Member Info for goldgnome

Dasut

Batie is non core, because it does not return the right amont on investment, commecnurate with risk. The gold is double refracoty(mostly aparently), requires an ultrafine grind and has high stripping ration. Apparently they could not find enough oxide gold to get the capital down quick enough

Australia day today ... Australia Day events begin with calls for country to unite as 'one mob'. Interesting day, beer and prawn on the BBQ

best
the Gnome.

Mr T

Burkina Faso has not always been like this. The reasons it is having trouble are many. A few observations.

1. Prior to the brutal French invasion, the Mossi Kingdom had ruled Burkina Faso, and lasted for several centuries,

2. The effect of the French on Burkina has been consistently net negative, not unlike Mali, where in short they are detested.

3. The French have been "more accepted" when they have propped up an unpopular and unsavory President [Compaore ](for 27 years), but this is an odd form of acceptance, given the way the Compaore family robbed the poor to pay the rich (themselves and friends)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-burkina-mining-corruption-idUSKCN12Q2QO
(etc)

4. The power vaccum left by the Coup which threw Compaore out (to the French disgust) has been filled by various players, who have neither the competence, the know how, or the correct foreign asistance to manage the country.

5. The country is natural resource poor, and industries it does try and operate in, like cotton have foreign government subsidized companies compete gainst them. Cotton subsidies have long been seen as a symbol of the injustice of the international trading system. The subsidies provided by richer countries give their farmers an artificial advantage in global markets, while depressing global prices and undermining the livelihoods of farmers in low-income countries, many of whom struggle in conditions of severe poverty and hardship...
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/chinas-cotton-subsidies-immiserate-farmers-worlds-poorest-countries
and the gold industry is plagued with profit shifting at the big end of town, and corruption and exploitation at the bottom end
(environmental degradation child labor, exploitation of the poor and uneducated etc)

Over simplyifying things, but if you have no job, no education, no trade, no prospects, cant marry the local girl as you are too poor?, and someone comes up and gives you a gun some bullets, and $5/day, what does a poor man do.

The electoral system imposed by the west is simply not amenable to West Africa. As a result they express their dispeasure frequently, by protesting, and when this does not work, then the army moves in, and a Coup is called. More people die in traffic accidents in the country than by Coup's.

Instead of spending billions every year on "security" [which sees foreign soldiers come into their land and Mali], well paid, well fed, and fail every year and this goes on for decades, one would question, just how does doing the same thing that has failed so consistently year after year, make any sense. It does not.

How would you feel if you were sent to fight a battle and were not given a gun but were given a handful of bullets, you were given a vehicle (no armour) but not a lot of petrol...and your platoon got wiped out in the first skirmish....slightly peeved?

sorry about the rant,
the gnome

When you are deep in an open pit, the stripping ratio gets higher and this means it takes longer to turn the ship, in the case of wall instability... strip ratio for the quarter was 10.3:1...I would like some more description on this from the mngt, or from the CEO or both....

Total material moved (waste and ore) of 30.4Mt (FY: 110.2Mt), a 43% increase YoY, driven by scheduled increased
material movement and improved operating efficiencies and productivities.

Total open pit waste material mined for the quarter was 27.7Mt (FY: 97.8Mt), a 56% increase YoY, driven by the
successful execution of the accelerated waste-stripping programme, improving the long-term flexibility and stability of the
open pit. The strip ratio for the quarter was 10.3:1 (waste:ore) (FY: 7.9:1).

Open pit ore mining in Q4 continued to focus on the Stage 5 North and Stage 4 West areas. Total open pit ore mined for
the quarter was 2.7Mt (FY: 12.4Mt), a 24% reduction YoY, at an average mined grade of 0.93 grams of gold per tonne
(“g/t Au”) (FY: 0.86 g/t Au), a 26% improvement YoY, driven by scheduled higher grades delivered from Stage 4 West.

