G0ldfinger

:lol: Dream on! As if Bernanke wanted to see interest rates at over 10% right now.

Pixel, Chris, thanks for posting this. Call me Silverfinger!

Thanks for all the kind comments. If some of you are doing much better financially than only a few years ago, and I had something to do with it, then it was worth all the effort. No beans to be spilled. Firstly, I want to spend more time offline and reading (real books, printed on paper). Secondly, some of us use GEI (or other forums) akin to a personal blog. So does Bubb himself. The problem is the noise, as many others are doing the same, interfering with you. Then there also is the spin either owners or moderators can put on it. If you don't agree with the spin, e.g. if you want to communicate a "message" different from it, you have a problem, even if you're a mod (one of many). You can start your own forum, but you're just going to run into the exact same problems, as some of you with forums of your own can possibly tell. So, instead, I will possibly start a blog at some stage, where I can focus my own thoughts without the noise. Noise is good to some extent, as it fosters discussions and your ideas get challenged. On the other hand, there is also a danger of running in circles all the time, hearing the same arguments over and over again. With comments on a blog, and possible spin-offs where blog entries are discussed in a separate forum (e.g. on here), the line of thought can possibly be kept in better order, is easier to navigate. So, there you have it: less posts from now on, and I will try to keep clear off the ever-returning same discussions (with the usual suspects), but maybe there is going to be a blog at some stage in the future when I find the time and motivation to set one up. BTW, this also means that I am going to be a little less active as a mod (not that there was much to do recently anyway). The recent comments on moderation, which I originally did not want to comment on, are not justified. This forum is moderated pretty light-handedly. Personally, I hardly ever suspended anyone, especially not for longer times, and I can't even recall the last time it happened. Obviously, I am by far not the only mod, but speaking as one, I think even the "problem posters" got, all in all, more than fair treatment and "second" chances over and over again.

DOUBLE POST. Momentarily, I am reading "Red Capitalism" by Walter & Howie. Based on this, but also based on what I have seen elsewhere, I would advise everyone to stay clear off China. It is not worth the risk. The Chinese property bubble is way worse than anything ever seen in the US (in relative terms at least), and the financing is an unprecedented credit binge that makes Charles Ponzi look like a saint. What will the outcome be? Based on previous bubbles (Hainan etc.), this one will end in tears too, and the bad debt will be hidden just as cleverly as we do in the West. Given the size of the bubble this time round, and given the old bad debt of previous bubbles is still in the system, I can't see how China won't be forced to monetize. This will lead to bad inflation, most likely simultaneously with an epic property bust. What will the Chinese investor do? The only safe haven, with strong/hyper-inflation in necessities, and an epic bust in property and IMHO the stock market too, will be gold and silver. There will possibly be a gold & silver scramble coming in China of a kind the world has not seen before. I think China will export its (hyper-)inflation, partially as a measure to ease it off inside the country, by means of FX adjustments and state subsidized price fixing of commodities (using their USD-reserves). EDIT: BTW, as some people have possibly wondered, for various reasons, I will spend less time posting on GEI from now on.

It looks as if the train line is less than 20m from the house! This is a MAJOR NO-NO!!! I once lived similarly close to a train line when I was a student. I made it 6 weeks, before I moved out. The first train was at 5:00 AM, weekends not much later. You can't ignore a train so close, not with the best anti-noise measures and ear plugs 24/7. It is like an earth quake, the tremours go through the whole house. Your subconsciousness will signal you DANGER. Your stress levels will always be elevated (this is proven for people who live in noisy houses, leading to less life expectancy). Value of this house to me personally: GBP 0.00. You simply can't live there.

Let me tell you, those Martians are messing things up again...

You're right! It seems it's just Google that links wrongly to http://infoitpoweringgatheringit.com/in.php?n=1 Just google "King World News".

King World News has been hacked for two days now.

