Tag Archives: gold mining stocks

FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – A WILD PARTY IS INEVITABLY FOLLOWED BY A MASSIVE HANGOVER, BUT THERE IS A SAFE HAVEN

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FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – A WILD PARTY IS INEVITABLY FOLLOWED BY A MASSIVE HANGOVER, BUT THERE IS A SAFE HAVEN

THE MONTH THAT WAS – IN THE WORLD OF MONEY…..in particular ..GOLD AND THE GOLD MINERS

You don’t need us to tell you that the stock market over the last six months has been the worst in the last fifty years and the bond market worse than any in over one hundred years. It could have something to do with the fact that the US Federal Reserve, joined by other central banks have presided over the largest experiment in financial history.  We’ve discussed this many times before, and symptoms such as companies selling at 50-75  times sales, “shiny objects” in the form of trillions of dollars of cryptocurrencies, hundreds of billions of dollars in the form of SPACs that could purchase a trillion dollars of companies “to be determined” are just a few chapters in The Financial Follies of the Early Twenty First Century.

After a modest rally at the end of last month, the stock and bond markets weakened again in June, especially the last few days of the month. Gold mining stocks acted more like “stocks” than gold bullion, which actually held up fairly well. While gold bullion was down only about 1.6% in June, mining stocks were down in the mid teens. However, as we discuss below, the gold mining stocks represent truly extreme value at this price, should be trading two to three times higher relative to the current price of gold bullion and a great deal higher than that once gold bullion does what it will ultimately  do.

THE FED (THE PRESUMED GUARDIAN OF THE MONEY)

As we discussed last month, the Federal Reserve is kidding themselves (and lots of investors), as they project the possibility of a “soft landing” for an economy that is already in “stagflation” and about to get worse under the increasing burden of higher interest rates. There is no possible way that interest rates could be raised high enough to stifle the current inflationary trends. That would require short term rates above the rate of inflation, encouraging savings rather than spending, which translates to a level of 8-9% even if inflation comes down to five or six percent from the current rate above 8%. We predict that, within just a couple of months, the Fed will find an excuse to back off from forcing rates higher, even though inflation is far from tamed. That inflation related reality should encourage ownership of (purchasing power protecting) gold related assets.

Aside from higher interest rates, the Fed has promised to reduce their balance sheet that now includes about $9 trillion of fixed income securities, in particular US Treasuries and Mortgage Backed Securities. The printing of fresh capital to finance the federal operating deficit has been an important feature of the Fed’s activity, as shown in the chart below. You can see how the Fed’s balance sheet popped from close to one trillion dollars in the heat of the ’08-’09 financial crisis, continued upward to over four trillion dollars during the great recession. It plateaued for several years, and the Fed’s plan in late 2018 to reduce its size was aborted in early ’19 after the stock market went down by 20%. It is worth noting that the quadrupling of the Fed balance sheet (by printing money out of thin air to buy US Treasuries and Mortgage Backed Securities, keeping interest rates abnormally low in the process) was followed by only about a ten percent reduction before political pressures prevailed and they backed off.

With that history, let’s go to the second chart, which shows what has happened since the Fed announced the current plan to normalize their balance sheet. In early May the Fed announced their plan to start reducing the balance sheet, $47.5B during June, increasing to $95B/month by the fall, a rate of reduction that would then prevail for an unspecified time. More specifically: beginning June 1, it will no longer reinvest proceeds of up to $30 billion in maturing Treasury securities and up to $17.5 billion in maturing agency mortgage-backed securities per month. Beginning September 1, those caps will rise to $60 billion and $35 billion, respectively, for a maximum potential monthly balance sheet roll-off of $95 billion.

The chart just below shows what has actually happened.

You can see that, no matter how you look at it, the Fed’s action has substantially lagged the announced “plan”. If they cannot, for one reason or another, reduce Assets by $47.5B monthly at the beginning of the program, there cannot logically be much confidence in the longer term. Also, if interest rates have been so firm, and the economy  has been so soft, when there has been minimal implementation, we can only imagine what the capital markets would do if $95B per month of tightening were imposed.

THE SAFE HAVEN (GOLD) AND THE LEVERAGED SURROGATES, GOLD MINING STOCKS

Gold bullion has in fact provided a relatively safe haven this year, down only a few percent in US Dollars and up materially in almost all other currencies. Gold mining stocks, as we said above, have acted more like “stocks” than bullion itself, which central banks worldwide  (even as they debase paper currencies) continue to accumulate in record quantities.

Our conviction regarding the underlying value of gold mining stocks is higher than ever, considering the recent lackluster performance relative to gold bullion itself. The chart just below shows how the gold mining stock index compares to the price of bullion and you can see that the gold miners should be  trading two to three times higher, considering an “average” relationship.

Beyond this, precious metal producers are generating the highest profit margins within the commodities sector. Even more impressive: Comparing the GDM gold mining index to the S&P 500: GDM has a P/E 25% lower, a Price/Cash Flow almost 50% lower, a Price/Book Value less than half, an Enterprise Value/EBITDA of about half, a dividend yield almost double with debt/Enterprise Value of only half. In summary: the gold mining stocks provide extreme value in accordance with  the legendary 1934 Graham & Dodd tutorial, Security Analysis, that has helped to enrich Warren Buffet and so many other long term value driven investors.

Roger Lipton

 

 

 

 

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY REPORT- CAN THE FED “CONTROL” THE SITUATION?

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY REPORT- CAN THE FED “CONTROL” THE SITUATION?

The capital markets traded to the upside in April, as the Biden administration lays out their agenda and the Federal Reserve assures everyone that they continue to have everything under control. We suggest that you come to your own conclusions. Ben Bernanke had no clue that the financial crisis of ’08-’09 was coming, though there were quite a few warning bells ringing. You never know which snowflake will start the avalanche.

THE DEFICITS AND THE DEBT

For those of you that like to know the latest deficit and debt numbers look like, the US deficit for the month of March was $660 billion, up from $119 billion in ’20, just before the pandemic related spending took off. The deficit for the first six months of the current fiscal year has therefore been $1.7 trillion, up from $741 billion in ’20. Since the comparisons from here will be up against the huge spending from April through September of the fiscal year ending 9/30, the comparisons will be “tougher”, depending on what stimulus programs are implemented.

Safe to say that the deficit for the current year ending 9/30/21 will be substantially more than the $3.1 trillion of last year. No doubt the total debt, not including unfunded entitlements, will be in the area of $30 trillion somewhere in the fourth calendar quarter of 2021. This continues to be of prime importance because heavy debt burdens the recovering economy and enormous spending, mostly financed by our Federal Reserve’s currency creation, will be necessary to keep the economy from collapsing. With the 2022 very important congressional election season beginning in just a matter of months, you can bet that the Biden administration will spare no expense to make the economy look good.

INFLATION OR DEFLATION?