...there are reasons to believe the current equity sell-off will be relatively short-lived. Moreover, heightened fears suggest a near-term bottom may be close. As a result, investors might consider taking some profits on hedge positions in the Vix. Once a decline in realized volatility confirms a market bottom, they should rebalance back into US equities, preferring large-cap value stocks, especially banks, to minimize the drag from higher yields (see US Equity Transitions). Beyond this, however, they should continue to maintain hedges, as monetary tightening and narrowing budget deficits suggest heightened volatility will be more common in the medium term. Vix futures remain the preferred hedge

For the first time in a long time, we agree with Jeremy Grantham – equities likely need to correct quite significantly. Here are some simple mental models. The cyclically-adjusted Shiller price-earnings (p/e) ratio is sitting at 37 times compared to its long-run mean of 17 times and median of 16 times. The only time in the last 150 years it has been higher was just before the 50 per cent drop in US equities during the ‘‘tech wreck’’, which resulted in the Shiller p/e falling from 44 to 21 times.

If we suppose that it is reasonable for US shares to normalise back to their pre-pandemic peak on the basis that investors incorrectly extrapolated ultra-low inflation and 10-year bond yields in perpetuity, stocks would need to adjust downwards by 28 per cent.

If we consider a more serious downside scenario whereby equities mean-revert to their December 2018 level (which is when the Fed last had its cash rate at a ‘‘neutral’’ level of 2.5 per cent), shares would have to drop 48 per cent. There are many shortcomings with this analysis. One of the biggest is that this time is different to the recent past in so many ways. Unfortunately, that point of difference implies even greater downside risk.

When was the last time you can remember a US president egging on the Fed to crush inflation and raise interest rates? When do you last recall inflation being a major US political issue? The post-GFC period has been defined by politicians trying to strong-arm central banks into easier, not tighter, policy settings.

Of course, President Xi Jinping is begging the Fed not to hike interest rates given his currency is pegged to the US dollar. Further, China is, like the US, home to hordes of ‘‘zombie’’ companies. In the US, zombies represent roughly 15-20 per cent of all listed firms. These are entities that do not have enough money to service the interest repayments on their debt using existing earnings. Heaven help them if rates rise sharply, as they are now doing. In China, the state has been the primary backer of many of these entities, which can only survive with access to this artificially cheap public sector funding.

China’s latest economic challenges were on display this week with the release of its annual economic snapshot for the year just ended.... headline 2021 GDP growth rate of 8.1 per cent beat forecastsPeople’s Bank of China’s (PBOC) surprise interest cuts on two key lending rates. While flagged by policy-makers late last year,China and the United States are not only moving in opposite directions in the way they manage the pandemic, but they are now at odds over monetary policy.‘‘The Fed and the PBOC are very likely going to be moving in opposite directions in 2022, and that in itself is pretty remarkable,’’ Bloomberg’s chief economist, Tom Orlik, predicted in a December podcast. He notes that the Chinese yuan was historically tied to the US dollar, which meant the PBOC had to raise or lower rates when the Fed did, regardless of economic conditions.‘‘Now, after a decade of careful, painstaking reforms, the renminbi is much closer to a free-floating currency and that has given China’s central bank a new degree of freedom on how it manages monetary policy. We already see them using it,’’ Orlik says in comments that resonated this week.China is the world largest producer of gold, and the worlds smallest seller of goldBut this week Xi was back before Davos, held online for the second straight year because of the pandemic, with a new message. This time he was positioning China as a leader in global monetary policy. In an unprecedented move, he told the United States and other rich Western countries they should not raise interest rates when developing countries were saddled with huge debt...which they cannot repay. Same old game by the west, so smart to offer a better game for the developing countries, which is what China has been doing for a decade or more now.The global financial system does sadly need more rigour and structure and the US, which is near in civil war with a President who has one of the lowest public press conferences for a president (thank goodness), has shown they are not up to the job, to proceed.We live in velly interesting times? I am again! expecting good times for gold.the gnomeps lets not mention the shenaikans going on in the Ukraine?

