Post by
PGMBOY on Jan 31, 2005 3:05am
$800 - $1000 GOLD IS CONSERVATIVE
Embry: $800-$1000 gold is conservative
Dorothy Kosich
'31-JAN-05 05:00'
VANCOUVER--(Mineweb.com) Sprott Asset Management Chief Investment Strategist John Embry is adamant that gold will hit at least $800 per ounce as "paper money is going to hell in a handcart."
In a presentation to the Mining Exploration Roundup in Vancouver, Embry said he believes even a $1,000/oz gold price may be conservative. Meanwhile, he reasserted his steadfast contention that the gold price continues to be manipulated.
Many people have problems with envisioning a significantly higher gold price "because 20-year bear markets tend to result in mind sets that take a long time to change," Embry declared. "The vast majority of today's investors have been involved in markets for less than 25 years, so they have no recollection of the last big gold bull market which ended in 1980."
Embry expressed his disgust at recent remarks by Jessica Cross of Virtual Metals" which I think really took the cake." Cross had remarked that gold jewelry is losing its gilt-edged status, and defined "the modern British jewelry lover as someone who drapes their body with hunks of worthless 9 carat gold crap. ...This is putting off the traditional and wealthy gold buyers."
Embry declared that it should be taken into account that "Ms. Cross is married to the former number two at the South African Central Bank, James Cross. You might draw the conclusion that she is not exactly unbiased on this subject given central bankers' current attitudes toward gold.
Steadfast in his belief that the gold market is being manipulated, Embry told the audience "it would be extremely naive to believe that clandestine intervention is not occurring today."
"It appears that central banks are unwilling to allow the gold price to repudiate their excessively loose monetary policies," he wrote in a paper published last August.
"This time, a new group of central bankers, equally as myopic as their forebears, are at it again with considerably greater gusto and infinitely more subterfuge. They are doing it covertly in an allegedly free market by leasing their gold into the market through their bullion bank associates. As near as we can determine, they have pumped as many as 500 million ounces into the market over the last 10 or 12 years," Embry declared in his speech.
He added that he tends to agree that "the U.S. has seriously abused its role as the world's reserve currency and the redressing of this will be very painful. Whether the U.S. dollar is fated to fall dramatically or whether other countries will aggressively resist the fall by debasing their own currencies remains to be seen, but my suspicion is that we will probably see a considerable amount of both."
"In either case, gold will reassert itself as the only currency which represents a true store of value so the current weakness represents a glorious buying opportunity," said the renown gold bug. "I am greatly encouraged in my negative views on the U.S. dollar by the fact that the world's greatest investor, Berkshire Hathaway's Warren Buffet has $20 million of Berkshire's assets denominated in foreign currencies. To my knowledge, this is his first major currency bet and he tends to be right an awful lot of the time."
Meanwhile, imports of gold into Turkey were up 129% year-over-year in the most recent month, according to Embry, adding "the Arbas may be prepared to trade in more of their U.S. dollars for alternatives like gold."
Embry said that a bullion deal in New York recently told him that they cannot keep up with physical demand in Switzerland "and all the world's gold refineries are running full out trying to keep up with overall demand. This is very important because physical off take is the key to breaking the stranglehold that the Comex paper traders have maintained on the gold price to date. Their recent machinations are providing physical buyers with cheap gold and they can't believe their good fortune."
"The only things you have to know to believe in gold at this juncture is that paper money is going to hell in a handcart, thus fuelling investment demand for gold, there is already an enormous gap between gold demand and mine supply that has been filled by central bank gold, and the central banks soon will not be able to fill that role. That equation adds up to dramatically higher gold prices," Embry declared.
In an article soon to be published in "Investors Digest," Embry wrote, "The commercials (i.e., the bullion banks), as they have done many times before, had gone extremely short and, yet again, reaped significant short-term profits when the price broke (aided incidentally by considerable official intervention). However, it must be remembered that bullion banks have been steadily on the short side from the time gold bottomed at $252 several years ago."
"So, although they are winning numerous battles, they are slowly but surely losing the war," Embry asserted. He claimed that "any U.S. dollar rally will be transitory and that we are also nearing the moment when the public questions the value of all paper currencies, not just the U.S. dollar."
Meanwhile, U.S. gross external liabilities are approximately 11 times export earnings while net liabilities are about three times exports. "The later figure resembles those of crisis-prone Latin American economies," Embry wrote. "Whether the U.S. dollar is fated to fall dramatically, or whether other countries will aggressively resist the fall by debasing their own currencies remains to be seen, but my suspicion is that we will probably see a bit of both."