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  • 9 Safe-Haven Investments In Case Politicians Destroy The US Economy

    From businessinsider.com

    With the debt talks collapsing, it's getting harder and harder to say for certain that the US won't default. While some people aren't convinced that this would be a disaster, there's a real chance that this would lead to an economic catastrophe, crushing the dollar, Treasuries, the banking system, and so on. So with the August 2 deadline fast approaching, here's a look at some popular safe-haven investments. Gold is basically at record highs but it is literally considered to be the "gold standard" of safety investments. A default by the US could shake the paper-based financial system to its core, leaving people ... (full story)

Gold is not safe investment ... If You compare prices from 1930 and 2010, You'll see that Gold is gone up 80 times the value of Gold from 1930 (20 dollar/oz) ... prices for food from 1930 compared 2010 have gown about 5-10 times and for let say cars and real estate up to 30 times ... so printing money and low inflation in US show, that dollars are not OVER-PRINTED ... printing keeps risk of deflation low .. without printing US could have high deflation or stagnant growth ... so they are printing as much as needed to keep both risks of deflation and high inflation low ....
but GOLD is overbought ... comparing Prices of food, real estate etc. to Gold we should have Gold value at 600-700 USD max. ... US dollar is undervalued and GOLD is way overbought ... If i need to remind You 1980 ... gold went up .. to 600 USD/oz and came down 20% in one Year and in five Years (1985) Gold lost 50% of its value ... after that ... Gold was trading almost 20 Years between 200 - 350 USD/oz .... as long as US Dollar is Reserve Currency You should not worry much ...
Probability of US default is near ZERO ... it's just a Game like with Greece ... US Gov. needs weak dollar for some reason and this "risk of Default" is just one method/way of doing it ...
well said
  •  Guest
  • | IP XXX.XX.0.233
@krisware

Very apparent you are unaware of why people buy Gold. And not just people. Central Banks.

Also, very apparent you are unaware of the history of fiat money as well.

Do some research, go further back than just the 1900s and look further than the States.
When determining gold, you can not look at a value that is fixed during a long period, so from the time Gold was fixed, from FDR's time, up until the breakup of Brenton Wood, you will see pretty much a flat line.

After the Brenton Wood accords breakup, was the first time for a very long time, gold was actually back on a free market, and its true value can only be determined from that market.

Gold may very well be overbought, but the market will always do it's retracements, and if you are bullish on gold, a retracement is a splendid place to buy.

As long as papercurrency is trusted, gold will be of lesser importance, but if paper currencies are in jeopardy gold will replace it's risk.

The Dollar have very big chance of losing it's world reserve currency status, and by most economists this claim is very real.

Look at ANY papercurency around the world, and you will find that it doesn't look good at all. Most nations are heavily burdened in debt, a debt that will go up and up, and as it is going up and up, the printing presses have to accelerate it's printing speed to keep up with more inflated money.

Show me one currency in the world, that is traded freely ( including the Swissy) and I show you a mountain of debt, an increasing mountain of debt.

You may object and point at the Chinese Yuan, The Cinese holds extremely little gold compared with their economy, and have their reserve in other debt burden economies....papermoney.

When the whole course of world paper currencies have turned...debts are actually being lowered, I will start beliveing in a genuine down trend of gold, until then...gold will rule.

Golds value and real estate value is not comparable, remember, what gold is worth is what the market tells you it is worth, not what you think it SHOULD be worth compared with real estate.

If Dollar is undervalued, it should go up, and probably after this debt limit ordeal...it will go up....temporary .... Dollar have been inflated to lose 96% of it's original value since the introduction of the Federeal Reserve, and with the Federal Reserves warp drive driven printing presses, ...do you think that the value of the Dollar will start to creep up from 96% to 95-94-93 % and continue up to it's original value it once had?

The value of the Dollar is not coming back, at least not under the system it is operating under now, and that is only one way for gold to go...up.

What you think the market should do, how over bought you think gold is, how undervalued real estate is, how undervalued you think the Dollar is, is all meaningless.

