Best Of The Best Share Discussion Threads

[traderabc] 03/9/2009 10:14

Speaking of YAU, seems it's getting excited about something.

[redprince] 02/9/2009 15:25

Agreed-talk is cheap and i for one do not buy into this "end is nigh" nonsense.
Goods and services will still be traded albeit in the West we are going to be a lot less well off.

[masurenguy] 02/9/2009 14:25

Plenty of loonies around - even with Professorships in Politics !

[traderabc] 02/9/2009 14:10

Russian Professor: Collapse Of America Could Begin In Two Months


Doomsday author says Obama is doing nothing to forestall disintegration



Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Russian Professor Igor Panarin says that events are continuing to confirm his doomsday prediction first made over 10 years ago, that the United States will completely collapse like the Soviet Union before the end of 2010, and warns that the chaos could begin to unfold in as little as two months.

[traderabc] 02/9/2009 10:50

'Quite agree : suspect this thread has many more readers than posters.'


Bluebelle, my hit counter is suggesting this too. I suspect that my 'political rantings' here on ADVFN over the last few years has put off quite a few potential contributors.
I've been told I'm an 'extremist', and perhaps they are right, but as far as I can see, modern markets have become so 'extreme' that my stance is perhaps merely realistic.

I never imagined that I'd ever be become interested in politics, it's a subject that bored me senseless for most of my life, but the more I studied the markets the more I have come to realise that economics goes hand in hand with the political agenda. IMO if we are to prosper financially we must be fully aware of the political agenda that constantly plans to take our wealth/freedom away.

[traderabc] 02/9/2009 10:21

c2i

Thank you for the kind words.
YAU, and CEY are two I'm familiar with, both bought and sold years ago with excellent profits.
I bought back into YAU several months ago but paid too much, I suspect I'll have to hold it for a few more years to make anything worthwhile. Still it's a good well run producer with a regular dividend, additionally it is in one of the only sectors that has good fundamental longer term prospects.

I'm not that keen on LWEA, don't get me wrong it will make you a lot of money if it soon goes up rapidly, however the 'time decay' will be harsh if it flat-lines for a few years before the move. The roll over costs will eat up a considerable portion of the profit.

I used to buy SG warrants with mixed results, again they are an excellent way of making money, but only if you get the timing right.

With precious metals I think buying the real thing has many merits, the lack of carry costs being the most important. The crooks on crimex can't shake you out if you hold the real thing, leverage can turn out very ugly when you are on the wrong end of it.

With commodities the choices dwindle so that etfs seem to be one of the few viable options, that or hold commodity stocks with their inherent risks.
I have never used the 'leveraged' type etfs, if I did buy them it would be for a short term 'trade' as a move was already in progress.Not a buy and hold imo.

Incidentally, I hold Palladium with the Perth mint certificate program, I was informed a few years ago (at the highs) that they no longer offer these, they tell me that they will honour existing holders but once sold they cannot be bought back. I'm not exactly sure of what the significance is with their recent policy change, it may well mean that their 'paper palladium' is not backed by the 'real thing' so I suppose I'm relying on the Perth mint staying solvent.
That said I trust the Perth mint a lot more then I trust any of the ETF providers.

Good luck with your investments c2i.

[bluebelle] 01/9/2009 13:24

contrarian2investor - 28 Aug'09 - 18:04 - 663 of 672
traderabc,
I am a lurker on YOUR thead.
Firstly, thanks for your very insightful and balanced discussions.
Secondly, I appreciate your continued research and posts.


Quite agree : suspect this thread has many more readers than posters.

[contrarian2investor] 01/9/2009 13:05

traderabc,

Thanks for a full and candid reply.

I too remain invested in gold, mainly via YAU, CEY and other mining tiddlers.
I also hold PAL:US and the PAL etf.
On the agriculture side I have recently phased in purchases of LWEA which is a leveraged Wheat ETF, as I see it as a long term commodity play. I also intend to make further agri related long-term purchases following the impending correction.
I have reduced my current equity holdings down to 8%, with the intention of reducing it even further.
Additionally I have increased my use of Covered Warrants to play currencies and indices.

traderabc, I don't think you are coming across as a doom monger, just as a realist. Who then backs up their stance/viewpoint through their investments. I wish you all the best with your investments and endeavours.

Furthermore thanks once again for your hardwork and research on this thread.

c2i

[traderabc] 01/9/2009 11:46

Future of Food

[traderabc] 31/8/2009 20:12

Sunday, August 30, 2009
investment expert Jim Rogers Visits Sri Lanka



Investment Guru Jim Rogers visits Sri Lanka


Famous investor Jim Rogers, and co-founder of the Quantum Fund with George Soros, was in Colombo last week on 3 day visit. He had talks with several government officials.

He is very bullish on Sri Lanka and Colombo Stock Market , he made several comments on Sri Lanka’s investment opportunities in international media recently, he frequently quoted in recent times in international media about Sri Lanka being a good investment opportunity following the end of the three decades long war,
Although Sri Lanka’s civil war ended recently, Colombo equity market is still struggling to get the attention of international investment funds.
67 year old Jim also visited historical town Kandy during his short visit.

