"We're in the boredom killing business"
"You have meddled with the primal forces of nature"
"Why is it that a woman always thinks that the most savage thing she can say to a man is to impune his cocksmanship"?
"The daily business of life is a corrupt comedy"
"The daily business of life is a corrupt comedy"
151 comments:
ht Charles Hugh Smith
West illustrates the problem by translating human life into watts. “A human being at rest runs on 90 watts,” he says. “That’s how much power you need just to lie down. And if you’re a hunter-gatherer and you live in the Amazon, you’ll need about 250 watts.
That’s how much energy it takes to run about and find food. So how much energy does our lifestyle [in America] require? Well, when you add up all our calories and then you add up the energy needed to run the computer and the air-conditioner, you get an incredibly large number, somewhere around 11,000 watts.
Now you can ask yourself: What kind of animal requires 11,000 watts to live? And what you find is that we have created a lifestyle where we need more watts than a blue whale. We require more energy than the biggest animal that has ever existed. That is why our lifestyle is unsustainable. We can’t have seven billion blue whales on this planet. It’s not even clear that we can afford to have 300 million blue whales.”
It is an interesting weekend when the secretery of the treasury admits the budget sent by the president will bankrupt us. (I know..) And yet, many of the peeps around me, not idiots, just don't seems to understand that the playing field has changed.
And it gets back to all those years from both parties where whenever deficit spending was questioned the answer always came back that our economy was growing fast enough to service that particular year's additional debt. Except that that was a lie. Or the answer from people who were easily deluded.
"Balanced budget provisions have been added to the constitutions of most U.S. states, the Basic Law of Germany and the Swiss Constitution. It is also often proposed that a balanced budget rule be added to the national United States Constitution. Most balanced budget provisions make an exception for times of war or national emergency, or allow the legislature to suspend the rule by a supermajority vote.
In 2009 Germany's constitution was amended to introduce the Schuldenbremse ("debt brake"), a balanced budget provision.[1] This will apply to both the federal government and the Länder (states). From 2016 onwards the federal government will be forbidden to run a deficit of more than 0.35% of gross domestic product (GDP). From 2020, the states will not be permitted to run any deficit at all.[2] The Basic Law permits an exception to be made for emergencies such as a natural disaster or economic crisis."
...From Widkipedia. Any wonder why people are placing bets on the Swiss and Germans? 2013?.....
CV:
We are expanding our garden this year. No talapia though. If it comes down to it, I'll decrease the level of Bambi with my 30-06.
In the summer, here on this "nob" our electric bill is about 70 bucks. Yep. The wind is constant in the summer. And we are always 5 degrees cooler than lower-lieing areas of east Tennessee.
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/real-crisis-will-soon-hit-us
According to Mark McLoran of Agro-Terra, the Earth’s population is currently growing by 70-80 million people per year. Between 2000 and 2012, the earth’s population will jump from six billion to seven billion. We’re expected to add another billion people by 2024. So demanding for food is growing… and it’s growing fast.
However, supply is falling. Up until the 1960s, mankind dealt with increased food demand by increasing farmland. However, starting in the ‘60s we began trying to meet demand by increasing yield via fertilizers, irrigation, and better seed. It worked for a while (McLoran notes that between 1975 and 1986 yields for wheat and rice rose 32% and 51% respectively).
However, in the last two decades, these techniques have stopped producing increased yields due to their deleterious effects: you can’t spray fertilizer and irrigate fields ad infinitum without damaging the land, which reduces yields. McLoran points out that from 1970 to 1990, global average aggregate yield grew by 2.2% a year. It has since declined to only 1.1% a year. And it’s expected to fall even further this decade.
Thus, since the ‘60s we’ve added roughly three billion people to the planet. But we’ve actually seen a decrease in food output. Indeed, worldwide arable land per person has essentially halved from 0.42 hectares per person in 1961 to 0.23 hectares per person in 2002.
It’s also worth noting that diets have changed dramatically in the last 30 years.
For example, in 1985 the average Chinese consumer ate 44 pounds of meat per year. Today, it’s more than doubled to 110 pounds. That in of itself is impressive, but when you consider that it takes 17 pounds of grain to generate one pound of beef, you begin to see how grain demand can rise exponentially to population growth with even modest changes to diet.
Fat = 9 calories per gram
Protein = 4 calories per gram
Carbs = 4 calories per gram
I'm still checking on how many calories per gram "stock certificates" & electronic balances are...
CV
If I want to spell secretary secretery, I will. I do these things to confuse Lefty..the perambulator Lefty, I mean...
I agree with this statement...
"for two years now, the fact is, those of us on either side of that argument have been wrong, we are stuck in some hellish in-between
but I think we are fast approaching resolution on this matter
if we get hyperinflation, it really doesn't matter in the end, that too, ends with deflation, so one way or another...that's where we are going, though, in the meantime, your investment strategy for each couldn't be more night and day....and this could play out over years
wish I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt which it was.....but I can only rank what I think is most probable.
So my "choice" is to have food (because inflation or deflation translates to SCARCITY)...
- Scarcity in getting to market in DEFLATION
- Scarcity in affordability in INFLATION
I tend to disagree with this...
"It is not how much something costs that matters, but how much it costs in relation to how much purchasing power people have, and that will depend largely on changes in the effective money supply. In order to understand what is happening to affordability, one has to adjust nominal prices for changes in the money supply and thereby express price changes in real terms."
That's cut and dried IN THE BOX THINKING...
While it may be conceptually factual, it is obviously a simple statement made by a person who exists in, and is a wage earner in an economy where there is sufficient money supply to (debt based or not) facilitate the flow...
OUT OF THE BOX thinking would allow one to consider the "WHAT IF" (if an economy ever broke down)...
I posted something above to the extent that "Westerners" use up around 11,000 watts per day to survive... Most of those watts are consumed by the inefficient (& ridiculous path) that food actually travels from seed to stomach... needing:
- Crude oil & Nat gas (for fertilizers, machines, planting, harvesting, packaging, & transport)
- Travel to markets
- Individual preparation
I've not included many other things for expediency...
In a broken down economy, one would have to begin to dismantle the process down to the most frivolous of wasted expenditures... Some things would make the cut (because they were easily obtainable), others wouldn't...
So the final question is... Would "the economy" ever break down?
Logically, if it is discovered that DEFLATION (though that's the actual endgame) would put a stop to the complex procurement operations, then INFLATION would be the chosen path...
At least with inflation, those with "MEANS" survive and protect themselves...
It is visible to myself that THAT is the path that has been chosen...
Where I see "ERROR" in the original statement is in the scenarios such as are unfolding in the Middle East, those WITHOUT MEANS are reacting and responding (in REVOLUTIONARY terms)... This can go on and on as efforts are made to suppress them and/or retain POWER by the elite...
Rome "stairstepped" it's way into the Dark Ages, little by little...
check out this chart- what do we think? look at the volume- or lack thereof- wild!
http://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?s=XLF&p=D&b=5&g=0&id=p92500329608
CV/Bruce- as I suspected- the riots and demonstrations in this country are occurring because people are afraid of losing (taxpayer paid) benefits-
Wisconsin is like Greece or France (where college age students demonstrated over the rise in retirement age by 2 years- you would think retirement wouldn't have even crossed their radar screen with their whole lives before them?)-
as far as I'm concerned a public union is nothing more than a means for extortion- whereby support is withheld from candidates until they agree to let them pilfer from the public coffers-
the Governor in Wisconsin is making the right choices- but maybe he should back down- and then fire as many teachers and public workers as it takes to balance the budget (but keep their current contract as is)-
that way the unions would see the consequnces of their actions
Your prison dollars at work...Martin Armstrong has a new piece.
http://www.martinarmstrong.org/files/Sovereign%20Debt%20Crisis%20Dancing%20With%20Death%20%202-9-2011.pdf
thanks for the link Jenny:-)!
Well, this is a depressing post from start to finish : (
not sure what to make of this article: "For the agile professional investor, fear of another crash is not really a concern right now. Surveys show bullish sentiment high among the pros. Hedge funds have increased leverage again to pre-Lehman levels. Wall Street banks paid out large year-end bonuses and are about to start paying dividends again. This professional confidence has been reflected in a steady stock market climb since the summer that’s barely experienced a major 1-day drop, let alone crash."
http://www.cnbc.com/id/41655262
haven't gotten into this yet but i could be good!
