romans holiday

But that may be irrelevant given the utterly distinct monetary systems. Weimar could literally print pieces of paper and put them to work in the economy being an un-sophisticated cash based economy. Our economies are digital debt-based economies, with deflationary forces much harder, if not impossible to overcome by monetary means..... given the legal and political constraints on major world powers. Weimar is utterly different from the US, a down and out defeated nation lumbered with terribly unjust war debts. I think the admission from Turk that a US hyper-inflation can not resemble Weimar is telling.

Is WEIMAR on the table? maybe not Actually, if you listen to that interview, James Turk says any hyper-inflation in the US will NOT resemble Weimar. The reason he gives is that the US, unlike Weimar, has a sophisticated banking system involving bank deposits, digits, credit etc So for Turk, Weimar and Zimbabwe are off the table. He now looks for a parallel in Argentina. So it is Argentina, according to Turk, we sould be studying. Weimar is just a bogeyman. Though I reckon it's 30s and Japan we should be looking at. http://www.greenenergyinvestors.com/index....st&p=175036

Up 20 dollars today 1216 I saw something on the business news about the national banks in Greece being rounded up to buy Greek bonds. The whole charade is looking ridiculous. They should just get on with it, default, and leave the Euro zone.

Who said buy and hold is dead. Buying in September has shown a good annual gain for each of the past five years. It also makes sense to add to your position, or start building one. Basically, a currency swap to a strengthening currency.

Gold often falls through the 30 MDA. Not so for the 200 MDA, where the price has held consistently above it for quite some time.

The middle way?

Adrian Ash on the seasonals: http://news.goldseek.com/BullionVault/1278695131.php

Around 20% "return" a year. That would put the price around $1250 at January next year..... and $1500 at January 2012,....and $1800 at Jan 2013................... $2150 at Jan 2014.

I really do think the posting of rockets on the moves up should be banned from the site. Reason being, gold has shown a steady [though at times volatile] strengthening. When the price rockets up breaks to the upside a little, gold investors tend to get a bit over-excited. Afterwards, with the consolidation, people feel a little deflated.....or, it is the turn for the bears get overly-excited. Emotion should be left out of investment. The rational approach would be to focus on the long term steady [and mundane] strengthening of gold which the line above represents.

Nice chart.... and very bullish! The RSI indicator is looking good also.... touching the lows that have been seen over the past couple of years.

Gold still looking strong in pounds. The latest spike in pounds/ Euro had more to do with concerns over those currencies, which have now settled down. At what point would you buy back in?

Bubb, I think you might be reading your own subjective desires into your technical analysis there. Why not take the starting point from 2004/5... before that you see a slump down from '95 to 2000, then that slump correct through to 2004/5. After this date we see the strongest part of the gold bull market. I like to think I'm relatively "detached" to the price of gold [well, as much as you could be anyway] as wouldn't mind seeing it go either way; if lower, I can pile into silver with cash, if higher I'm further encouraged by my core postion in gold. Unless there is complete panic and forced liquidation, I doubt gold could really go below 1100... though that said, sub 1000 is always possible, but looking more unlikely; on the logarithmic scale there doesn't seem to be much "excess" in this top. The reason I think gold will stay relatively strong is investors/ CBs are re-monetizing it... by buying it as an alternative currency. edited

The longer the time frame, the better logarithmic. If you're looking for short/ medium term corrections then linear would be better, wouldn't it? The linear chart I posted with the trend lines only covers the last few years. Here's logarithmic charts for medium and longer term: edit

Even if the later steeper trend held, Sinclair's target of 1650 by January 2011 looks unlikely. Did anyone hear whether he'd climb Mt Fuji or something?

Getting their houses in order for the stress test, this selling of gold by European banks has contributed to the latest dip in price. Most likely only a small disturbance in the greater scheme of things. As AEP recently mentioned in an article, the BIS is also promulgating austerity these days.

I hunted around a bit, but couldn't find anything, which I thought odd. Maybe it's thought control! I guess I should perhaps then stick with the generally accepted meaning of the term. But then isn't the kind of argument [outlined above] that points out the inconsistency/ incoherency of a person's beliefs, in need of a fine latin phrase? How about argumentum contradictio?

