What Happens To Gold Stocks In A Crisis?

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Doug Casey’s Take

Episode: What Happens to Gold Stocks in a Crisis?
Host: Matthew Smith
Guest: Doug Casey
Date: February 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this subscriber Q&A episode, Doug Casey—best-selling author, speculator, and libertarian philosopher—answers questions on crisis investing, with a focus on gold stocks during market turmoil. Alongside host Matthew Smith, Doug discusses the nature of sound money, the impact of financialization on assets like Bitcoin and silver, the prospects for real estate in Argentina, risks with small business investing, and the perennial value and pitfalls of precious metal stocks. The episode is rich with contrarian insights, practical anecdotes, and historical context.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Bitcoin: Currency, Speculation, and Financialization

• Is Bitcoin still a viable currency, or just a speculative asset?
  • Doug explains Bitcoin meets Aristotle’s criteria for sound money: durability, divisibility, convenience, consistency, use value, and the inability to be created out of thin air ([02:10–03:50]).
  • Host and Doug both see Bitcoin as worthwhile to own, but note how financialization—introduction of futures and derivative products—has changed its price behavior, making it feel less genuine as a “real” market ([05:14–08:00]).
• Notable quote:

  “People want to get rid of the crappy money and keep the good money... That’s why we don’t use wheat as money, why we don’t use real estate as money.” — Doug Casey [02:00]

  “As soon as [Bitcoin] started to be financialized ... the pricing changed. It took the wind out of the sails, like gold after futures trading began.” — Matthew Smith [05:32]

2. Argentina Real Estate Opportunities

• Where to invest in Argentina?
  • Doug recommends Buenos Aires (BA) apartments for accessibility and value (BA apartments at ~10% the cost of New York’s). Raw land is cheap but complicated to own/manage (squatters, illiquidity). Doug shares personal stories of owning vast tracts in Patagonia and Salta ([12:44–18:46]).
• Strategy note:

  “If you got a New York apartment, I think a great arbitrage would be to sell it and buy one in BA now.” — Doug Casey [13:52]

  • Biggest risks with raw land: management and squatters.

3. Investing in Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)

• Risks and headwinds:
  • Doug observes he doesn't directly invest in SME rollups but sees opportunity in the “silver tsunami” (aging founders with no succession plans).
  • Major headwinds are general macro risks and the weakening of the lower-end consumer base ([19:17–21:12]).

4. Gold Miners: Analyst Rerating and Crisis Dynamics

• Is the rerating thesis for gold miners valid?
  • Doug believes miners remain undervalued; gold and silver have reached a new equilibrium, but the market hasn’t priced this in yet ([21:57–23:05]).
• Geopolitical risks:
  • Operations in places like Mali face political dangers: war, nationalization, unreliable governments ([24:21–25:53]).
• Mining stocks in a crisis:
  • In a severe market downturn, miners may initially fall with the market (like 2008), but “rebound differently.” Central bank buying could create a floor under gold ([65:14–71:28]).
• Notable quote:

  “It’s a crappy business, but it’s a great place to be right now because these stocks are really cheap. Cheaper than they should be. Way cheaper.” — Doug Casey [26:15]

5. Financialization of Assets & Market Distortions

• Bitcoin, silver, and derivatives:
  • Financial engineering (derivatives, futures) distorts underlying market prices, creating volatility disconnected from fundamentals ([56:58–58:19]).
  • The same systemic risks are evident with Bitcoin, silver, and in legacy systems like fractional reserve banking ([63:48–64:34]).
• Notable quote:

  “Markets become casinos when financialization takes over—they’re distorted far beyond the underlying.” — Matthew Smith [57:39]

6. Religion, Civilization, and Free Markets

• Gibbon and Rome’s moral decline:
  • Doug critiques the notion that Christianity directly fostered Western greatness or free markets, instead arguing that Christianity undermined martial/ancient virtues ([30:05–39:20]).
• Notable quote:

  “Don’t mix up religion with science. They’re two separate things.” — Doug Casey [39:13]

7. Strategic Minerals & Government Stockpiling

• Case study: Aries Strategic Mining (Fluorspar):
  • Doug sees potential for government favoritism if the US builds strategic stockpiles, but warns government involvement always ends badly, except for well-connected insiders ([40:58–43:38]).

8. New Films and Cultural Decay

• Hosts discuss the dystopian themes of “One Battle After Another” and recent trends in U.S. cinema—loss of the middle class, decline of Western values ([43:38–47:33]).

9. Gold Taxation and Tier 1 Assets

• Clarifies that gold’s new status as a “tier one” central bank asset has no bearing on its collectible tax treatment. Taxes will rise as governments desperately seek revenue ([47:33–49:02]).