Mohamed El-Erian: Bernanke's remarks "viewed through the lens of emerging economies."
http://bit.ly/fyrOLg
I didn't think white lace was on the menu.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Great clips up their CV....
When I see those sorts of clips from a movie that is 35 years old, it re-inforces on me the concept that things don't really change much. People tend to believe that what they're experiencing and feeling is some sort of "unique" experience that is really "different."
That's why I get a chuckle out of the histrionics of the people on the "far left" who blather/yabber on about the "corptacracy" and "facism" we're experiencing in the America....blah, blah. It's been that way for A LOT longer than anyone realizes....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zRnW_Hxr60
Give thanks fi life a lot, shout that.
Appreciate the season path.
Appreciate life a lot, shout that.
Give thanks to Jah a lot, shout that.
Seven years of famine, seven years of fat.
Babylon, your system dry rot...
@andy
Just coming inside now... Alot of "chopping" with the mattock today... Thankfully, I probably already burned more calories today than will be supplied by all the food grown this summer within these square feet... It takes a long time to INCREMENTALLY increase arable land (but, of course, the average joe thinks he can wait until the last minute and do it all in a couple of days - as if he or she were watching a half hour show on cable TV)...
NETWORK was a FANTASTIC movie... Perhaps one of the most "prescient" of all times)... I wanted to choose something that was an example of something TOPICAL, plus the fact that the OSCARS post is coming next week...
I'm happy with the post... Sorry that karen was depressed by it (she deserves better considering she graced us with the "legs" profile)...
CV
For Karen. Related to previous "discussions" on Cam...
Cameron Diaz Becoming Madonna
AT,
where do you find the time to find&read that kind of S****?
AAIP
@AAIP.
"where do you find the time to find&read that kind of S****?"
On the weekends, when I'm bored...and there's no good Sports on anymore....
Atlas Shrugged Movie Behind the Scenes
I had no idea there was even an Atas Shrugged movie coming out....not sure what to make of this from a socionomics/trend perspective?
Libertarianism is gaining such a following, they're making a movie on that book?
Interesting...
@Andy T (7:47)
My guess is that... On a SOCIOECONOMIC basis (not that CV knows f***ing s*** about socioeconomics - I'm just a simpleton a**hole who starts buying farmland a few years ago and offhandedly squirrels away nickles in my spare time while building irrigation systems)...
"ATLAS SHRUGGED" (the movie)... Might imply...
Well...
Atlas IS, IN FACT "shrugging"...
But don't take MY word on it...
Just for fun... You know... "THE FUN"... for all the "DEFLATION FIRST" monetarists out there...
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/tired-all-qe-just-asset-swap-rhetoric-then-read
"What all too many commentators overlook — each either eager to beat the deflationary drum and so justify even more interventionism, or else to deny that their own favoured asset class is in another bubble — is that, as Leland Yeager long ago wrote, money does not have to be borrowed into existence, it can be spent into existence by the state for so long as that money's recipients show a willingness to accept it as a medium of exchange - and that is exactly what we have at work here.
So, the government spends money it does not have into existence and disburses it through its welfare/patronage network; the associated debt is then taken up by a monetary institution (not least, the Fed itself, whether by its earlier process of debt substitution on private sector balance sheets when it was buying MBS, or in its current, direct uptake of Treasuries at the NYFRB) and the non-bank sector ends up with increased holdings of new MONEY as a result.
The fact that the banks - for whom most of this money represents a liability — now largely offset it on the asset side of their balance sheets by placing it with the Fed (in the form of excess reserves), rather than re-lending it to others, does NOT somehow cancel out the creation of this money, it simply suppresses the commercial banking sector's possibilities for further multiplying it via the traditional operation of the fractional reserve mechanism.
So, granted, the banks are not taking the first injection of newly created money and generating 10 times, 15 times - or whatever - more money from it, in addition. But the Fed has nonetheless successfully placed a great deal of new money in the hands of those same banks' customers and this is patently exerting its expected influence on the prices of a whole range of non-money goods and assets, in a typically differentiated, Cantillon-effect fashion.
How anyone can deny this is truly a mystery!
---
I truly apologize for having to have someone else intellectualize and literate my concepts... But when one is BUSY DIGGING GARDEN PLOTS & IRRIGATION CONDUITS INTO THE GROUND TO COMPENSATE FOR THE OUTCOME OF THE ABOVE... I'm sure I deserve a 'hallpass'...
Happy DEFLATION and trading accounts people!
CV
Okay, Andy.. so she's having a bad hair day! lol.. and has gotten a little bigger.. or maybe just unfortunate fotos.. bad lighting?
This is a bit over the top but i've been "everywhere" and this is all I could scrounge up: http://www.philstockworld.com/2011/02/17/how-to-fake-an-economic-recovery/
found something interesting/punky: "Is the Treasury market not giving us the right warning signals? Is the market just wrong?
This may in fact be the case – because the Treasury market isn’t what you’d expect the deepest, most liquid market in the world to be. Nowadays, it’s pretty distorted.
Think of the biggest Treasury buyers. It’s no longer panicky investment banks or hedge funds. It’s no longer Bill Gross at PIMCO, the world’s biggest bond manager. He’s dumping his. It’s foreigners and the Fed.
About half of all Treasurys are currently held overseas – and half of that is owned by China and Japan. For them, buying Treasurys is not an investment. It’s a way to manage their own currencies and economies."
http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2011/02/17/mean-street-pray-for-a-us-bond-crisis/
"This is a bit over the top...."
That is an understatement my dear....
"Okay, Andy.. so she's having a bad hair day! lol.. and has gotten a little bigger.. or maybe just unfortunate fotos.. bad lighting?"
Or, she has become a 15 year old boy....
Not that there is anything wrong with looking like a 14-15 yr old kid who's hitting the gym hard....
It's just that....it's not really that attractive to 95% of the male populace; though, I may be speaking out of turn.
Actually, I probably am speaking out of turn. Test driving a new Gin tonight--it's called Hendricks, from Scotland. It's not bad at all...at 88 Proof, it does the trick.
Which is why I'm probably "speaking out of turn" in regard to Ms. Cameron Diaz.
Hendricks, yum.
Actually, AT, I was in Karen's camp on the whole CD thing, but I think you may have flipped me....
- Whammer
I think that the state CAN spend you into inflation as CV posted. Since I an not an economist, some of my thinking my not go down accepted lines, but I do think state spending, as in encouraging housing buys when people can't afford them, and trying to keep housing values up when they should fall further are examples. As is supplementing college expenses and student loans, as it keeps college costs higher than they should be. GM costs to build cars are higher than if a formal bankruptcy had been declared and restarted. Tax "inflation" is higher than if we'd had a BBA..because it simply could be...the national government needed the money don't you know.
Borders is bankrupt. They weren't GM.
And I agree that Wisconsin is probably doing the right thing. I don't think I agree with the right to ask more money as a public worker than my private counterpart. But I disagree that private unions are bad. I don't think people not employed by the government should be prevented from organizing...it goes too far when unions try to block non-union members from work, however.
And I do think the budget Obama proposed was the act of a coward. John Kennedy, who I remember, would not have done this. There are good democratic presidents, but this is not one of them.
Ahab,
I agree with that thinking too. That public union members shouldn't have their benefits paid for by the private taxpayer. It simply isn't fair to the private guy...
For Lefty, who I understand likes oily bottoms:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gsv8vJ45hWNxvco5tgcPE_iHt6dQ?docId=b0876e788169473cb4fbe2d7ff275ffb
Scientist finds Gulf bottom still oily, dead
Ahab,
It is a lot like the grasshoppers and the ants, assuming there are a lot more ants than grasshoppers and that the grasshoppers work. When the grasshoppers decide it is time for them to retire they aren't worried, cause the ants know they have to do their own planning for retirement, and the ants have always worked harder to provide for the grasshoppers in retirement. Ants finally woke up and told the grasshoppers what is good enough for us is good enough for you..
bruce-
I think the Gov of Wisconsin will get the last laugh-
either the legislation is passed- or 6000 public workers get fired-
what people don't seem to understand is that public unions are a recent phenomena- tough to cry unfair treatment when you are paid by taxes, can barely get fired, are sitting in a warm cubicle or office and if you're a teacher- a nice long summer vacation-
not quite an auto worker . . .
and finally- been meaning to post this- following on CV's theme . . .this resonates today as much as it did 35 years ago- GET MAD PEOPLE-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGIY5Vyj4YM
AT,
BP, as you could imagine, is all over the Atlas Shrugged move, I'd expect Socionomics I to cover it in great detail once it's out, in the last Theorist letter he dedicated a section to it.