There is an increasingly active debate developing as to whether inflation, or possibly some form of deflation, is in our future, and when. Keep in mind that both can happen, just as we have already seen higher prices in assets such as stocks, bonds, real estate and others. On the other hand, general income levels have not moved by much and “core inflation”, excluding food and energy, is still subdued.

Both inflation and deflation can be good for gold. The miners did very well during the deflationary 1930s, in spite of a fixed gold price, because their costs were coming down as the worldwide economy collapsed. Gold did even better in the inflationary 1970s, moving from $35 when Nixon eliminated convertibility in 1971 to $850 early in 1980. On balance, we prefer inflationary trends and that is what central banks around the world are desperately trying to provide.

There are some very obvious short term trends that point to inflation. There is major upward pressure on the minimum wage, with an apparent shortage of workers. There have been shortfalls in supply, and higher prices for semiconductors, lumber, copper, agriculture, gasoline, used cars, and housing. Interest rates, while still low, have moved upward, which could signal the bond market’s expectation of higher inflation. The M-2 money supply has moved up by 24% in just the last year, the most rapid rate in 150 years, and economics 101 dictates that more money chasing the same amount of goods should be inflationary at some point. Most importantly, consumers increasingly expect inflation to accelerate, and that expectation alone can be a critical ingredient. Lastly, the weakness in the US Dollar points to higher domestic inflation.

On the other hand, some of the most intelligent observers, including Lacy Hunt, Gary Shilling, and David Rosenberg, believe that the likely inflation coming out of the pandemic, over the next six months, will be modest. Fed Chairman, Jerome Powell, calls it “anchored” and “transitory”. Hunt and Schilling have had three decades of accurately calling for low interest rates, a sluggish economy, and subdued inflation, largely as a result of the debt burden. David Rosenberg, perhaps the economic commentator with the most well documented view, is looking for a short term economic bounce, accompanied by a modest uptick in inflation, but a return to economic malaise within six months.

Powell believes the Fed can control inflation by reversing the accommodation, allowing interest rates to rise, just as Paul Volker did in from 1979 to 1982. Hunt and Shilling and Rosenberg believe that the economy will go nowhere because of the debt and the aging demographics. The debt, in their mind, is a huge problem over the long term, but the Fed activities preclude a full scale  economic collapase. It seems to us that one of the most important ingredients in the reasoning of Powell, Hunt, Shilling and Rosenberg is that inflation is been “anchored” for the last ten years, even though the deficits and debt have gone through the roof. Therefore: the same beat can go on for the foreseeable future.

Though these are very smart people that we are trying to interpret and “second guess” to a degree, we are inclined to think that inflation will be higher, and longer, than is suggested above. Historical precedents may not apply because this monetary experiment is of a different magnitude than has ever been seen before.

Firstly, the Fed can’t “pull a Volker”, if inflation takes off, because the $28 trillion of debt now compares to $1 trillion in 1980, and today’s many trillions of unfunded entitlements were of little concern forty years ago. The annual operating deficit was only about $100 billion in 1980 compared to perhaps $4 trillion today. Even with an economy that is 6-7 times larger today, the problems are of a different order of magnitude. Raising interest rates, as Volker did, would trigger a massive decline in asset prices and a terrible depression.

The assumption by Powell and the others is that, based on the lack of inflation the last ten years, as deficits and debt built up, there is reason to believe that further monetary accommodation will, similarly, not create an inflation problem. We have seen that, though the Fed took its balance sheet from $1 trillion to $8 trillion in the last ten years, financing most of the annual deficit with newly printed dollars, the “velocity” of the monetary aggregates collapsed at the same time so the new currency did not pressure the CPI upward.

The Fed wants 2%+ inflation, and $7 trillion of new currency did not get the job done. In an extreme example, do you believe that $100 trillion of new currency, chasing the same amount of goods and services, would drive prices higher? We would say: highly likely. Seven trillion dollars didn’t get the job done. One hundred trillion dollars probably would.

The only remaining question becomes: What amount of new currency, between $7 trillion and $100 trillion, would kick off inflation? We think we are going to find out. Nobody knows how the above discussed elements will interact, but we expect a stagflationary period during the foreseeable future, likely with an even weaker economy and higher inflation than in the 1970s.  We also expect gold and the gold miners to be among the very best asset classes to own in the turbulent period ahead.

Roger Lipton.

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – ECONOMIC, SOCIAL, POLITICAL, MONETARY WORLDS ARE IN HOLDING PATTERN, BUT GOLD PERKS UP!!

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – ECONOMIC, SOCIAL, POLITICAL, MONETARY WORLDS ARE IN HOLDING PATTERN, BUT GOLD PERKS UP!!

THE CONTEXT

The general market has been very strong since the election, so there has been less perceived need for a “safe haven” such as gold. Gold bullion was therefore down about 5.7% in November and the mining stocks were down 8-9%. However, it has become increasingly clear over the last week or so that Janet Yellen, the apparently incoming Treasury chief,  will be a predictably doveish monetary policy participant. That is one reason that gold and the gold miners have “caught a bid” in the last few days. Perhaps it is dawning on investors that the deficits and spending and debasement of fiat (unbacked) paper currencies around the world will definitely continue. The new administration has been dubbed by some as “Obama 2.0”. Recall that in the first two years of President Obama’s administration gold bullion went up 100% and the gold miners went up over 200%.

We discuss below the recent short term performance, perhaps why gold has been in a consolidation mode over the last four months, and then a longer term discussion. While I understand that many of you don’t want to deal with these details, we like our readers to be as well informed as possible.

FOUR MONTHS OF CONSOLIDATION IN THE GOLD PRICE

The chart just below is over the last several years, and shows how the price of gold has correlated with “real yields”, that is the actual short term interest rate (inverted on the chart) adjusted for inflation. With short term rates less than 0.5% and inflation of 1.5-2.0% the “real yield” is now close to a negative 1.5%. That means that savers, in high quality fixed income securities, are losing purchasing power of 1.5% annually. It also means that, from the standpoint of current real return, investors are 1.5% better off in gold, yielding zero. The chart shows how gold has moved up in price as the real yield became increasingly negative. Over the last four months, however, you can see that the negative real yield (in red) stabilized and actually became a little less negative, so bears on gold speculated that interest rates were moving up, real yields might be rising and gold would be less attractive, so the gold price corrected over 10% from its high in early August.. Lately, however, you can see real interest rates (in red) breaking out on the upside, so the real yield (inverted on the chart) is becoming more negative. Contributing to this situation is over $17 trillion (a new high) of sovereign debt worldwide yielding less than zero. This type of action presaged earlier upward moves in gold bullion, and the miners, so that might well be the case again

LONGER TERM

The USA is the most powerful nation on earth. The holding pattern we are in before the new administration takes control, as well as the Covid-19 vaccines become widely distributed, has affected the world we live in, on many levels.

At the moment In the capital markets: The stock market chooses to look across the valley, flirting with an all time high as this is written. Traders have lightened up on their gold bullion positions, since a “safe haven” is not considered as necessary. Gold mining stocks have retraced virtually their entire gains since the first of the year. The reasoning in a nutshelll: (1) A new, more comforting, US administration is about to take office (2) Vaccines are on the way (3) There is no alternative to investing in the equity markets (TINA) since interest rates are so low.