I have heard exactly the same argument as the goldprice have gone up, around 500 Dollars, it just couln't go any higher, it was all a bubble and so on...then it went to 700.

Same thing, long explanations about price indexes, inflation, and all that jazz, and gold just couldn't go any higher, it was all a bubble, just to see it go to 900.

This is the way it has gone to 1100, 1300, 1500...and what was the latest...1600.

And sure enough, here is this description of real estate, historic figures, Dollars "actual" value, and reserve currency.

What determine what gold is worth, what real estate is worth and what the Dollar is worth is the market.

There is one more thing with the market, that is a humbling factor.

The market is always right.
There is much to be said about how many (some on this site) do not understand how the fiat system works. There is a very valid reason why many have chosen gold over the past 6000 years. We look as gold as an investment rather than money because we do not buy goods and/or services with it.

However, history shows us it has not always been as such and more importantly, history also shows us how paper currency has played out it is not a pretty sight to say the least.

Finally, price and value are not one in the same. People make a tremendous error in believing they go hand in hand. Far from it. One could look at Central Banks and what they hold. Take for example, how Mexico's purchase of gold in the first half of 2011 exceeded their full year 2010 purchase of the yellow metal. This is, of course, just one example.

Our government and Central Bank will do anything (and I mean anything) to hold the current system up. They will pump endless amount of *digital* money into the system in their efforts to, as they tell us, "improve the economy and create jobs". They will try and control the yield curve, and if needed, much like the Japanese, hold the equities markets up by buying equity products like ETFs, index futures, etc. Do not put it past them.

We have seen QE1 and now QE2. To believe that, at this point, they will just give up is ludicrous. However, the real question is not will they do it (it = a form of QE3), but more importantly will it have any effect?

In the end, one can hold paper assets including currency. History is not on the side of those who do. If you believe that "this time it will be different", well... you should know how that typically ends.
Buying gold now would probably the worst possible idea of all, imo. Farmland... now you may be on to something. Business Insider publishes sensationalized bullshit... again, imo.
Quoting Jolly Roger
When determining gold, you can not look at a value that is fixed during a long period, so from the time Gold was fixed, from FDR's time, up until the breakup of Brenton Wood, you will see pretty much a flat line.

After the Brenton Wood accords breakup, was the first time for a very long time, gold was actually back on a free market, and its true value can only be determined from that market.

Gold may very well be overbought, but the market will always do it's retracements, and if you are bullish on gold, a retracement is a splendid place...
I do not agree ... Gold is overbought because of fear and greed ... to much emotions are involved ... this always means, that it is in bubble state ... so it was with real estate and sorry ... real estate and gold are comparable, because both are investment tools and both get their value from growing need ... nobody can tell the price of gold (only markets) ... it grows like any other speculative investment tool ... few Years ago You might thought that Real Estate was Safe or Lehman Brothers Stock .... we are all part of a game ... US does not need to worry, because all Worlds Currencies are in bad shape, so there is no way the Dollar would loose its status as Reserve Currency ... Swiss Franc is just another investment tool and is comparable to Gold ... and You should not worry about printing money, becaus You have low inflation ... and this tells You all ... I would agree if we had a period of Hyperinflation ... but we do not ...
so what will actually be the direction for the US dollar from all this indication.
Quoting krisware
I do not agree ... Gold is overbought because of fear and greed ... to much emotions are involved ... this always means, that it is in bubble state ... so it was with real estate and sorry ... real estate and gold are comparable, because both are investment tools and both get their value from growing need ... nobody can tell the price of gold (only markets) ... it grows like any other speculative investment tool ... few Years ago You might thought that Real Estate was Safe or Lehman Brothers Stock .... we are all part of a game ... US does not...
as long as US interest rates are low (and expectations show it will last to -a minimum- the end of 2012) then GOLD will enjoy bullishness ... think about shortning Gold when the FED and BOE start to hike interest rates with flat to bearish attitude.
fall is always much faster and deeper compared to the growth ... just for recovering from 50% fall You'll need to add 100% growth ... that's why fall always feels much worse ...
anyway ... i'm always looking for signs and probability ... it is not probable that US is going to have default If there is no need for it ... default is another way of getting rid of Debt (would recommend to Greece - 30 years of living in debt bondage or trying with Debt free fresh start with new currency) ... fastest way of clearing Debt would be Global Deault and restart of the system (ideal way) ... but that would mean failure of Central Banking System and Current Monetary Policy ... they would better face another WW before facing the truth ...
krisware,

You keep telling what is under or overvalued, what price gold should "actually" be and so on...I keep telling you, it is meaningless...

