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PROFILE:
StreetTracks Gold ETF (Symbol: GLD) |
PROFILE:
StreetTracks Gold ETF
(Symbol
"GLD")
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UPDATE: March 16/08 -
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| The run and
subsequent collapse of
Bear
Stearns (one of the world's leading investment banks)
combined with the news on Friday that
Lehman Bros
(also one of the world's leading investment banks)
has had to secure a $2 Billion line of credit indicates an
extreme degree of risk in the US financial system. The
collapse of Bear Stearns,
combined with the redemption halts in dozens of multi-billion
dollar hedge funds, among many other factors, indicates the risk
of a major U.S. bank-run or bank-holiday is growing greater.
If you want to partially insure yourself against a bank failure, you
should purchase approx. 3 - 6 months worth of
your living expenses in either Gold or Silver
Bullion, and then stash it somewhere in your house (don't tell
anybody though, not even your friends) only
to be used in an extreme financial emergency.
Should
you get caught in a bank failure, you can take a
portion of your Gold or Silver coins/bars to your local Bullion
dealer, where you can then convert it to cash, and then use that cash
to pay your credit card bills, gasoline bills, food bills etc,
etc.
In these increasingly uncertain
financial conditions, once you convert
some of your cash or stocks to the equivalent of approx.
3 - 6
months worth of
living expenses into Gold or Silver Bullion and stash it in your
house, you'll sleep alot better at night, I guarantee it.
And don't take my word for
the need to insure yourself against the
growing financial crisis;
the I.M.F. just warned last week to prepare for worsening
financial conditions. |
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UPDATE: March 5/08 - There is now nearly irrefutable
evidence that the precious metals "stocks" are being managed for
political/financial purposes (at a cost to precious metal stock
investors) ...
please see this article for the proof ... the manipulation of
precious metals stocks on a massive scale is just another piece in
the complex puzzle as to why Gold & Silver "Bullion"
(and their ETF's) have
generally outperformed Gold & Silver "Stocks" over the past
approx. year... and why your money is alot safer in bullion as
opposed to stocks.
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UPDATE: Nov 8/07 - In addition to the "strong Dollar
policy" deception that the Bush Administration has
perpetrated on the world community over the past several years
(see my Nov 4/07 update below) ... YOU
ARE ALSO CURRENTLY BEING LIED TO YOU ABOUT THE REAL RATE OF
CONSUMER INFLATION.
You see, the US Govt. has allowed the real rate of consumer
inflation to get so far out of control, that if the US Govt. told
everyone the truth about real rate of consumer inflation, the
Govt. would immediately come under extreme financial pressure...
the end result for the Govt. is it would be guaranteed to loose
the next election by a justifiably irate electorate... and by
loosing the next election, that would mean certain Govt. officials
would loose their partial control over the money printing presses,
and how/where Govt. money (Pork) is spent.
So modern corrupt Govt. officials have invented ways to hide their
financial malfeasance and run-away inflation inorder to stay in
power and partially control the monetary printing presses... they
hide their financial malfeasance through the modern use of
"substitution models" to deceive the majority of voters that they
are good money managers, when in fact, they aren't.
Luckily, a few independent economists still measure inflation the
honest old fashioned way (without using the modern manipulative
substitution methods) and when using the traditional old fashioned
inflation gauges to measure the current consumer inflation rate,
the result is a reading of just over 10% consumer inflation
annually.
One of those few economist still measuring inflation the honest
old fashioned way is a guy named John Williams... John runs a web
site call "Shadow
Stats"...
Shadow Stats is a web site dedicated to measuring economic
statistics the honest old fashioned way... his web site shows
the difference between how inflation and other economic statistics
are measured through the modern manipulative substitution models,
and how they were measured the honest old fashioned way... John's
web site shows that when inflation is measured the traditional old
fashioned way (without the modern manipulative substitution
methods)
consumer inflation is actually/currently running at just over 10%
annually.