Meanwhile: The facts of life include the following discussion points. Take them under consideration, with the cautionary overview that it is very difficult not to be seduced by the madness of crowds. 

With that preface:

The central banks around the world continue to stand by, prepared to accommodate further when necessary, which will no doubt be the case, though the form it takes is a bit more uncertain. Overall,  the basic situation has not changed, in terms of (1) Negative interest rate debt, which is at an all time high (2) The current deficits and cumulative debt are at record levels (3) Most asset classes have been bid to record levels (4) Governments around the world are searching for sources of funds, and the public will pay (5) Gold is underpriced, the gold mining stocks even more so.

NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES

The total worldwide sovereign debt now selling at negative interest rates has just hit a record of $17 trillion. China, for the first time, recently sold negative yielding debt. Major trading nations compete with each other to raise capital so the fact that German five year bonds sell with a negative .74% yield allowed the Chinese to provide an attractively higher yield at a negative 0.15% on their five year paper. The Chinese issuance was part of a package that yielded a barely positive 0.318% for ten years and 0.665% for fifteen years.

People…this kind of situation has not happened in recorded history, and is not good.

THE DEBT AND THE DEFICITS

As we have written before, the addict needs an increasingly large “hit” to maintain the “high”, though hardly anyone would say that the worldwide economic situation is rocking and rolling (i.e.”high”) While common wisdom these days is that the economy was strong before Covid-19 hit, US GDP  (up about 2.5% in calendar ’19) was forecast, before the Covid-19,  to grow only about 1.5% in Q1, clearly rolling over. The chart below shows vividly how large the stimulus, worldwide, has been, to get us through the pandemic, compared to the last crisis.

People….there has to be a hangover after this fiscal/monetary party.

MOST ASSET CLASSES ARE AT RECORD HIGHS

Ben Bernanke, Fed Chairman ten years ago, made it clear that his Fed’s objective was to support asset prices, which in turn would hopefully create a trickle down wealth effect for the broad economy. Janet Yellen, and now Jerome Powell have continued in the same vein. Moreover the mandate has evolved, as described by Powell, to achieve a “symmetrical” two percent inflation rate (tolerating above 2% for a while) and, most recently, economic growth that will benefit all segments of the economy, clearly targeting the wealth gap. This policy, echoed by central banks worldwide, has produced negligible interest rates of fixed income securities (all the way out to thirty years),  supporting the stock market because TINA (there is no alternative). The chart just below shows vividly how US equities (the S&P 500, ex financials) are selling at 49x free cash flow, almost 50% higher than at the top of the dotcom bubble.

People…..safe to say we are closer to a top than a bottom.

GOVERNMENTS NEED HELP, AND IT’S ON THE WAY, FROM US !!

First, we should understand that the minimal, or even negative, interest rates, are a form of wealth transfer. Fixed income security holders earn nothing, losing ground to even minimal inflation, and the government benefits from negligible interest cost on Treasury securities.

Additionally, though President-elect Biden publicly dances around the subject, it is clear that tax rates in the US will go up under his administration. It won’t be close to filling the cash flow gap but will be designed as acceptable to the public while the can (cash flow gap) gets kicked down the road. There has been a lot of discussion in the United Kingdom on this subject and our policies tend to mirror theirs.  Rather than a Value Added Tax (VAT) which would raise the most money but tax everyone, taxes targeting the rich alone are more politically preferable. This could include a tax on homes with a value above a certain level, much higher capital gains taxes, higher estate taxes, and higher rates on large incomes. The charts below show the long term trends in tax rates both in the UK and the US. Tax rates in the future may not match the 90%+ as shown in the charts, but higher than today they will be.

People…..it won’t be enough to materially reduce deficits, but everyone will be paying a more “fair share”.

GOLD IS UNDERPRICED, THE GOLD MINERS EVEN MORE SO

The price of gold has historically correlated strongly with the U.S. debt buildup, the growth in money supply, the buildup in negative yield debt, and Central Bank asset buildup. It has also protected purchasing power both during inflation (as in the 1970s) and deflation (as in the 1930s). By every measure, the price of gold should be a multiple of its current price. Central Banks around the world, who are most attuned to long term monetary trends, have been collectively buying over 400 tons of gold every year in the last ten. Though central bankers never admit to liking gold as an asset class, since a gold standard limits the ability of central banks to create more currency, this is a classic case of “do as I do, not as I say”. Gold mining stocks, whose earnings are leveraged to the price of gold, are even more underpriced than gold bullion itself. With the gold price almost the same as the $1900 high of 2011, the gold mining stocks are 50-60% below those levels. This undervaluation is underlined because, as the chart below shows, they have flipped from a negative cash flow position to free cash flow generators. One can only imagine how much cash they will generate as the price of gold (their end product) catches up with other asset classes.  Dividends are already being steadily raised by many of the major miners, just as they were in the 1930s, when Homestake Mining, between 1929 and 1936, paid out dividends worth three times the 1929 stock price.

People….it’s not a question of IF, more a question of WHEN.

CONCLUSION

We see no constructive movement, in terms of dealing with economic imbalances and fiscal/monetary distortions. The problems are an order of magnitude impossible to comprehend, let alone deal with, and have been created over decades, The current crop of politicians, worldwide, give no indication of a willingness to directly confront the situation.

We continually search for the flaws in our long term investment argument. If the facts, and important trends have changed, we would gladly adjust our approach. This is not the case, however. The fiscal/monetary influences on the worldwide economy have been on a parabolic ascent in recent decades. Stagflation, as in the seventies but worse, is the best outcome we can hope for in the foreseeable future. Events will at some point force the necessary financial, political and social changes necessary to encourage long term productive economic growth. The operative phrase is AT SOME POINT…..

Roger Lipton

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – POLITICIANS BICKER, CONSUMERS AND INVESTORS, HOLD COLLECTIVE BREATH

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – POLITICIANS BICKER,  CONSUMERS AND INVESTORS HOLD COLLECTIVE BREATH

The general equity market was on the downside in September, up a little so far this month, probably based on the uncertainty relative to the election and the size (and nature) of the new stimulus program, still under negotiation between Steve Mnuchin and Nancy Pelosi. Gold bullion was down 4.3% in September, as the Fed Balance sheet “stabilized” around $7 trillion for a couple of months before taking off again. The gold miners were weaker in September, down a bit more than bullion. Both are still up substantially for the year.

Over the long term, the price of gold has closely tracked the increase in government debt. We’ve written almost continuously about the debt and the deficits and how increasing debt is a burden on the future economy. In simplistic terms, deficit spending (for an individual, a family, a business or a country) brings consumption forward at the expense of the future. It is just that simple and future consumption is currently being sacrificed at the altar of the can kicking (down the road) exercise.