The market tells you what real estate is worth and what gold is worth.
  •  Guest
  • | IP XX.XXX.188.188
Quoting krisware
I do not agree ... Gold is overbought because of fear and greed ... to much emotions are involved ... ...
People have been saying gold is overbought since before it hit $1,000. I remember when i was a commodity broker in ATL, winners bet on continuations, losers bet on turns.
Jolly, Mr. Market is not all. I have my old 10yo car worth $100 maybe $200 on the market. I use my car to drive to my daily work, for weekends trips etc. I have drived about 250,000 km and it still works fine. How do you think what is a value of my car? Do you suggest that selling it for $100 would be good deal for me?
Quoting Ulule
Jolly, Mr. Market is not all. I have my old 10yo car worth $100 maybe $200 on the market. I use my car to drive to my daily work, for weekends trips etc. I have drived about 250,000 km and it still works fine. How do you think what is a value of my car? Do you suggest that selling it for $100 would be good deal for me?
Your car is a solid transportation vehicle, not a liquid financial vehicle. When you say, "worth $100 maybe $200 on the market" then yes, that is exactly what the market is telling you: that you and I can buy a comparable automobile for that sum of money. Undoubtedly, any individual can personally value the worth of anything to her. It does not change the fact that the market aggregates all of these individual "values" in a very convenient manner.
This is not a question of gold being undersold or oversold. Let me explain:

Any traded instrument is a "product". As with all products, there are associated "Product Life Cycle Curves". If you went to college this will ring a bell, if you didn't a quick Google search should fill in the blanks.

Continuing...

These product life cycles are charts/graphs which illustrate the life of a given product/market/industry/ etc. Basically anything that requires marketing, sales, and product delivery. If you look at the product cycle of the Industrial Revolution, then you'll see a very health gradually increasing curve that levels out for an extended period of time prior to showing signs of weakness. If you look at a Beanie Baby product life cycle chart what you'll see is a bit different. Instead of a gradual slope, you'll see a velocity spike resembling a rocket launch, followed by a sharp pivot point reversal crashing back down to the ground. This is commonly known as a "fad". These happen all the time, because we humans are the ones doing all buying and selling.

Where does this bring us to now:

Well, take a look at your NASDAQ chart from the 99/00/01 era, and you'll see what I'm talking about. That chart mimics a Beanie Baby product life cycle curve. As a matter of fact, look at any "Bubble" charted on historical data - financial bubbles are nothing more than product fads (Beanie Babies, Cabbage Patch Kids, Rubiks Cubes, etc). All the same animal.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the current gold buying hysteria is not sustainable. When will it burst? Now that's a better question.
Just looked at a Gold chart (I don't trade gold). I'm calling 1700 area as the top... beyond that you can expect a decline down to 1350. IMO
Ulule,

I have a few vehicles, one of them is an old VW Rabbit diesel-79,the paint is terrible, have one driver seat only, rest is gutted, market value 100 bucks....if the buyer is generous.

I get 50 MPG ...very few cars , even modern hybrids get that even today, and this is frikking 40 year old technology.

I can cook my own biodiesel from discarded kitchen grease and have almost free fuel.....

The user value of that car is skyhigh....but the market value is still 100 bucks... on a good day.

The user value your car have to you, is one thing...it can be very high....but then again, you are not selling it...so it is not on the market.

Even if you outright looove your car, all your kids was conceived in it, and two of them was born in it, and works perfectly, it's still a 100 Dollar car.....on the market.

