Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
Download PM's dossier on Iraq
http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page6139.asp
http://www.mips1.net/MGGold.nsf/UNID/TWOD-5EA6AZ
NEW YORK -- They came for fire and brimstone. They got it. They are gold bugs; a 3,000 strong congregation that descended on the Marriot Marquis in Manhattan for the fifteenth annual New York Institutional Gold Conference.
Gold's high priests did not disappoint. These money shows are expected to deliver strong harmonies, but this one offered unusual doctrinal purity with this refrain – we're experiencing a secular bull market for gold and a secular bear market for, well, pretty much everything else. Indeed, the secularism required for this religion is so extraordinary that last year's conference was cancelled for lack of interest; that was when gold was only just beginning its ascent and before Alan Greenspan became the devil incarnate.
As if to reinforce the metal's revivalist power, conference coreligionists could marvel at Danté's Inferno raging on the electronic ticker tapes (Dow -114; Nasd -36; S&P5c -12; 10-yr -.095) threading above Times' Square. The photons pulsing billions of vanishing dollars were, however, lost on today's Broadway exhibitionist; very much the heathen secularist – a guitar mauling, Stetson capped crooner with "Naked Cowboy" scrawled across his rear end.
Jim Sinclair, on the other hand, remained fully clothed and guitar free at all times. Latterly chairman of Tan Range Exploration [TNX], but more famous as "Mr Gold" for his four decades of experience with the metal, Sinclair packed the pews and the aisles.
He is literally the Billy Graham of this business, which has more than its share of Al Sharptons and Jesse Jacksons. He had an unadulterated message of portfolio salvation that doesn't require intercession. It's between you and the gold price.
He and Monaco based newsletter publisher Harry Schultz have essentially repackaged the marriage vows – love gold, but don't die with it. They warn that you can have every fundamental in place, but without the right technical props gold is little more than a Roman candle waiting for a match – blindingly bright for a short time before flaming out never to be reused.
Gold's flame out could follow a spectacular lift-off ignited by the confluence of 5 factors. Sinclair sees the dollar going into freefall and precipitating the revival of the "Gold Cover Clause", originally mothballed by Nixon. The cover clause basically stipulates a percentage of gold backing the dollar and is seen as the only hope to prevent an outright dollar implosion with catastrophic economic, political and social consequences.
"If gold goes over $529 without the gold cover clause [being invoked], then sell because it will get below $200 an ounce!" boomed Sinclair. And with that he left the stage to the most rapturous applause of the day.
A rather more sober message than the unalloyed exuberance of the thousands-of-dollars-an-ounce crowd.
What the meek stand to inherit
James Grant of Grant's Interest Rate Observer also attracted a large following. Grant, soft spoken and a master of that American peccadillo, the euphemism (collateral damage, stature deprived, IQ challenged…), made a good G.K. Chesterton or C.S. Lewis. The cerebral style is no less effective at winning converts.
A battle between inflation and deflation rages behind Grant's Narnian spreadsheets. Both evil, to be sure, but the former is vastly more favourable to gold which emerges as a one-dimensional Aslan. Taking his cue from history, Grant said deflation was only likely when "credit creation was stymied." He doesn't see that at all, just an "overinvestment of faith in the dollar, yen and euro" that will be rewarded by "a concerted effort to depreciate currencies through rampant credit creation." Heretics have been burned for less, but Grant seems indifferent to immolation: "When it's over, the Fed will look like the Bank of Japan."
He was especially uncomplimentary of Maestro, aka Greenspan – "a self-exculpating revisionist"; "he's been found out as a federal employee, not a miracle worker"; "he sounded more like a stock broker" (now that is a sin) and "the public sector's Jack Welch" were just some of the reproofs.
Indeed, Maestro is being single-handedly fingered for the tech stock cult, now in its death throes, but which spawned such excess that the funeral pyre of malinvestment will burn long and hot. Judgement is at hand in the form a potential 30% fall in the Dow back to "fair value", thinks Grant.