A corollary to the current situation is that Federal Reserve money creation has been used to finance a very large portion of the US Federal deficit spending. As the table just below shows, the deficit in the current year has been $3 trillion for the eleven months ending 8/31/20. It seems like no accident that the Federal Reserve Balance Sheet has increased from approximately $4 trillion to $7 trillion currently, coincidentally exactly matching the eleven months of “stated” deficit.

But the story doesn’t quite end there. It’s true that the Fed, with the keystroke of a computer has created trillions of dollars to purchase US Treasuries, which has financed our massive spending deficits. The Fed has been a major buyer, for sure, but not the only buyer. In fact, the Total Public Debt of the US has gone up by almost exactly FOUR TRILLION DOLLARs in the last eleven months, a cool trillion dollars more than the stated deficit spending. Only with government accounting can the incremental debt not equal the deficit during the same period. Our website article on this subject, written in October, 2018, and provided to our investing partners  as well,  is provided just below.

https://www.liptonfinancialservices.com/2018/10/semi-monthly-fiscal-monetary-report-rising-deficits-even-faster-rising-debt-weve-only-just-begun/

In essence the reported monthly and annual deficits are just the numbers within the budget, and almost always the debt buildup is greater, most of it borrowed from the Social Security “lockbox”, now almost depleted. As our article two years ago pointed out, in the eleven years ending 9/30/18, the “extra” debt amounted to an enormous $3.24 trillion.

So the beat goes on, except:

All the numbers are an order of magnitude larger than just a couple of years ago. We all are well versed in the stated deficit, now over $3 trillion for fiscal 2020, but hardly anyone talks about the extra trillion of debt that has been incurred. A trillion dollars is still a great deal of money and the number of trillions is building rapidly. Just a matter of months ago, fiscal hawks were warning that the cumulative debt could approach $30 trillion by 2030, now more like the end of 2021, nine years earlier.

Many observers lose track, or lack perspective, over the actual results of various asset classes, including gold bullion. We all know that gold went from $35 to $850 in the 1970s after Richard Nixon eliminated the conversion of dollars into gold. From 1980 to 2000, with good reason, the price of gold suffered as Reagonomics (with Fed Chairman, Paul Volcker)  and then Clintonomics  kicked in and a strong economy with relatively modest inflation reduced the need for gold as a monetary safe haven. When US deficits increased dramatically in the early 2000s, with the cost of two wars, Y2k inefficiencies, and the aftermath of 9/11, gold started to perform well, and that has generally continued in the last twenty years. The chart below shows how gold bullion has performed in various currencies.

The chart is as of May, 2020, when gold bullion was up 14.3% in US Dollars and it has done even better since then. As you can see, 2013 was the one very poor year (out of 20). It is worth noting that our Partnership was down over 50% that year, since the gold miners typically go up and down more than the price of bullion. We have often pointed out that the upside performance of the gold miners has substantially lagged the price of gold bullion, and it was specifically the terrible 2013 from which we are expecting to recover.  Aside from that observation, you can see that gold bullion in US Dollars has averaged a 10.7% increase annually, almost exactly the 10.3% average of all currencies. There is nothing shabby about the price performance of gold bullion as an asset class, and when the gold mining stocks catch up, the same observation will apply.

Keep all of this in mind as the politicians, economists and pundits predict a new growth phase for the US economy. The Presidential “debate” on Tuesday evening only reinforced our view that the partisan (adolescent) bickering, the legislative dysfunction, the spending and deficits will all continue indefinitely, and there is no “graceful” way out of this political, social and economic mess. Gold and gold related securities have historically protected purchasing power over similar stressful periods, and we firmly believe that this time will not be different.

Roger Lipton

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – THERE IS NO GRACEFUL WAY OUT OF THIS MESS!

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – THERE IS NO GRACEFUL WAY OUT OF THIS MESS!

The capital markets were quiet in June compared  to April and May, but still productive for owners of gold related securities.  The general market was up slightly in June, but all indexes except Nasdaq are still down for the year. Gold bullion was up 2.7% (now up 17% for the year. The gold mining stocks, with their cash flow and earnings leveraged to the price of gold, are still cheap statistically and are moving at a dramatic rate. Most impressively, in the last three month, from the low point, gold bullion is up 13% and the gold mining stock indexes are up well over 50%.   As our discussion below shows, the trends are more than adequately clear, all supportive of much higher prices for gold bullion and especially for the gold mining stocks .Moreover, there is no graceful way out of this fiscal/monetary mess.

Pictures can efficiently provide a summary of what has been going on from a fiscal/monetary standpoint over many years, leading us to a considered opinion of what the financial world will look like in the future.

The chart just below shows the current 30 year yields in various countries around the world. It is an axiom that the bond market supposedly prices in some sort of a “real” yield on top of allowing for inflation.  With the US 30 year yielding close to an all time record low of 1.44%, hardly anybody expects inflation to be zero over the next 30 years, which would provide a 1.44% “real yield”. It is a better assumption that the pricing represents expectations of a weak economy as well as the US Fed’s intention to increasingly support the long end of the yield curve.  The 30 year is “bid” to represent a safe haven as well as a short term trade, rather than a 30 year investment.

We can also assume that interest rates will stay very low, if the US Fed has anything to say about it (and so far they have), because it is only the ultra low rates that allow the US to carry the sharply increasing debt load.  The charts below show the ongoing annual budget deficits as well as the increase in the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet, whereby the Fed has been financing an increasing amount of the US operating deficit. Lest you think that this will all change once the economy gets going, and the operating surplus will reduce the cumulative debtt: Since 1981 there have been a grand total of four surplus years, the last three under Bill Clinton and the first under GW Bush, before the two wars started. The total surplus in those four years was about $760B, so you can judge for yourself how much of a dent  a stronger economy will make in the current $26 trillion growing debt federal debt burden.

We can also assume that interest rates will stay very low, if the US Fed has anything to say about it (and so far they have), because it is only the ultra low rates that allow the US to carry the sharply increasing debt load.  The charts below show the ongoing annual budget deficits as well as the increase in the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet, whereby the Fed has been financing an increasing amount of the US operating deficit. Lest you think that this will all change once the economy gets going, and the operating surplus will reduce the cumulative debtt: Since 1981 there have been a grand total of four surplus years, the last three under Bill Clinton and the first under GW Bush, before the two wars started. The total surplus in those four years was about $760B, so you can judge for yourself how much of a dent  a stronger economy will make in the current $26 trillion growing debt federal debt burden.

You have now seen how the bond market is predicting slower growth, at least in part due to the growing debt burden (around the world), which has been financed largely by worldwide Central Banks.

The last chart shows the steady decline in GDP growth in almost every post-recession expansion since 1981. The most recent ten years is fresh in our mind. A business friendly outsider passed one of the largest tax reductions in history, allowed for repatriation of almost one trillion dollars that had been frozen overseas, reduced the legislative burden on businessmen and encouraged the Federal Reserve Bank to print trillions of new dollars and keep interest rates near zero. The result was a grand total of 2.3% real annual GDP Growth over the last ten years, perhaps 0.1% to 0.2% more in the last three years under President Trump than under President Obama. This can be best described as a minimal “marginal return on investment”.