Bruahaha, the Quartermile. Still one of my favourites. These two bed flats went for GBP 450,000 when the going was good, and rented for GBP 1,400 a month. After maintenance, not exactly a great investment. But, gee, there would be capital appreciation, right? I had the pleasure to spend an evening in one of them. As an unsuspecting European, I would be running if someone tried to sell them to me for "luxury". In fact, they are the typical UK card board box crap with thin drywalls, crappy doors, and laminate that is called "wood" for some reason I don't know. Then you have no balcony, and at night the outside is so loud (bl00dy drunk students) you can't even leave the windows open...

From "ladder" to "swamp". That word "ladder" has always made me barf.

So house prices in NI have gone down 50% since 2007, and during the same time gold has more or less tripled. So, house prices in Northern Ireland are down something like 83% when measured in gold ounces. Beautiful crash (10/10)!

Very nice indeed.

How idiotic. I love manic paper traders.

Gold, oil: it seems some Einsteins out there have just discovered that none of the problems have been solved or have gone away.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-24/greenwich-s-priciest-homes-languish-with-four-years-of-inventory-on-market.html The high end will never be affected... yaddayadda... oil sheiks yaddayadda...

Still at the all time high in Euro-Gold.

Chinese investors bought almost 100 tonnes in the first quarter. More than anyone else (incl. India). http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/unternehmen/0,1518,763729,00.html

I bought Silver Wheaton, Silvercorp and Great Panther Silver recently. I'll buy more over the next few months if they drop further.

As I've posted a while back, I only put my SIPP money into gold over the past few months, so my answer would be yes. But it is always a good idea to slowly start getting into a new market. Spread it out, average in...

DOUBLE POST But if they were in from the beginning, they made a 10-bagger. He himself took more risk. It only goes to show that he is a responsible individual. In this market, he promised $1,650. We're almost there! Can gold go to $16,000? Sure, no problem. But despite his model possibly telling him this number, he is not talking much about it (except for him saying that his $1,650 figure will most likely look ridiculously low, on which I agree). If you bought gold when Sinclair did (2001?) and hold it through that bull and even long after a potentially parabolic move and sell-off afterwards, you'll most likely will have kept up with inflation (say, move to $16,000, then sell-off to $10,000, you still made a 33-bagger from $300 or so in 2001). That's the whole point. No reason to frantically go short etc. without a core position. Just buy & hold.

Sinclair sold there for his clients because this was the debt equilibrium price. This same equilibrium price is over $16,000 as we speak, but you want people to regularly short PMs. Come on, don't sweat the small stuff! Furthermore, you know that Sinclair himself then shaped the top at $850 (he didn't just "call" it, he CREATED it!). He sold his gold there because he "knew" it was overvalued (by over 80% according to his gold-debt model). http://gold.approximity.com/since1970/External_Debt_Equilibrium_Gold_Price_LOG.html

Soros sold $800M gold recently. He must read too much Bubb or Ker. Paulson is holding on to it, I guess he has done his research. Boosting mining companies holdings: Paulson does what I do right now. I hope Soros won't end up in the poor house in his old age. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-16/soros-sold-most-of-his-gold-etp-holding-during-first-quarter-filing-shows.html

It's the cost of property with gold underneath it that determines marginal new production cost, (EDIT: and how difficult or expensive it is to mine, of course). Expressed differently, if the price of gold goes up, its production cost goes up because it is getting more expensive to buy property for a gold mine (because it contains expensive gold... feedback loop...). Essentially, the problem with that argument is that there is not that much "value" added digging gold out of the ground. It's not like creating silicon chips out of sand. BUT on the other hand, the annual new supply is very limited (and mining still is expensive). EDIT: So, if demand outstrips supply at a given price level, you can't just increase production arbitrarily. Similar with oil. We hear about $5 oil production cost in Saudi Arabia all the time, and all these reserves. Then why is the price over $100? Because the new stuff is very difficult to get to, somewhere many miles deep in the Gulf of Mexico. And why should the Saudis sell for $5 if they can get $110? They have to bribe their own populace after all...

What a nutter!