The New Case for Gold

I read Currency Wars, another book written by the author, a while ago. Even though I was impressed by the concept the author presented in that book, I was turned off by his writing style. In that book, the author spent chapters and chapters bragging about himself telling us how great and important he was, perhaps to establish credibility. The reader had to sift through the fluff to get to the gems of wisdom. As you probably already know, that book made the author famous and currency wars is now a widely understood and often quoted concept in mainstream media. This book is very different in that regard. It is concise, to the point, mostly factual and the arguments that the author presents are based on sound economic principles. There is very minimal bragging by the author so hardly any fluff. I was able to finish the book within a weekend reading off an on during the day. I am utterly impressed by the author. He is not only knowledgeable but also a genius who can use his knowledge to visualize the future. His arguments are extremely sound. It is amazing how he explains complex economic concepts in simple language for the regular reader. Most readers will not even realize that he is using Masters or PHD level economic concepts to explain what is happening and what will happen. I have a master's in economics from a top school in the nation so I understand the concepts he is using to arrive at certain conclusions. Another reason I was impressed by this great man is his acknowledgement that he may be wrong. That is the mark of a wise and experienced person because you really never know what will happen in the future. He presents various scenarios on what will unfold in the future without making predictions with certainty. He only suggests that you put 10% of your investible assets in gold. Why? Because he says that even if he is wrong, you will lose minimal amount of money. Even though I have more or less come to the same conclusions as the author and believe that what he is saying is probably right, it is possible that the future may unfold differently. Regardless, read this book! It is worth your time and money. Mr. James Rickards, has done an amazing job this time!

In this latest manifesto and companion volume to his two previous best sellers, Currency Wars and The Death of Money, James Rickards provides cogent arguments for owning gold in any and all economic environments, while demonstrating once again that he is a master storyteller. He begins by debunking the six common reasons that critics cite in making a case against gold as money, taking us through the periodic table of the elements, explaining complex systems, and giving the reader a crash course in economics, discussing nominal and real interest rates, inflation, deflation, and monetary policy. His succinct description of the structure and operations of the Federal Reserve Bank, the Bank for International Settlements, the IMF, the London Bullion Market Association, COMEX, ETF’s and hedge funds, among others, and the historical, current, and future possible manipulation of the price of gold is fascinating, if not terrifying. Rickards has a unique ability to deconstruct and reduce basic arguments and concepts, setting accepted paradigms on their heads while making a case for volatility, chaos and collapse. His characteristic deadpan humor makes this book a pleasure to read (his anthropomorphized water molecules that he uses to explain why old models don’t work is a personal favorite), and I am grateful for his advice on how to be prepared for dire events and the collapse of the international monetary system. His message is clear: while diversification is crucial to any investment strategy, preserving wealth and planning for the oncoming chaos should prompt us all to act—don’t delay, don’t walk, but RUN to your nearest gold dealer.

Rickards does a great job debunking the usual objections to gold. He also reveals the fascinating story of how in 1934 the U.S. government apparently seized over 8,000 tons of gold from the Fed and gave it to the U.S. Treasury, leaving behind "gold certificates" that are still on the Fed's balance sheet to this day. He hypothesizes that this debt of gold is the reason why the Treasury stopped selling gold in 1980. Why won't the U.S. government permit an audit of the supposed 8,000 tons? Rickards maintains that the gold is "safe and sound" and offers a novel excuse for the refusal to audit: allowing an audit would imply that gold is important. "By refusing to do an audit, the government maintains the pretense that gold is trivial." That sounds implausible to me, and I continue to believe that the simplest explanation is most likely to be true: the gold either isn't physically there in the vaults, or if it is there has been leased to bullion banks that have in turn loaned out each ounce a hundred times over and are unlikely to be able to return it to the Treasury. Rickards says gold is going to go to at least $10,000, and worries that conventional brokerage and bank accounts are vulnerable to Putin's team of hackers, but then strangely recommends only a 10% allocation to gold. What are we supposed to do with the other 90% of our savings? He is vague on that point. He recommends fine-art and land, but it seems to me that these are not only unsuitable for average savers, but occupy the same bubble territory as equities and bonds. Would anyone argue that stocks offer a potential 8x upside at this point with little downside as gold does? Rickards also says that he recommends "certain hedge funds and alternative investments …" but offers no details. The book is not a "how to" guide that offers clear step-by-step instructions for acquiring gold. Physical Gold Fund (where Rickards is an adviser) and Sprott are mentioned briefly, as are different vaulting companies. But no details are provided that would help people new to gold get started. The easiest and most economical way to save in gold - the BitGold subsidiary of GoldMoney - is not mentioned, although in Rickards' defense that service is only a year old. In spite of these deficits, though, the book offers a great deal of useful information about gold and definitely succeeds in making the case that everyone should be looking very closely at gold.

