Most financial advisors don't need to spend their mornings studying COMEX option chains, warehouse reports or refinery approvals. But occasionally, what's happening behind the headline price can tell us something useful. Two recent developments are good examples. In gold, unusually large concentrations of call-option open interest have developed well above the current market.
Two stories this week offered very different lessons about scarcity and value. U.S. Debt Nears $40 Trillion The U.S. national debt is approaching $40 trillion, a number that was almost unimaginable not long ago. There is nothing magical about the $40 trillion threshold. What matters is the direction. Governments can issue more debt and central banks can create more currency.
Over the past couple of days, financial headlines have been dominated by Japan. Rising government bond yields, pressure on the yen, and the role of U.S. policymakers in helping stabilize markets have all generated plenty of discussion. Like many investors, I started reading because I wanted to better understand what was happening in Japan. I ended up asking a completely different question.
Gold is one of the few assets that grandparents, parents, and grandchildren have all recognized as wealth. Empires have risen and fallen. Currencies have come and gone. Entire industries have been created and destroyed. Through it all, gold has remained gold. That alone should tell us something about its role in a portfolio.
I recently had an incredibly valuable conversation with Alain Gilbert of Gilbert Analytics. Although we theoretically sit on the complete opposite spectrum of gold and precious metals, there is great reason to align and understand both sides.
Do you remember what happened to money in the 1970s? Or after 2008? Or during COVID? Most people remember the headlines from those periods. Fewer remember what was happening underneath. These weren’t just isolated crises tied to oil shocks, housing markets, or a global shutdown. They were different versions of the same underlying pattern playing out. Those were debasement cycles.
(Hint: there is usually no moat) A financial advisor we work with recently arrived at our partner vault facility with thousands of pounds of silver coins in the back of his truck. For years he had been storing them across a ranch in ammo boxes. Yes, real ammo boxes. Most were buried in the ground. Others were hidden in sheds or tucked away in corners of buildings.
I recently had the opportunity to speak with James Murphree the CEO & Economist at Murphree Investment Group, and it turned into one of those conversations that stays with you. We covered two topics that, at first glance, do not seem connected: private credit and silver. One is a 3.4 trillion dollar yield engine embedded deep inside institutional
Inflation is always on the mind of us metal bugs. It comes with the territory. But lately, with the dollar softening and both stocks and metals rising together, it feels less theoretical and more urgent. When everything is going up at once, it’s usually worth stepping back and asking what’s actually happening underneath.
Every time gold or silver rallies, the same question pops up: “Is this the top?” It is the wrong question. Precious metals are not growth stocks or valuation stories. They are monetary assets. Trying to pin a tidy “top” on them misunderstands what bullion is, why it exists, and how it behaves.