10. Japanese Market and Global Capital Flows

• Interest rates rising in Japan may unwind carry trades, pushing capital into Japanese equities at Western expense ([50:02–52:50]).

11. Fractional Reserve Banking and Usury

• Doug denounces fractional reserve banking as a fraud, but sees lending (credit) as essential for modern economies ([59:28–63:48]).

12. Stop Losses in Gold Miners

• Doug doesn’t use stop losses, citing volatility and the risk of being whipsawed by market manipulation. He favors holding quality miners for the long-term trend ([72:00–74:51]).
• Notable quote:

  “Buy something that’s good...and just hold on to it. I don’t believe in stop losses. I’m not using them right now.” — Doug Casey [74:20]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Bitcoin’s evolution:

  “Bitcoin’s pure form has been adulterated.” — Matthew Smith [08:55]

• On mixing gold with faith:

  “Don’t mix up religion with science...Religion has nothing to do with free markets.” — Doug Casey [39:13]

• On government stockpiling:

  “What has the government ever done in business that ended well? The answer is never.” — Doug Casey [41:50]

• On gold miner investing:

  “Crappy business—but a great place to be right now.” — Doug Casey [26:15]

• On stop losses:

  “If you’re a little guy playing around where elephants are dancing, you’re gonna get stomped on. Buy something good and hold.” — Doug Casey [73:53]

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Important Timestamps & Sections

• [01:21] – Doug’s overview of Bitcoin’s viability as money
• [05:14–08:00] – Discussion on Bitcoin’s financialization and market changes
• [12:44–18:46] – Real estate in Argentina: BA apartments vs. raw land
• [19:17] – Risks in scaling and rolling up small businesses
• [21:57–26:30] – Gold miners, analyst ratings, Barrick’s earnings, and sector outlook
• [65:14–71:28] – What happens to gold stocks (and gold) in a financial crisis?
• [72:00–74:51] – Stop loss philosophy and practical advice for mining stocks

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Tone & Style

The tone throughout is candid, anecdotal, and pragmatic. The hosts avoid hype, emphasize skepticism—especially regarding government actions and financial engineering—and focus on preserving and growing wealth during unstable times.

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TL;DR Key Takeaways

• Gold mining stocks are likely undervalued; present a compelling opportunity during crises, but can fall with the broader market before rebounding.
• Bitcoin meets monetary criteria but is at risk of distortion by financialization and institutional interests; still worth owning some.
• Real assets in Argentina (especially BA apartments) are undervalued, but raw land requires careful management.
• The financial system is increasingly casino-like; beware derivative-driven volatility in assets like BTC, silver, and gold miners.
• Central banks are accumulating gold, providing a floor to prices that may act differently from past crises.
• Stop losses may not serve long-term investors well in volatile sectors like gold miners—focus on fundamentals and trends.

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For further company-specific mining recommendations and deeper sector analysis, Doug directs listeners to his premium newsletter and the free Investors Roundtable educational panels.

Transcript

[A]

All right. Good morning Doug. We're back with questions from subscribers to Crisis Investing and members of the File. If you're interested in asking Doug question, subscribe to Crisis Investing in Substack. There's a group discussion. You can ask a question there or you can ask it on file. And we write them all down and then we present them here on Friday. So Doug, the first question is taking a thousand foot view of Bitcoin or maybe a 10 year view. Do you still think its original intended use case holds true? How can Bitcoin ever be used for transactions if the belief is that someday it will all be worth millions due to its limited supply? Why would anyone use any of it? You're you're told the hodl to infinity. So how does it ever become a currency? At this point it's more than likely intelligence agencies either created it or had a hand in its inception. And a BlackRock and other governments are gobbling up the supply. How can it be trusted when those institutions are involved? And I will say it was specifically talked about in the Epstein piece that Epstein funded the bitcore developers early on. So we do know that there's CD ties to it at least maybe not at inception, but at that point. But anyway. So what do you think? What's the 10,000 foot view on bitcoin?

[B]

