I think gold as money is dead. It's still good as a hedge against inflation, and, maybe, extreme financial disruption, so I keep around 2% of the portfolio in precious metals. Globalization is deflationary, so it's not good for gold.
Tradeable goods are stable in price in the face of big world wide monetary expansion, which proves that there is a strong deflationary undercurrent in the world. This makes sense, since there is a huge productivity increase in the countries joining the capitalist bandwagon (China primarily), while their consumption is lagging behind.
Buying into HK real estate at this point means that you are fairly optimistic about the future, in spite of all your doomsday talk :-)
My long term outlook is also optimistic. There will be no Malthusian catastrophe.
Renewable energy can almost compete with oil at last year's highs, so there will be no catastrophe due to energy shortages.
The earth's population is rapidly reaching a plateau and will start declining within a generation or so. It is surprising how rapidly fertility rates drop as countries rise above the extreme low income threshold.
In the medium term we will have trouble because of the extreme savings and consumption imbalances (the US consuming and getting into debt, the rest of the world saving), but after some painful reflection, the world will adopt the right policies to keep the gravy train running for another generation or two.
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