As usual James Richards books are very well written and he makes his points crystal clear so anyone can understand. This book The New Case for Gold is no exception! There is no filler talk--he gets right to the point--after giving the WHY (brief history lesson), then the WHEN (what's really going on now) and finally the WHAT (your action steps) James gives you steps for safe options to protect your savings. I find his advice invaluable. Especially good for beginners but also good for more informed folks who want a second opinion or direction. I find many stock brokers have been trained a certain way and have only a micro view--they do not seem to understand the full picture of today's very interdependant world--and James is a MACRO Economist so he knows how all the pieces (market sectors, international currencies, financial warfare, etc) and how they together affect our financial security. I also have read his book The Death of Money which is an incredible concise synopsis of world history which explains way more than what we are taught in history class! It gives the missing pieces so things make sense--ie how we got from past to the present AND what we can do for safe protection--not guestimates.

It's just an old lonely metal. For millennia IT had dominion over the rise and fall of empires, a frequent arbiter between wars' winners and losers. IT was the expression of love, of lust, between lovers, between kings and queens, and is the feared adversary among warriors in conquest. "Gold is a barbarous relic." "Neanderthal", antediluvian" Gold has no yield..no intrinsic value...not enough gold in the world to support finance...caused the Great Depression. But wait. Gold has no maturity risk. Gold has no commodity risk. Gold has no issuer risk. Gold is atomic element number 79 and will not degrade. Gold is physical and not digitally exposed. Gold movements are not subject to government edicts. Gold is a store of value. In the days of Empire, Rome used mostly gold and silver for money until corruption of the elements became anathema to public acceptance. In the early twenties the German Weimar Republic ignored gold in its currency expansion as the mark soon became hyperinflated. In 1931 "The Great Betrayal" caused a wave of panic as the Bank of England defaulted on its obligatory conversion of sterling to gold. In centuries past China saw the fall of an empire as a copper shortage was reflected in coins with iron substitutes. The expensive American War of Independence was reflected in gold and silver coins as values declined to zero in just two years because of government currency intervention. Is gold held by individual citizens at risk of confiscation as happened in 1933 by legislative fiat of the Roosevelt Administration? The author is equivocal on this issue but his words on pages 138 and 139 are worthy of consideration. In the author's Conclusion he writes "my models on systemic risk in capital markets point toward dire events, including the collapse of the international monetary system..." Are we to ignore the warnings of one who is an advisor on international economics to the Department of Defense and the U.S. intelligence community?

