We don't have any gold -- but that's only because we don't have any savings.

I am on record (look at my past CathInfo posts going back to 2006)
advising people to buy gold & silver if they have any nest egg to preserve.
Back when it was $700 or even as low as $650 -- and we're talking 2007 here! Imagine putting $50,000 into gold when it was $700, only 3 years ago. It would be $1315 an ounce now. Quite a gain compared to the stock market, eh?

It's a shame I'm not at the stage of life where retirement savings are a possibility. I shake my head at all the baby boomers who have nest eggs tucked away in the Stock Market -- here they've had SO MUCH TIME to prepare (practically a full life that can't be cut short because it's so complete), yet most of them do life "by the book" including investing in the stock market. Let's put it this way -- most modern crappy subdivisions were built FOR the baby boomers. Baby boomers are probably the most un-creative (not able to think outside the box) people I've ever met. No offense to any CathInfo members... But I digress.

I wouldn't be keeping too much in the bank these days, and CERTAINLY not putting anything in the Stock Market. Even money-market accounts aren't totally secure in a situation like today's.

Anyhow, rich people didn't get to be rich by being stupid, especially not by being stupid with money...


Super-Rich Investors Buy Gold by Ton
October 5th, 2010

Via: Reuters:

The world’s wealthiest people have responded to economic worries by buying gold by the bar — and sometimes by the ton — and by moving assets out of the financial system, bankers catering to the very rich said on Monday.

Fears of a double-dip downturn have boosted the appetite for physical bullion as well as for mining company shares and exchange-traded funds, UBS executive Josef Stadler told the Reuters Global Private Banking Summit.

“They don’t only buy ETFs or futures; they buy physical gold,” said Stadler, who runs the Swiss bank’s services for clients with assets of at least $50 million to invest.

UBS is recommending top-tier clients hold 7-10 percent of their assets in precious metals like gold, which is on course for its tenth consecutive yearly gain and traded at around $1,314.50 an ounce on Monday, near the record level reached last week.

“We had a clear example of a couple buying over a ton of gold … and carrying it to another place,” Stadler said. At today’s prices, that shipment would be worth about $42 million.

I agree -- we're all going to have to get used to a new "lifestyle" if we're to survive.

We might have to learn from the rich, just to have enough means to eat. It could get really bad.