Hot on the heels of China, which has recently increased its gold hoard to over 1,000 tonnes and intends to accumulate far more, comes Russia, which has acquired an extra 10% in the last seven months.
This is at a time when the wealthy are turning pessimistic about the economy again. As I said two years ago, generally I now see newspapers as useless, except for tidbits like that: "Other than weather forecasts, the last usable information I can remember is from the summer of 1987, when I learned that Sir James Goldsmith had sold all his shares on the Paris Bourse, which confirmed my feelings about the way the market was going - but that item came from Private Eye magazine." The current pessimism is reflected not only in last night's close on the Dow (now below 10,000 again), but also in a surge in demand for safe government bonds, as "Jesse" reports.
I said a few days ago that the price of gold was well above its inflation-adjusted trend, but the interest of foreign countries, bearish millionaires and speculative funds boosted by cheaply borrowed money may keep the market buoyant for some time yet.
And I'm sure we'll all be watching the stockmarket with some interest this autumn.
DISCLAIMER: Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Unfortunately, because of a plague of spam comments, you need to be a "registered user", otherwise your observations will be buried in a torrent of multilingual nonsense. Please do comment!
Say what you please, so long as it's phrased politely and is not libellous or legally proscribed. Fact, reason and wit are keenly welcomed.