This book is just 'okay' in my view, but not great. In order to explain why, let me first say that my interest in gold and silver as a store of wealth is high. I fear the devaluation of the US currency by the Fed just as much as the next guy. When I started reading this, I was actually interested in gold as a potential backing for money in the future and I'd read closely articles that described why gold could reach $8000/oz should our government decide to set up a gold standard at a very low parity. This book contains a lot of similar arguments to that extent. It is interesting at times when it describes why gold has been used as money in the past and why (compared to other natural elements) is the only resource that can ever fulfill the three functions of money. The book talks about the gold position on the Fed's balance sheet and this is also very interesting. With this said, it isn't long until the book becomes a lot of assumptions and loosely structured arguments about what China is doing and what Russia is doing and what is likely with a gold-backed global currency. It discusses manipulation of the gold market and while this is interesting, it is similar to most of the arguments in this book - not academic or supported with a section of notes or a bibliography. It made me think that I wanted to get a perspective that's been well-researched and documented or even reviewed by other scholars. It's one thing to make an argument that sounds good or researched and it's another thing to build an argument on well-documented sources and evidence. So I'd recommend that readers of this book afterward pick up another recently published book, The End of Alchemy: Money, Banking, and the Future of the Global Economy . In it, a former governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, discusses questions about the future of money as well as a return to the gold standard. Because King's book has sources documented, I was referred to a both a great popular book on the role of the gold standard in causing the Great Depression Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World as well as an academic article written by Ben Bernanke on the same subject. I see now that while gold has value and I'll continue to buy some to store my wealth, it'll never become the backing of the US money supply again. I'll let you research that for yourself rather than attempting to explain why. So Richards book is entertaining but it leaves a lot to be desired if your goal is to get a balanced approach to the question of gold's future in our economy. It's a quick read and won't hurt to skim through as it contains a lot of interesting ideas.It's just up to the reader to go and find out how much evidence there really is to support those ideas.

In his newest book, The New Case For Gold, Jim Rickards has produced his most powerful and timely work yet. In a very articulate narrative he explains all the reasons why the average person needs to acquire gold and acquire it NOW. Rickards takes a very complex global monetary and economic subject and puts it into very simple and understandable terms. Whether or not you are an experienced gold advocate or a complete newbie to the world of gold you will learn something. Mr. Rickards is a very smart and accomplished expert in the world of global finance. He uses that expertise to share the big picture and all the "moving parts" that are involved between the major players on the world stage. Rickards gives a thorough historical background of the part gold has played in the world economies. His advice to regular folks who may not be investment savvy and looking for a simple strategy to protect their wealth is to own physical gold as insurance or a hedge against a potential monetary and economic crisis. This book is not just recycling the old justifications for owning gold. Rickards points out the majority of our money and wealth is in a digital form these days. Consequently our portfolios and bank accounts are at very high risk of "cyber financial terrorism"! He warns us that hackers from our international competition are perpetually attempting to break into our government and large financial institutions computer systems to bring them crashing down, reeking havoc and disaster. Physical gold, says Rickards, is a tangible asset that can't be hacked. These are only a few justifications in a long list that Rickards promotes. The New Case For Gold is the most comprehensive work about what's going on in the global economic, monetary and currency wars with the most rational financial strategy for us regular investors. The message: Buy some physical gold NOW while it's still available and affordable. Invest the $15 for the book. It may be the best investment you ever made. TC

James Rickards is a genius. So much of a genius, in fact, that he can patiently and carefully explain complex concepts to the rest of us in plain english. Written in 2016, Rickards makes the case for investing a portion of your assets into physical gold "just-in-case". Nine years later and his 'case for gold' is just as timely as it was when this book was first published. You don't need to be a CPA, Banker, Economist, or even a Gold Bug to enjoy this book and learn how to put Rickard's ideas to work. The gold price in 2016 was $1100 per ounce. Today it's three times that. Tomorrow?

Too short but it was written by somebody who is not a fund manager with an independent view about gold. It’s a pity, and at some point regrettable, his left oriented opinion about Economy

Jim Rickards at his best. Great insight, brilliant exposure, huge back up of facts. Don't miss it, gives you what you need know in these dire straights!

The author gives hint of politics played by big players to keep general people out of holding Gold. It's very rightly said in Hindu scriptures and others that Gold and silver our God's money.