Okay, so I guess part of the question anyway is how can it ever be a currency if it's going to millions in some people's opinion and nobody wants to spend it. But there's something called am I correct saying Gresham's law, which basically says people want to get rid of the crappy money and keep the good money. I mean, you know, given it, given a choice. If you're going to pay for something, I'll pay for something and depreciate dollars, not gold. Yeah, and hold on to the gold for myself. This is natural. So this is true of bitcoin too. That's not a reason why it's won't be a good money. It's the reason why it will be a good money. And the argument that look, I was a late adopter to bitcoin. I only figured it out really in 2017. And the way I figured out that it was going to be an okay money and it's still a pup, you know, it's in the history of these things. It's only been around 20 years. I mean less than that actually. What was 2011 to? Here we are in 15 years. So you know, it's still evolving and being accepted and most people in the world don't even know it's of its existence. But it's growing. Okay, look, I've said this before, but it's worth saying again. It's that the characteristics of a good money, and Aristotle figured this out in the fourth century B.C. it's got to be durable. That's why we don't use wheat as money. It's got to be divisible. That's why we don't use artwork as money. It's got to be convenient. That's why we don't use letters, money or oil. It's got to be consistent. That's why we don't use real estate as money. They've tried that too, of course. And it has to have use value, which is why we don't use paper as money. Printed government paper. And there's a reason that Aerosol didn't think of because it was totally irrelevant. Out of the question in his day is it can't be created out of thin air. So I think bitcoin satisfies all of those characteristics of a good money. And it's got some advantages over gold because it's electronic. Now it's got some disadvantages relative to gold or silver because it's electronic. So. But I think bitcoin could have a place in the fact that governments and corporations are toying with buying it. Okay, I don't see a problem with that. They own gold too, or whatever. So answer to the question, Bitcoin's not going to zero. And I think if you buy it now where it's. I don't know what it is, 65,000 or something like that at the moment. I think it may be a very good speculation here over, over a long.

[A]

Enough time horizon, like I wouldn't say for three months or six months or anything like that necessarily. Right. You have to look at it much longer term.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting asset that you can hold the way you hold your gold because it's electronic and you can carry it a lot easier than you can carry your gold and transfer it easier than you can transfer your gold. So, yeah, I, I think bitcoin's a good idea and I suspect now's a pretty good time to buy because it's down like 50 from its recent peak. So.

[A]

Right.

[B]

What do you think? I mean, you were in bitcoin before I was, that's for sure.

[A]

Yeah, I was, I'll tell you. But I. There's. There was a real change that happened with bitcoin. In late 2017 when they started trading futures on it, as soon as they started to financialize, wasn't just about simple supply and demand. They could start creating all these derivative instruments around it, essentially creating markets around bitcoin that didn't have anything really to do with the underlying asset itself. So as soon as that started happening to me, it started, its pricing changed, it didn't follow. Like logical, like if you look at a long term commodity, you know, boom and bust cycle, that's what bitcoin was. But it's super compressed and it was, you know, you could just see how it moved in that and you could. And it, it just felt like a real market, like a real supply. You could feel a mania, you know, and then you knew it was time to take some profits. I mean it was and that's becoming less and less true the more financialized it becomes, you know, so they start. So now all the derivatives and the wrapping of bitcoins to get yield and you know, all these different things that you can do with it now I think if taking it away from its pure form, like, like gold in its pure form, you know, when they started, you know, with the futures trading around gold, you know that it's like no one's taking possession of it. They're just settling for cash all the time. It's like it kind of, it took the wind out of the sails I think of, of gold itself because the action was in these larger markets where these derivatives, the whole derivatives complex could be added to it. So you know, I don't like or trust the Wall street people. And the more involved they get, definitely the more skittish I get about it personally. And then the other, and I'll say I also think that it's worth owning some bitcoin. I wouldn't, I don't, I'm against these bitcoin maxis that just think, you know, it's all in and on bitcoin and it's going to be the future of everything. But I do think you should own some. But I did read recently, last year, I guess it was Roger Ver's book Hijacking Bitcoin and you know, he explains how essentially it was co opted by, we weren't sure exactly who but in these Epstein revelations that have come out, it seems very clear that his group had something to do with the hijacking of it. That took it from being a currency to where now it's like the digital gold. It went from, people thought of it as a currency to where the PR around it all switched to where it's digital gold, which means it's supposed to be gold, not used but locked up and you know, kind of maybe take out debt against it and stuff like that instead. And anyway, that, that book was. Is worth reading if you're into bitcoin. I think it's really. It's like even if you're totally sold on bitcoin, it's worth seeing that other side from Roger Ver, who was known as Bitcoin Jesus was there from the very beginning. Was. He was bitcoin Jesus because he was a. The. He was an evangelical for bitcoin and talking about its virtues and his side of seeing what happened from the inside and how it was corrupted by the changes that were made to it. So those are the. To me, the downsides of bitcoin is that it isn't. Its pure form has been, you know, adulterated, I guess, you know, so. But yeah, I think you should have some exposure to some of it. Yeah. I don't know. What do you think?

[B]

Well, I had, I had dinner with Roger in Aspen. So we went out to a restaurant together after a conference. And he's a likable, bright, civilized guy. I mean, I liked him and I've been in touch with him a bit since then, but he was. He served. I think he had to do six months because of some financial whatever that the government accused him of.

[A]

And right after his book was published. Right after his book was published.

[B]

Was that the timing of it? Yeah. So I don't know how he's doing. I think he's living in the Orient, in Korea or Japan.

[A]

That's.