It's coming in two parts, should be very interesting, one of the funniest things about it is that there is a fibonacci number of years between the book being written and the movie coming out.
- Ben
also- forgot to credit the stock chart posted 10:05 yesterday- SOH poster-
the declining and very thin volume on XLF- from the looks of things- it wouldn't take much for that to plunge precipitately
"What all too many commentators overlook — each either eager to beat the deflationary drum and so justify even more interventionism"
You have to love an article that begins its argument with such absolute bullshit.
Find me ONE, just ONE deflationist that is calling for more interventionism.
That is so far off the mark I think I'll laugh all day about it.
"...The fact that the banks - for whom most of this money represents a liability — now largely offset it on the asset side of their balance sheets by placing it with the Fed (in the form of excess reserves), rather than re-lending it to others, does NOT somehow cancel out the creation of...."
hey look, more nonsense, no deflationist claims that this is what happening, and why people don't understand the dynamics of deflation is beyond me at this point, you might call it .....a mystery.
- Ben
Observation:
All the people arguing for hyperinflation or even inflation, outside of a mention of prices of commodities and perhaps a chart or three of said commodities, I notice in all their articles none of them go through the US monetary ledger from the household, to the local, to the state, to the Federal level to provide an overview of past and present monetary dynamics.
You'll notice this distinct different when reading Gary Schilling or a Kyle Bass, one of a handful of deflationists who always make a point to go through all the numbers when they discuss the subject.
- Ben
Ben,
The PPI has been screaming inflation since September. Those of us who feel this could be the onset of CPI inflation will grant to you that in the depths of the Great Recession, inflation was impossible. It isn't now...for the reasons I've been posting over the last several weeks.
This may be the "little bang" of the universe of inflation. All I am saying is don't be so dismissive..keep your mind open.
hard to equate now to the 30's with BB following through on his helicopter analogy-
are his actions able to quell a larger credit/housing contraction?
probably not- but is there new "hot" money in the bank's hands to bet on commodities and other assets all over the world?
I say yes
The much more accurate narrative on inflation is that it happened in the period of 2000-2008, and probably started much before this. PPI and cpi were above where they are now during that period. Gold was on a tear, energy and house prices were rising. ALL prices were going up, on EVERYTHING.
http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/inflation/current-inflation-rates/
But, most people took the rising food/commodity prices in stride because their biggest "investment" was in their house. They looked at what their neighbors were buying and selling them for and began to believe that theirs was also worth that much. It was worth that much then, it's not now.
Wealth effect, I think the wonks call it.
Here's something else. Actually little homilies like the trend is your friend, and don't fight the Fed make a lot of sense. If fact, the business of making money by investing in stocks and bonds is the ultimate in capitalism. We disparage Tepper, but the fact is, this man understands the two tenets of investing as I see it. Is it legal? and Will it make me the most money if I am will to risk it? There is nothing else that matters. I like Hussman, read him every week. But look at his results over the last 5 years...you'd have been better off to leave it in a DOW etf. He has "lost" for his investors compared with autopilot investing...
The trend is your friend. Look at this:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=HSGFX+Interactive#chart3:symbol=hsgfx;range=5y;compare=^dji+^ixic+upro;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined
..But in the game of investing our own or other people's money over time, there is a simple way of deciding points: Who made the greatest percentage of improvement with the monies they had to invest?
My Howard Beale moment is over. Back to studied contemplation of my navel..
Bruce,
All due respect, but I think you've got it twisted about who's being dismissive here. I mean, this site aside, what are you even talking about when it comes to who's being dismissive of a certain outcome? Most economists call deflation impossible, most market pundits agree. Impossible. Can you count for me how many people have called inflation impossible in say,... the last week? I'm going to go with 0. In fact, an awful lot of statements with regard to inflation involve some sort of "no doubt" attached to it.
I posted not four days ago at this very site that I'm open to both outcomes and have repeated so many times in a three year period now that I DO NOT KNOW what the outcome is going to be. Not really sure how else to say it so people here understand that.
I haven't made an all in bet on one outcome and have become married to it. As I stated the other day, I rank probability and I've done so with years of research.
I'd suggest a review of the data;
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/search/PPI/1
If the PPI is "screaming inflation" then what was it doing in 2008? I have gone through the numbers here regarding QE 2 how much of the debt has been monetized in total thus far, etc. etc, tell me exactly what has changed monetarily that made inflation impossible then and what is now what some people seem to think is a certainty. The global central banks began offering unlimited credit about one month after this data set generally peaked, you may or may not argue that they are doing that now.
Now when it comes to statements that are just flat out false, then I am going to be dismissive, most of the people that are in the deflation camp come from the Mises school of thought, NONE of them are calling for more government intervention. I don't even know why someone would say something like that.
It's truly amazing I continue to allow myself to be suckered into this conversation.
- Ben
Ben,
I will drop it. Good luck next week.
Ok. On this topic...comes a fun story.
Today, my wife is cleaning out her closets, something you do a on long weekend I guess. She comes across this very heavy canvass bag of coins that been given to her on her Grandmother's passing.
I remember quickly going through this bag of coins several years ago and thinking: "Wow, this little old lady had a bunch of old coins she was saving. Interesting." Didn't give it another thought.
The backstory is she owned laundromats a long time ago and she would filter out the the "silver" coins (quarters and halves).
So, flash forward several years to today and now I'm actually going through this "bag" a little more closely because of what's been happening with Silver...
Holy crap. This lady had "many" rolls of these Silver half dollars and Silver quarters and bunch of Silver dollars.
So, today's fun project is to catalogue and the booty.
"suckered into this conversation."
what conversation? LOL
Ben- it's all good- better to bounce around topics and have a bit of "heat" and confrontation than sit around and circle jerk each other, patting each other on the back at all times (like other sites I know of)
Bruce,
My man, you are making some interesting comments today. This I would much prefer to discuss than inflation or deflation.
My thought in re: Hussman and Tepper
I think a lot of people that repeat that the trend is your friend have very clearly never once read Reminiscences and they are saying this without really understanding what it means. It is also made very clear in that book that those things apply to speculators. And it is very clear in the book what a speculator is and what an investor is. They are most certainly not one in the same.
John Hussman is an investor, David Tepper is a speculator
You want to know why advisors take horribly ill advised risks all the time, destroying people in the process? You want to know why Wall Street is the way it is?
"But in the game of investing our own or other people's money over time, there is a simple way of deciding points: Who made the greatest percentage of improvement with the monies they had to invest?"
Why didn't you link Hussman's chart since inception? Shouldn't an investor be judged over the longest possible time horizon? That doesn't look bad at all when dividends are included in there does it? Remember the impact those dividend payouts have on a mutual fund, and I don't know if that fund paid capital gains as well:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=HSGFX+Interactive#chart3:symbol=hsgfx;range=my;compare=^dji+^ixic+upro;indicator=dividend+volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined
and I'd keep in mind, Hussman's returns when compared to Teppers are commensurate with the risks he is taking.
The John Hussman's of the world are beloved when the 2008's come around, the Tepper's when you have rallies like this one. It's social mood.
- Ben
ahab,
no doubt about that on the patting, what I mean on the inflation deflation thing is, none of us know what the hell is going to happen on that front. Like that article Jennifer linked the other day though, it started out by explaining that the debate was tough because each camp approached the topic from a completely different perspective, so we might not be patting each other's backs, but we are in a circle jerk because that's what is happening here. Neither camp is wrong when it is approached from their side.
- Ben
Andy-
funny you say that- my mother used to break into my dad's stash of silver coins, break open the rolls and use them for the laundromat and cigarettes at the gas station . . .
polar opposite from your wife's grandmother
Ahab-
Yeah, it's good thing I forgot about that "bag o' coins," because I would have dumped them long ago...
I'm in unchartered waters here...this a serious collection of various coins.
what you have andy is what's called a bag of junk- literally-
that's the name for circulated silver coins sold in lot- junk-
worth every penny of the going silver price-
so "junk"- that has value- lol
don't touch my junk
AT
Most of them are probably 90% silver, as ahab says they are called "junk silver".
There were a few years around 65 where the silver content varied, but, by the sound of it, a suitcase, possibly 20 lbs(use a bathroom scale) at roughly $500 a pound...
.9x20x500=?
also
Junk silver has a very good premium over spot, in some cases better than new issues.
Junk is a very bad name for it.
anon @ 1:59-
I would think that junk would have some serious value in a currency collapse-
all that stuff sitting around in basements and closets would see the light of day again and possibly become the new medium of exchange- (as maybe it always should have)
AT,
don't be fooled by anecdata..
there are plenty of good, and decent, websites available that speak, thoroughly, to what you have..
esp., if you have Coins in Rolls, what you have may 'Grade' ....
and, 'Grade' can be your Friend..
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=Grading+Coins
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=U.S.+Coin+Composition
and, LSS: the Price "SS per Face Value" you'll see advertised in the Newspaper is, usually, Low/Worst Case...
eBay, actually, will give you a decent idea of how 'things are trading'...
O, back to the point about 'Grading'--try not to "shake the Bag" ...
AAIP
Dimes bitchez, the smallest denomination which would be easily recognizable
pre 1965 dime, worth today
http://www.coinflation.com/coins/1946-1964-Silver-Roosevelt-Dime-Value.html
$2.3650627139
and, to ahab's point, @2:36
if things do ~"get sideways", Today's prices will look like a, mere, Fraction of what those will be trading for...
remember this,
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=U.S.+Mint+record+sales+of+Silver+Eagles
which, still, amazes me, b/c ~5 years ago, you couldn't get, hardly, Anyone interested in Silver/Eagles..
ibid.
fwiw-
I love the sound of silver- when I flip it on a counter or table top-
and I think to myself- ahhhh . . .the sound of real money
SS = $$ , above
ahab,
@15:08
no kidding, right?
can you imagine the difference...(?)
are, current, 'Coins' are G*rbage..
tho, Nickels are the best bet in the 'Change Drawer' ...
ibid.
Ok. So, the "junk" added up to around $7,000 worth of silver, plus a bunch of Morgan Dollars and other "collectibles."
Fun stuff. Like finding a little treasure in the house.
are = our
flippin' homophones ! :)
andy @ 3:12-
that would definitely make my Sunday:-)!
MEH-
no doubt- nice crisp ring to it
So, on Holiday Weekends like this, I like to post my Scribd stuff on Monday. So, will probably wait to "post" till tomorrow.
Silver Dimes bitchez....20 rolls of them...
Silver Quarters ..... 11 rolls of them....
Silver Half's .....10 rolls of them...
I'm ready for the shit to go down. Heh heh...
ahab,
yes. it's funny, 'my' Coin Dealer, when someone brings a 100oz Bar, hits it with 'no-mar' Hammer, and 'listens' to it...
and, can 'flick' Coins, w/ her fingernail, and guess the approx. Silver content of 'unknown' Coins..
it's something else..
ibid.
Estate sales were a great place to pick up junk silver and other forms of it, fraction of the true value, not many knew of how much it was worth until a few years ago.
You can still find it, at very good prices, but it's gotten a lot tougher...
btw, speaking of ~'things getting "sideways"'..anyone buying 'Coffee' ?
recently, I've noticed, when the local variants of the 'Try 'n Save' have had 'Coffee' "at a decent Price"/"On Sale", peep have been whacking out their Stock...
ibid.
andy-
Kennedy's have silver in them through 1970(although a lesser amount after 1964)
all the Eisenhower's also have some silver content
"Estate sales were a great place to pick up junk silver and other forms of it, fraction of the true value, not many knew of how much it was worth until a few years ago.
You can still find it, at very good prices, but it's gotten a lot tougher..."
yes, the same was true for 'Flea Markets', but '008 changed that (for the, very, large part of it..)
also, pre-'008, you couldn't believe the amount of Sterling Tableware that Yuppies (of their Parents) were dumping...
"Too much work"/"'Noone uses that stuff anymore'"/"It's 'old-Fashioned'" ...
had it right, in the '80s, "Die Yuppie Scum" !
;)
AAIP
ahab,
this: "all the Eisenhower's also have some silver content"
isn't True..
ibid.
MEH- unbelievably- it is true:
http://www.coinflation.com/coins/1971-1974-1976-Silver-Eisenhower-Ike-Dollar-Value.html
ahab,
though, that's a subset of "Eisenhowers"
others were struck from pure 'Clank'..
ibid.
Should also note that some claim the reason silver prices plummeted after the hunt brothers was because so many people 'discovered' how much silver they had laying around their houses, and cashed it in.
Anon.
that, certainly, did happen..there were, ever, 'Newsreels' of peep standing in Line, with their "Silver Services, etc.", waiting to 'Cash it in' ...
though, while they were getting paid, basis Spot, a lot of that stuff was worth even more (and, thereby, not melted)..
but, think about it, much of 'that Stock' wasn't replaced (how many 'Brides', do you know, are signed-up for .925 Tableware? as ex.)
True, the AMC was, once, very wealthy, though, a lot of that Wealth has been dissipated...
ibid.
I still have bags of "silver" ware sitting around. Got broken into once and they didn't touch it, were more interested in the TV (maybe $300). The $2000 of tarnished silver didn't draw much attention.
Ben,
You are inserting your belief system into a business model that rewards risk. That is fine with me, but you need to understand what makes you tick. Teeper is NOT a speculator. He's an investor, who invests other people's money, who is willing to take risks at times. I have told you before that I have been Tepper in the past with my own money after careful analysis. That 285k in my Keogh that I bet on tech in 1998 is today worth 2.2 million. With no additional deposits. I would put that ROI up against even the Oracle. And over the last several months, I'd have put my money on UPRO, if I needed to become wealthy again. It is not an individual mind in the market, there are so many investors that it becomes a hive entity or hive mind if you will. You need to stand above this and realize it for what it is...not pontificate about how those who have missed the boat have taken better care of their investors money. They have NOT. And the sooner you understand this the better investor you will be.
Some of us wanted to get past the idea of work. We want to become independent of work. I suppose you do what you must for the funds you manage, but son, if you want to become wealthy yourself so that the work you do is because you choose to do it not because you have to do it, then take more risk.
You don't have to have an IQ of 150 to do this. Just patience and appetite for risk, as well as careful analysis of what you are doing.
What ROI did your investors have last year?
http://www.elliottwave.com/freeupdates/archives/2011/02/17/Silver-Price-News-Reaching-Resistance-4-Times.aspx
interesting Chart .. looks fatal to (financial) 'Longs' (?)
AAIP
MEH- I stand corrected:
"The Eisenhower Dollar was struck with a copper-nickel composition for circulation and was the first United States dollar coin to not be struck in a precious metal"
the coinflation link must have been for proof/uncirculated- (but I had always heard that all Eisenhower's had silver)-
live and learn:-)!
A speculator is someone who makes more money per buck than I do?
"I bet on tech in 1998"
but you entered a bit late and you must not have told the whole story. All the horror stories I heard from folks when their financial advisor's told them to double down (all the way down!)-
so the rest of the story: you cashed in your winnings (before the crash)
most did not
A speculator is someone who takes more risk than I feel comfortable with?
Really, we all need to understand what makes us tick investor-wise...some are comfortable with risk, some are not. It takes all kinds....
UPRO is up 210% since its inception. Techs were a once in a lifetime opportunity for hobbyists such as myself...however, in this up market, you could invest for tech-like returns by using leverage....by any practical evaluation, they were similar "leveraged" markets in the late 90's..
