patrick.net

What do you mean?

Prices may retrench significantly before heading up again.

NOT INVESTMENT ADVICE

Linda,

I believe the Fed was set up to "fight inflation". Keeping USD strong is one of the ways to do it. But when Fed came into being, we didn't have a huge national debt, no medicare or SS shortfall, and we were still the manufacturing powerhouse of the world. When I was a kid (in the 70s), I had some milk cans dating back to the 50s (I think it is Kilm) passed down from grandparents with which I stored my toys, and the cans were so sturdy and well built that whenever my parents saw them, they kept saying, "see, made in America means superior quality." I am not sure if such an image still exists today.

So in a way, it is not all the fault of this admin. We happen to have a very corrupted and incompetent BushCo at the tail end of a long unsustainable path. If we had a more competent admin, these problems would still stare at us in the face, but at least we could prolonge it or dig a bit out of the hole instead of digging deeper.

I think "strategically" devaluing USD is exactly what this admin has in mind as an easy way out.

Isn’t the Fed’s main job to keep the USD strong, along with low unemployment,and controlled inflation?

* The mission of the Fed is to create a utopia
* Utopia does not exist

Conclusion: the Fed will fail

Dream on, baby.

During his testimony at the congress, Bernanke raised serious concerns about inflation. Unfortunately, his words were misinterpreted (and later corrected) by the press. He's going to keep raising the rates and bust gold.

Owneroccupier,

Finally, you see the light! I've been saying this for a while now. The worst part is that Americans are on average a very unhealthy bunch, so I anticipate them getting ill early into retirement, further exacerbating the medicare cost problems.

That is fine, I am waiting for his action. Action speaks louder than words. I am ready to jump back into USD whenever I see concrete actions.

Bernanke needs to choose between high inflation and high unemployment. It will be an interesting choice.

"misinterpreted (and later corrected) by the press"

I wouldn't put too much stock in the words of Maria B.

Me, too. I believe the latter choice of "high" is more likely.

No, it has nothing to do with M.B. (or B.M.W.).

If you go over the transcript of his testimony, you'll see that the initial press reports were off the mark.

GC,

Yeah yeah, your all encompassing theory about the ruling class screwing everybody else...I get it.

I gave up.

Destruction of the US dollar will have grave impacts on a lot of other currencies of nations running trade surpluses with the US but lacking local markets capable of picking up the slack. That's why the economic house of cards keeps having more cards stacked on it by all the players.

Think Asia, Mexico etc.

Owner Occupier is right, it doesn't mean anything if the US dollar is dropping against gold - the valuation of gold itself may remain constant to some degree against other currencies or in pure purchasing power.

Don't think what happened with peso devaluation etc can happen in the US? Think again:

If all oil producing countries switch to Euro the rest of the world would dump the Dollar causing it to drastically lose its value. To understand the seriousness of this let us look at China alone. China has an excess of $800 billion in its foreign exchange reserves and may increase to $1 trillion soon. China buys most of its oil from Saudi Arabia and trade between the two countries has exceeded $14 billion in late 2005. In 2006 China also entered into government-to-government deals with Saudi Arabia. Iran is also a major supplier. If China alone dumps the Dollar the American economy would suffer greatly. Now imagine what would happen if other countries, such as Japan, India, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia and all the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) countries, would also dump the Dollar.

source: http://www.americandaily.com/article/12589

This same line of reasoning is widely reported elsewhere, just google "destruction of the US dollar".

US and Canadian dollars will be at par in the next two years - that's not just an appreciation of the Canadian dollar, it's a devaluation of the US buck. this is a stunning turn of events from the $.63 Canadian dollar of 3 years ago.

And even though the Saudis etc are going to make a pile on those last barrels of oil they squeeze out of the sands in the next 20 years, when the oils gone, where will those final petrodollars flow?

I think gold is a good bet to go higher.

People are going to laugh at the present California housing prices in 20 years the same way people make fun of dutch tulip crazes.

Severe economic shocks are coming, look out below.

tsusiat,

"US and Canadian dollars will be at par in the next two years - that’s not just an appreciation of the Canadian dollar, it’s a devaluation of the US buck. this is a stunning turn of events from the $.63 Canadian dollar of 3 years ago."

Don't I know it! Lee Valley is becoming quite expensive for me.