[B]

I don't know for sure. But. So he wrote this book and Safedin Amus. Yes, yes. Has also written a book on bitcoin which I haven't read read. So I think. And I should, but I've got a lot of friends that are bitcoin maniacs, quite frankly. I mean, it's the end all for them. So, you know, I'm. My attitude is more like yours and I try not to froth at the mouth about any particular anything, anything. It's, it's, it's. It's just not. Just not wise. And anyway, what you're talking about, the financialization of reminds me of that joke about there was a mania and sardines one time. And so a guy calls his broker and says, hey, sardines, I hear they're great. Buy me a contract broker buys them a contract, doesn't ask any questions. And so a You know, a few months later, the guy calls him back and says, hey, those sardines are not doing too well. And he asked his broker what went wrong. They said, well, you bought the trading sardines, not the eating sardines.

[A]

So that's the difference. That's the difference between buying real gold and real bitcoin.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. So these things, these things are complex. Anyway, what was the question was, I mean, should maybe you should buy Michael Saylor's leverage bitcoins? I think they've gone down a lot. Yeah.

[A]

I think he said he's at a point where he's gonna have to start liquidating in order to pay dividends. So that could cause much more downward pressure on the price of bitcoin if that happens.

[B]

Yeah. So I really haven't followed those, those financial instruments that Saylor has created around bitcoin, some of which pay. I don't know how he structured some of pay interest and I think some pay dividends. I. I'm not even sure, but he's got half a dozen of them at this time with varying degrees of leverage and current return. So Nick Gianbruno is done way up.

[A]

To speed on it.

[B]

Yeah. Into this. But so anyway, if you want to make a lot of leveraged money on bitcoin. Yeah. Look at sailors instruments. I have no particular feeling on it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So, yeah, anyway.

[A]

Well, I think it's good either to read safety's book on one side the bitcoin standard, which is excellent, and then on the other side to read hijacking bitcoin. Just to see Roger Ver's long view of the whole thing. I think is gives you at least a balanced view, you know, to approach bitcoin with.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

All right. Doug, you mentioned a couple times of buying real estate in Argentina is a great opportunity. What regions of Argentina are worth looking into?

[B]

Well, I don't know really. I mean, I've been to a lot of places in Argentina over the years, but I think it's. Look, when you're buying real estate in a distant country, I think it's wise to do some traveling around the country and see if you like it, see what you think. Now, the Buenos Aires real estate market is the one I'm kind of most familiar with. And I think because I kind of follow the price of apartments in Buenos Aires. And what are you going to compare them with? Well, the best comparison is I think New York apartments, frankly. And I. I think Buenos Aires apartments as equivalent as you can get probably 10% of what you pay In New York.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Things change. But I think that Argentina and Buenos Aires are going to do better, certainly since Belay has been elected or kind of triumphed, I guess. Not elected, he was elected two years ago. They got a four year cycle and I think he'll be reelected based on a number of things. That's my opinion. So we got six good years ahead of us in Argentina. So BA is going to do better and New York is going to do worse. So if you got a New York apartment, I think a great arbitrage would be to sell it and buy one in BA now if you want to, you know, buy something else, you can, listen, you can buy 10,000 hectares. We're talking, you know, 15,000, 20,000, 50,000 acres, hundred thousand acres. You can do that and for really pretty cheap money. I mean, I mean I've done it, I still have it. It's an illiquid market, but yeah, I, I think it's a good play. So.

[A]

Yeah. And the most accessible is obviously the apartments in Buenos Aires. And it's easy for somebody who, wherever you're coming from, to be able to see the value in those apartments compared to wherever, wherever you're from, frankly. And I think that they're, they're a good value really, regardless of where you come from in the United States. I think you'll find them nice. So.

[B]

And if you buy raw land in Argentina, I mean we're talking big, big swaths of raw land. You got other things to consider like how do, are you going to manage it? Are you going to keep squatters off of it? That's actually a real problem. Not so much in the US but it is in, in argent South America generally.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So complications. But answer to the question, it's cheap, you should buy it, but you got to manage it whether you're going to buy something in Buenos Aires or out in the boondocks.

[A]

That's why I like BA because it's getting apartment, it's the easiest to manage and it's the most accessible part of Argentina because that's where you fly into and it's the most. You'd be able to see the value because you, you know, whatever built in context you have, you know, you'd be able to effectively understand, I mean, if you, I guess in the habit of buying raw land in places, you'd be able to see the value right away too. But you know, it's the easiest entry point is a Buenos Aires apartment. No doubt about it.

[B]

Yeah, that's right. Because like I've Got actually done this with Bill Bonner mostly. I mean, we own a piece of ground in Patagonia in the Lake District. It's really beautiful. It's only a thousand hectares, 2,500 acres. Really beautiful, well located. Bought it long ago, 20 years ago. Jesus. We still got it and you know, it just sits there. And then we bought, we bought 50,000 hectares, which is to say how many acres is 50,000 hectares?