The inflation that effects my expenses, that si the things I have to buy, rents, couci fees etc is a lot lot more than 5 or 6 %. The REAL inflatin rate, is the real amount of additional money that you pay for the goods, services and general living. Petrol has gone from a$1.30/litre to A$1.85/l in the last 12 months, Milk, Water, council rates, my wine cost up 25% in 2 years (!) etc etc ... My estimate of my infaltion rate is about 15%

As I have said previously a good thing to keep tabs on yourself, rather than wait to be told by the official govt figures LOL. As we all know, alll is not what it seems
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYT39lMdmbM

enjoy the Australian OPen Tennis, watch Ash Barty!

the gnome

The afternoon selloff wasn’t surprising, said Sameer Samana, a strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute. Even after the recent pullback, selloffs usually need time to find a true bottom. Moreover, on a day like Thursday, it’s likely some traders decided to sell into the early gains in order to cut some of their losses from the prior selloffs.

“This is just how markets bottom,” he said. “It just takes a few days.”

Indeed, the choppy trading shows investors are trying to gauge how far this selloff will go. On Wednesday, the ragged, weekslong selloff pushed the Nasdaq down more than 10% below its record close, putting it in correction territory. Those kinds of plateaus usually bring in bargain hunters, but on its own is no indication a selloff is over, observers say.

“Whenever we see equities churn lower, as they have this year, we are mindful that the risk of a meltdown grows rather than diminishes,” said Nicholas Colas, the founder of analytics firm DataTrek Research.

who knows but sell off on SOME of the high growth stocks.

the Gnome

CONTRY RISK SOUTH AFRICA/GOLD South Africa—Last May, three men strode into a suburban street and sprayed gunfire into a car, killing mining executive Nico Swart on his way to work.

Mr. Swart, 47 years old, had been a general manager at Richards Bay Minerals, or RBM, which is majority owned by global mining giant Rio Tinto PLC. His murder, which is still under investigation, marked another grim flashpoint in the decline of South Africa’s signature industry.

In June, protesters and looters attacked RBM operations, destroying property and mining equipment. In response, Rio Tinto declared force majeure on all customer contracts at RBM, employing the legal provision that excuses parties from contract terms because of unforeseen circumstances.

South Africa’s $24 billion mining sector, which has provided the raw material for nearly half the gold bullion and gold jewelry ever produced, is waning under the pressure of violent crime, growing costs and regulatory uncertainty, as well as tapped-out mines.

Some of the world’s most familiar mining brands have headed for the door, threatening severe consequences for South Africa’s struggling economy, which has also been walloped by Covid-19. The nation’s unemployment rate hit a record 34.9% last year. Mining employs more than 450,000 people and makes up some 8.4% of national economic output.

In recent years, South Africa’s metal refineries and processing plants have been the target of commando-style robberies carried out by Kalashnikov-toting gangs. Mining companies suffered 22 armed heists at precious-metal facilities in 2019 and 2020—a period of rising gold prices—as well as an attempted robbery in 2021, according to Minerals Council South Africa, an industry group.

“I’m very angry about what’s happening in South Africa, and disappointed,” said Neal Froneman, chief executive of Johannesburg-based Sibanye-Stillwater Ltd. , one of the world’s largest producers of platinum, palladium and gold. “But I have to put my personal views and emotions to one side. This is why we’re internationalizing our business.” The company in recent years has expanded mining operations to the U.S. and Finland.

The rest is not any better, but looks very grim for South Africa
I would put Sth African Gold Companies on a Hold or SELL

best
the gnome

I am always interested in how country risk is calculated into investment calculations. Barrick maybe wishing to diversify out of the USA? Diversify into a country (via a company) where Mining has a social icense to operate, as it gives actively back into the government and local communities.

