Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Gold/Mining/Energy : Gold Price Monitor -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Alex who wrote (10376)	4/22/1998 9:05:00 AM
From: Bobby Yellin	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 116763

wonder if what happened to Gates recently was an omen of things to come(not putting down Gates.) how in the world if systems that are supposedly to be year 2000 compliant are not compliant..what about systems that are definitely not..besides how many companies in Europe have software for coming common currency.. I am also not laughing at the meteorite showers.. also humans are social creatures and what will it do their psyches when they rely on most of their transactions through tech rather than through people.. we definitely live in unchartered waters..but history does repeat itself because human emotions and needs stay constant..(although we might be in the manic phase of emotions)

To: Alex who wrote (10376)	4/22/1998 9:07:00 AM
From: Alan Whirlwind	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116763

Alex, that meteorite shower threatening our satellites sounds serious. I heard a story recently that cell phone and beeper companies and the like are renting steeples from churches to place transmission equipment in. The local congregation gets a monthly income and the companies needn't expend the extra capital on relay towers. According to the story, technology will negate this symbionic relationship in 10 years or so, but in the meantime everyone's happy with it. --Alan

To: Alex who wrote (10376)	4/22/1998 9:44:00 AM
From: Keith Monahan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116763

Hi Alex - Interesting article on gold in the May 4th issue of Forbes (page 50). The author makes the point that throughout history, one ounce of gold typically could buy a fine suit of clothes. Today, however, this standard implies a gold price of perhaps $1,000 per ounce. Hmmm, ANOTHER reference to $1,000 gold. <g> Here's the text - I couldn't find a link on the Forbes site, however, there is a nice chart the goes with it (all prices reflect inflation- adjusted (real) price of gold in 1998 dollars): "Gold Miners versus Haberdashers" by Peter Brimelow. "With an ounce of gold a man could buy a fine suit of clothes in the time of Shakespeare, in that of Beethoven and Jefferson, in the depression of the 1930's," according to one of our sources for our chart. This remained true in the 1980's, but it isn't true in the late 1990's. The suit standard now implies a gold price of perhaps $1,000 per ounce. A really good man's suit today can easily cost 4 ounces of gold - say, $1,250 at gold's mid-April high for the year to date. And that's without a vest, once standard. Which is particularly interesting because the real price of gold has been astoundingly stable since Shakespeare (born 1564). Even in the troubled 20th century, with inflation in the West on a scale unprecedented during the last 600 years (Forbes, Jan. 12), gold's wild oscillations averaged at $612, very close to its $639 average for the tranquil 19th century. And comfortably within its historic range. Interesting point: Gold will have to rise by about $300 just to get back to the $627 average of the last two centuries. Arguably, some of those 20th-century oscillations were due to the 1934-71 U.S. government fixing of the nominal gold price (shown on our chart as a real price decline, because inflation ate away its purchasing power) and the subsequent rebound. Plus the gold price does seem to have staggered temporarily in response to supply shocks - for example the Californian and Australian discoveries in the middle of the 19th century, the Yukon and South African discoveries at its close. A supply shock is the favored explanation for our chart's most striking feature: the abrupt and permanent downward shift of the gold price in the early 16th century. That when the gold stocks of the Aztecs and the Incas were introduced to world markets, courtesy of the Spanish conquistadores, and the Western Hemisphere's golds mines began to make their presence felt. A pleasingly convenient symbol: The price of gold reached its historic peak($2,400 in 1998 terms) in 1492, when Columbus sailed the ocean, etc., etc. Of course, past performance is no guarantee of future success. But compared with its post-Shakespeare norm, gold is unquestionably rather low. You could argue that recent technological improvements and demonetization have caused a (permanent?) supply shock. Or you could take the situation at face value and agree with portfolio manager Caesar Bryan, whose Rye, N.Y. - based Gabelli Gold Fund is the best-performing gold fund this year. "This chart looks cheap to me," he concludes.