[A]

That's like 2.2. Right. Times that.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. So we got, we got about 120,000 acres in Salta and it's pretty nice because we got like 40km of lakefront on it. And you know, it's pretty interesting when we got it pretty cheaply, we're still sitting on it, so there's no bid for it. I mean, there's always a bit at some price, but. So, yeah, you can do this stuff down here.

[A]

I mean, yeah, it's a lot of land. Well, it doesn't. And, and Bill separately owns a. Another piece of land that I believe is like equivalent to the size of Rhode Island.

[B]

That's right. This is, that's, this is Bills by himself and I think, I think it's Guelphine and adjacent. I think he's got, I think Bill's got a hundred thousand hectares or 200,000 hectares.

[A]

When I checked one time ago, it was like Rhode Island.

[B]

Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, exactly. And, and for a while it was looking very dangerous because, you know, some of the natives there, you know, so. Well, no, we own it because we're originarios and, you know, making all kinds of trouble. And I think he's quashed those problems at this point. And when you got that much land, you're never going to see but a tiny portion of it, quite frankly.

[A]

Oh, I mean, you know, I've got 500 acres and there's parts of it I'm sure that I haven't seen and there's a lot of it that I'm not that familiar with.

[B]

Yeah. And that's, that's 500.

[A]

It's nothing.

[B]

So anyway, yeah, it's a good, it's a good idea. So come on down and take a look.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. Okay, next question. We run a business that invests in small and medium enterprises and scales them to 10x revenue valuations so that they are attractive to investors. What are the big risks and headwinds that Doug can see for a business like this?

[B]

Well, this is not my bailiwick. I don't do that kind of thing. I have a friend Mike, who you've met, who used to write a newsletter for us, he does that now. That's kind of his regular occupation. Doing exactly that. Buying mom and pop businesses and rationalizing them and making sure they're run right and combining a couple together to get economies of scale. Sounds like pretty much the same thing, so.

[A]

And he's doing really well with it.

[B]

I think he's doing really well. So I don't know, you know more about this than I do. Seems like I think it's a good idea, but.

[A]

Oh, I think it's a great idea, you know, and especially because there are so many of these small businesses that were the founders of them are retirement age and they don't know there's no reasonable exit strategy for them because their business is too small to be interesting to most investors. And you know, they don't have a, you know, family that would, you know, carry on with the business, which means you'll be able to probably pick them up at low prices. And it seems like that's only increasing as, you know, the baby boomers kind of phase out, want to retire. So there's probably more and more opportunities like that to get these things on the cheap, you know. So the only headwinds that seem obvious are just the kind of big macro headwind, you know, which would just be, you know, depending upon the specific genre of business, you know, may affect you more or less. But you know, the K shaped economy, if you're going for the lower end consumer, obviously they have less and less resources to go into that kind of a business. You know, stuff like that they have to consider. But I mean, I think it's a great business model.

[B]

I mean you gotta, you gotta manage it too. I mean.

[A]

Yeah, it sounds like that's what they're good at though.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, I like the idea, frankly.

[A]

Yeah, I think if you're a good operator, I think it's a great business. So next question, newbie investor here. I've been hearing a lot about analyst re rating of major producers as they use really low gold, gold prices in their models. This would imply miners could grow a lot, especially when combined with the GDX to gold ratio being so low. Does this thesis have merit? He says separately, Barrick has an outstanding quarter. I mean, I had a blowout quarter in line with this thesis, but the stock hasn't moved and actually declined slightly. So could all of this thesis be already priced into gold miners?

[B]

No, it's not. I mean, look, most of these mining companies, most of them are run by Suits most of them, not all of them, treat gold as just another commodity. And everybody knows commodities fluctuate. So you gotta assume that the, the median price for gold is gonna be a lot less than it is now at 5,000. So that's one thing. And institutional investors who hate gold mining stocks, like Warren Buffett does, anyway, look, these big gold mining, I think that gold and silver have reached a new equilibrium level. The market doesn't believe that. I believe it. The market doesn't. So earnings are going to go way up in the future, dividends are going to go up, they're going to buy shares out of the market, they're going to pay off the debt that they have. So I think buying, producing gold stocks right now is going to treat you really well for a lot of reasons over the next year or two. So that's my answer.