[traderabc] 31/8/2009 15:22

Insiders Selling Stocks at Highest Level Since May 2008


Washington’s Blog
Monday, August 31, 2009

Best buying opportunity since the Great Depression?

TrimTabs is reporting that insiders know better:

Selling by corporate insiders in August has surged to $6.1 billion, the
highest amount since May 2008. The ratio of insider selling to insider buying
hit 30.6, the highest level since TrimTabs began tracking the data in 2004.

“The best-informed market participants are sending a clear signal that the
party on Wall Street is going to end soon,” said Charles Biderman, CEO of
TrimTabs.

[traderabc] 31/8/2009 11:47

Betting Against the Fed


Steve Hanke
Campaign For Liberty
Sunday, August 30, 2009

The federal reserve is scrambling to convince the public that it is not a secretive institution that acts at the behest of Wall Street, but the public isn’t buying the Fed’s line. According to a Gallup Poll conducted in mid-July, the Fed received the lowest approval rating of the nine government agencies and departments evaluated–even lower than the Internal Revenue Service.

Trying to show the softer side of the central bank, Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke took us on a tour of his hometown of Dillon, S.C. on a 60 Minutes segment in March, and in July he fielded questions from newsman Jim Lehrer and an auditorium full of people for more than an hour in a televised town hall meeting.

Both events were carefully choreographed–and unprecedented. During his face time Bernanke explained many things, including the Fed’s strategy for shrinking its balance sheet and withdrawing the ocean of excess reserves from the banking system. Unfortunately, he did not address my main beef with the bank: that it clings to a flawed inflation-targeting regime with a horrible history of monetary policy failures.

[nabcom] 29/8/2009 13:44

Thanks for sharing that traderabc

Guess its just a coincidence your post is number 666 :-)

(lurker2)

[traderabc] 29/8/2009 13:26

Post 666 ;-)

c2i,


"deflation/inflation"

I think we are going to see a hyper-inflationary depression, an environment of rising commodity prices, a range bound stock market, collapsing £ & $, a stagnant housing market, and millions of tonnes of bull$hit spouted by our politicians (left or right, but always wrong) as they usher us into their new world order of fear mongering bloated government, oppressive laws, wars, rising taxes, and a dropping standard of living. In other words, more of the same.


'investments you have made or are intending to make.'

Several years ago I took up a 'core' position in metals, namely Gold,Silver, Platinum and Palladium, these I still hold, I 'trade' only a small quantity of the silver occasionally.
As for stocks, I have perhaps 40 holdings, some bombed out small caps, some mid caps, and a handful of etf's. Virtually everything I have is 'commodity' based. Recently I have been selling some of my stocks, as I believe September could be a bad month for them, as it usually is.

My buying or selling is almost always based on charting, I love long term unbroken trend lines and try to only buy when they are being probed. I do comment on these here on advfn, eg TEM, MAN AIGA threads. I have already sold MAN and will probably sell TEM next week.

WSM has a chart that interests me presently, but I'll probably only pull the trigger late Sept, early oct if the chart is still appealing.

I intend to buy Gold heavily if it breaks out convincingly from the $1000 area, I'd probably hedge that buy with selling some silver on the upward spike that should accompany it, as I'm a bit overweight with my silver holdings.

I don't really trust any market atm, commodities included, the last crash was very educational in that respect. I suspect that the western markets will underperform and eventual 'de couple' from better sectors of the world economy.

I'm interested in buying agricultural land, perhaps abroad, and will probably do so when/if precious metals do what I'm expecting. I'm also interested in stockpiling food and useful goods on a larger scale if I can find a safe place to store them.

I'm a firm believer that 'cash' is 'trash' and it is better to convert it into something 'real', the stock market is not particularly 'real' these days.

I'm expecting a revisit to the lows experienced last year, perhaps soon , if not then, certainly in the next few years. I'm also convinced that any stock market highs we may see could be offset by currency depreciation and rampant general goods and services price inflation.

The only stocks I'd be inclined to buy in the future would be commodity based mid to large caps, after they have corrected significantly, though I'm more inclined to sell what I already hold.


I suppose I'm coming across as a total doom monger, but I'm not really that worried about the future, i firmly believe most people on the planet are resourceful and moral, humanity as a whole should be able to overcome the problems ahead, as for the people responsible for getting us into this mess, they may not be so lucky.

In the end the global elitists are going to learn that it will be 'our world order' not 'their' world order. I have faith that they will stumble and fall just when they think they have finally got complete 'control' over the planet, 2012?

[traderabc] 28/8/2009 23:30

Glen Beck is an ass, but this is just hysterical. Highly recommended.



‘Beginnings of Another Enemy?’: Beck Targets Barack Obama’s Civilian Army

[traderabc] 28/8/2009 23:05

c2i, I'll get back to you soon.