BinT,
that UPRO Chart is a thing a beauty..
http://finviz.com/quote.ashx?t=UPRO
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/08/are-wall-street-analysts-contrary-indicators/#comment-383343
“It should make dedicated bears nervous . . .”–BR, above
BR,
here, again, you show that, on this Field of Pursuit, you are in need of no Cane.
differently, I think you’re Correct about hesitating on siding with the ‘Wouldn’t know Preferred Stock, from Livestock’-Crowd..
~~
also, it seems that one can’t a page w/o hitting: ~”Retail bails from Stocks; Equity MutFunds see net Flows at near record negatives..”-Stories..
~~
LSS: lots of room to the upside, We could get back to SPX ~1120, in a hurry..
~~
I will say that the Magnitude of this, recent, run, has suprised, even, me ...
but, it is a great ex. of why people should understand 'the Futures'-Market..
LSS: in this levered-World, trying to compete with, merely, 'Equity' is the ol' 'Knife to a Gun-fight'-trick..
AAIP
@Andy T
So you found a bag of "junk coins" (high silver content)...
Which you say might be worth $7,000...
Question #1
- Is that FACE VALUE?
If not, I assume you're predicating the price on SPOT SILVER (over face)... Or, "melt value" as one might say...
If that's the case... How do you account for the difference between FACE VALUE and MELT VALUE?
"Deflation"... I suppose?...
So if I were you, I'd run as quickly as I could to the bank tomorrow and convert that silver into $100 fiat bank notes... Because SURELY the fiat notes will have higher value going forward...
bravery or stupidity?
a dude comes home late after partying with his bros all night long-
when he opens the door his wife is standing there with a broom raised overhead-
and the man says- "are you still cleaning or are you fixin' to fly off somewhere"?
I wonder if she hit him with the broom?
Ben,
I'm going out, but I will leave you with this one thought.
"I make the most I can and take acceptable risks" is a mantra for losers. Really. With your own money, if you want to get to the next level it requires significant thought and risk taking at the right times...
MEH-
the Chicago way?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ScvAJG51V4
cv--
right? given the, total, Fiat nature of the 'Paperback' (?) Hardcore 'Deflationistas' have, for that Fact, always, struck me as 'touched'..
AAIP
ahab,
that's a great Clip, Connery is one of the best.
also, re: "Eisenhowers", de nada ~
ibid.
though, to your 'Q:', yes, peep that are 'Accounting', with 0-leverage, are getting f****** mauled ...
alternatively, if this 'Paperback'-regime does experience a, further, 'Currency Crisis', the U$D, as we know it, will be replaced --with what? doesn't matter-- the 'Cost of Living' isn't going to go down, in this Jurisdiction, anytime soon..
AAIP
Ahab,
Leaving in a minute, but I bet the farm on tech in October 1998 and sold every share in April 2000. I have discussed this before, but I am not a professional investor, this is my hobby, but I made 400% (actually more) in 18 months.
UPRO could have done a similar thing for you, if you were interested, as I was then, in becoming financially independent.
Yes, many lost their shirts. I listened to Greenspan, and did my homework..
Ben does have the ability to piss me off sometimes...
so . . . a guy walks into the bedroom with a sheep on a leash and says-
"Honey, this is the cow I make love to when you have a headache."
The wife, lying in the bed reading a book, looks up and says-
"If you weren't such a total idiot, you'd know that's a sheep, not a cow."
The guy replies, "If you weren't such a presumptuous bitch-
you'd realize I was talking to the sheep"
Should be encourage that Ahab? Pretty good joke..
Wow...things get heated up around here pretty fast when there's no football to diffuse the testosterone on the weekends. I found a 1963 dime today and I was pretty happy about it until I read about Andy's treasure trove! On a funny note, when I was in high school, maybe freshman year of college, my father gave me a book called "Risk to Win." Hopefully Giles will use his day off to work out any remaining kinks in the machine.
good articles, today, here:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/
ibid.
http://finviz.com/quote.ashx?t=WFMI
this Chart seems to be "cruisin' for a bruisin'" ..
this:
P/E 37.29
has to be a + (hardly..)
ibid.
@jennifer
a '63 "Rosie" (dime)... In 1963... would have bought you...
1/3rd a gallon of gasoline (.30 cents)...OR
2/3rds of a McDonald's Hamburger (.15 cents)...
so...
1,000 "Rosies" (a Ben Franklin "C" note) would have bought you...
- 330 gallons of gasoline, OR
- 660 McDonalds hamburgers (of a better "meat quality" than todays with which the beef is MIXED in with [well, you don't want to know]
Let me remind you ALSO that "87 octane" gas didn't exist in 1963 either... REGULAR was more like 93 octane (better than most PREMIUM gas blends today)... But WHO CARES about details such as these???
The "melt value" that dime today is $2.36
$2.36 would buy you...
- 2/3rds a gallon of REGULAR gas... But really only a half gallon of a comporable 1963 octane blend...
- 2 "burgers" off the dollar menu (of less quality than the 1963 burgers)...
SO... Holding on to those 'Rosies' (over time) would have actually bought you MORE of the aforementioned items (but when you net out the QUALITY DIFFERENTIAL, it would be up to you to decide how much you'd gained)...
Instead, if you'd bought a $100 bill (a Ben Franklin "C" note) with those 'Rosies'... Well - with that $100 today, you get a whopping
- 30 gallons of low octane gasoline, OR
- 100 dogmeat hamburgers from the dollar menu (good thing you like the taste of the buns), but is it worth sacrificing 660 for 100???
---
Or maybe you could have put those 'Rosies' in the stock market, and held on thru multople phases of 'BOOM-BUST' (hoping all along that it all didn't crash & burn), and when you NEEDED to, pulled your $$ out (and paid taxes to the government on it so that Congress(people) & Senators could vote themselves pay raises, retire on full benefits, and fund about a half dozen war efforts...
I'll get back to you all on where my conscience lies on all of the above...
Bruce,
my larger point was about a comparison between Tepper and Hussman. Not about what you are doing. I never said one was right and one was wrong, they are both right. But they are also two different people doing two different things, not everyone wants the same things out of markets.
As for a belief system you don't know as much about me as you seem to think, mine is that you should take outsized risks when the probability is far in your favor to do so, each person develops their own system for determining probability. I think it is very clear David Tepper and John Hussman have very different belief systems, that's what I was pointing out. As for what a mutual fund can do and what a hedge fund can do, there is little point in comparing the two.
As far as the risks you took, I recall you saying all that before and I think that's great you did it. In case you have forgotten, I also took extremely large risks making very large directional bets in the market in 07, 08 and 09. I'm not here for some contest about who has more money, but what I did those three years changed my entire life not just for my own accounts but for what it did for my business reputation. I wasn't simply taking risk in common stocks either, so there's no need to be calling me "son". I know all about risk, and the risks I often take for myself are hardly appropriate for the vast majority of my clients. Markets aren't a hobby for me.
2010 was the first year after very large profits for me where I didn't take outsized risk, I suppose looking back at last year it was all so clear in hindsight, I found it to be one of the hardest years to trade since I've been doing this.
anyway man, I didn't mean anything by what I said up there, don't take it personal.
@Mark,
I'm curious what this means:
"right? given the, total, Fiat nature of the 'Paperback' (?) Hardcore 'Deflationistas' have, for that Fact, always, struck me as 'touched'.."
The most hardcore deflationist I know of is Bob. He's a self proclaimed gold bug and was pounding the table back in 2000 to buy gold and silver and even went so far as to show you how to store some outside of the country. He says the worst monetary choice ever made was the removal of the gold standard and says his dream is that with everything that is going on right now that it results in the return of everyone using real money. He recs in all his books that a portion of every one of his readers assets should be in gold or silver and then even recommends other metals positions for those with larger estates.
It would seem to me that deflationists understand better than most the fact that the dollar is little more than paper. What are you reading from people that says otherwise?
- Ben
@ben
Not to speak for Mark, but I'd say that a "fractional reserve banking system", naturally has an INFLATION bias...
Otherwise, what's the point?
DEFLATION only occurs during periods where the debt service gets out of whack...
---
The things is... NOW... after 2008... We have crossed an "event horizon" (with regards to debt service)... It's INSURMOUNTABLE... Which, by nature creates a different paradigm from the ORIGINAL, let's call it, "fractional inflation" which accomodated economic expansion before excess GREED set in...