Resolution Copper (Tier 1 copper mine in the USA, and givend evelopments in Chile and elsewhere might be of strategic interest to the US Govt and Industry)– has been caught up in a heightened level of global activism against mining that has stalled not only this project but so many others, and is now threatening to undermine the fight against climate change, and with it the economic and military security of Western democracies.

Major projects have been blocked across the US. But it goes beyond America: from Chile to Serbia, fresh threats to critical minerals projects are popping up, dragging approval processes out to the point at which the average new mine now takes 16 years to start production, according to the International Energy Agency.

US President Joe Biden, who has repeatedly raised concerns about the need for critical minerals independence from China, which controls 73 per cent of the market, has also taken the activists’ side. Last year his government rescinded the approved environmental impact statement for the Resolution mine and ordered a review of an already approved deal by Congress allowing Rio Tinto ownership of the land.

I have posted previously about the contry risk in Australia, which is incresing every year. Just ask Djokovic.

ASIDE, Email from a Serbian friend

The life expectancy of Australians has increased since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, new research from the Australian National University (ANU) has revealed.
The average age of death is now 83 years old
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-18/australians-living-longer-due-to-pandemic-life-anu-study-finds/100761624

But the average age of people who died with covid was 86.9 years old (85.2 years for males, 88.4 years for females)
https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/covid-19-mortality-1

Should Victorians be locked up for 262 days every 2 years as part of a new strategy to extend life expectancy in the state? (State Premier has plans)

Is covid actually good for Australian Public, as its effects extend life, and hence should Djokovic be allowed back to play for the public good?

Should Australian states shut their borders at random more often?

There must be some robust science behind the government's thinking?

Cest la vie as they in Serbia
the Gnome

Thanks for the jolts, the inflation rate for each month is normalised to an annual rate, so no you cannot add them quite like that! But 7 is far greater than 2, even in economic speak.

April 2019
Worldbank issued its updated outlook on the commodities markets. The outlook includes gold price forecasts. For 2019 a price of 1,310 US dollars per ounce is expected. The gold price is forecast to rise further to 1,360 US dollars in 2020.

April 21, 2020
Analysts of Bank of America have published a report titled ‘The Fed Can’t Print Gold’ and set a gold price of US$ 3,000 in 18 months

November 17th, 2020
The global investment bank Goldman has reiterated its previous 12 month target of US$ 2,300 for the gold price.

February 4th, 2021
The London Bullion Market Association published its annual precious metals forecast survey. On average, the 38 surveyed analysts forecast a price of US$ 1,973.8 per troy ounce in 2021.

April 2021
The Worldbank forecasts prices to average 4% lower in 2021, and decline further in 2022. According to the Worldbank, nominal gold prices in U.S.-dollars should decline by 2025, before they tend higher again through 2030 and 2035.

July 6th, 2021
According to the investment bank Goldman Sachs, the gold price has significant upside potential of reaching up to US$ 2,500,

and so on

best

Predictions #1,723 In summary, we expect much better performance from gold in 2022, with the potential for a 60% advance from current levels. Gold miners could outperform to the upside and may double from current levels.

After rising to $3000 in 2022, we expect another consolidation, followed by new highs in 2023 and then a more profound decline in 2024...

The value of paper decreased by 7% last month...and then looking at the monthlies

Date Value
December 31, 2021 7.04%
November 30, 2021 6.81%
October 31, 2021 6.22%
September 30, 2021 5.39%
August 31, 2021 5.25%
July 31, 2021 5.37%
June 30, 2021 5.39%
May 31, 2021 4.99%
April 30, 2021 4.16%
March 31, 2021 2.62%
February 28, 2021 1.68%
January 31, 2021 1.40%
December 31, 2020 1.36%
https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_inflation_rate

If you add all the monthlies for the last 12 months, one gets about 58%, and TARGET WAS 2% ANNUAL. This means the purchasing value of your dollar you saved and put in the bank 12 monthsis a lot lot lower ...

I guess the new target will be 2% inflation per month?

