Ideas and analysis on money, markets and the world around us.
The past week might have been quiet in the wake of the festive season, but British based precious metals' trading company, GoldMoney has seen some significant buying by its customers keen to take advantage of the…
Read the articleEncompassing the year end and its holiday on Wednesday, this week has been notable for precious metals. For gold there have been three important features: firstly, Tuesday saw a powerful one-day reversal, with gold…
Read the articleThe future price of gold cannot be discussed without considering its implied discount rate expressed through time-preference. This is the relative desire to own goods at an earlier date rather than later. There are…
Read the article"Now the New Year reviving old desires The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires" Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Yes folks, it's that time of year again; but unlike old Khayyam who reflected bucolically on the continuing…
Read the articleIn testimony before Congress in 1912, J.P. Morgan, the leading financier of his day, declared: "Money is gold, nothing else." A century later a diametrically opposing view was taken by Wall Street legend Warren Buffett…
Read the articleThis was the week the Federal Open Market Committee decided to start tapering. The result was gold traded below $1200 yesterday for the first time in nearly six months, and silver pulled back to $19.10. The action is…
Read the articleBy November, the most recent month for which statistics are available, the US Fiat Money Quantity (FMQ) had grown to $12.351 trillion. This is $4.96 trillion more than it would be if it had grown in line with the…
Read the articleNow we know: The Fed is going to purchase $75bn of assets, a reduction of $10bn a month. The two other bits of information that came from the FOMC meeting were that purchases of US Treasuries and mortgage bonds are to…
Read the articleThere is inevitable speculation that tapering might be announced at the FOMC meeting this Wednesday. It should be noted that this is Ben Bernanke’s swansong, and if tapering is to be announced he would probably go out…
Read the articleFor many commentators there are two distinct camps in the gold market: investors in bullion and speculators in the paper market. With the two markets pulling in different directions some dealers think it is only a…
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