Blog

April 27, 1998 – There has been in recent weeks a very significant and noteworthy development in the precious metal markets. Three of the precious metals are now in backwardation. What is backwardation? Does it help to say that backwardation is the opposite of contango? The terms backwardation and contangoare little used, and both conceptsRead more

April 6, 1998 – Ever since the Dow Industrials Average made a new record high in early February, I have been warning that one should play the market from the long side, or don’t play it at all. It is now very apparent what I meant and why I was making this warning. The DowRead more

March 23, 1998 – This week the Belgian central bank released a statement that read in part: “The weekly situation…was influenced by an arbitrage operation of gold against foreign currencies”. Were they purposely trying to be coy? Or do central bankers enjoy making these opaque statements that leave more questions unanswered than answered? I wasRead more

March 9, 1998 – Last month Warren Buffett lit the fuse of a precious metals firecracker with the stunning announcement that his investment company, Berkshire Hathaway, had purchased 130 million ounces of Silver. Initially Silver soared on the announcement, and Gold bounced higher in sympathy. But since that initial flurry of activity and the briefRead more

February 16, 1998 – I think it was Helmut Kohl who compared the political process to sausage making – by advising facetiously that in politics like sausages you really don’t want to know what was put in to get the desired result. While this adage may work well for politics and sausages, it doesn’t workRead more

January 26, 1998 – You may not have heard about the ‘Millennium Bomb’ yet, but you will soon be hearing about it a lot. Increasing attention is being given to it, and rightly so. The Millennium Bomb is a big worry, and it may be a major problem. I’m not yet convinced that this bomb’sRead more

January 12, 1998 – The Great Depression had ended before I was born, but this traumatic collapse that unhinged the world economy in the 1930’s has had a profound influence on my life. Worried that a depression may repeat, when still young I learned to fear it. This emotion was the common thread I receivedRead more

December 15, 1997 – I have been conspicuously quiet about the Yen for many months. After very successfully riding the Yen’s strength from the ¥120’s and selling at ¥80 in 1995, we have been on the sidelines. The reason is that the outlook for the Yen has been very uncertain, and more importantly, even thoughRead more

November 24, 1997 – Two op-ed articles about Gold appeared last week in two of London’s leading newspapers. The timing is not surprising. Given the low Gold price and the current discussions about Gold’s role in the proposed European Monetary Union, one would expect some editorial opinion. And as is often the case of ‘opinions’,Read more

November 10, 1997 – On October 24th a committee of government bureaucrats from the Swiss finance ministry and the Swiss National Bank shocked the Gold market. After having reviewed for several months Swiss monetary policy as well as the legal framework by which the Swiss currency is managed, the committee announced that it was recommendingRead more