Of, .... the prediction anything to do with Basel? or just a passing notion, or motion as it might have been
best
the gnome

Building a small gold refinery is all of the rage ..
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-gold-africa-refineries-insight-idCAKBN1ZE0YG
pluse there are runours of a few small ones. Even a rumour that the former Presdient of Burkina Faso, family had their own which processed the small scale and artsinal gold from the country. These people number about 2 million peple, and may produce up to x00k ozs gold per year, all illegally. The refinery does not exist now, due to the coup d'tat.

https://voxdev.org/topic/firms-trade/gold-mining-burkina-faso-who-wins

best
the gnome

A short article in the WSJ caught my eye. A rare $10 gold coin from 1907, one of the 42 examples known to exist, is expected to sell for between US$500,000 and US$550,000—50,000 times its face value—at an upcoming auction in Las Vegas. A $10 note in 1907 would be now worth $296.60 today. Interesting?

So we have the limited supply concept, just like bitcoin, except there is something of intrinsic value? Limited minted coins have been a round a lng time, and in fact there are many new, limited edition now being offered, some of them very attractive. Art pieces. Have a look ...
https://www.perthmint.com/shop/collector-coins/masterpieces/the-jewelled-horse-2021-10oz-gold-proof-coin/
RRP AUD $279,000.
Key features:

Proof quality 99.99% pure gold
Three-dimensional horse crafted in 18-carat rose gold
Hand set with approximately 2.76cts of fancy intense to vivid pink/purplish pink diamonds
Exquisite golden diamonds totaling 0.01ct
Previous releases Jewelled Tiger, Jewelled Phoenix and Jewelled Dragon coins are sold out

Like to guess what this would be worth in 100 years time?

I am off to put a bet that Djokvic plays in the Australia Open, even though his visa has been cancelled for a second time, in "the publics best interest", LOL. Bit of a strange term, when most of the public in Australia would pay a few $'s or more to go and watch him play.

Most of our covid rules in Australia dont make any sense, and so we have another one, yawn.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-15/rapid-antigen-tests-covid-rules-australia-weariness-governments/100757486

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-13/family-stranded-again-after-border-restrictions/100753978

Absurdity reached new heights in West Australia,
Western Australia has now locked out travellers from every Australian state and territory due to growing concerns about the spread of the Omicron variant!

Latest restrictions meaning that a couple who did not vaccintae would not be able to go to hospitals, aged care facilities and all hospitality venues, including restaurants, cafes, pubs and bars, taverns, nightclubs and where dine-in fast food is available,indoor entertainment venues including play centres, gaming and gambling venues including Crown Perth, theatres, concert halls, museums, cinemas and live music venues, bottle shops, gyms, fitness centres, health studios, amusement parks, community sport and school-based events will also be exempt, no yoga classes and even the zoo!

Real reason? The WA govt has made such a mess of the Health system in times of great prosperity, than they are barely coping without covid! Where did the state taxes go?

They used to call it the Wild West, and Wild and Wooly it still is.

The Lunatics have finally taken over the asylum.

best
the gnome.

Thanks Mr B.

I have invested in properties, and made a reasonable return, but never as an invesment - a lifestyle for my wife and myself and family? I also have provided homes for our many childen, but this is part of the giving back campaign, as I now know I can take very little into the next world.

I think property investment is a hardish game, that now is harder with "rent forgiveness" as being the newest political innovation (apart from deporting Djokovic, more later). Controlling timing is hard, and I dont like this concept. Lots of fees, and unknowns appear on your doorstep.
I like liquidity. A sadder statement is, that itieasier now to make a living out of financial trading this and that on line. Work from home or anywhere. Work when you want. No HR department, easy to keep the books. Its attracting the brighter minds, work on your termers as they now explain themselves, and I would be with them. Why do the grind stone routine, 9-5, work for someone else for peanuts, HR departments, dry team meetings, doing not what you like necessarily, nor when you like it nor where you like it. I like the new world, and appreciate it will look nothing like the world that I grew up in. Cest la Vie !