[A]

Yeah. And just some comments. I looked at Barrick's numbers and so their fourth quarter just, this is the benefit of the accelerating gold price. The fourth quarter generated half of all of the earnings for the company for the year because they, you know, they were able to sell each ounce of gold at roughly $4,100. And you know, so just that difference, that price increase they were able to take advantage of in the fourth quarter alone, you know, made it so that the profits doubled for the year that they, their, their models, what they, they're modeling at Barrick themselves. And so the analysts are probably lower than this number, but Barrick is modeling out their future year this 2026, at a $4,500 gold price. So, you know, they're again being very conservative just. And I think that the reason the price might have been down is because they talked about, you know, that their production numbers, they expect to be, I think, slightly lower. You know, they down, they move guidance down on ounces produced for the year. So it was maybe on those, that news, I'm not sure. But either way, if they get, you know, if it's $5,000 gold instead of 4,500, that, that just blows things out in terms of earnings.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. And another factor is that he mentioned is that they have a large operation in Mali and Mali is afflicted with Korea warfare and Islamism and all that type of thing. And so how's that going to affect Barrack? I mean, are what passes for government or whoever passes for trying to become the government going to try to steal it or shut it down or taxes to death? Who, who knows? I mean, listen, you got to go to Mali and figure these things out or get information from somebody who's reliable that knows. One of my very biggest positions and oldest positions is B2, which has a major mine in Mali. And I mean a lot of analysts just write that off even though it produces half of their. Half of their gold. So it's a speculation on politics and I'm flying blind. I mean nobody goes to Mali. Where do you get accurate data? Can you, can you trust, can you, can you trust the guys that are mining there? I mean they got an opinion, but maybe it's slanted. So this is one of the problems with the mining business, especially in the third world. You got different problems in the first world. So it's a crappy business mining.

[A]

It's a crappy business. But with gold prices where they're at and the direction that they're heading, I think they're the ones that are producing gold, you know, at a. That's. I think Barrick would produce last year at like 1650 an ounce was there all in sustaining costs. I mean they're just. They are literally minting money.

[B]

They're meant. They're minting money. So it's a crappy business. But it's a great place to be right now because it's a. These stocks are really cheap. Cheaper than they should be. Way cheaper than they should be. So that's the way I'm playing it.

[A]

Okay, so his thesis is sound is the question now what are the best stocks to play within, you know, the gold mining sector? That's a different question. We talk about that in crisis investing. The paid subscription with specific recommendations. But the question is about the thesis is correct, I think. All right.

[B]

Also they should go to the, the experts roundtable where we don't recommend all the stocks. There's. But we've got a dozen guys that are quite knowledgeable geologists and observers and investors and I mean that know the right. That look at a company and you can get an education by watching Investors Roundtable and see companies torn apart.

[A]

Right. I can think of one of the gold ones we did was a company called Rua Gold which is in New Zealand. And that was. That was really interesting because that one in particular because the discussion among the geologists about you know, what is there an explorer still? But just seeing the questions they get, get from the experts that are on the round table to the company and then the back and forth with the guys all at the end once the company is gone, it really gives you a great education about like what are the red flags what to be concerned about, you know, where the opportunity is, et cetera. So that's a great, great source. And I'll. I'll put a link to it at the bottom of the video.

[B]

Yeah, and it's. And it's free. And it's a great education, so. And. And half the time the guys hate the company and say, don't buy this.

[A]

Yeah, they do. They do. And sometimes there's great disagreement between the guys, which is awesome.

[B]

That's true.

[A]

So let's see. Next question. So, a topic covered many times, but I don't recall it being asked from this perspective. He references Mirmakan Capital Research when they published something saying Edward Gibbon blamed Christianity, the proposition that every man is formed in the image of and has a personal relationship with God, for draining Rome of its martial spirit, undermining the empire. He may have been correct. But Rome's energy was already spent, and the Christian proposition would form the foundation of future European greatness. No less than Hesioda. Hesiod. Hesiod. Hesiod for Greece. Okay.

[B]

Contemporary of Homer, we think, oh, around 700 or thereabouts BC who. Who wrote a couple of tomes. Yeah.

[A]

Anyway, I haven't read them. Obviously, Christianity's assertion of an unchanging deity elevated truth over narrative, without which science cannot exist nor technology advance self consciously. Its defense of individual dignity evolved into individual rights, which underlies the idea of a free market to exchange goods and capital and thereby fund investment and innovation. In fact, the very concept of economic value is not coherent without individual sovereignty. Antiquity was the time of the city state. In his work the Republic, even Plato intertwined justice and the city state as one being. Christ, he says, was the driving force of individual freedom and free market forces in Western civilization. What's Doug's take?

[B]

Well, that question. I just called up that question so I can look at it. That question is quite a mouthful. So. And the inquisitor definitely has a point of view. So it says Edward Gibbon blamed Christianity, the proposition that every man is formed in the image and has a personal relationship with God. Well, that's not all of Christianity, obviously, for draining Rome of its martial spirit and undermining the empire. Yes, he did. It was one of the two reasons that Gibbon gave why he thought that one was Christianity and the other was barbarian invasions. But he blamed Christianity for destroying Rome's moral strength, actually. So it's one of the two reasons why the empire fell. Okay, says he may have been correct, but Rome's energy was already spent. Well, wait a minute. Rome actually reached Its peak geographically and probably in other ways under Trajan, around let's say 150 in AD and Christianity then was just a minor oriental cult that nobody took seriously, quite frankly. I mean it wasn't until Constantine in about 3, 25, 330 that he made it officially the religion of the Roman Empire. So.

