Skip to footer

Could gold really be on the ropes?

When looking at gold you can be an expert in the fairy tale aspect or accept the fact that it is the ultimate Greater Fool trade, for better or for worse. With levels reading 1500 an ounce, at least one analyst thinks the hallowed metal may be flirting with breaking under.

|
Yuriko Nakao/Reuters/File
Gold bars are displayed during a photo opportunity at the Ginza Tanaka store in Tokyo, in this September 2009 file photo. With current gold prices levels reading 1500 an ounce, at least one analyst think the hallowed metal may be flirting with breaking under.

I'm not a technical analyst by training although I've been forced to both respect and understand technicals over the last 15 years the hard way. The shop I work at has integrated a technical discipline into everything we do on the analytics side, which frankly has been a big help to me in terms of risk management and understanding the supply/demand picture from 50,000 feet up.

When looking at gold ($GLD), you can be an expert in the fairy tale aspect of it and cite episodes from Ancient Sumeria as proof of its value - or you can grow up and accept the fact that it is literally the ultimate Greater Fool trade, for better or for worse.  Since there are no earnings produced from gold we really only have supply and demand to go by, and that is why the technicals are really all that matter with this particular "asset class." I'm speaking to an audience of 6000 gold bugs in Vancouver next Monday, if I should disappear as a result of this post, please give my blog to Tadas Viskanta and my Twitter handle to Joe Weisenthal, as per my living will.

Anyway, 150 seems like a pretty important level for $GLD (1500 for an ounce of gold) and it seems to be flirting with breaking under as we speak. 

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Could gold really be on the ropes?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/The-Reformed-Broker/2012/0530/Could-gold-really-be-on-the-ropes
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe