Sophisse

Twenty-Two Years of Job Creation Wiped Out in a Single Day

I would like to give a thumbs-up to Robert Heath's comment and a thumbs-down to the original article.

Yield Curve Near 10-Year Highs

I agree with the previous poster. I think the yield curve sees future nominal growth, hence the high rates - but inflation could eat all of those nominal gains and then some.

But I'm probably wrong.

Defining a Depression

Thanks for the well-thought-out and original thinking. I still hope you're wrong though :)

The Next Crisis Is on the Horizon

Thanks for this interesting article. I do find it fascinating that I can read arguments for deflation, and arguments for inflation, and find both to be equally well-reasoned and well-supported.

Where Have All the Peak Oil Believers Gone?

I wish there were more to this article than: "the price shot up, all price spikes are bubbles, now the price dropped, QED".

You appear to be a trader. You get your information from the market and market wisdom. But if you're predicting the future of oil, surely some thought should be devoted to actual oil fields, consumption, etc.

Similarities to U.S. 1937, Japan 1998

You wrote that, after 1929 "policy makers did all they could to get things going again, focusing mostly on fiscal policy and creating jobs. Over the next several years, this had the unintended consequence of creating too much inflation."

You seem to be skipping over about 4 years. 1929-1933 was a period of severe deflation. The primary government response was to try to balance the budget, which meant spending cuts and tax increases since the tax base was eroding so significantly. This approach worked so badly that Roosevelt was elected to try a new approach.

While the stock charts may look similar, government response was strikingly different than it is today.

The Family Foresight Thought Experiment

A very good perspective to keep in mind, at a time when today's dramatic price fluctuations seem to be shortening our time horizons - well, mine anyway.

The Strange Case of Dr. GLD & Mr. Bullion

Tom said: "As for GLD shares held by investors being redeemable into physical gold - they aren't."

Tom - you are incorrect. Read the prospectus, specifically "creation and redemption" on page 3, here: www.spdrgoldshares.com...

Only "authorized participants" can do this, not the ordinary joe who buys some GLD with his schwab account. Authorized participants are professional investors like banks, brokers, hedge funds, etc. By buying GLD, you are trusting those participants to arbititrage any difference between GLD and actual gold, by creating or redeeming shares.

If you can't trust banks, brokers, and hedge funds to want to make money for themselves, then yes you better own your own gold - and keep it under your mattress, because you never know when your local bank - or the government - or the illuminati - will steal the contents of your safe deposit box.

The Strange Case of Dr. GLD & Mr. Bullion

I can't really understand why there is any discussion on this issue. The author's "disconnect" is not there, end of story.

Why is this so certain? Because GLD is supposed to be tied to the physical gold spot price, which you can find in nice graphs here: www.kitco.com/charts/l... . And you can find historical prices for GLD at yahoo here finance.yahoo.com/q?s=... or wherever you like.

So look at them. Is there a discrepency? Answer: no.

I think it is an interesting question of why gold coins are out of stock while at the same time the spot price is down. Perhaps traders are selling while survivalists are buying? I'd be interested in the answer, but it has nothing to do with GLD.

If I'm wrong, please correct me!

A Glut of Petroleum Products

To summarize your numbers:
- distillate inventory is ~9m bpd over average (about 7%)
- gasoline inventory is ~6m bpd over agerage (about 3%)
- crude inventory is ~35m bpd below average (about 12%)

The Oil Bubble Will Meet the Same Fate as Tech, Housing

There is a significant difference between the oil price rises and the other bubbles you mention: oil is not an asset. Internet stocks and real estate are both assets, in that they are not consumed. When I buy them, I can't use them, I need to either hold them for their revenue stream or sell them to another investor.

Oil is not an asset, it gets used up by the final buyer.

Oil futures are assets. A bubble in oil futures would qualify as an asset bubble. But since oil futures expire into actual oil, such an asset bubble would necessarily be pricked at expiration time. For bubble students, this maps to the dutch tulip bubble centuries ago.

I'm not so naive as to suggest that futures prices have zero effect on spot prices, but the non-asset nature of oil is a critical aspect of this price rise that needs to be addressed by any bubble theory.

Confirmatory Bias and Oil Investing

I love this article! You encounter the concept of confirmation bias, and you immediately fall in love with it because it confirms your bias that oil bulls are misled. LOL!

I completely agree with your thought that all investors need to be concerned with confirmation bias, and I highly recommend The Black Swan for that concept and others. However it is a risk and pitfall that every investor needs to struggle against (with the possible exception of index investors).

I agree with you about the peak oil crowd, but the same applies to the oil bubble crowd.

Offshoring Is a Dubious Policy When the Question is Oil Drilling

Great article, thanks.

Dollar Hurt by Geopolitical Concerns and High Oil

It does seem like question of which is the cause, which is the effect, is worthy of some comment.

The Long Case for Canadian Oil Sands Trust

You can read what Sprott thinks about peak oil here: www.sprott.com/peakoil... . As you can see, he saw this trend coming long before the current wave of excitement.