Bernanke and the rest of the white collar mob at the Federal
Reserve know the real rate of consumer inflation is running at
over 10% annually, but they know the population in the United
States is to busy being titillated/mesmerized by CSI Miami,
Britney Spears, OJ Simpson, video games, Sex in the City, working
2 jobs, living paycheck-to-paycheck, along with a nearly endless
supply of other distractions, that the average US citizen does
have the time to notice, nor the inclination to care about the
real rate of inflation... and unfortunately for the US population
in general, they've allowed themselves to sleep-walk straight into
double digit inflation, a depreciation of their currency by
approx. 50% over the past 3 years, and massive Wall Street fraud
on a truly epic scale... all while being feed daily doses of
propaganda by the US Govt. and the Federal Reserve that consumer
inflation is barely over 2% annually.
This next chart is
an inflation comparison chart from John Williams' web site...
the upper line in the chart (the blue line) shows consumer
inflation measured the honest old fashioned way... the lower line
in the chart (the red line) shows the modern method of measuring
inflation through substitution models... as you can see, there is
a very, very big discrepancy...
Consumer inflation measured the
honest old fashioned way vs.
with the modern manipulative substitution methods
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BTW, if you actually believe the lies from the US Govt. that real
consumer inflation is actually running at just barley over 2%...
your probably one of those people who also believed the Iraq war
was really about spreading democracy, and that no-money down 100%
mortgage financing was good for the real estate market.
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UPDATE: Nov 4/07 - My thoughts on the stock markets in
general right now is; your focus shouldn't be on making money,
it should be on preserving your capital... and if your one of
the thousands of investors who was burnt by any
one of the
hundreds of mortgage companies that have gone broke, or any
one of the
dozens of hedge funds that have also gone broke or are on the
verge of going broke over the past
few months, you can really appreciate how important preserving
capital is right now.
Of major concern to you right now should be the recent stock price
action in America's biggest banks... their stock prices are
indicating serious problems are brewing under the thin veneer of propaganda
being spewed by the likes of CNBC, other Wall Street cheerleaders,
and cooked Govt. statistics... the following chart shows the stock
prices of several of the largest US banks compared to Gold (Gold
is the blue line)... as you can see from the chart, the big
money is moving out of the bank stocks...
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Gold vs. the Top 5 US Bank
Stocks ... |
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Bank stocks are important indicators because they are like
economic thermometers of their consumers, their assets, and the
economy they operate within... when the bank stocks are tanking,
it's telling you the customers and the assets that make up the
bank balance sheet have serious problems.
IMO, with the recent accelerated breakdown in the bank stocks, the
best way to preserve your capital right now is physical Gold
bullion, with the reputable Gold ETF's being good trading
vehicles due to their low commission rates & ease of trading.
Looking at the recent price action in the large bank stocks, it
may be prudent to start taking delivery of some physical Gold or
Silver bullion very soon, if you haven't started already.
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UPDATE: Oct 31/07 - So much for all the
"strong Dollar policy" talk from US treasury officials over
the past 2 - 3 years... hindsight is 20/20... and it looks like
all that "strong Dollar policy" talk was a pack of lies designed
to make bag-holders out of US Dollar holders and US Dollar
savers... in hindsight, what can you expect from an administration
that lied their country into the most expensive war in history,
which has subsequently pushed
millions of US homeowners to the brink of bankruptcy...
If you want to preserve your
savings... investors need to stick with Gold and Silver,
preferably in the form of pure Bullion or reputable ETF's.
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AUG 29/07 - During these
turbulent times in the stock market,
it's difficult to confidently conclude where to safely
place your hard earned money...
recently, stocks in almost every sector have performed
very poorly, however, there is a
growing stream of evidence emerging
from stock market data indicating that Gold is
fulfilling it's
traditional role as a safe-haven asset class.
Recent data from the stock market does not paint a picture of
Gold "going to the moon"... rather,
what the data trends show are; Gold is generally
retaining it's value while the majority of
top stocks from a wide range of sectors are clearly
in
a "down
trend".
Below you can see current charts showing Gold's performance
(Gold is shown as the blue line in the charts
below) over the past 6 months against
the top 5 stocks by market capitalization across 10 different
sectors... as you can see, during the
recent broad sector
sell-off, Gold has generally held it's value... particularly
note-worthy is how well Gold has performed against financial and
real estate related stocks...
basically, only the top Technology
& Energy stocks seem to be able to
broadly match the recent resiliency of Gold...