[A]

Well that makes sense. The empire was kind of spent at that point.

[B]

It was spent at that point. Yes, yes it was. And Christianity you can correctly say, was a, was a worm eating away at the moral tenor of, of Christianity. And it did drain, you know, let's see what else he says here. Eat energy already spent. The Christian proposition would form the foundation of future European greatness. Well, yeah, but not right away because after Rome collapsed and the dark ages ensued, where people no longer built great buildings, didn't maintain the roads, there was no commerce, there was nothing. And people lived in, you know, everybody lived in shacks or ruins from, let's say this actually started around 450 up to 8 or 900 anyway. So it was about 400 years, the so called Dark ages where Christianity was the ruling ethos. So I don't, I think it's pretty hard to argue that Christianity formed the foundation of future European greatness. No less than he for Greece. Well, I don't know. Every, every civilization, every age has its kind of ruling idea or set of ideas. Okay, so he had, and Homer were, you know, set the tone for ancient Greece and Christianity for Europe. But so anyway, Christianity's assertion of an unchanging diety elevated truth over narrative. Well that's not really true because in the ancient world there was a distinct difference between theology, what the gods studying the gods and science studying nature. So the fact that, that I guess he's referring to Yahweh or maybe Jesus, later it would be Allah. I guess these are all unchanging entities. The Holy Ghost too fits in there somehow, I suppose. But elevated truth over narrative. Wait a minute, that's. How do you know it's true? Because the Bible says that you've got to be somebody that believes in the Bible to say elevated truth over narrative. Well, it's all narrative. Quite right. Whether it's the Bible or Hessian or Homer or or Horus or Ovid or anybody that writes about ancient gods without which science cannot exist, nor technology, nor advance. Self consciously that's not true. Religion had absolutely nothing to do with science in those days. Religion was about worshiping the gods, giving the God cult, as they said, treating them with respect had nothing to do with Science. So that's simply untrue. And actually, throughout most of Western history, religion has been the enemy of science. I mean, Galileo is just a prominent case of that, but one of many, many where they've been enemies to each other in defense of individual dignity involved into individual rights. In the west, we've always believed individual dignity, that's honor and things like that. Uh, and you know, did Christianity see the reason why Christianity acted as a worm eating away at ancient culture was like, what were the virtues of Christianity? Well, faith, hope and charity, those are not martial virtues. Faith is believing something which is unbelievable. And hope, you know, hope is never been anything to rely on. I mean, that's hope, that's.

[A]

Hope is not a strategy. Hope is not a strategy.

[B]

Right. And charity, that's about turning the other cheek and giving away all that you own and so forth. Well, that's. Charity is not something you can build a civilization on either. It's giving things to people that haven't earned it and probably don't deserve it. So Gibbon was right in what he was saying that Christianity was a worm eating away at the morals of the ancient civilization. So. And Christianity's got nothing to do with the idea of a free market. Nothing, nothing to do with it, really. That's not what Jesus was talking about. In fact, free market to exchange goods, capital. Jesus didn't talk about that type of thing. Jesus.

[A]

I just, I just want to make a comment on the dignity, individual dignity. You know, in, in the book the Preparation, we list the ancient virtues. And one of them that we list is dignitas, which was a Roman and a Greek virtue called something else, but which is a sense of self worth and personal honor derived from living a virtuous and responsible life. So that exists in ancient Rome. It, you know, they didn't, didn't require the introduction of Christianity for that to form.

[B]

Yeah. So I'm afraid the questioner is asking this question, you know, a very slanted and rhetorical and frankly, intellectually dishonest way, unless he's just unaware of, of these things. And what was the firm that wrote this stuff that it's.

[A]

Meyer Meekin Capital.

[B]

Yeah. So you look that up and it turns out that they're, they're gold bugs and they play with these small mining stocks and all this type of thing. But I'd be very, very suspicious of people that are trying to combine their religion, whatever their religion might be with, with geology. I mean, I remember years ago there were, there were some really dogmatic Christians that, that said that Jesus told them to drill here. And what do you know? They it somehow I don't know if it was by hook or by crook or good luck or whatever, but they drilled a fantastical right down a narrow vein. But that's all there was, was a narrow on. But they attributed to Jesus. And a lot of Christians are involved in gold and silver even back then. And they all bought the stock and it went 10 for 1 before it collapsed back to 0 again. Anyway, don't, don't mix up religion with science. They're two separate things. And I'm not a religious person, but listen, religion's fine for, for people, but they're two different things. So anyway, I don't know if that answers the question or not.

