- Mr. Gloom and Doom takes a shine to gold and mining stocks
- Jim Rickards hires a crackerjack geologist to dig for literal and figurative gold
- Windfall profits through the M.I.D.A.S. Touch
- Your next car might come with the ultimate backseat driver
- More bailouts for Greece… The coming horror of virtual reality… Not voting for Trump or Billary… and more!
Marc Faber, field marshal of the curmudgeonly Gloom, Boom & Doom Report, is not optimistic about the market.
And since the title of his famous newsletter has a two-thirds weighting toward pessimism, this should come as no surprise.
But there’s one market sector that fills Mr. Gloom and Doom with optimism these days — gold and mining stocks.
Faber recently told CNBC, “The most attractive asset in my view is gold shares” (he also advocates oil and gas shares). “I think they still have significant upside potential this year.”
Most 5 Min. Forecast readers know by now that Jim Rickards has created a brand-new service, Rickards’ Gold Speculator. It’s specifically designed to capture once-in-a-decade type gains from gold and mining shares.
Jim believes gold is ultimately heading to $10,000 an ounce. And mining stocks provide the opportunity to leverage that eightfold increase over today’s prices into life-changing gains. Similar opportunities in the past have allowed alert investors to return up to $192 for every $1 invested, for example.
Hence the motto of Jim’s service: “Mining Fortunes as Gold Marches to $10,000.”
One problem, though: Jim’s an economist, not a rock-kicker.
It’s one thing to anticipate the literal and proverbial pot of gold awaiting miners as the Midas metal careens toward $10,000. But quite another to identify specific winners. See, some miners are good as gold. Others are 50/50 propositions. Some are outright frauds.
As Jim himself admits, “I don’t hold myself out as an expert in mining stocks… Basically, you have to be half geologist, half equity analyst. I’m trained to do the equity analysis… and I know a good amount about mining — but I don’t usually do that kind of analysis, because it’s not my area of expertise.”
So he went looking for someone whose area of expertise it is. And he found one…
Enter Byron King…
Says Jim: “Byron is a Harvard trained-geologist whom I’ve gotten to know well. He is our pair of boots on the ground. He kicks around the rocks at mining sites… examines the mines… meets the management… witnesses the operations… asks the tough questions… and then works with my senior financial analyst to cut the cards and make sure the companies’ financials match up to the story he’s heard on the ground.”
Byron’s spent decades doing exactly as Jim described. And he spends so much time traveling to mines around the world, doing field research and visiting business contacts, he’s on the road at least one week a month. Often, more.
Byron’s also a lawyer used to poring over balance sheets and contracts to make sure every jot and tittle is just so. And he’s a true Renaissance man. In addition to being a geologist and a lawyer, Byron’s a former U.S. Navy flight officer who’s racked up 130 carrier landings. He was such a hotshot he became an aide to the highest-ranking officer in the entire navy, the Chief of Naval Operations.
But these days, he’s a true rockhound who’s returned to his geologist roots, looking for profits in the resource space. And succeeding.
(Consider: This year alone, Byron personally made $101,953 in just 47 days from gold and mining stocks. Isn’t that someone you want picking your stocks?)
Introducing the M.I.D.A.S. Touch…
Jim and Byron have developed a system to pinpoint junior mining companies in the best position to profit from gold’s rise. They call it — wait for it — the M.I.D.A.S. Touch.
It stands for Mining Information to Develop Assets and Secure gold production.
Say that 10 times in a row! We’ll stick M.I.D.A.S., thank you just the same.
It essentially involves exploring a company’s mines to make sure it’s got the goods, putting its management and financials under a high-power microscope and keeping track of the overall gold market. Everything that could affect a company’s performance, soup to nuts. And they only recommend the crème de la crème.
And here’s what makes Rickards’ Gold Speculator truly special: They just don’t give you a bunch of companies to pick and choose from, like other services. No, Jim and Byron give you a specific list of companies in which to invest and tell you how much to invest in each particular trade.
If they give you a list of 10 companies, for example, they want you to buy each pick, in the percentage they suggest. They’ve got a highly technical formula that takes all the guesswork out of the process. And gives you the greatest chance of success.
Not every pick will be a winner, of course. But it only takes one or two big winners to hit the jackpot. That’s the beauty of their system. Hundreds upon hundreds have already taken advantage of their efforts. You can join them.
To learn more about the M.I.D.A.S. Touch andhow it can work for you, click here.
Let’s drop in on the markets…
Holy Toledo, would you look at that — the Dow’s up another 154 points this morning. The S&P’s up 17 and the Nasdaq, 35. Why? Does it even matter these days?
But if it’s a rational answer you seek, Greece reached a deal with its creditors. That poured some oil on troubled waters.
It also clears the path for additional bailout loans… which will lead to another crisis when Greece can’t repay those loans… which will probably lead to another deal with its creditors.
Boy, this is getting old.
Another reason stocks are up: Oil’s up. Crude is flirting with the $50 mark this morning following an American Petroleum Institute report showing a decline in U.S inventories last week.
Things are going with such a swing today that utilities and telecommunications are the only sectors flashing red.
Well, gold’s also down another eight bucks or so today on further strong dollar gossip. Another chance to buy the dip?
Get ready for the ultimate backseat driver…
You know that Nervous Nellie who’s constantly monitoring your driving and harping about impending road hazards?
Well, your next car might come with one. But this one’s not a human, but a computer. And it could save your life…
Ninety-four percent of all vehicle crashes involve human error. Drivers get distracted. Drivers make mistakes. They do foolish things, like driving on a quart of whiskey or texting their friends.
More than 32,500 people perished on American highways and byways in 2014, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Another 2.3 million were injured.
