Blog

November 10, 2003 – “Predicting rain doesn’t count – building an ark does.” So says Warren Buffett. Long-time readers of these letters know that I hold Mr. Buffett in the highest possible regard. Though I have never met the man, I admire him from afar, and I continue to marvel at his exceptional track record.Read more

October 27, 2003 – Because financial statements provide a snap-shot of a company’s balance sheet for just one day, the opportunity exists for corporations to take steps before their fiscal year-end to ‘window dress’ their financial accounts. In other words, they take those actions that they believe will present the financial statements sent in theRead more

October 6, 2003 – After gold trading closed in New York on Friday $13.70 lower from the previous day, a Reuters article gave the following reason for gold’s rout: “Gold tumbled 3.5 percent in New York on Friday as the first rise in U.S. payrolls in eight months lifted anxiety about economic growth and underminedRead more

September 15, 2003 – Back in January 1993 The Economist magazine published an article entitled “Fool’s Gold”. It was so full of inaccuracies and blatant anti-gold propaganda that I felt compelled to respond, and did so in Letter #120 (“No Fool’s Gold”, published March 1, 1993). There is no need to go into details, butRead more

August 25, 2003 – Debasement is a word often used to describe money, or more precisely, the decline in the value of a currency. According to Webster’s, it means “to lower in status, esteem, [or] quality.” That definition surely applies to the dollar, and many other national currencies for that matter. But debasement also hasRead more

August 11, 2003 – Thirty-two years ago this week, President Nixon changed the course as well as the innate qualities of the dollar. The dollar, which is a money that predates the Constitution, had always been a precise weight of precious metal – silver until 1900 and gold thereafter. All that changed in 1971. ButRead more

July 27, 2003 – A lot has happened this past week, and as far as gold and silver are concerned, all the news has been positive. I decided to publish this Interim Letter to provide a quick update. And to do this, I will use the accompanying charts. Looking first at gold, we can seeRead more

July 21, 2003 – I’m no fan of John Maynard Keynes. I find most of his economic theories to be just plain wrong. But because I am a determined and outspoken advocate of truth and accuracy, I would like to correct a terrible injustice levied on Keynes, and at the same time also correct anRead more

July 7, 2003 – Within the next several months, the price of gold will soar. This past January I projected gold to reach $900 in February 2004. Even though gold has climbed somewhat since then, the days continue to rapidly tick away, making that price target appear evermore distant within the months remaining until theRead more

June 16, 2003 – The headline of the May 30, 2003 issue of The New York Times blared “U.S. Cautiously Begins to Seize Millions in Foreign Banks”. It was frightening headline, as was the story itself. The federal government was seizing millions of dollars from foreign banks solely because the feds said it was “ill-gottenRead more