Traineeinvestor

One of the things that surprises me a little is that platinum is not only cheaper than gold, but much cheaper. Any thoughts on why that is happening?

Silver looking very strong - not sure if it will calm down once the markets are past the immediate Brexit panic?

A massively aggressive prediction for the price of silver to go to USD140 by 2019 on the back of surging industrial demand and a lack of investment in new production: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-26/miner-sees-silver-price-surging-ninefold-as-global-gadgets-boom

I might have been tempted but after a series of phone calls this afternoon, I got the same asking rent from someone else without the potential headaches. Provisional agreement has been signed so we are back to full occupancy.

After a bit of negotiation, two of the three people who were interested agreed to a rent level which is 18% above what the previous tenant was paying. The new tenant works for a bulge bracket bank and has been in HK for several years. Hoping to sign the provisional agreement on early next week when he gets back to HK. I strongly suspect that the MTR opening is the major driver of the increase. As an aside, I rejected one offer from a mainland tenant because they refused to produce either a HKID card or a passport with a HK visa in it. They offered to pay three months' deposit, but it just wasn't worth the hassle of dealing with someone who couldn't prove they had right of abode in HK.

A couple of reference points for HK property: 1. I rolled over a lease to an existing tenant at a 7% increase (slightly below the rate of inflation and below what agents were telling me I could get but it's better than having to find a new tenant); 2. we put the unit we were staying in while our home was being redecorated on the market on Saturday. We've already had three offers at close to our asking price. The high offer is 17% above the previous rental (set in mid 2013), probably helped by the opening of the HKU MTR station as well as the continued gentrification of Kennedy Town. Only a couple of reference points but demand in Mid-levels looks pretty strong at the moment.

It's been a while. I had a few issues which limited the amount of time I was spending on line. Thanks for the link - interesting and well presented but not exactly news (except to US policy makers). Daniel Yergen's The Prize is a great read on the history of the oil industry and gives some background on its development in the middle east.

Saudi Arabia is chewing through its reserves at an unsustainable rate. Unless oil prices move up in the not too distant future, they will have to make cuts to domestic spending. Rather paradoxically, any resulting political instability in Saudi Arabia would (likely) push oil price up.

An anecdotal pointer to the market becoming saturated - I have started getting calls from agents (not ones I have dealt with before) asking me to viewings of new releases before they are opened to the general public. Leaving aside the violations of the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, I view this as a possible indication of the market slowing down (or perhaps some agents are just getting creative in order to get a bigger slice of the commissions on offer). My view is that the market is too expensive to represent good value for investors - of course, I've held that view for a few years now and the market has proven me wrong. As a side issue, there are plenty of people who have made good money out of the share market in recent months (even a retiree like me with a stodgy portfolio of dull boring dividend orientated stocks has done okay). If history is any guide, some of those gains will likely be diverted into the property market at some stage.

Interesting article on Bloomberg about how China is expected to announce it's gold holdings as a precursor to having the RMB added to the World Bank's basket of reserve currencies: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-20/mystery-of-china-s-gold-stash-may-soon-be-solved-as-imf-beckons

"All necessary steps will be taken to prevent the local housing market from overheating ..." Not sure which local housing market he's talking about but a lot of people have been claiming that the HK housing market has been overheated for a few years now.

Thanks for posting the Zero Perspective article but I do not understand how raising the margin on what appears to be a lot of different futures contracts is being done to "punish" gold/silver? The article ignores the fact that margin requirements were increased across the board for many commodities (at a time when regulators are clamping down on risky investing generally) and then asserts that this is done to "punish" one particular commodity. Very hard to take that website either seriously or comically. Even if one makes the leap and assumes that the across the board increases in margin requirements for many commodities were targeted at silver, I don't understand how this "punishes" the restless metal? The higher margin requirements apply to both long and short positions and, therefore, affect bulls and bears equally. If anything, by making investing through the futures markets more expensive, the margin increases make taking delivery and/or investing in physical directly relatively more attractive compared to holding rolling positions in the futures market. Higher costs may also have an impact on liquidity in the futures markets, but that could be either bullish or bearish depending on which way the market is heading at any given time.

Article published today on Bloomberg: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-21/silver-poised-for-bull-market-as-economic-woes-spur-haven-demand.html Short version: speculators are getting more interested in silver

SHK sold all 300 flats in it's latest Tung Chung development in less than 7 hours: http://www.scmp.com/...ties-sold-out-7 "Properties on sale included flats with one or two bedrooms and net floor areas ranging from 408 to 645 sq ft, priced at HK$4 million to HK$6 million. Many buyers had their eyes on the smaller one-bedroom flats, which had sold out by early afternoon, according to the property agents. The cheapest flat was a 412 sq ft unit on the first floor priced at HK$4.09 million before the discount - or HK$9,948 per square foot in terms of saleable area. After the discount of up to 10.5 per cent, the price would be HK$3.66 million, or HK$8,904 per square foot." 13,800 people registered as prospective buyers of the units. This bit at the bottom of the article caught my attention: "Midland Realty expected average home prices in the New Territories to go up by 10 per cent over the next year, passing the HK$10,000 per square foot mark."

Given the government's track record of making wildly inaccurate budget forecasts and equally impressive record of squandering taxpayer's money, I place precisely zero reliance on the forecast of budget surpluses. HK already has more people living in free or heavily subsidised housing that in private sector housing - when will it stop?

One way to find a bargain on HK property: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-11/-haunted-apartments-go-for-cheap-in-hong-kong.html

This is a fairly major development - assuming the referendum passes: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-05/prepare-for-gold-rally-if-swiss-bullion-referendum-passes.html

A bullish view on silver: http://www.bloomberg.com/video/silver-presents-a-great-buying-opportunity-horwitz-O7spBNeHQSiGbg1~HvOA2g.html

I doubt if anyone thinks much of the entire PB insert - on the whole it was rubbish. Most (if not all) of the articles were shallow sound bites or statements of fact with no meaningful attempt at either explanation or prediction. The typical research stuff that the private banks offer their clients is much more substantive than anything that appeared in the article - some of it is actually pretty good. This is prettly much a case of the messenger (SCMP and the journalists) who should be shot rather than the banks

What wasn't explained is why rents are increasing again? Is it simply increased end user demand > increased supply? Is there something else/more contributing to the increase?

Chinese Gold and Silver Exchange Society becomes the first non-PRC operator given permission to set up a gold and silver storage facility in China: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-15/hong-kong-gold-bourse-approved-to-build-vault-in-china.html Not so much significant as an indicator of how the centre of the global precious metals business is shifting.

The fact that it is on mineweb is a very strong indiction that it is anything but banker-sponsored (even if it was originally from Reuters). It's just stating a combination of facts and the opinions of the people interviewed. Given the inflationary, FX and credit risks involved in onshore local currency deposits in India, I would be very very hesitant about putting more than near term cash needs on deposit. I think the guy who purchased land will do much better in the longer term.

This is clearly bearish for gold: http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/content/en/mineweb-gold-news?oid=252969&sn=Detail It also serves as a useful reminder that for many potential investors in gold, local concerns are vastly more significant than global geo-political issues.

A picture says a thousand words - both One South Lane and Eight South Lane are sandwiched between much older buildings - not only are there no views but there is limited natural light and limited privacy to go with the prospect of redevelopment of adjacent buildings. I do not understand the attraction at all.

Apologies - it was One South Lane (but the comments still apply). Eight South Lane is still to be launched. Agree with your comments on larger and older developments being preferred.