Roubini: “When Governments Reach the Point Where They Are Borrowing to Pay the Interest on Their Borrowing They Are … Running a Ponzi Scheme”


George Washington Blog
Friday, August 28, 2009

In a new essay in Forbes, Nouriel Roubini writes:

Net public debt is going to double as a share of GDP between 2008 and 2014. Even using the very optimistic forecasts of the Congressional Budget Office, which anticipate growth of around 4% over the next few years, the net debt burden will rise from 40% of GDP to 80%–that’;s an increase in the debt stock of about $9 trillion. The interest charge alone on that increased debt will be in the region of $300 billion to $400 billion a year, which in turn may mean more borrowing to pay the interest if primary deficits are not reduced. When governments reach the point where they are borrowing to pay the interest on their borrowing they are coming dangerously close to running a sovereign Ponzi scheme.

Ponzi schemes have a way of ending unhappily…

[contrarian2investor] 28/8/2009 18:04

traderabc,

I am a lurker on YOUR thead.

Firstly, thanks for your very insightful and balanced discussions.
Secondly, I appreciate your continued research and posts.

I would however like to glean your views on the deflation/inflation discuss, where do you sit on this?

Furthermore you rarely if ever state which investments you have made or are intending to make.

So if its not too much of an imposition. I wonder if you would be kind enough to share, which assets/investment you are investing in currently, in preparation for the next correction? TIA

c2i

[traderabc] 28/8/2009 10:56

Vital Signs and the “Fix”

Kal Gronvall
Aug 28, 2009

As we approach the middle of the summer, 2009, it is of utmost importance to be able to slice deftly through the heavy propaganda fog that the government is pumping out through its mouthpiece the media. As Obama is optimistically predicting a miraculous recovery in the third quarter of this year, and promising, on top of that, to create 600,000 new jobs out of our current U. S. economic and financial graveyard, he is, in reality, “green shooting” us into the greatest disaster in our nation’s history, from which there will be no recovery.

Speaking of reality, and to illustrate my point about the media, years ago I read Michael Parenti’s book entitled Inventing Reality. The major premise of Parenti’s book was that the government, through the media, invents reality, while the real truth is never told. I remember a startling quote from the book that said it all. Parenti interviewed Walter Cronkite at the end of his career as a news commentator, and Walter Cronkite said, “In all my years as a news commentator I was never once, able to tell the truth, about anything.”

[traderabc] 27/8/2009 17:24

AGRI-FOOD THOUGHTS
by Ned W. Schmidt, CFA, CEBS
Schmidt Management Company
August 24, 2009

Years have passed since investors seemed to pay attention to anything other than the latest short-term, but irrelevant, number of the day. Perhaps the ESPN approach being applied to business news is part of the reason for that. What might happen next week or next year seems of little concern. However, next week and next year have a habit of becoming today over time.

Sometimes though, short-term events, being largely ignored, unveil longer term developments. One of those might be the drought currently ravaging India’s farmers. Summer monsoons provide more than half of the rainfall in much of India. Indian Agri-Food production is uniquely dependent on those annual rains. This year those rains have not come as expected. Rainfall is about a third less than normal. Agri-Food production will suffer in India as the summer rains are critical to India’s Agri-Food production. Rice production, a major staple, will fall by more than 10%.

[traderabc] 27/8/2009 17:23

Saab Stories
October is the Cruelest Month

Tarek Saab
www.goldandsilvernow.com
Aug 25, 2009

"Saab Stories" is a bi-weekly syndicated column presented by Tarek Saab, President of GoldandSilverNow.

T.S. Eliot famously declared "April is the cruelest month" in his poem, The Wasteland. Apparently, Eliot was no stock investor. For those holding stocks, it is October which has been the cruelest month. October 1929. October 1987. October 2008 . . . Wasteland indeed.

[traderabc] 27/8/2009 17:20

Thursday, August 27, 2009
China economy still growing . Noodle economics

China's economy still growing a CNN report
CNN's Richard Quest talks with the Chairman and CEO of First Eastern Investment Group, Victor Chu.

[traderabc] 25/8/2009 10:47

'Land grab' fears over UK crop-growing

Farmers in Ukraine are beginning to lease their land to foreign investors for the growing of crops.

The move is being seen as one way of easing the problems of food security in the UK, but there is concern that it is creating a ''new colonialism''.

Jeremy Cooke reports from western Ukraine.

[traderabc] 25/8/2009 10:26

"Mr Obama said Mr Bernanke had helped prevent a repeat of the Great Depression."

Lol! Both of these fools will be judged by history, it's a close call to say which one will be the most despised for their contribution to the economic disaster they are steering their economy towards.


Bernanke set for second Fed term



Ben Bernanke was first appointed in 2005 by Mr Obama's predecessor
President Obama is expected to confirm that he will nominate Ben Bernanke for another term as chairman of the US central bank, the Federal Reserve.

The president is expected to take a break from his summer holiday to make the announcement.

Mr Bernanke has been praised for taking action to bail out failing banks, which Mr Obama believes has limited the effects of the economic crisis.

Mr Bernanke's four-year tenure comes up for renewal in January.

In remarks prepared for the announcement, Mr Obama said Mr Bernanke had helped prevent a repeat of the Great Depression.