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Wall Street
Investment Banks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Home Builder
Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Money Center Bank
Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Mortgage Company
Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Biotechnology
Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Auto Dealer
Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Retail Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Internet Stocks
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Gold vs. the Top 5
Transport/Trucking Stocks ... |
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Gold vs. the Top 5 Oil Stocks ... |
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The
StreetTracks Gold ETF (symbol:
GLD) is probably the easiest, most cost effective,
and least risky
ways for North Americans to invest in the Gold market
in the short-term...
GLD
is essentially a proxy for Gold Bullion ownership... each share
of
GLD represents ownership in 1/10 of an ounce of Gold Bullion
that is held by a custodian.
In the short-term (IMO) the
StreetTracks Gold ETF has a couple
large advantages
over the purchase of either Gold coins/bars and/or
Gold stocks.
One of
GLD's
major short-term trading advantages
over Gold coins/bars is:
GLD
has a very low brokerage commission structure...
GLD
trades just like a stock, essentially meaning; with today's
cheap on-line trading platforms,
GLD
can be bought or sold for only approx. $9.95 per trade at a
company like E-Trade.com... whereas, traditional Gold Bullion
Dealers in comparison charge hefty premiums, Gold Bullion
Dealers typically charge a 3 - 5 percent commission to buy, and
0 - 2% commission to sell... in other words, to make a "net"
5% return on a $5,000 investment in
GLD,
the price of Gold only needs to increase by approx. 5.5% to
cover your trading costs... while to make a "net" 5% return on
a $5,000 Gold Bullion investment
purchased from a Bullion Dealer, the price
of Gold needs to increase by approx. 10% (to off-set the cost of Dealer commissions & a couple other miscellaneous
costs).
One of
GLD's
major short-term trading advantages
over Gold stocks is:
GLD
has virtually none of the built-in risks that are so prevalent
in Gold stocks... Gold/mining stocks are loaded with numerous
risks...
GLD
sheds virtually all of the following risks (some of which have
been severely dogging many of the Gold stocks over the past year);
- no reserve replacement risks,
- no production risks,
- no geo-political risks,
- no stock dilution risks,
- no financing risks,
- very limited management risks,
- no labor strike/union risks,
- no manpower shortage risks,
- no equipment breakdown risks,
- no equipment shortage risks,
- no cost inflation risks,
- no permitting risks,
- no weather risks,
- no environmental risks,
While many small cap. Gold stocks have
been experiencing many of the typical early-stage & start-up
risks, the small cap/junior Gold stocks have been
especially dogged by stock dilution-financing risks over the
past year, stock dilution-financing opens a company up to myriad
of different risks, and can stack the deck very heavily against the retail
investor, especially during periods of extended Gold price consolidation
like the market has been experiencing for over the past year,
stock dilution-financing can have a very toxic effect to the
share price when they are ill-timed & ill-managed. On the other
hand, the large cap.
Gold stocks are typically much better financed (often
self-financing) so they typically are not subject to the same
stock-dilution financing risks as the junior companies, however,
many of the large cap. Gold stocks have been dogged by a
combination of; management risks, geo-political risks, reserve
replacement risks, cost inflation risks, manpower & equipment
shortage risks, and production risks.
IMO, once the price of Gold
bullion clearly shows signs of strongly breaking away from the current Gold
price consolidation, investor sentiment will likely
"temporarily" swing in favor of
the Gold
stocks over Gold Bullion &
GLD.
BTW... I'm not advocating the
complete abandonment of buying Gold coins/bars in favor of Gold
ETF's... the traditional
purchasing of Gold/Silver coins/bars
still has it's purpose,
because; if a full-blown banking
crisis or currency crisis was to unfold, you'll want to have a
small stock-pile of precious metals coins or bars at your
disposal to exchange for guaranteed purchasing power
until things return to normal.
Pictures of the Streetracks
Gold
ETF Bullion Holdings ...
Held in Trust at the HSBC Vault ... |
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financial advisor... and operates
as
a free source of Penny Stock information.
The Publisher of WebPennys.com may from time
to time buy, sell or hold GLD shares or Gold stocks. The Publisher of WebPennys.com is "not" being paid a fee
of any type for doing a profile on
GLD.
WebPennys.com
has obtained it's information from
sources it deems reliable and correct, however, the accuracy and integrity of any
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is not guaranteed nor warranted by the Publisher of
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and further,
it is the viewers/surfers SOLE
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