Obviously no one believes GOLD will ever rise.........I think a crisis is about to erupt

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People are so complacent today, it's scary. We are heading into unchartered waters with the stock market and economy. The only game in town is buying tech stocks. They are almost forcing everyone of us into this market. More and more I find people in stocks that never invested before. The question is when does it end and do you put your money in this casino. No one likes gold. hmmmm The crowd is postively buying stocks with both hands. These are sure times to stay on your toes, because I fell like throwing my money in stocks. Only I think it will end very very badly. Anyone know ?

-- RJ (rj@home.com), February 29, 2000

Answers

Sure I know.

I read the last chapter in the book.

But I don't want to spoil it for you, so I won't tell you.

-- (4@5.6), February 29, 2000.


Why so negative? It's the new economy, dude! Inflation is dead! Bankruptcy is a thing of the past. Money-losing companies are the way to go.

-- Cluless and loving it (Brainwashed@clueless.com), February 29, 2000.

RJ:

Exactly how long have you been waiting for this crisis to erupt? Since '79...or '83...or '99...? Gold bugs have been touting the "return" of gold since the big crash in 1980. It's now 2000. It hasn't happened. It's not going to happen. How long can you be wrong before you realize the only crisis is of your own making?

-- Jim Cooke (JJ Cooke@yahoo.com), February 29, 2000.


A VERY basic rule for investing is that everyone cannot make money the same way... However, people often forget this rule. Failure to heed it makes for some nice "bubbles." Tulips, anyone?

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), February 29, 2000.

Jim Cooke, you seem to have ALL the answers, please tell us how you see the market unfolding this year.

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), February 29, 2000.



Some guy told me to get a whole bunch of these.

The bank just laughed at me. What gives?

~Sad Sack

-- Ivan (workin@ntherailroadallthelivelong.day), February 29, 2000.


If gold doesn't have a comeback please explain to me how people are going to be making money by investing in stocks that are not earning a profit----nada,zilch,none as in no earnings!

Paul Volker spoke in Thailand about one month ago. He said that there will be a one-world currency but it will not happen in his life- time (yes, I know, he's seventy-ish). He made this remark after explaining it took 40 years to launch the Euro.

nancy

-- NH (new@mindspring.com), February 29, 2000.


Excuse me, the Volker comment was meant for another thread.

nancy

-- NH (new@mindspring.com), February 29, 2000.


Jim Cooke,

You need to have a larger picture for gold to make sense. It is not an investment, it is MONEY. An ounce of gold is still an ounce of gold. A dollar was 1/20th of an oz of gold, now it is roughly 1/300th of an oz of gold.

Gold has been money because it is scarce, while federal reserve notes seem to be all too plentiful.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), February 29, 2000.

When the supply of gold becomes sufficiently drawn down as a result of persistent high demand, something is going to happen. Gold demand has been high for at least 14 months. Lots of buying. Eventually, TPTB won't be able to control the situation anymore.

-- Y2kObserver (Y2kObserver@nowhere.com), February 29, 2000.


TPTB do not control the price of gold. Supply and demand do. It will eventually rise. It will spike. It will drop. People who believe in a gold standard will continue to think of it as more valuable than paper. It is just another commodity. A lot of stubborn people have been holding gold for a long time since the big drop from the 700 dollar plus mark, and have lost a lot money in lost opportunity from this decision. IMHO, it has lost its lustre. If enough people think otherwise, it will regain it. It seems foolish to pay much over its production cost. In principle it is no different from any other metal.

-- ImSo (lame@prepped.com), February 29, 2000.

Hey, ImSo---Are you Sure that the price of gold is controlled by supply & demand? Actually, the manipulations on gold have been so bvious, including Greenspan's admission that "the central banks stand ready to lease more gold should the price rise.." that I'm amazed that there's ANYONE out there who still believes that ANY of the commodity markets are free, unmanipulated, LET ALONE the GOLD market!

-- Ben (bcorson@dmi.net), February 29, 2000.

Hey, Ben!! You'll be equally amazed, I'm sure, to learn everything that costs anything is "manipulated". The ultimate driving force behind the manipulation is Supply and Demand. Read all about it in Economics 101. The Hunt brothers couldn't have driven silver up to $50 in 1980 by drying up supply unless there was a demand to buy the diminishing supply. Is it sinking in?

And "TPTB" are not some giant conspiracy--just assorted forces trying to affect their side of the supply and demand.

No charge.

-- ImSo (lame@prepped.com), February 29, 2000.


ImSo,

You are wrong on two accounts.
1)Gold is not just another commodity. It has thousands of years of history behind it as money. Over the years, the dollar has lost an incredible amount of purchasing power, and it will continue to lose purchasing power. On an earlier thread, someone was commenting about $10,000 an oz gold. It may not happen in our lifetime, but it will happen eventually. Learn from history. Every fiat currency has eventually failed. Only our arrogance as Americans keep us from imagining that it could happen to the dollar.
2) Please don't assume that you are superior because you don't buy into any conspiracy theories/TPTB. Not every happening is a conspiracy controlled by some hidden powers behind the scene, but every happening is not necessarily as the mass media presents it, either. You seem to be an intelligent man, so use your critical thinking skills to tell us why, as supply of gold has remained basically constant, and demand for gold has gone up considerably, that the price has gone DOWN.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), March 01, 2000.

flat-earthers all of you (well at least most of you) Gold is rare but so are lots of other useless things. In todays world there is no real use for gold and until there is one it will hold a nominal value, Id say $10/oz if it wernt artificially inflated by the flat earth crowd still buying it.

At least tec stocks have "some" potential to be of some value....Tell me on thing that Gold will ever do for anyone that a chunk of Brass properly treated can not.

THE EARTH IS ROUND GUYS....get out of the 90's

-- Danny (danny@evans.com), March 01, 2000.