I remember having an argument with a friend at university years ago. He was insisting that an ad hominem is an argument "against the man"... the idea of discrediting the person. I'd always considered it an argument to show how that person's position was logically inconsistent... in terms of itself, incoherent. It does seem that the phrase has taken on this other modern meaning and lost the classic one, which is a shame. edit, just read iggle's post, which affirns the modern meaning. Here would be an example of ad hominem as I understand it: You say reason can give us objective and absolute truths. Yet, you also say reason is a secretion of the brain, and completely contingent. A historic accident. On what basis can reason give absolute truths? Another example would be "the problem of evil" for theists. Nothing is written in stone, words and phrases often change their meaning. I wonder though if this has anything to do with why people are less concerned with the coherency of beliefs today. It is much easier today to arrive at rationalist conclusions....the old way led too often to pesky [enlightened] scepticism.

Disagee. With Hobbes on this one. In a state of nature "the life of man is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". The homo economicus of modern economics is an ideological [though useful] construction, yet if taken too seriously becomes a complete distortion and caricature of ourselves.

Here-in lies some of our differences. I'd distinguish bartering from a market economy. Barter [common meaning of the word] is very inefficient because the barterers are not sure what something is worth. And then they will only barter for something they need at that moment. Without a currency, no efficient market has arisen which enables them to sell there product for currency [giving them a potential purchase in the future]. The market also enables "price discovery" so participants can be relatively certain what something is worth and hence will sell. Without this you have no "velocity" in trade. Obviously, this sort of organisation requires law and political power. Without it the wealth of nations would have been impossible. This is also the problem with today's currencies. Along with assets, investors/ CBs are now not so sure how to value their reserves/ savings [due primarily to the deflation in anglosphere asset values]. This will lead to hoarding in the case of some currencies, and capital flight in the case of others, then the reverse. Massive instability all round, and destructive of the real economy, not to mention people's livelihoods.

Yes, it would take quite some deterioration in conditions from here before government contemplated going back on gold. In this sense, I think they will be forced back on. 9] http://www.greenenergyinvestors.com/index....st&p=147745

Efficient international trade arises from stable/ fixed currencies. Trading/ free-floating currencies is a relatively recent experiment which is not turning out too well. I'd argue that stable currencies are what provides the very conditions for [stable] trade. Was it Thomas Jefferson who said the merchant has no country? The merchant might also find that with "countries" out of the way he has no market. Countries, with all their rules and regulations, provide the very conditions for markets to exist. Otherwise, you'd just have barter or pillage. I wonder if by "free markets" you're really referring to barter.

Stabilizing currencies is hardly price-fixing. If government can fight a rear-guard action and avoid a complete rout, they should do it. A complete laissez faire approach is no solution at all. It would be an abdication of government and cause untold bankruptcy and misery ... and this is just not going to happen. The way I see it, the rehabilitation of gold to government will be the means of avoiding the kind of chaos that some seem to wish for.

Here's my scenario fwiw: The deflation will last a good few years, with Japan having already shown the way ahead for developed economies. Consumer prices will stay flat as demand destruction puts downward pressure on prices even as various currencies depreciate [against others] putting upward pressure on prices . Under political pressure, China will "re-peg" it's currency to a basket of currencies, but this will not substantially appreciate the Yuan against the dollar. This re-pegging will have the effect of keeping the Yuan low as a depreciated Euro, and other depreciating currencies [Aussie?] will be a major component of this basket. The dollar will continue to strengthen, with the US economy crucified on a strong dollar. Deflationary and political pressures will force the US to protect their economy which will lead to a further downleg in world trade.... and with it further deflation. In the face of a deflationary quagmire, international leaders will look for stability at all costs, and re-boot the world currency system in a new Bretton Woods. This will involve the stabilization of currencies to gold, and fixing those currencies at the appropriate levels in order to restore balanced trade. Even with this "bedrock" put in place, the world economy could still slowly contract for some period... the main thing is it will be put on a more stable footing, which would provide the basis for a new period of growth in the future. Stability, not growth, will be the new buzzword. Gold bullion will be a beneficiary of the process as it first continues to strengthen in the market as an alternative reserve currency/ hedge against uncertainty. When the economy really hits the skids, with capital increasingly flying into gold [besides treasuries] the price will be capped... at anywhere between $2000/$3000 [there would be no alternative here as the economy would become starved of capital]. This capping of the gold price will involve, conversely, the "fixing" of currencies to gold. This will also involve the demise of market fundamentalism, which allowed currencies to float freely in the market. It will also finally enable the devaluation of the dollar, and the appreciation of the Yuan.

A good example of how gold holds onto gains in this volatile market a lot better than silver [gold is a lot "stickier"]. Comparing this move down to a previous one, if gold comes off another $25 to 1175 or so, it will still be $100 higher whereas silver may retrace back to near where it was at $15. The gold/ silver ratio looks to favour gold at the moment, and is looking to move up into the 70s.

Has to depend on what percentage of your worldly worth is already in gold, right?