I think it’s normal to have doubts – especially in rigged markets like this. Stockholm Syndrome creeps in and we begin questioning everything.
Commenting on these markets over the last decade, I often wonder how long they can keep it all together. The entire house of cards has stood up much longer than anyone has expected. The next wave of investors will likely go through the almost reflexive reach for derivatives first.
New investors, or would be long term holders, simply have an aversion and are well versed in the worlds of ETFs. Overall, I think we have to keep in mind that each and every move for the time being occurs by the will of those who control it.
Yes, the moves will conform to technical analysis in some way, but it’s all one gigantic painted tape. Confiscation is happening all around us.
It is insidious and sweeping. It even goes beyond literal currency and wealth.
With the massive misallocation of capital, combined with a declining workforce, the brain drain is phenomenal and scary.
Obviously, we have this slow, “boiled frog” currency devaluation masked by the data, denied by the media, and unnoticed by the masses.
Direct taxation is another form of ongoing confiscation. It will probably get worse, and more people will opt out that way.
Allowing the financial elite to have sweeping ‘above the law’ powers to front run, rig, and defraud markets is another egregious form of confiscation. Obviously, they will create so much risk that the whole system eventually collapses, destroying any last vestiges of a real economy and making it impossible to ever “reflate”.
And in the process of intervening, they will bail in depositors and indirectly grab retirement funds long before they go after the tiny majority of those who hold precious metals. Cyprus was a template. My IRA is a trial balloon.
Outlawing direct purchases would very likely have the same effect as attempting to impose gun control. It always backfires. It would dovetail with the “under the table wage movement” and tax avoidance on main street. It will also spark a grey market for the precious metals.
Basically, anything that legitimizes or publicizes the monetary side to precious metals will be avoided like the plague.
It’s best to keep expectations low for the short term.
Easier said than done.
We had chickens (and fresh eggs) for a while. They died, and we didn’t replace them. I think some of the urgency I felt about being prepared faded. In some ways this parallels the complacency we now see all around us.
Most of you have it down. Much better than most. That’s little consolation.
But the fundamentals are just that: fundamental. They manifest like truth – eventually – for better or worse.
Precious metals (and the way of life associated) come down to a very cheap long term (life) option. The downside risk on that option depends on your ability to hang in there over a period of time that will probably feel much longer than it is.
Many of you have been at this for quite some time. The world can seem like some lost opportunity.
It certainly doesn’t hurt to appreciate the aesthetics of what we are doing. That will keep you sane as we go along.