The coronavirus pandemic will be in the rear view mirror at some point in the next six to twelve months. The trends as described above will not. Rates will still be low, as signaled by Jerome Powell just recently, through 2022. This is because (1) the economy needs the support and (2) the US budget cannot afford higher rates on $26 trillion of growing debt. The annual deficits and cumulative debt will continue to step up by record amounts because that is essentially baked in the cake at this point. Just yesterday Fed Chairman, Jay Powell, reiterated the intention to invest a trillion dollars in all kinds of corporate bonds and ETFs. Also under active discussion is a trillion dollar infrastructure program.

As a result of the domestic debt burden, amplified by similar trends in every major worldwide trading nation, our expectation is that, after the sequential improvement from depression level economic activity, average real GDP growth will be no better, most likely materially worse, than the meager 2.3% average real GDP growth of the last ten years.

We fully expect that gold bullion will outperform equities in the next ten years, just as it has in the last decade. The bond market has outperformed both, as the entire yield curve was repriced downward, but that is less likely, from current levels, in the future.  Gold mining stocks have substantially underperformed the price of gold bullion over the last ten years and we continue to believe that they will be the best performers of all.

Roger Lipton*

*Roger Lipton is the managing General Partner of RHL Associates, LP, a Limited Partnership  that is 100% invested in gold mining stocks.

YEAR END FISCAL/MONETARY SUMMARY – GOLD, AND THE GOLD MINERS, RE-ESTABLISH UPWARD TREND, WITH GOOD REASON!!

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YEAR-END FISCAL/MONETARY SUMMARY – GOLD, AND THE GOLD MINERS, RE-ESTABLISH UPWARD TREND, WITH GOOD REASON!!

December, and the fourth quarter, continued in the same vein as the first three calendar quarters.  The operating leverage for the miners is starting to be recognized, since the move in mining stocks in December was more than double the 3.7% that gold bullion moved. It was a similar case for the year, with gold bullion up 17.9% and the miners up about double that. The most impressive relative move of the month was the last two days when the miners were up  2-3% with bullion up only 0.4%, so it is possible that this is the beginning of the still very depressed mining stocks catching up to the bullion price. The performance of our investment partnership, almost entirely invested in gold mining companies, mirrored that described above.

While bullion (at $1525/oz.) is down about 20% from its high of $1900/oz. (in 2011), the miners are down 50-70%, so the mining stocks could go up 100% or more with bullion rising 20-25% to the previous high. Since we believe that bullion will sell for something like $5,000/oz. within the next few years, you can see how our portfolio could multiply by many times the current price.

There is no reason to change our longstanding view that gold mining stocks have the most upside potential of any liquid asset class we know of. All the reasons we have been discussing for the last six years are only intensifying, and the potential reward for our patience has increased with time. You can review at your leisure our article written in August  of this year: THE CASE FOR GOLD – we are gratified that a true giant of the gold mining industry, Rob McEwen, who built Goldcorp, one of the largest and successful mining companies (recently merged with Newmont Mining),  has re-published (with our permission) our article on the website of his young company, publicly traded McEwen Mining (MUX). . Maybe we know something, after all 😊

Our many articles on this subject, largely summarized in THE CASE FOR GOLD, are hereby augmented with the following thoughts regarding Inflation, Central Bank Gold Purchasing, US Deficits and Cumulative Debt, Interest Rate Expectations and Worldwide Economic Trends.

INFLATION, which is supportive of the gold price, is not dead, as widely assumed. The apparent absence of inflation, as measured by the Bureau of Economic Statistics, has provided comfort to the PHDs at central banks. However (1) the price indexes that are quoted, inexplicably excluding food and energy which are consumed daily, have been manipulated periodically to put a false face on reality. Among other benefits to our government, understated inflation provides an insufficient increase to entitlements such as social security payments (2) Though certain imported apparel prices and some consumer electronics have not increased in price, asset prices (explicitly targeted by central banks), including stocks and bonds and prime real estate and collectibles have made the rich richer while the middle class strains to make ends meet. Inflation is with us when a Van Gogh painting sells for $240M or a NYC coop sells for over $100M. The super rich are purchasing iconic items which they know will command a premium price long into the future, as opposed to holding the colored paper that they know will have a tiny fraction of its current purchasing power. Even an understated 2% annual inflation rate destroys 50% of your purchasing power in 35 years. A 1971 dollar is worth about $0.15, a 1913 dollar is worth less than $.03. That Van Gogh or Central Park South penthouse will do better than that. The chart below shows how big ticket items, where the money is spent, have inflated over the last twenty years at rates well above those reported by our Bureau of Economic Analysis.

CENTRAL BANKS INCREASE GOLD BUYING, and the inevitable ramifications are becoming more obvious. Central Banks, most notably China and Russia, are buying physical gold at a record rate in 2019, at the same time reducing US Treasury Securities as a percentage of their reserves. Central banks collectively, even with China’s understated purchases, are now absorbing more than 20% of annual worldwide gold production. Furthermore, an increasing amount of trade is taking place between China, Russia, and the Mideast, conducted in terms of Yuan and Rubles and Gold, and the ounces of Gold it takes to purchase a gallon of Oil may indeed be a very important guidepost that determines the future relationship between various currencies. With geo-political-trade tensions so high, nothing would please the Chinese, the Russians, or the Saudis more than an ability to conduct more of their business in something other than US Dollars. Well connected sources are increasingly suggesting that China, combining the gold ownership of its many government agencies, likely owns upwards of 20,000 tons of physical gold, rather than the 1,900 tons owned by the Peoples Bank of China, which they report. This dwarfs the 8,100 tons the US has owned since 1971. Russia, with their rapidly increasing 2,200 tons, is the largest owner relative to the size of their economy and currency and most able to implement some sort of a gold related monetary system if they were so inclined.

There are reports of international discussions relating to a new “reserve currency”, joining or even replacing the US Dollar. The Bretton Woods Agreement of 1944 assumed the US would maintain the “value” of the US Dollar by backing it with gold. The USA has blatantly abused its trading privilege during the last 75 years by “closing the gold window” in 1971, generating annual operating deficits in 35 out the last 39 years, running up $23 trillion of debt (excluding tens of trillions of unfunded entitlement)  and printing $4 trillion of fresh (fiat, i.e.unbacked) money by our Federal Reserve Bank. International monetary circles are starting to consider a new monetary “approach”, and worldwide central banks may be anticipating that likelihood by way of their physical gold purchases.  We believe that China could announce, almost any time, a new form of currency, perhaps a so called crypto-currency, backed by upwards of 20,000 tons of gold. At the same time, a new base price for gold bullion at $5,000/oz. or more would be supported by the Chinese.

