Care to share the name? I always enjoy throwing a few bucks, outside the standard investment strategy. I’m in Inland Empire of Southern California (Riverside County) and we are still struggling. Schools are still in distance learning, virus cases continue popping up in large clumps & numbers in more conservative areas. California still has strict guidelines in place, and it wasn’t until just this past week that movie theaters and barber shops opened. It’s been tough, but I don’t think we’ve seen the top yet. It was barely a month ago that protections ran out, so I suspect beginning with September’s end and moving in to the next couple of months, we will see even worse numbers, as it pertains to unemployment, car payments, mortgages, etc. Add to that an election, which is going to throw even more chaos in to EVERYTHING, and the US has the ingredients for the making of a problem unlike we’ve yet to see. That’s not to say that seeing a healthy recovery in the near-term can’t happen, but in my locality, we’re a long way from that. As an aside, none of the shops have large amounts in stock. I should say, many DO have minimal stock, but premiums are through the roof and insulting. - ASE’s $38-40 - 90% at almost 30x face - odds and ends (bars and rounds) still over $31, while spot closed at $23 for the weekend. Remember...these amounts are USD, so for many of you guys in Australia, that’s well over $50/oz.
^ when vintage Ag is similarly priced to ASE, we will take it first (manufactured 30-50 years ago) lucky not all dealers are interested to post outside the country don't think things will ever improved and back to the old days, situations have transformed the market focus have shifted, BRI would become increasingly in focus, 1USD Trillion dollar project after all
I only go to a select few stores that reject the mask stuff. Our grocery stores and walmart dont care, gun shops dont, bullion shops dont, gas stations same. Weed shops dont care, liquor stores mostly dont care, the rest dont get my money. The smart businesses want customers' money and look past it. Metals have been around spot or a few bucks over. The peace dollars I got the other day were $19 usd each which is awesome.
I bought HST and PK a month ago, very small amounts. PK is above my cost price, but HST is down about a couple percent. HST is supposed to be the least likely to go bust, has the strongest balance sheet. PK has better upside but more risky. Just for punt. If there’s an October surprise, I’ll average down. There had been various approaches by governments. From North Korean style where anyone who breaks home quarantine is shot on the spot to virtually no control like what happened in Italy and New York earliwe this year. Of course, now, the opposite is happening in NYC, restaurants still not allowed to do in-dining despite minimum cases. In Singapore, in-dining is allowed, but restaurants need to open all their entrance doors and windows. Six months on, it is clear that mandatory masking up and contact tracing followed by quarantine works to reduce the spread. Lock down alone is not sufficient and is damaging to businesses. They have done this in Victoria but because the rules were introduced too late, it took longer to curb the virus and most people can't stay indoors for more than 1-2 months. The earlier the government acts on it, the better, just like Taiwan where they nipped it in the bud within days. Why were they able to do it? Because the Taiwanese intelligence was already tracking and studying the virus even in December. They had medical exchanges with hospitals in Wuhan. The Japanese were able to deal with the virus with surprising little government intervention, but it will take a very disciplined and cooperative society to observe social distancing and masking up without legal enforcement.
The consumption economy is going to be over. The first bricks are falling. There is going to an "equalizer", which will reset the financial system and transfer wealth not only between people, but also between industries and products. We can say goodbye to 7 $ Starbucks coffees, we can say goodbye to expensive "eating out" with gold diggers and going to expensive cinemas. Hookers are already cheaper, so are wristwatches, DSLR cameras, sneakers and even cars!... Sadly, we can also say goodbye to cheap flights, meat will cost more and fresh fruit produce as well. Electricity bills will be higher. Laptops, cellphones and fridges will not become cheaper. Fast food chains will still thrive, but will have more delivery services. I believe many expensive hotels will be either downsized into budget hotels or transformed into apartments. Many luxury hotels chains will go bankrupt. Office real estate businesses will go bankrupt, far less office space will be needed. More people will work from home. In fact, people will prefer to work for companies that offer work from home possibilities. What will happen to offices spaces in high-rise buildings? Similarly to hotels, they will be transformed into "something else" or will get torn down. In an extreme case scenario I see "Detroitification" in dozens of major cities (potentially hundreds across the world). "Escape from New York" or other dystopian decline.
This just came to my mind: 2 things can hurt gold tremendously, even if the economies don't recover soon. 1) if the new vaccine spreads (US and Russia both claim they will have plenty of vaccines by 2021) 2) "universal basic income" (one thing I find far more dangerous to human society on the long term than Corona: it's slavery)
Doubtful vaccines will take gold down totally with the real economic impact still not felt and stimulus still being pumped through to delay this impact. Debt-load is still going to be felt and increasing for a while. In fact, it probably helps Au rise steady instead of spike too early. A longer bull cycle that will continue to go on for years. People will still work from home, people will still be weary of travel, businesses will still go under, geopolitical tensions will still rise, social unrest will still remain, people will still want handouts. It will probably give gov’s even more green lights to jump-start economies with monetary injections - especially for the big businesses ‘on the edge’ that need ‘just that little bit more’ to keep it all going..
We were given 4 pieces of surgical masks per family sometime early Feb. Government got slammed and mocked online by giving only 4 measly pieces. In March, they gave out free cloth masks, which were very bad quality and shrunk after being washed so in June they gave out another 2 free cloth masks that were a slight improvement but still bad. The last batch of DET30 cloth masks given out in last month proved to be popular, 1 in 5 or 6 persons are wearing it. So they finally got it right after wasting money on the earlier ones that people threw away because they don't work. It's available on Amazon. You'll probably need it because if Biden wins, it will be compulsory to wear a mask.
I don’t think people in Idaho are going to give a damn what Biden says, I’d be surprised if cops enforced it
I guess you aren't aware of how these people work. There's no need for police when you have zombies to do the work. The police might not interfere when the zombies work for the government. The zombies are more powerful than the police when they aren't the government, imagine the superpowers they will have when they ARE the government.