Now, that 100 Dollar may very well be way way under the value you put on the car, so therefore, it is not on the market.

Would you however decide to put it on the market...here is your 100 bucks.

You may have a gold bar that your grand grand grand something had in his pocket from the Civil War, your grand grand grand something had it in his pocket in WW1, and his son in WW2, and his son in Vietnam, and he now gave it to you, with inscription on the bar of each one of your forefathers on it...

Obviously, for you and your family, it have much more than just gold value, it has so much more value to you and your family.

Individual value of specific objects have sometimes a market of it's own.

Usually antiques market or collectors market and other side markets, many times the value of those items can be much higher than the ordinary market.....

In order to get in on a collectors market or a antique market, the object has to have collectorvalue.

Just by the fact that you have something in your pocket, a little pocket knife, that you have had for fifteen years, and love to thumb, flip and play with, and perhaps sharpen and oil occasionally, doesn't mean that it has a higher market value.

Your personal liking to it, gives it higher value, but only to you.
  •  Guest
  • | IP XX.XXX.135.154
Gold is outdated vestige of history for value. We now have exotic alloy metals that beat the pants off gold any day. Scarcity does not equal value. Usefulness is what is valuable. A productive working person is more value than a non-working person. So lets put people back to work and there will be more available value in the world.
True the are scarcities of some things that are useful... like energy. Sooo... Just build the most efficient form of energy production possible to be the most useful. I hope you can guess what that is. BB
IMHO, buy food and store water. If it all goes to shit, you will be better off with that than the gold. You can't eat gold.
Guest,

True there are metals that are more rare than gold, and metals and metal alloys that will do things gold can't do, but they don't store those as a reserve in banks.

Platinum is more rare and more valuable per Troy Aunce. Uranium, Plutonium...there are a lot of metals that are more rare and valuable.

If gold would be an outdated commodity, the world finance community have not got the word in that case, nor have private persons, trying to have a hedge against a future breakdown, got the word either.

Sure food and water you can eat and drink, and not gold, but then again, a dish with milk and dollar bills as cereal is not too good for you either.

Energy is plentiful, the amount of energy the sun gives is about 1 Kw per square meter ( roughly a square yard) per hour. The trick is to catch it and store it.

Hydrogen is so plentiful it covers the vast majority of this earths surface, bound with Oxygen in water. You split it up into Hydrogen and Oxygen, and burn it...the only....only... residual you will get is water vapour.

The technique is not that hard, but the overall intention right now is on oil.

Sure I don't mind stashing macaroni and beans and drinking water, but I would not leave out gold.
buy uranium
Trade responsiblypatience is the key/Swing trader
Quoting Incrediblle
buy uranium
You should be the last guy anybody takes trading advice from. Your misinformed trading calls are inline with your current armature status.

Here's one of your examples:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=304657

I'd love to post some more of your trades, but they're all pretty much the same... out of the money.

Read more books, and write less posts - maybe eventually you can work your way off your demo account.
Quoting mr.marketz
You should be the last guy anybody takes trading advice from. Your misinformed trading calls are inline with your current armature status.

Here's one of your examples:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=304657

I'd love to post some more of your trades, but they're all pretty much the same... out of the money.

Read more books, and write less posts - maybe eventually you can work your way off your demo account.
I would suggest you to mind your own Fucking business,giving opinion is no were restricted on this forum,it was my opinion to buy USDCHF and I did with a stop loss.so shut your stinky ass.and go back to your demo trading lol
Trade responsiblypatience is the key/Swing trader
Quoting Incrediblle
I would suggest you to mind your own Fucking business,giving opinion is no were restricted on this forum,it was my opinion to buy USDCHF and I did with a stop loss.so shut your stinky ass.and go back to your demo trading lol
You're absolutely right, giving your opinion on this forum is not restricted. I just figured that you might want to save yourself from further embarrassment.

I gotta say for somebody "trading live since 2007" you're not very good.

BTW, which part of "Read more books, and write less posts" did you not understand?
Quoting mr.marketz
You're absolutely right, giving your opinion on this forum is not restricted. I just figured that you might want to save yourself from further embarrassment.