I'm not even going to pretend that I know (or STUDY) these things as much as you do, but this much is clear to me...
In this "post EVENT HORIZON" world (where BEFORE, might have existed a traditional cycle of "pssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss" [deflating the air from the bubble]), the EXACT OPPOSITE is going to happen...
There are PHENOMINAL reasons why it will probably be 'different'... Leading the charge, IMO, is WHERE the debt resides... It's NOT 'Johnny & Mary' defaulting on their boat loan, or 'Meg & Fifi'defaulting on the loan for their corner book or coffee shop...
Instead, the DEBT has been heaped onto soverigns (who can - and just might - say FUCK IT in the end)... I still see that as a ways off, but it, as stated above, is a different PHENOMENON... It means that they might as well just borrow at will...
The NUMBERS with which they could do so are staggering (especially as compared to an aggregate of 'Johnnys & Marys' - because J&M don't have to fund pension plans, fight wars, & fix roads)...
---
I'm making a jump here... But let me just say that the OUTCOME of all of the above does the following...
It tosses the traditional INFLATION/DEFLATION argument straight out the window...
For an INTELLIGENT argument on the subject, people should be considering...
"Paper vs. Physical"
The time for paper assets is finished... It may inflate, it may deflate, WHO THE FUCK CARES???... (What's worse is that the government WANTS people to be involved in this sort of traffic so it can put up 'toll booths' and get revenues to PAY THEIR MONTHLY NUT until the final day that say NO MAS)...
The time for PHYSICAL assets is here (and really has been since 2000)...
the way I see it . . . if it's really a currency issue-
then physical assets have nowhere to go but north
McB,
I hear you, re: Prechter..
the 'deflationistas', I was referring to, were/are the ones talking of 'long-run' lower U$D prices b/c of "all the Debt that has to be paid back..", etc..as if we were in some kind of "Default(renege)-proof" 'Hard Money'-schema..
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/renege
those people are, extremely, 'out to Lunch'--living in a pre-'33 World with no knowledge of 3/6/33
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=FDR+March+6%2C+1933
past that, cv--, above, delineates, well, most of my thinking--on the topic..
and, to reiterate, on a previous idea, I think this has been, and, is now, a 'Trader's "Market"'--one where Martin Zweig's approach, ~high levels of Liquidity + exposure through (leveraged) derivatives, is one that should be employed by many that are bothering to expose themselves to the "accion"..
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=Martin+Zweig+Winning+on+Wall+Street
AAIP
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=HSGFX+Interactive#chart2:symbol=hsgfx;range=my;compare=^dji;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined
..Speaks for itself. Since 2000, the DOW has beaten Hussman. Even a monkey could have bet on ups and bet against downs and done better than this.
If you aren't willing to take the occassional risk, equities are not for you.
bruce-
makes you wonder- why Mark Cuban (who made all his money in the tech bubble) says-
stock market is for suckers. . .
That chart on Yahoo does not reveal that Hussman has lost out to the index, it fails to account for the change in the mutual funds NAV as a result of dividends and capital gains distributions paid, therefore, you can't look at that Yahoo chart and conclude anything.
Look at Hussman's website here where the total return is calculated:
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/pdf/hsgperf.pdf
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/pdf/hstperf.pdf
he's done about double the S&P 500 since his funds inception, and that recently he overhedged and so in the very near term his management style got the best of him.
- Ben
Hussman has the same problem I've been trying to point out today: He does not understand his weaknesses when it comes to investing.
"Physician know thyself" Ever heard that term? Applies even more to money management. Hussman has a terrible track record since the bubble burst. Not saying he's alone, but the facts speak for themselves. And I'm really not angry, but all of us here have one and only one grade in this investing business....How much did I make legally? Period. Hussman has taken his natural tendency not to take chances and that is his method of running his investment fund. For the last 11 years he's sucked.
End of story.
Physician, heal thyself
Luke 4:23
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYF7H_fpc-g
I will attempt to catch up momentarily.. but the silver thing has me riled.
When JPM hangs a sign that reads, WILL PAY CASH FOR SILVER, i'll buy into the conspiracy.. LOL!! I have pounds of silver.. as do MANY people.. I'll cash it...
BinT,
Re:Hussman. Thing is, that's NOT the end of the story. He is often very good at forecasting short-term market direction. The problem is (as you point out) he doesn't act on it and he cautions the reader not to act on it either.
I just trade the shit. Aint worth gettin all worked up over. None of this crap is important. We should all remember that.
I don't know if this one has been mentioned already:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/20/your-money/20stra.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=prechter&st=cse
Prashant
Bobby P will go down with the ship, Prashant.
Brilliant mind, not so brilliant trader far as I'm concerned.
Stuff like this is just lame:
“Being bearish in recent months was wrong, but I think it was prudent,” he says.
.
.
.
No...
It was just wrong, Bob.
I-Bro,
what BinT was getting into, is, actually, from this perspective, quite important..
iow ~"If you're going to be 'Right', you might as well get Paid"
~~
also, I, really, don't understand Hussman..he's, obviously 'Intelligent', but the Risk/Reward strictures he lays on himself/his investors strike me as stupid..
I'd like to find a successful trader that concurs with his approach..
really, sometimes you have to 'flare your lips back', and have at it...
AAIP
To all who discussed the issue of coins (MEH, Ahab, CV, etc...)
Appreciate the discussion much. To be honest, I never really worried too much about physical coinage in the past. But, my wife basically dropped $10K in silver coins on my this morning, so I've become acquainted with what's going on out there.
Honestly, I'm amazed that people will BID metallic value for the coins. I think that's very interesting and different than what I would have predicted.
IOW, there's clearly RETAIL demand for the precious metals....
Not sure what to make of it all....
I had to dump $2K of the junk this afternoon...there's no peaking pattern in the Silver pattern yet, but that action says, at a minimum, "trim some length."
Good discussion today....
For the record, I didn't need the money...I just wanted to be able to say: "I sold some $32/oz Silver into the highs...yeah...that happened."
Bwaahahhahahahahah.
I'll be there to sell some more at $40. Ha.
@Andy
I'd be happy to take some off your hands...
At this juncture, I frankly don't mind paying anything NORTH of $20...
AT,
a better Q: is "What did you sell?"
don't worry about answering..
but, remember, some of those Coins will Grade, and Grade can change the Value of those Coins, markedly..
as well, some Dates, and Mintmarks, are worth waay more than others...
the idea of 'Junk' Silver is misleading..and, often, leads 'neophytes' to make costly mistakes (they wind being the Subjects, in the Stories that Dealers tell each other 'round the Campfire..)
LSS: like many other things: "if you don't know "how to Buy it..Don't Sell it.", and, its reverse is True, too..
AAIP
@CV. Yeah, I'm probably a bid at $21 now myself. I'm surprised to be able to sell the Kennedy's for $11.90/piece...that's basically the full value of ~$32/oz for the silver. I'll buy it back at some lower level...if that doesn't happen, then I guess I was wrong.
AAIP: I sold 1964 Kennedy Half Dollars.
I sort of like the idea of holding the Washington Quarters and the Dimes. Will hold onto the Franklin's and Lady Liberty's.
The Kennedy's just seemed "homogenized"....maybe I was misreading the siuation.
@Andy
My fear is... (and REALLY, I do mean 'fear'), is that when you want to go back in an 're-buy' the physical... You might not be able to find any available...
I'll use the analogy that I've used many times...
How much is someone willing to pay for the last jug of milk on the shelf? In certain times, price becomes irrelevant...
I think I'm willing to say, at this point... That silver will reach $50 before it hits $21...
I could be WRONG on that, but I'd take the 50-50 proposition bet...
Fair enough. That's why I'll go ahead and lay around in "some" silver pieces for awhile...
I think Silver sees 21 before 50, but, as you well know, I've been wrong before....
Also - I've said this before...
One of the REASONS, I think, we'll get a bout of continuing and ongoing inflation in metals & soft commodities is because the banks NEED to get these back into their vaults...
Someday, when everything goes KABLOOEY, a new 'system' of currency will have to be called into existence...
'Fractional Reserve' will be seen to have failed, and the new system will be BACKED by silver & gold...