The current worldwide fiscal/monetary “promiscuity”, unbacked paper currencies being diluted into oblivion by the politicians of the day, cannot go on indefinitely without predictable ramifications. When a trend cannot go on, by definition, it will not. We view gold as re-emerging as the true currency, the store of value and unit of exchange it has been for 5,000 years. Central banks, including our most direct political and economic adversaries, get it. The public in China and India get it. Investors in North America hardly at all, some might say “whistling past the graveyard”. It’s going to be interesting.

THE FEDERAL DEBT is north of $23 trillion in the US, also growing rapidly in the other largest trading nations in the world. We’ve pointed out many times that the debt is increasing even more than the annually budgeted operating deficits would imply. This can only happen with governmental accounting. The difference is due largely to the federal government borrowing from the social security trust fund. In the fiscal year ending 9/30/19, for example, the operating deficit was $984B but “off budget” spending, financed by the social security system which is itself approaching insolvency, took the cumulative debt up an extra $206B, from $21.97T to $23.16T. This is not “one off”, it happens almost every year and is to be expected. Therefore, we can expect the total deficit in the fiscal year ending 9/30/20 to be something like $24.5T, on its way to $26T by the time the newly elected president takes office in January,’21. This assumes that there are no economic disruptions, and a recession, with lower tax revenues and larger deficits are out there somewhere. All of this is very important because, the larger the debt the more difficult economic growth becomes. Whether we’re talking about an individual, a family, a company or a country, the more effort it takes to service debt, the less investment can be made in productive pursuit. Our economy and other major worldwide economies will therefore continue to be kept afloat by central bank financial creativity. It will work until it doesn’t, and will inevitably be accompanied by many unintended painful consequences.

INTEREST RATES are not going to change much in the foreseeable future. Interest payments on the debt are barely tolerable only because rates are so low. Every increased point (100 basis points) of extra interest equates to $230B of extra interest as current bonds mature, and over 50% of our outstanding debt is under 5 years. This extra interest would be a material increment and would squeeze out potentially productive government spending. Higher interest rates, which the US Fed tried briefly a year ago, stopped our economy and the stock market in its tracks, and the policy was quickly reversed. The US economy has stabilized currently but GDP growth is projected to be no more than a tepid 2% this year, even less than it was a year ago when slightly higher interest rates took their toll. The only way interest rates could rise by much is if the Federal Reserve, and other central banks, lose control over the situation and this would be a sign of impending financial chaos. Lower interest rates are possible, but the 10 year treasury note is under 2%, and the marginal benefit of lower rates from here is debatable. Negative interest rates on something like $13T of sovereign debt is a fact of life, but that approach has its own set of unintended consequences, and adoption by the US Fed would clearly be a sign of desperation. Give or take 50 basis points, we believe interest rates are “range bound” for the next year or two.

WORLDWIDE ECONOMIC TRENDS support our contention that worldwide central banks, in support of local economies, will maintain low interest rates interest rates, which provides a major tailwind for our portfolio. Headlines in the Wall Street Journal today, January 2, include (1) Asian Economies Must Brace for Chill Wind From China (2) Japan’s Lost 30 Years (with debt going to 250% of GDP) Give Pause to Those Looking at U.S. (3) Japan Has Gone from Growth Market to Bargain Rack (4) ‘Japanification’ Haunts Slow Growth Europe (5) Latin America’s ‘Oasis” Descends Into Chaos. As Wendy’s put it, thirty years ago: “Where’s The Beef”.

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER, we’re certainly pleased that our gold mining oriented investment partnership provided positive results in December, the 4th quarter, and the year.  The mining stocks have just begun to gain investment traction. It seems that, until now investors and analysts have not believed that gold at $1400-1500 per oz. is here to stay. They have been therefore unwilling to adjust upward their estimates of gold reserves, mine lives, earnings and cash flow expectations for the gold mining companies. Gold bullion prices have now clearly broken out on the upside from their six year “consolidation” and the possibility (we call it a likelihood) of a big upside move now comes into view. We can therefore expect upgraded expectations and higher valuations.

There have been virtually no major new gold reserves discovered in the last ten years, and new mines take many years to get permitted. Higher prices will allow expanded mining of some lower grade reserves by established companies but will not allow new mines to come onstream for many years. Existing miners have made major progress in cost control over the last few years and are in a position to improve cash flow and profits dramatically, even at current prices. Operating results for the quarter ending 9/30/19, the first quarter in eight years that the gold price was something like $200/oz. higher than a year earlier, have begun to demonstrate the operating leverage that is in place. We believe that the bull market in gold and gold mining stocks has resumed and the upside potential is very substantial.

Roger Lipton

 

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – THE BEAT GOES ON !!

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – THE BEAT GOES ON !!

The general equity markets were up modestly in April. Gold bullion was down a fraction of 1%. The miners, which had outperformed gold bullion in the first quarter gave back their gain. For the year to date both gold bullion and the gold mining stocks are essentially flat. Considering that the US Dollar is at a high and the general equity market has been strong, that is reasonably good performance for a non-correlated asset class.  Fundamentally: nothing has changed regarding the long term fiscal/monetary trends. In fact, the prospect for a major move in gold bullion and an even larger move in the gold mining stocks has only improved. The longer the fundamental factors that we present prevail,  the larger the price move in gold bullion and the mining stocks will be.

 Over the last month, the following bullet points come to mind:

  • Ten years after the sub-prime bubble of ’08-09, new financial excesses have arisen, including a private equity mania (Lyft, Uber,  Wework, etc.), a subprime auto bubble, a student loan bubble, a sovereign debt bubble among emerging economies, a “levered loan” bubble.
  • Central Banks continue to buy record amounts of gold bullion. They understand that the paper currencies are being diluted and are increasingly aggressive in diversifying their foreign exchange reserves away from US Dollar. China and Russia, increasingly considered our adversaries, are the most prominent gold bullion buyers. In India, where the public traditionally accumulates gold, the central bank has again become a substantial buyer, increasing their holdings by 50 tons (the total by over 10%) in just the last 15 months.
  • Debt creation as a GDP stimulant is increasingly impotent. As calculated by highly regarded economist, David Rosenberg, since 2007 “global debt has ballooned by $140 trillion while global GDP has risen by only $20 trillion. The “bang for the debt buck” is clearly diminished, and that will only get worse over time.
  • The highly touted 3.2% growth in US real GDP was largely dependent on non-recurring factors. Inventory build, government spending, and lower imports together contributed 2/3 of the total. The 3.2% number was also calculated based on only 0.8% annualized inflation, and that assumption is questionable. One thing we can count on, however,  is that economic performance in the US will continue to be presented in the most favorable possible  light between now and November, 2020.
  • Following on the previous point, just this morning Steven Mnuchin, Sec’y Treasury, pointed out that the US debt limit, which has already been exceeded, will have to be raised within six months, because our financial flexibility will have been utilized. $22 trillion is comfortably in the rear view window, and $23 trillion is months away.

The following discussion is a bit “technical” in nature, but we feel is crucial in terms of long term expectations for financial markets.