Grant didn't put any store in the gold conspiracy, simply because the metal is more powerful than any government and any monetary authority; witness the failed London Gold Pool of the 1960s. "All monetary systems come and go; this one doesn't even have a name… One day Alan Greenspan will fix the wrong Federal Funds rate... the world's faith in managed currencies is just amazing."
Get the message
David Tice, of Prudent Bear Fund fame, had an identical message to Grant, but he used some flashy props to drive the points home.
Again, it is all about excessive credit and Greenspan's folly. "You cannot burst the biggest bubble in history with mild results… what-the-hell debt is financing the spending."
Tice warns that unbelievers will be happily seduced by bear market rallies, but the faithful remnant will be holding gold, knowing this is the famed secular bear market; a rapture of sorts for gold bugs. "The magnitude of the bust will be proportional to the excess of the boom," Tice thundered to an enthralled audience, reminding them of the decadence (he actually said, in Grantesque fashion, "sociological defects") of corrupt CEOs and scummy bankers.
"The Fed has no bullets left," he said, rolling out a series of charts with peaks soaring higher than hedonistic 1929 and leaving you with no doubt that the valley that awaits will need more than one Psalm. And with that, many think the devil has been unmasked. And the fellow appears to be a vertically challenged, age enhanced Objectivist.
A cautionary tale
An angel appears to John and tells him that he has 10 minutes to get his life in order because he's about to die. "Okay, I've got 2 suitcases full of Krugerrands in the basement, let me collect them and we can go," John says, unfazed.
"No. I can't allow that," says the angel.
"Please, I worked my whole life for them. I can't leave them now."
"Alright, but I'm not carrying anything."
Accompanied by the angel, John arrives at the pearly gates, overburdened suitcases in hand. St Peter comes out to greet him, but steps short at the sight of the suitcases. "You don't need an overnight bag where you're going," he chortles.
"No, no," fusses John, "look here." With that he snaps open the case, proudly revealing towers of mint Krugers.
"Pavement! You brought pavement to Heaven?" St Peter asks incredulously.
Comment on this story >
The glory of gold (Tim Wood)
. . right stuff (joel casey)
. . Thanx Tim...A spot of sunshine on an otherwise dreary day...wish I could'a been there (Jack Fortin)
. . Article: The Glory of Gold (James A. Termini)
As JR says. " silliness of it all ".
Pure silliness...
Manipulation....
70% of it seems to be the charts, the other 30%. is playing this manipulation.
Tough market.
now that was a chart that made sense.
Predatory Lending is a fearsome thing. I have seen credit extended to people who cannot add, much less compute percentages. Old people, cognitively impaired people and your average garden variety fully capable nit wit. Everyone can have so much credit... but you'll notice the laws have crept up so that discharge of debt in bankrupcy is harder and harder.
Gold exit yesterday looking better all of a sudden.
Imagine that..
Manana
here's the silliness into later this week...
sidelined for now, out of longs here.
pressing miners on dip.
last of shakeouts underway.
i enjoy subsidies.
Nice call on Waterfall, JR...
Among other things, rumors of Europe Bank failure floating around this am.
Gold spike...
Manana
thanks saikman!
didn't realize i had mail.
I'm going to try Verio again - we have Chartraders.com registered. If we can set up an IHUB-type deal there, with no limit on posts for Manana (AT A REASONABLE PRICE) it sounds like it will work. I don't want to have to post my charts somewhere else, then link them to a post in here.
ned “the qqq bandit” riley was bottom pumping again this morning. siting the put/call ratio & imminient short squeeze. unfortunately ned fails to understand that any rallies will be sold after a short period of time as there
are no positive divergences for this market and no bottom until we have seen capitulative sellage on a wholesale basis. market psychology has evaporated into vapors of volatile fumes wafting thru mutual & pension funds around the globe… no wonder the dollar is strong, it’s end of quarter pension fund proppage.
sir alan, you have lost control. opened the mail yesterday… new visa card with a generous limit.