Canadian may go as high as 1.2 USD, my gut feeling tells me.

Forget about what he says. Because he can only say things he is allowed to say.

It boils down to what choices one has. US is extremely leveraged as a nation. You have to raise interest to at least above 8% (the true neutral rate) to stop gold's ascend, but that will send lots of people, and consequently US consumer economy into recession. Or, he can sit back and let USD tank, and inflation run wild a bit. The better part of it is, Fed is, or has lost control of how things can unfold. We are giving Bernanke too much credit, most of USD are not sitting in America, they are hoarded by the Arabs, Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, all countries that have a trade surplus with us. What they do with USD not only depends on economic benefits, but also how much they like us. Human emotions is definitely a part of international politics.

In the end, if he is not afraid of high unemployment which may cause social instability amongst all this illegal immigration backlashes, outsourcing fears, etc. Kudos to him. We will see.

O.O., how did you get this 8% number?

go to shadow government statistics site.

I don't trust official CPI any more, we all know it is cooked.

tsusiat,

do you have historical CAD exchange rate dating back further than the 1990? Thanks.

I know CPI is cooked. But 8% sounds too high to me. I believe 5-6% is a more reasonable number.

I understand that many have complained about the government fudging of statistics. But, conspiracy theories are just conspiracy theories. Someone raised a good point: Most beauracrats at BLS were appointed during the Clinton Adminstration; they don't have a strong incentive to help the Bush & Co, especially by doing so they would expose themselves to future prosecution.

OO & Tsusiat
I still think CDs in euros are a stong, conservative approach for my HAHAs. If oil moves to euros, they will rise against the USD.
Now I've never looked deeply into these markets. Perhaps theres something I missing in my thinking.
Since I sold my house, I don't want to gamble with my cash...but I don't want it devalued over the next few years either. At some point I will invest in real estate again....for that is where my interest lies. Until then...euros?
I've put a call into Everbank.

SQT, I emphatically agree. I expect to make money from speculation in these bubbles, on both the long and the short sides, for now I suddenly found a few good causes to make money.

GC,

all we are saying is just personal assessment. We can check back in a few months or a few years to see how right or wrong we are, and why. I'd like to do that.

O.O., that is fair.

Linda,

do whatever you feel comfortable, after all, you need to sleep tight at night, that is what counts.

He’s going to keep raising the rates and bust gold.

It all depends whether people believe in gold psychologically.

* If he pauses dollar will fall and people will rush to gold.

* If he continues to hike people will see that as a sign of higher inflation risk and they will rush to gold.

See, it is all psychological.

NOT INVESTMENT ADVICE

I sense that quite a few people on this board are on the long side of Au. Correct?

I'm not going long on gold, but I do see the possibility of a tremendous run up and going in now will have relatively little downside.

I won't be so optimistic. But then again, I espouse strange theories.

GC,

Alas, we're social creatures. Fortunately or unfortunately, what we say can be held against us.

OO--

Stats Canada are annoying as all get out, they want to SELL all their stats. It is a lot easier to get info on the US economy, but I will see what I can find...

I’m not going long on gold, but I do see the possibility of a tremendous run up and going in now will have relatively little downside.

Downside is limited because it cannot fall below $0. :)

Gold can be very risky. One can still lose money going long in a major bull market if the timing is bad.

NOT INVESTMENT ADVICE

That's why I said I wouldn't be so optimistic.

Owneroccupier,

I'll see what I can dig up via my school account.

In the end, it is all about wealth transfer. I missed on boat. I won't miss the new ones coming ashore.

In real dollars, gold is still pretty low priced. It is merely getting expensive relative to the dollar, because the dollar has devalued so much.

Of course, gold could fall to $20/oz, but I highly doubt that because of the psychological support for gold. It'll take a big bubble to burst that perception.

OO--

This site will let you do daily rates for Bank of Canada all the way back to 1996:

http://www.bankofcanada.ca/en/rates/exchform.html

Here's a good summary of the situation vis a vis the dollars from the CBC:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/dollar_cdn/

OO--

this site will let you retrieve the historical exchange rates back to 1971:

http://fx.sauder.ubc.ca/data.html

And cool enough, it is at UBC in Vancouver...

stupid world bank! seems to have every asinine stat except for exchange rate

Interesting, the loony was basically at parity during the last energy crisis.