Weekend humor
Thoughtful Thursday – What’s Our Money Worth?
by phil - May 5th, 2011 8:18 am
How low can we go?
I made a bottom call on the Dollar at 73 (and a top call on the markets) last week, not because the Dollar is strong but because the alternatives aren’t so hot either. While we have dipped a bit below that line, we are in serious danger of recovering now and I say danger because – as I have pointed out in Tuesday’s post and discussed yesterday as well and as we have long been discussing in Stock World Weekly, the recent equity and commodity gains are nothing more than an illusion based on the fact that their value has been calculated in an ever-weakening dollar.
This is not a small correlation – this is almost an exact correlation between the Dollar (using the UUP ultra-ETF), the S&P (red), oil (green) and gold (gold – that one worked out). I couldn’t put silver (SLV) on the chart because silver is up a ridiculous 120% in the same period and distorts the rest (was 170% last week) but you can view that set here. Note how we’re pulling back this week just because the Dollar STOPPED going lower – what will happen if it actually goes higher?
As I pointed out on Monday, silver was beyond ridiculous when you look at it in terms of the value of your home. The "value" of your home has dropped 78% when priced in silver in just 3 years. Are we to extrapolate that in 3 more years you will have to accept an pound of silver for your home? Surely you have more silver IN YOUR HOME than that!
Homes are something people NEED, food is another thing people NEED, fuel is something people WANT, while metals are things people DESIRE. Thus, as we move from NEED to DESIRE, prices are able to get less and less realistic. This is, in part because we do not have enough metals or even fuel to fulfill everyone’s desires but food is grown and houses are built as the need arises. Yes there are occasional gluts and shortages but, Malthus aside (and, over 100 years later, can we finally put that aside?), we make enough stuff to fulfill people’s needs – most shortages are a distribution problem – including starvation in Africa, a problem that was addressed accurately by the late Sam Kinnison:
Even Tricky Dick Thinks It Is A Bear Market Rally
by Zero Hedge - May 15th, 2009 11:49 pm
Courtesy of Tyler Durden at ZH