I gotta say for somebody "trading live since 2007" you're not very good.

BTW, which part of "Read more books, and write less posts" did you not understand?
I just went through your posting history and it seems you are a big loser who just wants to have cock fight with every one,so let me not entertain a Muppet like you.
Trade responsiblypatience is the key/Swing trader
Quoting Incrediblle
I just went through your posting history and it seems you are a big loser who just wants to have cock fight with every one,so let me not entertain a Muppet like you.
Sounds good, but before we conclude our discussion I'd like to leave you with some of your posting history.

Here's the one a few months ago where you ask for PA help - because you are trying to figure out how this whole trading thing works:

http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=292787

And here's another one where you inform the FF community that you're finally ready to go live in 3 months:

http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=290684

Why claim that your a live trader since '07, and give people advice and trading calls when you're obviously inexperienced and confused. It's misleading, and despicable.

In short, you're a fraud.

... and where the hell did you come up with buy uranium? lol
  •  Guest
  • | IP XXX.XXX.83.16
Gold is just a hedge for hyperinflation or political break down. If it looks like we are going to get a stable but slow global depression then gold will drop when people realize they are missing out on the appreciation of cash. There is a possibilty of this happening and buying gold at this level is not low risk.
lol now u making me laugh....buying uranium was a joke,and yes i never said i am so sucessful trader from 2007,many times i have jumped back to demo account to test some thing new,while trading my other methods on live account.so grow up and take a break.
Trade responsiblypatience is the key/Swing trader
The Roman Empire collapsed because it lost control of its currency, as gold was the currency. Successive administrations added other base metals to the gold coins, until the coins were more base metals than gold, so devaluing their currency until no country would trade with Rome. History repeats itself.
Don't wait for the wind, take to the oars.
I think decadence and barbarians might have assisted this process...
What you think and what history teaches us are worlds apart. The market is always right
Don't wait for the wind, take to the oars.
Pleiadian,

THanks for making my day. I haven't had a good belly laugh like this for some time now.

I stand corrected. What I should have said was that historians also attribute barbarian conquest and a general decline of civic virtue to the decline of the Roman Empire.
Quoting Jolly Roger

True there are metals that are more rare than gold, and metals and metal alloys that will do things gold can't do, but they don't store those as a reserve in banks.
Exactly this is the reason why in essence gold is the same as paper money. Or salt, or pepper, or frozen orange juice. Through history economies have been using many different commodities as currency and stored them as ("financial") reserves, not only gold. Although the greed sparked by this shiny metal is strong enough to cause several genocides in the past, we should not put gold on a pedestal as the ultimate post-apocalypse currency.

But yes, as long as there is a market gold has its value. So buy, or sell -- it's a commodity, with a weird sexy status, but still a market commodity, nothing more or less.

If and when the market seizes to exist, you'll need a piece of arable land, and an army to fend it off. And you'll pay them with potatoes, barter tokens, gold, salt-plates, uranium, bat wings, lots of love or who knows what -- but this is a whole different story.

Until then my fellow Forex traders, be calm and assertive -- and may you earn an easy living for a fulfilled and happy life whatever you do.
  •  Guest
  • | IP XXX.XX.59.161
Nice !
But who engineered and forced JPY as Safe heaven investment?

Does " Safe heaven investment"" mean:
--: Highly debted(worse than Greece) and almost dead economy with less liquid ?

If so ,who not force Zimbabuwei dollar or Greece's currency (if it has) as save heaven currency !!!

If so, Greece will be really saved !!!
I guess, Spot forex trading is no. 10th after 9 safe-haven investment. Let me share a little secret that i have been keeping since 2007. Most of the currency market movements are based on "seasonal charts dollar index" and I have been using it until today. It can give me wrong picture sometimes, but It would show the exact direction all the time.

