary Digests
The Perth Mint will accept final orders for its popular Lunar Series coins at the end of June.
In recent weeks, as consumer prices have surged higher, “revived inflation” has become the hot topic among establishment writers. Inaccurately, most writers blame higher energy costs, rising interest rates, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the costs of hurricanes.
The October 2004 Monetary Digest predicted that the stock market rally was over. We based our position on two things.
As the graph shows, the dollar suffered a steady decline September through November. As the gold and silver graphs show, both metals enjoyed solid gains during the dollar’s woes.
Stocks are in a primary bear market, which started in early 2000. For the 2-1/2 years after the 2000 top, stock declines became front-page news as they devastated portfolios, postponed retirements, and ruined some retirements.
Americans enjoy the highest standard of living in the world. Yet, few Americans understand that the dollar’s status as the world’s primary reserve currency contributes tremendously their lofty lifestyles.
Investors-especially first-time investors, often ask if they are doing the right thing by investing in gold or silver.
In 1970, gold threw off the constraints of government-set prices and within ten years hit $850 on the free market, a twenty-four times move.
Despite Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan’s affirmations that the Federal Reserve will guard against the threat of inflation.
Few Americans know that our great republic has become an empire with tentacles stretching to some 130 countries around the globe.
Since August 15, 1971, when President Richard Nixon closed the gold window, the entire world has been on a fiat paper money system. No country’s paper money is redeemable in either gold or silver.
Most people have the misconception that the 1929 stock market crash caused the Great Depression of the ’30s. Actually, the Crash of ’29 signaled the Great Depression, which was brought on by the Federal Reserve’s manipulations of the money supply during the 1920s and 1930s.
Low prices paint a dismal picture for silver; however, according to CPM Group’s Silver Survey 20011, the outlook for silver remains bright.
The stock market remains a key to a bull market for gold and silver. Calamitous events aside, as long as most investors are bullish, they will ignore gold and silver. However, those investors who have investigated gold and silver have found an outstanding opportunity.
The US is in its ninth year of economic expansion, which helped give rise to the greatest stock market in the history of the world. Never before have so many people made so much money with so little knowledge. Now, though, a myriad of technical indicators suggests that stocks have entered a primary bear market.
In terms of its eventual effects, there is nothing worse than inadvertently or mistakenly using the wrong measuring standards. Right now, what the world is seeing for the second time, and on a global scale, is a huge repeat of the events that took place between 1922 and 1929.
From time immemorial, man has treasured gold because of its unique properties. It is ductile, and one ounce can be drawn into a wire stretching miles. It is so malleable that it can be hammered it into leaves so thin that it takes hundreds of thousands to stack one inch high. It is resistant to chemicals, and gold ornaments last not a lifetime, but forever.
In 1999, for the 10th consecutive year, industrial demand for silver exceeded newly refined supplies. Although the deficit narrowed from 179.4 million ounces in 1998 to 120.4 million ounces last year, it remains high.
Japan has one of the world’s worst budget deficits, and that this year’s public-sector (government) debt will approach 118% of total economic output, more than twice the U.S. level. By year end, Japan will have the biggest debt as a percentage of GDP that has ever been owed by any developed economy during peacetime.
In 1989 Japan’s stock market peaked, and in 1990 its booming economy went into a recession. To turn things around, in 1992 the government implemented a basic Keynesian policy: government spending. Economists like to call such spending “fiscal packages.”
The Bank of England’s announcement of its plans to sell 415 tons of gold over next few years helped plunge the price of gold to 20-year lows. The day before the news release, gold traded as high as $290.00; however, two months later on July 6, BoE realized only $261.20 an ounce for the first 25 tons auctioned.
While Dow Theory analysis suggests that stocks are enjoying their final surge, technical analysis of gold’s price action indicates that the yellow metal has been building a base for a bull market. In August 1998, gold touched $272, breaching its 1985 low of $281.
If not for the Y2K problem, January 1, 2000 would be only a memorable day with hundreds of millions of people waking to headaches from too much partying the night before. The headaches of 1/1/00, however, will not be remedied by taking two aspirins and going back to bed. Y2K may turn out to be a migraine which lasts for months.
In recent months, the world’s economy has deteriorated rapidly. Pessimists say it teeters on collapse. Trying to figure out how to avoid a financial donnybrook, “world leaders” have scurried around the globe conferring, holding meetings, and issuing statements.
Without a doubt, this has been the most profitable stock market in the history of the world. Never have so many people made so much money. In the bull market of the 1920s, most of the investors were wealthy; few average Americans participated.
Warren Buffett is acclaimed as the most successful investor of our times, having become — according to Fortune magazine — the country’s second wealthiest man via his investment acumen.
When gold and silver rallied from $300 and $5, respectively, in June 1982 it certainly appeared that the precious metals bear market had ended and that higher prices were ahead.
During the 1980 campaign, the first half of the year was weak economically, permitting Ronald Reagan to enjoy an enviable advantage over the incumbent Jimmy Carter.
Since Mexico’s near default two years ago, articles about the banks’ plight with Third World debt have appeared in all establishment financial publications.
Due to our expensive austerity program and realignment of goals in accordance with the changing views in the industry. Certified Mint has been able to lower its prices, effective immediately, on all sorts of products and services.
Presently the U.S. dollar is undergoing its worst beating ever in the foreign exchange market. Dropping to an all-time low, the dollar literally has had no buyer on some days.
Twenty-four economists, as reported in the December 21st issue of BUSINESS WEEK, anticipate an average price increase of 8.7% in 1975. BUSINESS WEEK goes on to point out, “Last year, economists were humbled by their forecast performance for 1973. This year they are downright humiliated.”
The Dines Newsletter, one of the foremost pessimists on the economy and advocates of silver and gold, continues to maintain that we are headed for a devastating depressions in 1975 or 1976.