Yes our marvellous breath-taking politcians have decided to deport Djokovic, using all of the extravagant intellect and qualifications they are endowed with and that are nauseatingly on display 24/7. Another step down in my opinion. They serve not the people who elect them, but I cannot complain as I have not bothered to encourage them by voting.

The cricket is getting more exciting, and I do hope you people int he UK watched the first 10 overs of day

(continued) So are there any reasons gold should now emerge from its funk?

The behavior of the US dollar. In recent days, the US dollar has started to roll over, with Wednesday’s release of December’s US CPI print appearing to have added to the US dollar’s decline. Beyond the US CPI number, US growth stocks are no longer outperforming. This is a problem for the US dollar. The US runs massive twin deficits. For the US dollar to be strong, US capital markets must consistently attract large inflows of foreign capital. When US growth stocks were outperforming, it was easy for the US to attract large sums of foreign money. But if US stocks are no longer perceived to be “special” and worth large valuation premiums, then to attract capital, the US economy will have to do what other economies do: attract money through a deeply undervalued exchange rate.
Chinese policies. In 2021, China was an anomaly in that local policymakers sat firmly on their hands. When they didn’t, it wasn’t to provide help to a Covid-infected economy, but to gun down industries—education, internet platforms—that had got into the leadership’s crosshairs. This is now changing. In 2022, Chinese policy is likely to be more supportive of growth and markets. This should be good news for the broader emerging market space. And as we’ve seen, good news for emerging markets tends to be good news for gold as a derivative play on emerging markets.
In short, as 2022 gets under way, a number of trends appear to be unfolding:

US dollar weakness;
US growth stock underperformance;
Emerging market outperformance (see Playing Emerging Markets In 2022);
Easier Chinese policies;
A US Federal Reserve that remains well behind the curve.

Each of these trends by itself would be favorable for gold. Together, they could make for a potent combination. This may help to explain why for the first time since the spring of 2021, gold is trading above its 200-day moving average, while the slope of the 200-day moving average is once again positive.

Looks to me like reality is appearing at last, as the Fed has played itself intoa corner of self realisation of its head in the sand policies, and now the chickens are coming home to roost.

Just when Ray Dalio is predicting civil unrest in the US (yes, he has been doing this for a while, jus out on the timing by a year or 2, but watch)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/maneetahuja/2021/11/29/ray-dalio-says-americas-decline-will-upend-lives-not-just-portfolios-the-billionaire-investor-paints-a-dire-scenario-in-his-new-book/?sh=170306203c4f

Good luck.

Spare a thought for gold bugs, like me. Go back a year to the beginning of 2021, and the gold bugs’ reasoning was clear. Inflation was coming. With all the money-printing and fiscal stimulus across the rich world, inflation would breeze past the 2% rate the consensus was expecting at the time. From there, it would be just a short skip and a jump to higher gold prices.

As we now know, inflation did indeed breeze past 2%. But the skip and a jump to higher gold prices never happened. Gold bugs were left with the depressing spectacle of rapidly rising inflation eating into the real value of their gold holdings. To add insult to injury, gold prices actually fell. Through the second half of the year, as OECD inflation kept powering higher, gold repeatedly ran into resistance at US$1,830/oz, to end the year down -3.6%.

what went wrong? The most obvious explanation is that gold’s relationship to inflation is hardly one-to-one. Sure, over the very long term gold is an inflation hedge. But this doesn’t mean the relationship holds true over every quarter, or even over every year. Instead, as Gavekal has long maintained, investors should look at gold as a derivative play on emerging markets.

Nowadays, most of the world’s demand for physical gold comes from India, China, the Middle East and Russia. Over time, this demand for physical gold can create powerful self-reinforcing feedback loops, either to the upside or to the downside.