i didn’t actually apply for this visa, i had two several years ago and cancelled one. the risk boyz decided “more credit” should continue to fuel their chilling growth story. i refused the card, but no sooner was i about to hang up when the operator chripped, “ i just transferred that
limit to your exsisting card… “
this type of credit priming all exsists outside of al’s funhouse, he has very little control over the one arm bandits of credit. the liquor wagon pulled up in front of the drunks house and is now soaking his house in booze.
don’t lite a smoke joe…
we have managed to reach a historic low (44 year low) on ust’s.
the june sellage in gold is now becoming a serious problem for the funds who ejected to buy equities. “sell the winners to slow bleed the losers”: typical behavior as now they want back in badly and are basically getting blank stares from goldbulls.
Now let me think on this overnight. I do my best thinking away from the computer.
incog
It appears only certain file types are allowed. The pic of Hoover's cabin was a JPEG image file.
The MSN site uses some fetch.dll oddball file. I bet it can't be used as an image. Just like Mr. Gates.
incog
ooooo that's a good one Hoover!
LOL
incog
Hoover it's Charles Shaw Cabernet Sauvignon 2000 from CA. We bought a case of it cuz it compared to more expensive brands.
incog
Testing the chart with a hoover pic
I Hub sets record I think for new all time high in posts per day.
Guess I finally found a question that sparked all of your interests.
Wow! we actually have so many people that can post things. I never knew that.
Ill have to think of the next " non stock related question" again to spark all of you!
LOL
Manana
oh dear. That didn't go well at all, and I accidentally saved one of those charts to be my wallpaper. Unsettling. And kane you are just full of good ideas tonite.
I give up, that's it I quit for tonite..
<html>
<head>
<title>charts</title>
<meta name="generator" content="Created Using Yahoo! Wizards 2.61.65">
</head>
<body background="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/backgrounds/Generic/WP_525D.GIF" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" link="#0000FF" vlink="#FF0000" text="#000000"
>
<table border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 width=627>
<tr valign="top" align="left">
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=95></td>
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=9></td>
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=232></td>
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=282></td>
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=9></td>
<td><img src="http://www.geocities.com/clipart/pbi/c.gif" height=1 width=1></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=6 height=26></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=1 height=87></td>
<td valign="middle" align="center" colspan=4 rowspan=1 width=532><font face="Arial" size="+2"><span style="font-size:24">charts</span></font></td>
<td colspan=1 height=87></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=6 height=15></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=2 height=22></td>
<td colspan=2 rowspan=1 width=514><span style="font-size:14">saik's charts</span></td>
<td colspan=2 height=22></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=6 height=33></td>
</tr>
<tr valign="top">
<td colspan=2 height=105></td>
<td colspan=1 rowspan=1 width=232 align="center" valign="middle"><img height=105 width=232 src="http://www.geocities.com/zebghh/spx-tr.gif" border=0 ></td>
<td colspan=3 height=105></td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- text below generated by server. PLEASE REMOVE --></object></layer></div></span></style></noscript></table></script></applet>
<script language="JavaScript">var PUpage="76001065"; var PUprop="geocities"; </script><script language="JavaScript" src="http://www.geocities.com/js_source/pu5geo.js"></script><script language="JavaScript" src="http://www.geocities.com/js_source/ygIELib9.js?v3"></script><script language="JavaScript">var yviContents='http://us.toto.geo.yahoo.com/toto?s=76001065&l=NE&b=1&t=1032838128';yviR='us';yfiEA(0);&... language="JavaScript" src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mc/mc.js"></script><script language="JavaScript" src="http://us.geocities.com/js_source/geov2.js"></script><script language="javascript">geovisit();</script><noscript><img src="http://visit.geocities.com/visit.gif?1032838128" border=0 width=1 height=1></noscript>
<IMG SRC="http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=76001065&t=1032838128" ALT=1 WIDTH=1 HEIGHT=1>
saik and Hoover needs your social security # and mothers maiden name and some bank account #'s too while your at it lol
saik, if you send me your provider and passwords and crud I can set it up for you, I'm bad at html but I have some page builder stuff and can do it good enuf so you can have a place of your own to upload stuff to I think, maybe.
that won't work cause what we want is saik's charts and he eschews MSN.
but he doesn't inhale.
