23. November 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

 Something is persuading people to buy gold, driving the price to and past $1,100 per ounce, from about $270 at the beginning of this decade, and around $700 when the financial crisis first hit.This is not mere panic buying by a herd of small investors trying to benefit from what is called a momentum play. John Paulson (no relation to Hank), the investor who made $20 billion for his hedge fund between 2007 and 2009 by betting on a collapse of the financial and housing markets, is betting on gold in a big way. Paulson & Co already holds $3 billion in gold-related investments (including AngloGold Ashanti and Kinross Gold), and Paulson has just seeded a new gold-related fund with some $250m of his own funds. His modest objective: appreciation at a rate higher than the increase in the price of gold itself.

Serious money in the gold market these days read more at the TIMES here.

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15. November 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

GOLD $5000+ 11/11/09

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14. November 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

Gold and silver receive special treatment in the tax code. Considered collectibles, not capital assets, they don’t qualify for the maximum 15% tax rate on long-term capital gains. Instead, gains on the sale of gold and silver investments, including gold- and silver-backed ETFs, and gold bullion and coins (except certain U.S.-issued coins), are taxed at a maximum rate of 28% when such investments have been held for more than a year. When these assets are held for less than one year, gains are taxed as ordinary income.

See more here on how Gold and Silver investments are taxed in the USA. Barrons by subscription. Click here.

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20. June 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

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12. April 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

As playwright Arthur Miller once observed, “An era can be said to end when its basic illusions are exhausted.” And most of the illusions that defined the late global economic boom—the notion that global growth had moved to a permanently higher plane and housing prices from Miami to Mumbai would rise indefinitely—are now indeed exhausted. Yet one idea still has the power to capture imaginations and markets: it is that commodities like oil, copper, grains and gold are all destined to rise over time. Lots of smart people believe that last year’s swoon in commodities prices represented a short pause in a long-term bull market.

According to an article in Time magazine the bull market that ended last summer saw oil prices rise tenfold over nine years, mirroring the duration and magnitude of the previous bull market, which ended in 1979. That was followed by a bear market that lasted 20 years. If history is any guide, we’re only at the beginning of another long one.

My comment, as always commodities and commodity stocks are meant to traded.

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3. March 2009 by Dan Walkow, CFA, CMT.

Amid all the maket carnage gold has begun a retreat from the 1000 dollar mark. Could this be a double top in the short term?

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