Gold and FN talk....I found this at
https://forums.sympatico.ca/WebX/WebX.cgi?13@154.CKPJbdLfWzj^2@.efd1600/9
where we have some interesting discussions going on about Gold, the Economy, Interest Rates, etc.
HAPPY NEW YEAR
LouP
Franco Nevada From Bill Bonner, some GOLD talk.
I direct your attention to a study of the gold price done by Paul van Eden, quoted here many months ago. Van Eden noted that the price of gold varies inversely with the foreign exchange value of the dollar. As the dollar goes down on global markets, the price of gold goes up. Gold is the dollar's nemesis.
Gold is an enigma. It is money...it is a store of value...and it is a useful commodity - all at the same time. When people have confidence in paper money - they don't need gold as money, and it trades like a commodity. But when they begin to lose confidence in paper money and paper assets, gold's monetary features become attractive.
"Gold is the only asset," says Doug Casey, "that is not also someone else's liability." Recently, it was disclosed that Paul Allen, Bill Gate's fellow multi-billionaire at Microsoft had placed a "collar" on $3.5 billion worth of his shares. In effect, Allen had a put option that protected him on the downside. Unlike the fantasy "Greenspan Put," the Allen Put was real. But it meant that someone on the other side of the trade was taking a big loss. The speculator's "asset" (the right to profit as MSFT shares rose in price) turned into a huge liability. As the credit bubble deflates, many of these speculators will go broke. Genius will fail.
The speculators will go broke and be unable to make good on their commitments. Thus, not only the speculator's asset will turn into a liability...but Paul Allen's asset could be at risk too.
There are, of course, people who are long gold...and those who are short the metal. But unhedged gold has no creditors...no bills to pay...no `burn rate'...no balance of payments to worry about.
It is its eternal lifelessness that makes gold a valuable asset. It may go nowhere...but neither does it disappear.
This quality is especially valuable when other forms of money run into the trouble and wealth disappears. Already, more than $3 trillion has disappeared from U.S. capital markets. Yet, except for a roll of coins I seem to have misplaced, not a single ounce of gold has been lost.
But how to invest in gold? How about a gold mining company that has no debt, a half billion in cash and which you can buy today for only about a half as much as it would have cost you a year ago? At a recent price - about C$15 - the company had cash and securities to cover nearly 50% of the market capitalization.
The company is Franco-Nevada, recently the subject of a review in Grant's Interest Rate Observer. "The most prominent feature of the Franco-Nevada income statement," report the Grants team, "other than its 45% net profit margin, is that its single largest expense is income taxes."
A handy comparison chart provided by the interest rate observers shows that Franco-Nevada can hold its own in any company. Comparing the figures for the 9 years ending calendar 1999 (or fiscal 2000), Franco, at 27.4%, has greater annualized revenue growth per share than Intel and only slightly less than Microsoft. Its net income per share growth rate is three times Coca-Cola and 50% more than Fannie Mae. And its growth in book value per share is roughly the same as Fannie Mae, more than Intel and more than twice Coca Cola's.
Yet, the share prices are hardly comparable. Recently, you could have bought five shares of Franco-Nevada for every share of Microsoft or Intel.
"What exactly does this enterprise do?" asks Grants. "It cashes royalty checks. It owns a portfolio of more than 60 royalties in six countries (some 87% of its revenues are derived from U.S. mines). Precious metals constitute almost 90% of the royalty-producing resource base, of which gold amounts to 75% to 80%. Platinum and palladium fill out the balance of the metals resources. Other assets include five million acres of undeveloped land...This land the company makes available for exploration and development by contract operators..."
"Even one meaningful success," Grants quotes Steven Bregman of Contrarian Research, "could be enormously additive to the Franco-Nevada future cash flow and current net asset value."
Cashing royalty checks must be a good business. "In the years 1991-2000," Grants continues, "its average after-tax profit margin was no less than 57.1%." And, Franco, "if it were ever blessed with a gold bull market, would earn considerably more than the already stunning returns it has managed to generate in a gold bear market."
No one can predict the future - a point I make often and demonstrate frequently. But if this is one of those times when people lose confidence in paper assets - holding Franco-Nevada shares should make the whole spectacle more amusing.
Bill Bonner