the market: stocks, bonds, options, whatever

[ions]

I think that industry (medical industrial complex) is tilted in favor of economic value even tho it isn't as valuable as lets say cocaine or even pot.
The BRICS nations are trading in currencies outside the dollar which is struggling to survive as a reserve currency of global trade.
Real Estate is one of the best investments you can make. The old rule of buy low sell high is good to follow. But sometimes it's better to have that store of value whether it coin or bullion because if it goes up you make money. but if it goes down you buy more. And there's a lot of investments that follow that model.

 

[thujone]

experts recommend 25% in gold in a portfolio.

wtf i don't even have 20% in the stable equities.

this is what i hate about gold "experts", they're allllllways shilling

The dollar is just not a wise choice these days.

who is buying dollars? buy equities. they rise when the dollar falls.

Yeah have enough physical cash on hand to survive 6 months.

if I couldn't withdraw cash for six months, we'd have bigger problems to deal with!

My portfolio is 6% precious. That's only because crypto has outperformed it.
It can be exchanged one to the other which I have. Gold and silver have still performed tho.
It's about triple from the lowest point of my investments. both gold and silver. However the premiums on physical bullion now has increased too.

5% seems normal but that assumes normal cycles persist in the rest of the portfolio.

If SHTF then 20%+ would be appropriate

and there is always a chance of that

but gold bugs have been saying the world is gonna end for decades so...

 

[ions]

if I couldn't withdraw cash for six months, we'd have bigger problems to deal with!

That is likely to happen at some point. We don't know how long it's going to last, or when. You won't be able to withdraw funds from an atm and digital assets will freeze up. It is only getting worse the longer the fed keep printing money without backing (Quantitative easing). We wanted to correct the dollar as early as 2008 when the banking and housing market collapsed and there were corporate bailouts. As is the case with corporate bailouts, intel got one recently.

So how do we get sound money?
End the federal reserve and return to the gold standard.

 

[thujone]

It has been noted that the Euro is often being used in place of the USD when currency is used as the medium of value exchange.

I think someone noted that one of the BEST investments (subject to you having the appropriate licences) is medicines. I don't know how true that is but I know historically pharmacists have spotted that a monopoly is about to exist on a medication and were able to use this knowledge to their benefit.

Isn't that the rule? Only invest in things you understand?

Aspirin is shelf stable for longer than a human lifetime, if there were suddenly a supply shortage it would be great to have a big stash of that.

Aspirin is definitely one of those things that would make ideal currency in a hypothetical post-apocalypic world

But yeah I don't really understand pharma industry so that's why I'm hesitant to invest any in Madrigal despite how good the fundamentals look.

 

[ions]

It's like what is the point of the fed?
It aims to keep stock values high.
and Gold prices down.
However, what you are lacking in that agency is trust and confidence in the dollar. And trust in it depreciates everyday.

 

[thujone]

That is likely to happen at some point. We don't know how long it's going to last, or when. You won't be able to withdraw funds from an atm and digital assets will freeze up. It is only getting worse the longer the fed keep printing money without backing (Quantitative easing). We wanted to correct the dollar as early as 2008 when the banking and housing market collapsed and there were corporate bailouts. As is the case with corporate bailouts, intel got one recently.

So how do we get sound money?
End the federal reserve and return to the gold standard.

Central banks flipped from QE to QT years ago, with the exception of China. There's still too much liquidity in the system but that could all be China. Notice how much stuff China has been buying up lately?

Also, Intel is not getting a bailout anymore. The CHIPS deal was altered so now the USG is buying an equity stake

 

[ions]

you can put a tuxedo on a goat. it's still a goat.
or lipstick on a pig.
It's like a war on drugs is disguised as a war on terror.

 

[ions]

It's like there is good money and bad money.
Blood money and drug money.
Gold good. Crypto good. Drugs good.
Dollar bad.

 

[ions]

A lot of stocks are a bad idea too.
Specifically the FAANG stocks.

 

[ions]

There was a push for biotech a few years back.
and I was wondering whether they meant vaxxines or mushrooms.
Vaxxines is bad money.
Mushrooms is good money.

 

[4DQSAR]

I just wanted to ask if peope are keeping an eye on all the rare elements used in industry.

I just noted that cobalt has gone up in price by 37% in the last year but I suspect that if one were to analyse emerging technoligies, there may stil be elements that currently have limited utility BUT will become more important. I'm sure there are traders who are specialists in this, but I was shocked by how those markets seem designed only for those within industry i.e. they don't normally consider selling them to the public. OK, some are dangerous but if one merely has options, no need to handle them.

There is risk because sometimes when an element becomes commercially important, people look harder. Uranium being the famous example. Breeder reactors were built based on the mistaken figures regarding reserves of uranium and with cobalt, I suggest those African nations didn't even know they had a lot of it until the Chinese were unexpectedly keen to buy the mineral rights.

 

[Cheshire_Kat]

Breeder reactors were built based on the mistaken figures regarding reserves of uranium and with cobalt, I suggest those African nations didn't even know they had a lot of it until the Chinese were unexpectedly keen to buy the mineral rights.

Breeder reactors were not implemented because Uranium is so scarce. They were used because although Uranium is relatively abundant they required plutonium to make smaller and more powerful bombs. Plutonium is a mostly man made element created in these breeder reactors.

If they had been interested in making peace time reactors for energy (electricity) they would have used thorium reactors which are much, much safer and create no plutonium. Thorium is very, very common and a much safer energy source.

 

[4DQSAR]

@Cheshire_Kat - I should have more accurately said that there was only considered a limited amount of uranium that could be extracted. But technology advanced.

Forty Years of Uranium Resources, Production and Demand in Perspective

The "Red Book", jointly prepared by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), was first published in 1965 and has since grown to be a recognised world reference on uranium. Over the 40 years of its existence, the Red Book has collected an impressive...

www.oecd-nea.org

As you say, it turns out, uranium isn't anywhere nearly as rare as thought.

I'm pretty sure most early reactor designs could be used to breed plutonium but I take your point that some were certainly never intended to produce energy.

Thorium reactors have been around for a while and it's certainly an interesting idea BUT it's 233U that actually produces energy and the US made and tested a 233U bomb. So I would suggest that using thorium soesn't by definition means you cannot produce fissile material. In fact the problem of uranium salts being much more volatile than thorium salts was one of the problems designers faced. After all, you don't want all of the fissile material to change phase and become unpredictable.

BTW do you NEED plutonium for a staged weapon or is it just cheaper?

 

[Cheshire_Kat]

Thorium reactors have been around for a while and it's certainly an interesting idea BUT it's 233U that actually produces energy and the US made and tested a 233U bomb. So I would suggest that using thorium by definition means you cannot produce fissile isotopes.

Correct: Thorium is fertile, not fissile. Thorium salt reactors are a very old design, so they already knew at this point what they were doing. A small amount of U233 drives the reaction and is replenished but no heavier elements are created. Plutonium and to a lesser degree Cesium are wastes that were sough after by the military for their use. They chose the dirty reactors on purpose. Now we (the world) have more Plutonium than ever needed and we don't know how to dispose it properly.

PU 239 has a half life of just short of 25,000 years
Cs 135 has a half life of about 2,500,000 year

 

[4DQSAR]

Again, is that inherent to the use of thorium or inherent to the design of the reactor.

Because to be honest, my very first question was 'since the uranium salts are more volatile, couldn't someone use a thorium reactor to breen 233U?'

I honestly don't know - it's only because I knew the US had produced and tested a 233U physics package (bomb). I just read that Russia's very first staged weapon used 233U and now even India has tested a low-yield device.

Please don't mis-read me. I'm in no way attacking the concept of thorium reactors. But I do play devils advocate on the basis that if it's possible, someone will do it.

 

[ions]

APMEX.com is running an at spot sale on a 1g gold bar, limit 1.
The catch is it's like $120 and $200 for free shipping.

 

[thujone]

weird times

not much market reaction from rate decisions this week

gold miners surged again, up 10% yesterday

bull market could be running out of steam

 

[thujone]

keep an eye on Magna

stock was hit hard by the sanctions on Russia

looks like it could be staging a turnaround with some positive earnings

 

[notsmokeymcpot42088]

^lol my bank refused to wire money to APMEX once cuz I was too dumb to remember the what it stood for.

"What is that some mexican fly by night organization"---- Cmon you guys really don't know?

You want futures.

One question there, w/e w/e happens they go defunct dissolve etc who gets they gold first?

"Well that simply doesn't happen"

bah humbug -- Gold has had a hell of a year and I am very glad I pulled my money off the mkt in oct

 

[ions]

BirchGold.