Gold is the currency of the elite
Silver is the currency of the masses
Copper is a poor mans silver
Iron is a poor mans copper
http://www.crystalinks.com/romecoins.html
I'm frankly 'short' the notion that we'll morph to some kind of electronic payment system for everything...
People will increasingly go 'underground' (transacting with metals & coinage) as a way to REBEL against a government who wants to use the ELECTRONIC system as a means of recording and taxing their transactions...
I should have clarified the first paragraph above better 9because it READS WRONG)...
Let me say it this way...
- Banks need to get gold & silver back in their vaults
- They have been woefully unprepared for this phenomenon
- In 2008, these were the FIRST things that re-bounded after the general accross the board meltdown
- There seem to have been efforts to keep the prices contained (though I have no evidence to prove that)
- The PRICES rose anyway
Now I think we've reached the point that the banks would be just as happy as anything if metals skyrocketed...
Why?
Because they have the printing press...
QE means that they have endless means to "call into existence" as much currency as they want to buy up PHYSICAL assets...
J6P can't keep up with this pace... And J6P isn't interested anyway because he's too mesmerized by the DOW & S&P... J6P is back to partying like it's 1999...
Sure, food prices go up, cotton prices go up... & you have riots & revolutions all over the place...
But what do the bankers care?
Sound far fetched?
AT,
I hear ya, re: Kennedy Halves
also, they whacked out 'a lot' of them..
http://www.bestcoin.com/kennedy-half-dollar-mintage.htm
here's a better site:
http://coinauctionshelp.com/Kennedy_Half_Dollar_Mintages_Price_Guide.html
note: even, some of, the 'Common Dates' have subsets of unique types..
~~~
cv--,
w/this: "...People will increasingly go 'underground' (transacting with metals & coinage) as a way to REBEL against a government who wants to use the ELECTRONIC system as a means of recording and taxing their transactions... ..."
I wish there was a way to ensure that option existing, going fwd:..
but, there's too much of this http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=Drones+in+Domestic+deployment
and related, for me to be very sanguine about that scene..
AAIP
@AAIP
Looks like it's time to go 'long' SAMS then...
lol
no, I don't think that's very 'far-fetched', at all..
and, really, that was 'Why the FedRes was brought (back) into existence', no?
as well, w/this: "J6P can't keep up with this pace... And J6P isn't interested anyway because he's too mesmerized by the DOW & S&P... J6P is back to partying like it's 1999..."
during the first Spike, in '008, "Retail"-Demand fell off the Cliff.."gatherers"/"buyers" (pros) were left with 'a few'(of their long-time) Buyers/had to run it into Major Cities to raise Cash..
also, "Foreign Affairs" has been squawking about a 'new' Gold-backed Currency for multiple years, now..
AAIP
cv--,
being a 'strict constructionist', there should be an 'open market' for them, too..
There will be a "gold back currency" again someday... probably a ways off...
Mostly because before anyone ever has a gold backed currency, you need to be HOLDING most of the gold...
I doubt there's any such thing as 'democracy' as applied to the power to issue currency...
What a WONDERFUL position the Fed finds themselves in at the moment... The power to print money (debt) at will because those poor dumb f***s in Washington maxed out the credit card with PROMISES for VOTES...
Obama is their 'dream boy' (so was GWB and all the rest of them)...
It's hard to calculate how long it will take for them to get enough ingots back into their vaults using dollars they can create out of thin air...
I suppose it'll ebb and flow in a sort of 'stairstep' fashion...
Gotta keep the FEAR & CRISIS skids greased every once in awhile just to remind everyone that they REALLY - TRULY - are indentured to their MASTERS...
http://search.yippy.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&v%3Aproject=clusty&query=Higgs+Crisis+and+Leviathan
to your point..
Higgs knows, of which he speaks..
AAIP
Gold back over $1400 and silver over $33. Oil is up over 3.00%
CV
Not sure if fiat will disappear in our lifetime but I can see another currency becoming the second reserve currency.
"Ireland's Leading Party Wants New Bailout Terms"
". . .renegotiating the massive European Union/IMF bailout and of "burning" senior bondholders and subjecting their investments to sharp discounts."
hmmmmm . . . .
"Nations May Expand Food Stockpiles, Subsidies, Traders Say"- Bloomberg
"Governments worldwide will increase their role in global food markets and may boost stockpiles and subsidies or impose trade curbs to head off the protests"
my comment at TBP on Feb 11:
I wonder how many other authoritarian regimes will be forced out by the Fed? Government’s around the world better start subsidizing food and eliminating town squares pronto!
CV
On Feb 26 after the Ireland elections the new party in control issues a statement saying either we get new bailout terms or we'll pull an Iceland.
Wasn't it on Feb 27, 2007 that there was a huge down day at the end of the month?
Disclosure: I can't get Hussman's funds on our brokerage platform so I've never looked into his funds (until now), never ever once advised anyone to buy one, never put a dollar of my own money in one. Not really much interested in most of the type of work he does, going through P/E's, etc, he's a fundamental guy, which is fine, just not my thing. I also generally hate mutual funds, for a number of reasons, so I very rarely ever use them. Still, I wanted to look harder at how Hussman has done. This isn't about me defending him, it's about deepening an understanding of how people think about money and money managers.
Markets, for me, are all about psychology/socionomics. I wonder a lot about why people treat money managers the way they do at various periods of time and I'm especially interested in the media's and the public’s change in who they want to talk to/hear from at certain periods of time. An example of extreme performance questioning that I've thought long and hard about was when reading The Big Short... why were Michael Burry's investors so angry with him while his subprime bets weren't working since he had already returned them a few 100% prior to that during a period of time the market basically did nothing? Why did they all get angry the moment he stopped doing as well and why did they begin to doubt his ability? And after all that, how come none of them were even happy when he did cash out on those bets in the end? Market/human psychology is an amazing thing and we could probably spend years trying to understand what happened in this particular story. My general observation though is that I think it is fair to say that no matter what you do for your investors, they only care about your most recent trade.
So, I did a little digging because I had this basic assumption in my mind that Hussman has done pretty good but it seems people that follow him much closer than I do think he "sucks" or that you'd have been better off with a monkey. Those are pretty serious claims. I start to think….maybe I’m way off here? Is Hussman back of the line when it comes to performance? Is he blowing it with each passing day? Maybe he IS a monkey?!
Framing the comparison:
Apparently the 10 year period that ended 2010 was the worst in US stock market history, I think it's important we start with that basic overview here. Those are our general conditions during the period comparison. One might expect that in the worst decade ever that generally, people, including pro money managers, didn’t do all that well.
During that time Hussman's fund nearly doubled in value before you take into account taxes. Hussman’s annual returns over that time, when calculated correctly (yahoo chart does not show it properly as it NEVER does for any mutual fund), are 6.68% per year since inception, which is basically 10 years now. So, on the basis of return versus general market conditions alone it seems like he’s done alright. Of course, “alright” is a relative term as we can clearly see in this thread, so let’s go deeper.
Next we’d want to know how he looked compared to his peer group of mutual fund managers, and since we are ok comparing him to hedge funds lets just compare him to every single type of mutual fund out there, low risk, high risk, fixed income only, equity only, long/shorts, and all the in-betweens. Then lets look at stocks and ETF’s.
To the morningstar reports:
I looked at all mutual funds first in the Mstar database, there are 25,644 mutual funds tracked in the database. On a 10 year basis through the latest month end (Jan 2011) there were 2,481 funds out of 25,644 that did better than Hussman's 6.68% return over the decade ending 01/2011. Over that period what I can't see is how many mutual funds just blew up and went away. I do know that many tech funds exploded in the early part of the decade and others were put down by Spitzer (Janus, Putnam), many exposed to banks, HY, and real estate blew up in 2008/09, but I can’t quantify all that so this is what we have, 25,644 mutual funds you could have picked over that same period that made it to today. Of those 2,481 funds that did better than Hussman over the 10 year trailing period, about 3/4 were international or emerging market focused funds that carry little to no US equity exposure and if you look at many of them they have an alpha that is roughly half of Hussman's over the period, so they were taking more risk but not necessarily getting the right returns for the risk they took. Still, from an absolute return perspective, yes, they beat him.
