Here are the latest news items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. And it bears mention that most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor, JWR. Today, we look at possibly jumping back into Bitcoin. (See the Cryptos section.)
Precious Metals:
We’ll start with this: Why Is Basel III Creating A Buzz Among Gold Bugs?
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Fund Manager Reveals His Top 10 Precious Metals List
Economy & Finance:
From Wolf Richter: Fed Launches ‘Rate Peg Instead of QE’ Trial Balloon for Next Crisis. Here’s a snippet:
“During the next crisis when short-term interest rates are already at zero – for the Fed, that is still the lower bound – the Fed might not do the type of QE it did during and after the Financial Crisis when it set a target to buy a fixed amount of securities every month.
Instead, during the next crisis, when 0% short-term interest rates are no longer enough to stimulate the economy, the Fed might announce a target for slightly longer-dated interest rates, such as one-year rates…”
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At Zero Hedge: The “Muzzle” On Inflation
Commodities:
Oil Prices Plunge As U.S.-China Trade War Escalates. A selection from the article:
“Just a few days ago, the market was pricing in that the U.S. and China would soon sign a trade deal and avoid a major slowdown in global economy, which is typically a major hurdle to resilient oil demand growth.
However, with two tweets on Sunday threatening new tariffs on China as of this Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump shattered market calmness and sent equity and commodity markets sharply lower as investors and traders started to panic over a possible significant global economic slowdown and pulled money out of riskier assets such as oil.
According to an exclusive report by Reuters on Wednesday, President Trump’s Sunday tweets were actually a reaction to China reneging on almost all major points of a draft trade deal with the U.S., with Beijing backtracking on commitments to reforms and laws to meet U.S. complaints in intellectual property rights, competition policy, and trade secrets, among others.
The significant setback in trade talks outweighed bullish factors for oil such as China’s record crude oil imports in April, which could also be attributed to refiners rushing to buy oil from Iran before the end of the U.S. sanction waivers for all Iranian oil customers, including the biggest, China.”
Cryptos (Bitcoin):
It appears that Bitcoin is finally back in a bull market cycle. It was over $7,500 per BTC, when I last checked. If you are under 50 years old, then this would be a good time to take a modest position, not to exceed 3.3% of your net worth. Try to make your BTC buys on “dip” days. But be fully prepared to either make a handsome profit, or to lose it all. Yes, it is that kind of investment. As a solidly “tangibles” kinda guy, it is only with great reluctance that I’m now recommending this as an investment vehicle. After all it is in the most wildly intangible and abstract of market sectors!
Note: I strongly suggest that you store your Bitcoin (or other cytptos) in an air-gapped hardware wallet. My wallet is a Trezor brand, and it seems very robust. Be sure to only briefly connect your wallet to the Internet, to make transactions. Otherwise, keep you hardware wallet tucked away in your gun vault.
Tangibles Investing:
This lengthy, detailed, and well-reasoned article at Seeking Alpha is well worth reading: Ruger Is Certainly Not Boring Anymore. There are bound to be shortages of several of these new models, in the months to come. That will leave some room to make money on retail arbitrage, even on current production models. And if any of them get discontinued, then you’ll know what to do.
Provisos:
SurvivalBlog and its Editors are not paid investment counselors or advisers. Please see our Provisos page for our detailed disclaimers.
News Tips:
Please send your economics and investing news tips to JWR. (Either via e-mail of via our Contact form.) These are often especially relevant, because they come from folks who particularly watch individual markets. And due to their diligence and focus, we benefit from fresh “on target” investing news. We often get the scoop on economic and investing news that is probably ignored (or reported late) by mainstream American news outlets. Thanks!