Um sich als Geld zu qualifizieren,muss das jeweilige Medium, klar definierte Ansprüche erfüllen. So muss Geld eine - Zahlungsfunktion - Wertmaßstab - Werterhaltungsfunktion besitzen. Unterzieht man das heute gängige "Fiat money", welches aus dem Nichts geschöpft werde kann, obigen Kriterien, ist zumindest die Werterhaltungsfunktion nicht gegeben. Durch Inflation, verliert ein numerischer Betrag Papiergeld, stetig an Wert. Gold hingegen hat seinen Wert über Jahrtausende nicht eingebüßt. So konnte in der Antike eine Toga für 1 Unze Gold erstanden werden. Auch heute bekommt man für die gleiche Menge Gold eine edlen Herrenanzug. Somit sollte Gold als der feststehende Wermaßstab, gleich einer "Goldenen Konstante" betrachtet werden, um welche die Währungskurse schwanken. Dennoch, oder gerade deshalb, ist Gold als natürlicher Gegner grenzenlos vermehrbaren Papiergeldes, dauernden Anfeindungen ausgesetzt. So wird es als barbarisches Relikt, ohne intrinsichen Wert, welches die große Depression 1929 verursacht haben soll, bezeichnet. Zinslos im Charakter und mengenmäßig nicht ausreichend um Finanzen und Handel zu betreiben. Sämtliche Totschlagargumente entwertet der Autor und arbeitet heraus, dass Gold als Zahlungsmittel eine Währung darstellt, welche, in Anbetracht des fehlenden Gegenparteienrisikos, kein zinstragendes Investment, sondern eine Währung und global akzeptiertes Zahlungsmittel ist. Doch scheint das reine Papiergeldsystem, durch die exponentielle Aufzinsung der Verschuldung, an seine Grenzen gelangt zu sein. Finanzielle Instabilität, unerträgliche Schuldenstände und die stete Vergrößerung der Vermögensunterschiede, sind logische und unabwendbare Konsequenzen, welche mit dem Betreiben eines ungedeckten Geldsystems einhergehen. Umso mehr ist die Politik bestrebt, den natürlichen Marktkräften, welche eine Bereinigung der Fehlallokationen durch Deflation anstreben, zu widerstehen und Gold als sicheren Hafen nicht in die Aufmerksamtkeit der breiten Masse zu rücken. So wird der Goldpreis, seit der Aufkündigung des Goldstandards durch Präsident Nixon im Jahr 1971, "gemanagt" Dies auch vor dem Hintergrund, dass Schwellenländer, allen voran, China, als Nettokäufer, ihre Goldbestände auf ein Niveau anheben können, welches sie befähigt, bei einer anstehenden Neuausrichtung des Finanzsystems, eine Absicherung ihrer Staatsanleihenbestände zu besitzen und andererseits auch gleibhberechtigter Partner bei derartigen Verhandlungen zu sein. Der breiten Bevölkerungsmasse werden Gold und Bargeld, als nicht mehr zeitgemäßes Relikt präsentiert und langsam, durch die Implementierung bargeldloser Zahlungsmethoden, in den vollkommen digitalisierten Zahlungsverkehr geführt. Dieser liefert die Bürger der Willkür des Staates aus, welcher damit uneigeschränkten Zugriff auf das Vermögen besitzt. Es ist dies ein schleichender Prozess, welcher bereits vor ca. 100 Jahren mit der Abschaffung von Goldmünzen, zu goldbesichertem Papiergeld, über ungedecktes Papiergeld, hin zur rein digitalen Zahlungsform, und damit der Abschaffung des Bargelds, reicht. Gold in physischem, privaten Besitz, bietet eine Werterhaltungsfunktion, bei der, wie auch immer sich präsentierenden Neuausrichtung des Finanzsystems und schützt vor direktem staatlichen Zugriff, auf diesen Teil des Vermögens. Allerdings, so lehrt die Geschichte, legte der Staat auch regelmäßig die Hand auf den privaten Goldbesitz. So war dieser in den USA von 1933 bis 1973 verboten. Insgesamt ein sehr lehreiches, kompaktes Buch, von einem Insider der Materie, welches neue Ein- und Ausblicke auf die Entwicklung des Finanzsystems bietet und welche Maßnahmen der Einzelene, zu Vorbereitung auf die kommenden Ereignisse, ergreifen sollte.

Great read as usual from Jim Rickards