I knew there was a way. Cuz I seen them before on IHUB.
Can we right click on a chart that resides on our personal machine and upload it to the post? If not the work around would be to upload it to Hoover's MSN area and follow the instructions in the prior post.
I will give it a try. Everyone print post # 579.
This can be worked out.
incog
You cheap drunk.
so what did you find, you know any dingbat can find a great 30 dollar bottle, but a great 2 dollar bottle?????
Saik old boy,
Isn't this your provider?
http://support.cox.net/custsup/personal_pages/index.shtml
I got some good stuff too. Hood found it and it was
only 2 dollars a bottle :<)))) OK call me a cheap drunk!
lol
OOOOO so cool everybody is out tonight!
incog
Pictures here of the cabin by the way.... of the one on the island I been workin on
http://groups.msn.com/FCTraders/shoebox.msnw
Also it would be real nice if we could have posts emailed to our email so we could follow em there. Cause otherwise we get busy and forget it exists.
Exactly. Just some kind of public holding tank of chartage that you can link to. Most ISPs offer plenty of space. Like Earthlink, whoever you use.
I could email you one of saik's beautiful posts so you could figure out how to make it so. I think it must not be too hard.
little humor for ya'll
http://www.analpink.com/bas/movies/MadCow.swf
and NO ! it is not pornography !
it looks like all we need is a site that a chart can be posted were we would use a url to have I-hub pick up and post under the message.
Am I right?
thanks again matt. : )
Ok, so what you need is the ability to upload a post from your own computer, onto a public site. And you'd prefer if it was all encompassed in the same site you are trying to post the chart on -- like iHub.
Is this a correct assumption?
Come on man, you know our interface is perty. You don't want to leave. You can't resist us. :)
So let's make it happen. I just need to know exactly your needs.
Ihub is a web-link only setup...I cannot post what is not on the web - Ed over at TalkStox has offered us a forum, but I do not know if that's best - it sure is easy to upload charts, but file size is 60K, which even Topica beats. I can work with it though...
Manana:
Could you link me up or show me an example of what Saikman's post looks like?
Maybe we are having a misunderstanding of what constitutes a chart posted by him. As in, an attachment (where the chart resides on his computer) or a public site (like stockcharts.com)
MB
Let Saikman answer all these posts, Im sure this will spark a new round of input to get us going.
Manana
Anyone can post charts here. It's just a matter of knowing how. I'm glad Matt noticed the incorrect assumption that iHub doesn't support charts embedded in posts. It's one of the few sites that does.
Here's basically how to do it.
1. Go to the chart you want.
2. Right-click the chart and select Properties.
3. Highlight the full URL of the chart and press Ctrl-C to copy it to your clipboard.
4. Go to your iHub post and type [ chart ] (without the spaces).
5. Press Ctrl-V to paste the chart's URL into the message.
6. Edit out the "http://" part.
7. Type [ /chart ] (without the spaces) at the end.
That's all there is to it. Basically put the chart's URL (minus the http://) inside a pair of [ chart ] [ /chart ] tags.
Note that using a URL to a page that *contains* a chart won't do it. You have to use the URL of the chart itself. Which is why you right-click the chart and select Properties. To find out what the URL is for the chart itself.
O.K. We need JRMFL, Saikman, Kane, Hoover, Incog and the rest of you computer to .
SAVE US!
Cause I damn sure cant. I just post manana stuff.
Save these rambling, crusaders and other wise cheap asses as my self, looking to land in a new place where Saikman can post charts for free.
Manana, closes eyes, goes back to cave, sees what these brains in 2002 can come up with.
Manana
Volume | |
Day Range: | |
Bid Price | |
Ask Price | |
Last Trade Time: |