For example, a strong US dollar leads to tighter financing conditions across the emerging markets, and so to weaker growth. In turn, weaker growth leads to weaker demand for physical gold among poor emerging market consumers. Sometimes, liquidity conditions can even get so tight that rich Indians, Chinese or Russians are forced to cash in some of their gold holdings for US dollars. This pushes the price of gold down and leads to an even stronger US dollar. Wash, rinse, repeat.

In the upside feedback loop, strong growth in the emerging markets leads to higher disposable incomes in the local economies. Local savers put some of their money into gold, which rises in price. As the price of gold goes up, more savers part with more of their US dollars to buy gold, and the US dollar falls. In turn, the weakness of the US dollar leads to easier financing conditions for emerging market economies, which leads to stronger growth. Again, wash, rinse, repeat.

Between 2002 and 2011, the world experienced the second kind of feedback loop: emerging markets boomed and gold prices went through the roof. Since then however, emerging markets have struggled and returns on gold have been dismal, in spite of negative real interest rates and accelerating OECD inflation.

So are there any reasons gold should now emerge from its funk?

(to be continued)

Interesting analysis on the magnitude of inflation, and the rate of inflation, produced recently. What has had the greatest impact on investment returns, and what would one invest in?

The first key finding derived from the anlaysis is that abnormally low interest rates will always cause a collapse in productivity. When inflation eventually emerges, P/E ratios must shrink due to the resulting fall in the structural growth rate, which will drag corporate earnings lower. The SandP 500 Shiller P/E Index near all time high, and when this has happened it collapses (see black Tuesday, 1929)... about to turn down, fast?
https://www.multpl.com/shiller-pe
If this is true, then monetary policies followed by Europe since 2000 will be the main cause of the collapse in European structural growth rates and Europe will face a depression—not despite low rates, but because of them..vicious cycle? as low rates will lead to low growth, leading to even lower rates... The system will eventually break down, not because growth picks up, but because prices do.

...second key finding is that abnormally low interest rates will always spur higher inflation (unless a deflationary crisis hits the economy). As a result, the central bank will eventually be obliged to raise those rates.

Overall, this finding seems to work from 1938 to 1958, and again from 1982 to 2002... two notable exceptions:

1966-1972: inflation was on the way up, even though real rates were positive. This was likely due to the US government’s “guns and butter” policies...Vietnam war and the Great Society program. An external shock occurred when the US decided to float its currency in 1971, after which inflation really took off...
2009-present: US real interest rates have been negative through the period, until last April there had been no significant rise in inflation...over the last 12 years there have been three massive deflationary shocks: the great financial crisis, the euro crisis and the Covid crisis. These three successive crises kept prices suppressed.
..today situation looks similar to 1975, one year before US bonds began their worst ever bear market.

Now? inflation is accelerating; real rates are negative. The central bank is way behind the curve. Impact: bearish for long-duration assets...ANSWER: avoid losing money: hold cash in a good currency, hedge with gold, WELL POSITIONED GOLD MINING STOCKS and take fixed-income positions only in serious bond markets, if you can find them.
Additonal worries:

1. Productivity in key areas like manufacturing, all time lows,
https://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm

2. Disruption to work force practices (work from home,--> cafe, bar?), supply lines/ logisitics (etc) ... caused by flow on from government covid managment protocols..they known not what they do.

Happy to have gold exposure in these times, good luck to us all we may need it!

best
the gnome

Thanks Cowichan

I wonder if Mark Bristow sees Australia as risky place to invest, red tape going through the roof, more compliance, native title now moving into a compensation phase (thanks Twiggy Forrest and Fortescue! Rio! BHP!) etc. It will depend on how they see themselves as managing the different types of risk. The risk of CEO's tripping over their extra large ego's is another form of risk for investors.

best
the Gnome

Yes, there is discussion on a total ban on alcohol in Australia. Its a pandemic that has been raging for more than 200 years, and rumoured to have come out via the first ship from the UK? The Serbians are denying they started the rumour
Keep your senses of humour

the gnome