CENTRAL BANKS BUY STOCKS AND BONDS – A RECIPE FOR LONG TERM DISASTER !! – A LESSON IN “MARKET MAKING”

It’s been a number of years since we had an active market in the US for initial public offerings. Decades, and a number of stock market cycles ago, this then young analyst watched quite a few small companies come public, in many cases underwritten by brokers much smaller than the surviving investment bankers of today. Some of those underwriting firms, well intentioned to be sure, supported the brand new issue with a supporting bid, figuring it was just a question of time before the market figured out that the stock was attractive, the supporting bid could be removed, the stock would be freely trading and move up, the public customers would be happy, and the broker might even make a profit when selling their acquired inventory. Other underwriters, not so committed to supporting the new issue price, allowed the stock to trade freely immediately, tolerating the higher volatility, and allowing the free market to establish (“discover”) the price, for better or worse.

The interesting aspect of these two approaches was as follows: The firms that intervened in the marketplace in many cases finally choked on the inventory, their capital was not sufficient to buy the stock forever, and they ultimately went out of business. The more prudent underwriters that allowed for “price discovery” (as the PHDs would put it) by the normal supply and demand of the marketplace lived to play another day.

This small scale example applies to the trading habits of worldwide central banks today. As the US government builds its debt over $22 trillion, which is more than 100% of our GDP, lots of observers say it is no big deal since Japan, for example, has government debt at 250% of their GDP. The Japanese economy is still functioning, with slow growth to be sure, but there is no evident crisis. This reminds me of the cartoon where the guy jumps off the cliff, and, while in the air, calls out: “I feel fine !!”

There are over $10 trillion of government securities trading with less than a zero percent yield. This is as a result of the US, ECB, Japanese and Chinese central banks buying stocks and bonds, supporting the price of stocks and bonds, and suppressing fixed income yields. In this absence of true price discovery by the marketplace, fixed income savers have been penalized, to the benefit of stock and bond holders, creating a wealth effect for the latter. This good fortune on paper could (and will) be temporary, but for the moment, just like the guy who jumped off the cliff, we feel fine !!

Where are we in this process ??  In addition to the negatively yielding fixed income government securities, the Bank of Japan (that has been doing this for almost thirty years) now owns about $250 billion of Japanese ETFs, or 75% of that entire market of ETFs. On the fixed income side, the Bank of Japan owns about 45%, or $4.5 trillion worth of all the Japanese government bonds outstanding. With it all, the Japanese economy is still running well below 2% real growth, with inflation at well under the 2% objective. It is of course an important sub-text that central banks worldwide are trying to stimulate inflation, rather than subdue it, which was the original objective.  Closer to home, we have been informed that our Fed is abandoning QT, preparing for a new form of QE, which, some have suggested, could include the purchase of US equities as well as bonds.

Here’s a quick economic lesson for the hundreds of PHDs that are working within central banks, which we guess isn’t part of the new Modern Monetary Theory. Don’t intervene in a market unless you are prepared to BUY IT ALL, because you will, eventually. Witness the holdings of the Bank of Japan, who have been at this game the longest, still without the result they have been reaching for. Aside from a long list of unintended consequences that have yet to play out, the attempt to lighten the inventory, (Sell to whom?) has just been demonstrated in the US. One down month in the stock market (December) with the two year treasury rate approaching 3% and the US Fed caved. Whom do you think the Japanese Central Bank can sell to?

The above described central bank intervention in capital markets will inevitably destroy most international currencies, including the US Dollar, because the money will have to be created to support the capital markets and the presumed wealth effect that will prevent economic collapse and that will be highly inflationary. This is the “bubble” that Donald Trump described when he was campaigning but that he has forgotten about since he is in office. The politicians and central bankers will continue to chase their long term (NEW) goal of creating inflation substantial enough to service long term debt obligations. We described early in the article how the debt increase in increasingly impotent in terms of stimulating GDP growth. The corollary is that the debt, worldwide, is far too large to be paid off in the currencies of today. Substantial inflation is the only politically acceptable remedy, since outright default is too obvious to the voting public.

Roger Lipton

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – THE DEFICITS AND DEBT – HERE WE GO AGAIN!

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE

The general capital markets were up modestly in July, gold bullion was down 2.3%. The gold mining stocks were down about 3.5%.  Most importantly, our conviction hasn’t changed regarding the long term outlook for our portfolio that is heavily invested in gold mining stocks.

While last month we outlined a group of tangible factors that support our thesis, it could be useful to go back to the biggest single reason that gold will be the surviving “currency”, protecting purchasing power best. The worldwide credit pyramid that has fueled the economic growth over the last forty years must be liquidated. Debts must be paid off, and the numbers are too large for the worldwide economy to grow out of the problem. “Default” will be the result, but refusal to pay is too obvious and makes the politicians look bad. Inflation is the only other solution since the voting public doesn’t understand who caused it. Gold has gone from $250/oz. to $1200/oz. since 2000, starting with the President GW Bush debts to finance the aftermath of 9/11 and then the two wars. Gold doubled from $900 in ’09 and the gold mining stocks quadrupled and more) as the deficit spending ramped up even further under President Obama.

Here we go again: The projected US deficit in the fiscal year ending 9/30/18 is projected to be about $800B, up from $600B last year. However, the cumulative debt in the 10 months ending today ($21.2 trillion) is already one trillion dollars higher than last September and is projected to be higher by $1.2 trillion by 9/30.

Only in governmental accounting can the annual deficits not total the cumulative increase in debt. This is not new. You have no doubt heard from politicians and economists who are concerned about the future deficit spending. Republicans are concerned when Democrats are in power, and now the situation is reversed. However, they don’t talk about the excess debt, on top of the budgeted spending, called other borrowing. Over the last ten years, the cumulative debt increase has exceeded the total of annual deficits by a cool three trillion dollars. People, this is a lot of money. While the annual deficits going forward are projected to be over a trillion dollars annually over the next decade, you can only imagine what the cumulative debt will look like after the other borrowing. We have described the situation in terms of US debts, but enormous potential credit problems also overhang the economies of China, Japan, and the Eurozone, the largest after the USA. What the endgame looks like is unknown, but it won’t be pretty.

Stay healthy. Stay financially flexible.

Roger Lipton

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – SLUGGISH GDP, FED NORMALIZATION BEHIND SCHEDULE, GOLD THREATENS AN UPSIDE BREAKOUT

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – GDP GROWTH SLUGGISH, FED BALANCE SHEET COMES DOWN-BUT BEHIND SCHEDULE, GOLD PRICE READY FOR UPSIDE BREAKOUT?