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/alpha.asp
Regardless, this puts Hussman's fund in the top 10% of ALL mutual funds in the last 10 years.
If we do a true apples to apples, there are only 2 funds in the morningstar database called "long/short" funds like Hussman's strategic growth that have beat his numbers over the last ten years. So, here you could say he’s “top 3” of all mutual funds just like his. As an aside, my company launched 6 long/short funds in late 2007, none of them still exist and all the managers were the nail…..not the hammer.
Then I looked at individual stocks including dividends, how about we compare him to those. There are 13,372 individual stocks in the m-star database that have “survived” over that period, of those, 2,034 have a return greater than 6.68% per year over the last 10 years.
Then I looked at ETF's. This wasn’t as valuable because most ETF's haven't been around for 10 years, there are only 1,115 in the MStar database that have. Of those, 25 had a return of more than 6.68% per year. So about 2.5% of all ETF’s that have been around since his fund has have done better than him. Whether or not it continues to be that low moving forward only time will tell.
@Amen Ra (11:35)
yeah that was the day... 2/27/07
CV lives in infamy on the FAST MONEY ticker the night before because I texted in that there ould be a crash the next day (and there was)...
It was a "Martin Armstrong" date...
What's all that mean?
Nothing, I suppose, you can interpret as you wish.
But, regarding this:
"I'd like to find a successful trader that concurs with his approach..."
It would appear to me that there are over 23,000 mutual fund managers out there that might be interested in his approach. On top of that there might be a few thousand CEO and CFO’s that might have some interest in the way he manages risk, probably the same for pension funds, hedge funds, and some endowment managers. Further, I’ve seen countless studies that show individual investors had median returns around 3% per year in the decade of the 90’s, one of the biggest stock market moves higher in the history of all stock markets, so I’m guessing some of them might be interested in how he nearly doubled when markets returned less than 0% considering they got a weak 3% during a boom.
Might other people laugh at him, these so called “successful traders” sure, I guess so, but again, for me I’m really quite interested in why someone would say that about him, in particular, given the data above.
I'd perform a similar task with hedge funds but I have no accurate database to access. I saw the WSJ study at the end of 2008 and if I recall correctly the median hedge fund return 10 years annualized for hedge funds that made it that entire period was around 6% net of fees and before taxes, and those returns get skewed up by the David Teppers of the world, who have averaged 30% net for 17-18 years. They are in the top quarter of one half of one percent…..the David Teppers, if that’s what it takes to be a successful trader, then there are about 15-20 of them in the whole world.
So, props to Tepper, he’s killed it, no doubt about that at all….. but I’m not about to state that I’m better off with a monkey than with a John Hussman.
yikes! silver up over 7%, crude up 6%.. and a 20+ dollar move in gold..
i'm sure i missed some great comments above and will try to catch up!
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-21/oil-gold-gain-asian-stocks-decline-as-tensions-escalate-in-middle-east.html
i can only hope commodities blow out by tomorrow's open..
>> That's why I get a chuckle out of the histrionics of
>> the people on the "far left" who blather/yabber on
>> about the "corptacracy" and "facism" we're
>> experiencing in the America....blah, blah. It's been
>> that way for A LOT longer than anyone realizes....
Andy, do you think the "far left" doesn't realize these problems are a long time coming?
Would you prefer if the "far left" just shut up about it?
@Ben, I'm feeling better about the money I have with Hussman now ;-)
- Whammer
http://www.ino.com/
Crude Oil 95.37 +5.66 +6.30
Natural Gas 3.967 +0.061 +1.56
Corn 720.25 -2.75 -0.38
Soybeans 1381.0 -35.5 -2.58
30yr Bond 119.65625 +0.43750 +0.37
10yr Note 119.062500 +0.046875 +0.04
NY Gold 1407.0 +18.4 +1.32
NY Silver 33.850 +1.565 +4.80
Honduras law let police be called on home smokers
34 minutes ago
(AP:TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras) The last refuge is vanishing for besieged smokers _ at least in Honduras.
A new law says family members can call in the police on people who smoke at home.
The bans all smoking in most closed public or private spaces and orders smokers to stand at least six feet away from nonsmokers in any open space.
The law that went into effect on Monday doesn't clearly bank smoking at home. But it expressly says relatives or visitors can summon police to deal with smokers at home.
Some analysts say the law will be almost impossible to enforce in the Central American nation, which is also a significant producer of cigars.
http://news.ino.com/headlines/?newsid=689767267796710
MackieFear,
I hear ya, re: Hussman..
as I was saying, ~obv. he's 'Intelligent', but the Risk/Reward strictures he lays on his Trades strike me as 'Stupid'..
that's where I was asking ~I wonder what other successful Traders think of his approach..
~~
though, re: MutFunds, writ large, I, too, think they suck--and,really, most of their 'Managers' should be sued for 'Malpractice'..
it's amazing that so many of those 'Funds'--Mut/Pension--so woefully underperform..
it's so pervasive, one, almost, has to draw the conclusion: "it's on Purpose"..
~~
but, back to Hussman, it's nice that he's +, and it's not, necessarily, fair to compare him to "Tepper", et al., but, at least from this end, simple covered call Writes have done returns in the 'teens (%s) --fairly easily..
thus, back to my real Q: about Hussman & his Risk/Reward structuring/strictures..
AAIP
New Thread Up
Mark,
I'll state up front, I didn't read your initial comment that way at all.
"I'd like to find a successful trader that concurs with his approach..."
I thought it to be a lot more harsh and there was no mention of what "other successful traders" thought of him, I understand better now what you were getting at.
Seems like Hussman is a deep value guy running a long/short fund. Maybe like David Einhorn in some ways but with less talent right now, but that doesn't mean he's not extremely talented himself, David Einhorn is just on a totally different level at the moment.
Another thing I'd like to say is that doing well in markets for these guys that have been around a while doesn't really happen overnight, and it takes lots of trial and error and many years of careful study, it's not as basic as taking huge risks and getting paid. To be truly great in markets you must be a true student of the market. I don't believe this is my opinion, I feel like I've read every great trader book out there, they all repeat this, who am I to argue with the people that have done it. It would seem to me after looking him over that Hussman is most certainly a student of the market, and that he is no fool and is also in fact a breath of fresh air when it comes to the mutual fund industry as a whole.
He just penned an article with detailed study of P/E ratio for free on his site and he pointed out that current levels were seen at times like just before the depression, in other words, stocks aren't a good buy here for long term returns in his mind. This goes a long way in explaining the positioning in his fund. He's running a long term strategy fund so given the historical evidence of what tends to happen at these valuations he's cautious, so much so that he over hedged as a result. Time will tell if he's just plain wrong about this or not but in reading him, regardless, it's not about the short term. If you want short term returns your money shouldn't be with him.
You'll notice in the proper performance graphs on his site he has what the fund would have done without the hedges, in general his overall management choices have added value, recently without his hedges you would have now done better in terms of total dollar return as you can see. A first for the fund. I would also note both of them are well above the indexes, hedged or not. Is this good or bad or is he getting in his own way now? It's too early to tell. I also note in the graph that there were two other instances when this was nearly the case, one was roughly June of 2007 and the other around October 2002. Those are interesting dates.
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/pdf/hsgperf.pdf
I wonder, did he get letters from investors in June of 2007 letting him know the trend was up?
I think its easy to forget that managing several hundred million dollars in a fund is a lot different than managing several hundred thousand dollars. Keeping your paper profits for the former is not as easy as it is for small investors that can unload at nearly any price they want without fear of concerning the market, or of anyone even noticing for that matter. WB has been quoted as saying if he only had a million dollars to manage he could return 100% per year.
You commented the other day that pensions should easily be able to hit the 8% target. If it were so easy, don't you think they'd all be doing it?
I also commented specifically about the alpha on Hussman's fund because I couldn't believe how high it was. Seems at first glance he's outpacing the vast majority of his peers in the mutual fund arena on the risk/reward side.
In the end, from my point of view, calling John Hussman a loser is akin to saying there were no other good basketball players in the league when Jordan played because none of them were better than him. Some people are just on another level, but that doesn't mean that John Stockton was a shitty point guard.
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