Danny,

Your utter lack of knowledge about history is admirable. I'm sure that you would be completely convinced that you would be able to exit the market bubble before everyone else, if you only believed the market were overpriced.

When it all shakes out, a dollar is only as good as what is behind it. Tell us flat earthers what is behind a dollar these days, Danny.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), March 01, 2000.

Ray:

I have no idea what the stock market will do. I think it is still a good long term investment but it's going to have many ups and downs along the way. That's the way it is.

As I have said before, I was a heavy gold and silver investor in the late 60's and 70's and made a lot of money but I haven't bought an ounce of either since 1980. I believed then and believe now that gold and silver are primarily a hedge when the average person doesn't think the paper dollar is worth much. This was the case in the 70's but it is not the case now. The true believers here area a very small minority and the price of gold is not going up until a lot more people get worried.

J:,

Your reasoning that gold is money is specious. Gold was worth about $33 an ounce in 1933 and today gold is worth about $300 an ounce. But, what would have happened to that $33 if it had been invested in stocks from 1933 until today? I suspect it would be worth much more than $300. From that point of view, gold has been a dog investment all along.

-- Jim Cooke (JJCooke@yahoo.com), March 01, 2000.


Actually, gold is a rare element, whereas brass is a cheap and plentiful compound.

Actually, the Earth is somewhat pear-shaped.

Actually, aside from a commonly agreed upon and constant, ultimate store of wealth and medium of exchange (central banks currently hold over 30,000 tons of gold), its beauty, malleability, and ductility, gold has more than a few critical uses, some of which would make certain over-inflated tech stocks that much less "techy" without it.

from cominco.com:

Approximately 3,540 tonnes of gold are consumed annually in the Western World.

Jewelry manufacturing accounts for close to 80% of gold use, but it has many other important uses.

Gold is not affected by air, and is a good conductor of heat and electricity. These attributes make it appropriate for jewelry, electronics, dentistry and coinage. Gold is a soft metal; so soft that it is often alloyed to increase its strength. Gold is biologically benign. It will not corrode or tarnish, and is unaffected by moisture or oxygen. The purity of gold is described by the carat scale; totally pure gold is called 24 carat, or 1,000 fine.

Gold plays an integral part in hundreds of aircraft applications including radar equipment, windshield glass and navigation circuitry. Today's cars use gold to ensure the performance of airbags; gold- coated electrical contacts ensure that the system will work flawlessly for the life of the car. In addition, all high-performance cars use gold contacts and connectors in wheel controls to prevent spinning and loss of traction.

Today's electronics rely on gold. Gold components are found in cameras, home computers, camcorders, and televisions. Gold is also in wiring, electronic circuitry and microchips, which contribute to the efficiency and quality of our modern technologies.

-- Nathan (nospamwh@tsoever.moc), March 01, 2000.


Gold is a useful metal. It costs around $250 or so to mine, depending on where and how. Much beyond the cost of producing it and the value is as artificial as a dot.com.

Hey--if you like it as an investment, go buy it. Like every other investment, it's value is manipulated by people with more power to influence its price than the average small investor, and ultimately supply and demand will catch up to that manipulation. So far it hasn't done too well, but who knows? Certainly not I. If TEOTWAWKI hits, currency will be food and not metal.

-- ImSo (lame@prepped.com), March 01, 2000.


Jim,

As I stated earlier, it is not about gold as an investment. It is about gold as money. You seem to have completely missed my point.

A dollar, once upon a time in this country, was defined as 1/20th of an oz of gold. Therefore 1 oz of gold= $20. Now this is where I must have lost you before, so I will try to be more clear. If you had 1 oz of gold 100 years ago, you would still have 1 oz of gold today. If you had $20 100 years ago, you would still have $20 today.

Today you can trade your 1 oz of gold for $20, (and get roughly $280 more), but you cannot trade your $20 to get 1 oz of gold.

Get it?

Investments are fine and dandy. I think that you should have them. My point about gold is not about investing. It is about what has preserved and what will continue to preserve wealth without investment risk. The answer is not specious, the answer is not the U.S. dollar, the answer is GOLD.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), March 01, 2000.

J:

You can make the same arguement about ANY commodity - there's nothing special about gold in this regard. If bought a barrel of oil in 1920 for 32 cents, how much could I get for it today? This has nothing to do with making yourself more clear so my humble mind can comprehend. It has to do with your belief in gold as some special storehouse of value. Gold is not money any more than oil or pork bellies are money.

-- Jim Cooke (JJCooke@yahoo.com), March 01, 2000.


Jim,

Any commodity?

Pork bellies rot.
Oil is flammable.
Iron rusts.
Lead is plentiful.
Tin is plentiful.
Water is plentiful in some places.
Etc.

Gold has been money for thousands of years because it is a rare metal with special qualities.

When the government ultimately destroys the value of their paper currency through inflationary printing, what will the standard of monetary exchange be? Pork bellies? As it has been for thousands of years, it will be gold.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), March 01, 2000.

This is from the U SA Gold Board

TownCrier (02/29/00; 10:10:46MDT - Msg ID:26200) The Fed added $2.503 billion to banking reserves via overnight repurchase agreements http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/000229/v5.html This stacks on top of yesterday's 3-day RPs totaling over $3.75 billion, and further builds on last week's 13-day operation in excess of $7 billion.

That's over $13.25 Billion the Fed has added to Banking reserves in the last two and a half weeks! Whats going on here guys?

If I remember correctly Uncle Al was supposed to be drawing down all the extra Y2K dollars he added to the reserves last fall not adding to them? But of course he's gotta keep that market primed!

Can you say inflation?

Got Gold?

-- Zdude (zdude777@hotmail.com), March 01, 2000.


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