THE ECONOMY

It now seems clear that Q1’18 will not demonstrate a pickup in the economy. After 2.9% real GDP growth in Q4’17, lagging the much heralded 3% plus in Q2 and Q3’17 (Q3 aided by reconstruction activities after the storms), it now seems clear that Q1’18 will be closer to 2% than 3%. Recall that Q4 consumer spending, which included the best Christmas season in at least five years, included record high consumer credit card debt (with an increasing incidence of default) and a reduction of the consumer savings rate down to about 3% of household income, not the healthiest combination for longer term spending expectations. Sure enough, the first quarter of ’18 seems to be characterized by slightly higher consumer savings, as the public is still burdened with high health care, rent, and education costs. We saw a chart recently that indicates that about 33% of 25-29 year olds are living with parents or grandparents, up from about 26% in 2010. No doubt many of these Millennials are coping with the burden of student loans. Surveys indicate that many consumers are going to apply savings from the new tax bill against debts, rather than increase spending. Economic spokespersons (i.e.Kudlow, Mnuchin, etc.etc.) continue to predict that the tax bill will stimulate faster GDP growth and much higher tax revenues, in time reducing the federal debt burden. Time will tell, obviously, but the jury is still out, and the signs are not convincing so far.

FEDERAL RESERVE NORMALIZATION PROGRAM

The US Federal Reserve continues to “normalize” the bloated balance sheet, but is running behind schedule. Recall that the plan called for $10B/month reduction in Q4, $20B/month in Q1, $30B/month in Q2, $40B in Q3, $50B in Q4’18, and that’s as far as described. The plan fell behind schedule by $23B in Q4, fell another $4-10B behind plan in Q1 (depending on whether you use 3/28 or 4/4), so was $27-33B behind schedule as of 3/31, a significant percentage against the $90B that was scheduled. In the first week of Q2, ending 4/11, the Fed’s balance sheet was essentially unchanged. The rubber meets the road now with a reduction of  $30B monthly. Since the Fed’s activities affect short term interest rates rather than longer term, it could be instructive to look at what the bellwether ten year treasury note has done over the last six months. During Q4, as the Fed got $23B behind their $30B objective, the ten year traded between at 2.35% to 2.45%. The Fed stepped up their selling in Q1, meeting their quarterly objective (though not catching  up) and the ten year moved dramatically, from just above 2.40% to as high as 2.95% and closed Q1 at about 2.75%. So far in Q2, the ten year has traded back up to 2.85% as this is written.  The more volatile two year treasury, which bottomed around 1.3% in midSeptember, has moved in a straight line to 1.9% at 12/31, 2.27% at 3/31, and 2.38% today. These are very dramatic moves, and the pace of “normalization” continues to quicken. Time will tell what affect $30B/month of Fed “runoff” has on interest rates, but the possibility exists that rates could spike higher, especially if the Fed tries to catch up with the shortfall to date of about $30B. If interest rates spike upward in Q2, as they did in Q1, it could  be unsettling to capital markets that are already showing volatility that we have not seen in years

GOLD UPDATE

Gold has been “consolidating”, around $1350/oz., up 3-4% for the year, fairly firm day to day, seemingly threatening to break out on the upside. No doubt the increasing visibility of federal debt accelerating to over $1 trillion annually as far as the eye can see, is contributing to the interest, as well as the possibility of increased inflation. Since Central Banks, worldwide, are trying to stimulate inflation, it stands to reason that they would be continuing to purchase gold bullion, which they are. Market technicians, chartists, point to $1,375 and $1,400 per ounce as “breakout” levels on the upside. After a 4-5 year consolidation, some observers think gold bullion could make a move to new all time highs, above $2,000/oz. From our standpoint, the gold miners seem to be the most advantageous way to participate, since the gold mining stocks are even more depressed in price than the metal itself. The last time gold bullion was around $1,350/oz., in mid 2016, the gold mining stocks were about 35% higher. If the price of gold breaks out on the upside, the gold mining stocks should do even better.

Roger Lipton

SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – GOLD SLOWLY RISES – BITCOIN “ADJUSTMENTS”

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SEMI-MONTHLY FISCAL/MONETARY UPDATE – GOLD SLOWLY RISES –  BITCOIN “ADJUSTMENTS”

The price of gold bullion firmed a bit through the month of July, with gold bullion up about 2.3% for the month. The chartists could say that a base has been formed to support a major move upward. The gold mining stocks were up somewhat more, reflecting the operating leverage from the change in price of their end product. Our major position in the miners continues to be our  emphasis and, as we have pointed out before, has the potential to multiply our portfolio value by many times. The weakening of the US Dollar which began in June continued through July. A weak dollar is not a necessity for gold (and the mining stocks) to go up in price but, all other factors being equal, should prove to be a positive for us.

We talked last month about the steady increase in the monetary base that has been created by Central Banks worldwide, and that this financial experiment will undoubtedly end badly. An increasingly dangerous corollary of Central Bank currency creation is the purpose to which those funds are put to work. What is not well known is that Central Banks have been buying hundreds of billions of dollars of equities. Since major Central Banks cumulatively hold over $11 trillion of foreign currency reserves, it is natural that they should want to diversify those reserves away from the currencies which are being continuously diluted. Along with steady buying of Gold (which we suggest is the “real money”), the Central Banks are adding equities to the mix/

The Bank of Japan has been buying Japanese ETFs at the rate of $53 billion per year, and now holds over 71% of those ETFs. The bank is now one of the top 5 owner of 81 companies within Japan’s Nikkei 225 index. As reported by Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, the Japanese Financial Services Agency (Japan’s SEC) is now “paying close attention” to this phenomenon.

The European Central Bank has been buying 60 billion euros worth of bonds monthly, and Mario Draghi recently announced a continuation (A hesitancy to back off?) In the meantime, Deutsche Bank CEO, John Cryan, has said: “There has been absolutely no price discovery now in corporate bonds….which is a very dangerous situation”.

The Swiss National Bank has been steadily buying equity securities, including US based companies. Equity securities, as of Q3’16, comprised 20% ($128 billion) of their of their $643 billion in foreign exchange reserves, up from 7% in 2009, including investments of $1.7 billion in Apple, 1.08 billion in Exxon, and $1.2 billion in Microsoft.

Here in the US, our Fed has talked about beginning to unwind our $4.2 trillion balance sheet by no longer reinvesting the funds from securities that are maturing. The result of this form of money “tightening” can only be a guess, especially with an already soft economy.

These are serious amounts of capital being put to work in an increasingly dangerous way. To some extent, Central Banks are biased toward continued equity (and bond) buying, because their absence from the marketplace would cause a price decline and trillions of dollars of “paper losses” on their respective balance sheets. I learned a long time ago (the hard way) that when you become “responsible” for supporting a particular market, the best possible strategy is “get out of the way” and take the current loss before it inevitably becomes much larger. The key question, at this point for Central Banks, now becomes “Sell to Whom?”.

Lastly,  a Wall Street Journal  Headline this morning reads: Bitcoin RIval Arises From Sector Spat. I will write more about Bitcoin, and the other “Cryptocurrencies” in the near future. As a preview: I believe that years from now, books will be written about the current fiscal/monetary world we are living within, and the cryptocurrrencies will be appropriately viewed as symptomatic of the tail end of the financial folly. Stay tuned on this subject and, in the meantime, be careful out there.