Aside from the human costs, the economic costs are enormous. One NHTSA study found that automobile accidents caused $877 billion in economic losses in 2010. That’s more than $2,700 per year for every single person in the country.
So an Israeli company called Mobileye is developing technology to make cars smart enough to overcome their drivers’ mistakes.
The current version of Mobileye’s tech uses a single camera attached to the base of a car’s rearview mirror. It lets Mobileye’s computer survey the road ahead. It can identify vehicles, pedestrians, traffic lights and street signs — even bikes and animals.
And it can apply emergency brakes when a driver is about to smash into something because she’s texting her boyfriend about the new dress she just bought.
Our tech geeks, Ray Blanco and Stephen Petranek, have given Mobileye the once-over. And they’re impressed. So are automakers:
“Mobileye’s camera technology is so good that three of the four largest global automakers are going to adopt it. Together, that’s one-third of the planet’s automobile industry. The company has become the leading supplier of advanced driver assistance systems to 25 different automakers.”
Mobileye has also developed a way to use the camera to record real-time road maps. It can tell drivers about potholes, detours, traffic jams and other hazards.
Driverless cars?
“This puts Mobileye squarely on the path to being the foremost autonomous driving company in the world,” say Stephen and Ray. “It starts with collision avoidance, moves to partially autonomous driving and then eventually to smart cars that can take you home if you aren’t able, or don’t care, to drive yourself.”
Ready or not, they’re coming.
If you think car accidents are bad, get ready for the coming horror of virtual reality.
Virtual reality is finally coming into its own. And now scientists are beginning to explore its potential effects on the human mind. “Some are undoubtedly positive,” The New Yorker reports — “as, for instance, when the technology is used to help war veterans overcome PTSD, or as a means to expand a person’s capacity for compassion.”
But the magazine claims VR’s impact also has a dark side. Researchers Michael Madary and Thomas K. Metzinger of the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, in Germany, issued recommendations “on the ethical design and implementation of virtual reality. Their appraisal of the medium’s psychological force “is both studious and foreboding.”
They claim that “the power of VR to induce particular kinds of emotions could be used deliberately to cause suffering. Conceivably, the suffering could be so extreme as to be considered torture.”
They suggest “careful screening of subjects to minimize the risks of aggravating an existing psychological disorder or an undetected psychiatric vulnerability.”
Apparently, some VR designers are taking the message to heart. Wevr, a Los Angeles-based VR studio, has a rule to exclude any antagonist “bigger than a small dog” in any VR scenario. (What about scorpions, fellas? They’re not so big. But a heck of a lot scarier than a Great Dane.)
[Virtual reality has arrived. Investor’s Business Daily recently said this year, VR will be worth $2.3 billion.
That’s 6,217% industry sales growth in the last year. A few years from now, VR could be a $30 billion-a-year industry.
It could well become the mega-story of the decade. And today’s your chance to stake your claim to a part of this mountain of new wealth.
Click here now to learn how to grab your share.]
“Not in your wildest dreams.” That’s how one reader responded to our assumption that he’d be voting for Trump this November based on his comments about U.S. foreign policy.
“Hillary, Billary, Sanders, Trump. Those cauldrons of political lunacy are so busy calling each other’s kettle black, they don’t see that the public despises all their lies and all they stand for. We’re offered a ride on either an ass or an elephant.”
The 5: We thus stand corrected. Glad we could set the record straight. Moving on from that subject…
“A while ago, you highlighted a fabulous study showing that inflation from the mid-/late 1700s to the 1920s was around 300%,” a reader with a long memory writes. “Then from the 1920s up to 2005, it was over 5,000%,” he adds for effect.
“I’ve always felt if anything illustrated why one should have a gold standard, it was that study — particularly showing what happened over the past 100 years. I’ve tried to find it more than once to print it out or put it in some permanent location and have been unsuccessful. Could you please run that again? Thanks so much, and keep up the great (and amusing) work.”
The 5: Hmmm… we’ll have to check in with Dave about that one when he gets back from vacation next week. It’s probably worth another look.
“Please stop with the gold fear mongering. It’s relentless and repetitive,” one irritated reader tells us.
“I think I’ve read the $10,000 prediction about 100 times in the past month in emails from Agora. We get it, and we would have bought the stinking book or Jim’s new idea by now if we wanted it. Move on before I lose my mind.”
The 5: We’re sorry you’re annoyed by our extensive coverage of Jim’s $10,000 gold thesis and how to play it. And we hope you didn’t lose your mind after today’s issue. But we feel it’s a major story that merits considerable coverage. As such, we feel duty-bound to give it a full airing. We appreciate your comment, however.
“If a crash worse than 2008 is coming soon,” another reader asks, “then what happens with all the stocks your investment advisory newsletters recommend? Wouldn’t they be obsolete? And by this logic, shouldn’t we all be in gold and cash only?”
The 5: No, there are other ways to prepare for a market event such as this. Some could result in windfall profits. Not that we’re hoping for it, of course. And not even Jim Rickards recommends gold and cash exclusively.
Regards,
Brian Maher
The 5 Min. Forecast
P.S. Recently, Jim Rickards issued an urgent sell alert to select readers. Here’s what he said (we had to block out the name of the company)…
“On Monday, I recommended XXXXXXX XXXX…
“Today, we received word of a XXXXXX buyout by mining titan XXXXXXXX. XXXXXX shares are up… a 33% gain in about two days. Sell your shares in XXXXXX XXXX… Book superb gains!”
Readers who sold in time could have had the chance to see an annualized gain of 5,231%!
But don’t worry if you missed out. This was just the beginning of a whole new type of investment Jim’s recommending.
But this story is moving fast — click here to get started.