I always say to my students: "Most of the traders will follow the trend and our job is to catch the reversal points"

Thank you.
  •  Guest
  • | IP XXX.XXX.162.98
Kairen, are you talking about trading the market cycle?
battlebutt,

Damn good I must say, damn good...yes, there is no need to put gold on the pedestial, but in order to detrhone it from that pedestial, you have to convince a lot of people that gold is not magic...

I live in an area where once there was a goldrush, peple could tear down whole mountains, or reroute rivers, just to get to it.

Goldfewer does something to a human mind. In my youth I had a touch of it, I was dredging in rivers, for it, and could expel a lot of effort just to get to a couple of small pieces.

Its funny how it expresses itself, it is like a mental hunger, you have to satisfy....and gold is ...when you hold it in your hand, not fullfilling it, it just increases the hunger.

I saw once instance, one guy that caught gold fewer so bad he died by it...( many has) . He came to this gold area in style, in a Caddie, got caught up in it for long many years, and he traded down his life, step by step, just couln't let go, and ended up like a bum living in tents along the rivers, always with plans always one day from fortune. He got drunk one night and fell asleep in his tent, and didnt crawl into his sleepingbag, and died of exposure.

You and I and anyone can tell that gold is "just a metal" , perhaps describe it on the periodic chart, or tell how other metals are more rare, or tell any physical fact about it.

I know all that, and you know all that, and everyone else and his brother know all that, but no one can explain why gold can induce such a high hypnotic trance in people, making them go nuts in order to posses it, or to get it.

Substitutes, like Silver and Platinum will work as good, technically...and as you say batwings or whatever....but it just isn't ...gold.
Jolly Roger,

I must agree! Furthermore, I was laughing while reading your post, because I noticed if we put the word "pips" in place of "gold" we have a story so typical for many aspiring Forex traders.

And even without the mesmerizing appeal of holding gold in their hands, many traders have faltered on their path to riches.

Yes, pips are pips, land is land, frozen orange juice is... well, you get the picture -- nothing's like gold, that's for sure.

Disclaimer: This is not a buy signal for gold.
Quoting Guest
Kairen, are you talking about trading the market cycle?
yes, it works for me..
  •  Guest
  • | IP XX.XXX.27.31
Quoting Ulule
Jolly, Mr. Market is not all. I have my old 10yo car worth $100 maybe $200 on the market. I use my car to drive to my daily work, for weekends trips etc. I have drived about 250,000 km and it still works fine. How do you think what is a value of my car? Do you suggest that selling it for $100 would be good deal for me?
Your old car is worth more than $100 for scrap metal. Perhaps you're not keeping pace with commodities.

My family has owned farmland for generations. It's been a great bet. I think it will continue to be, or has the world population started to shrink?

Gold seems a bit overbought ATM but it's not a bad comparison.... acre for ounce.
Quoting mr.marketz
This is not a question of gold being undersold or oversold. Let me explain:

Any traded instrument is a "product". As with all products, there are associated "Product Life Cycle Curves". If you went to college this will ring a bell, if you didn't a quick Google search should fill in the blanks.

Continuing...

These product life cycles are charts/graphs which illustrate the life of a given product/market/industry/ etc. Basically anything that requires marketing, sales, and product delivery. If you look at the product cycle of the Industrial...
IMHO majority of thread shows a fundamental disknowledge about bubble markets. All economic bubbles burst. There is not one single example of unburst bubble. Yet many intelligent people REALLY believe we finally found economic bubble that won't burst. The best prove are comment in style: "At 500$ they said it was bubble, at 700$ the same, now we are at 1600$ and climbing, so there's obviously no bubble, since it doesn't stop growing." Exactly the same comments as in rhodium bubble 2008, China stock bubble 2007, uranium bubble 2007, dot-com bubble 2000, Japan stock bubble 1990, Gold bubble in 1979 and many many bubble before and in between. All bubbles when inflated indefinitely burst sooner or later. The bubble may grow for another month or year but the fall will only be deeper.

So, reading through the thread one might read mr. marketz's above comment and forget the rest.
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  • Posted: Jul 23, 2011 6:50pm
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     Newsstand
    Category: Fundamental Analysis
    Comments: 41  /  Views: 8,455