[A]

Yeah, well, I think the question one last thing was the, you know, the idea that Jesus reflects this sense of individual value, you know, that in that individual's life has value because this is, you know, as a child of God that you know that in that, that individuality that that separates you from the tribe. Like is there any merit to that idea and being a historical influence and.

[B]

Thinking, well, listen, I'm kind of a fan of Jesus.

[A]

Yeah, I'm too. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

You know, I don't have any problem with most of the things he said. A lot of wisdom, but he wasn't an economist and he wasn't oriented towards storing away the goods of the world. That wasn't, that wasn't exactly the opposite.

[A]

Yeah. Okay, well, good. Next question. Does Doug have an update regarding his view on Aries strategic mining? I watched the round table and Doug seemed intrigued by the proposition. This is Aries strategic mining is one of the ones we did on Experts Roundtable and it was, if I recall, the only permitted floor spore mine in the United States, which is a on the critical mineral list that needs to be stockpiled, by the way. Yeah. Doug, any feelings on that?

[B]

Well, spar, I guess, which is a source of the element fluorine is not something on most people's must have list. I mean, so it was an interesting analysis of the company, of the company that the boys made and I guess Trump has added it to his vault, as he calls it, of things that the government is going to acquire and put a price floor under and that.

[A]

Yeah. And these guys have a big DOD contract for producing it.

[B]

Yeah. So it's a different kind of, It's a different kind of speculation, frankly. And the fact that Trump is, is building this vault where the government is going to stick its nose now into the mining business and accumulate lots of elements that it's. It's going to end badly one way or another. It's going to. It's going to end badly. Absolutely. For the taxpayers, probably for everybody involved. I mean what is the government ever done anything getting involved in business that ended well? And the answer is never. So but it works.

[A]

It can work out really well for those insiders and those specific beneficiaries of the largess of the state though.

[B]

And if, and if Aries is the only florist bar miner in the US it could work out very well for them. So I think. Didn't we just start a free blog on so called strategic minerals?

[A]

Yeah, well, yeah, we call it, we call it state speculator. You can find that on subsect too where we're just kind of exploring these ideas further. Like you know what happens with these. There's so many government actions occurring and investments being made. We're trying to make sense of it and understand investment themes around it. So yeah, I'll link to that too at the bottom so people can. Or in the description of the video so you guys can check that out too. But we'll explore that there if you want to see it.

[B]

It's a free read and you can learn more about it. And I don't have any particular opinion about. I mean they're look, Aries is probably in the right place if, if it's a vault mineral the government's going to be buying. Yeah. They've got a stable market. Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

Okay, so next question is, have we had a chance to watch the movie One Battle After Another. It's the new Leo DiCaprio film, he says. Quick notes. It seems to have quite the Hollywood lineup and also seems to be speaking to a core American issue of the moment. Kudos to DiCaprio for continuing to move quickly on topics of the Zeitgeist. However, the perspective he's sharing on the topic of riots and ice and obaa, I'm not sure what that is. Seems to be just as confused as his perspective on Covid and dlu. There are some rather insightful elements to the story. It's very much framed in the US Poor, multicultural, gender fluid Americans, not citizens against them. The ice analog filled with racism and hypocrisy. There is no middle class in the whole film, for example. Kind of interesting. There are the elite white dangerous clique, the cringe out of control military and the confused and contradictory poor rebels. Everyone seems to have a secret, illegal and or hypocritical issue. They Usher forward in the film. It's a narrow perspective of America today. It's very biased, but it's also not entirely inaccurate. So I'm curious your and Doug's take on this, this version of America and where things are heading. It echoes a bit of your discussion on the movie Civil War previously. Last year, we discussed that film.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Is this the America we have to come?

[B]

Well, that's a possible. I haven't, not having seen the movie, but I'd like to say it sounds like it would be high budget, well made, exciting, although rather ideologically tainted in the manner of Hollywood. But, yeah, I'd like to watch it. Sounds like an exciting, interesting movie, a dystopian movie about the collapse of our current society. So can't wait to see it.

[A]

Well, when he says is that we're heading, I mean the idea of no middle class, I think that's noteworthy, that that's not in the movie. And it does seem like that's the track we're headed on, you know, K shaped economy and so forth.

[B]

Well, I read movie reviews, even if I don't get to see current movies that much. And the movie reviews that I read about it tells me, yeah, I'd like to watch the movie. It'll be thrilling and entertaining and interesting. The other movie that won the most Oscars, along with this one, I think won a bunch of Oscars, is. What the hell's the name of this movie? It's a movie by, for and about black people. And I've got absolutely nothing against black people, but I'm not a black person, so I'm not the market for them. And whenever there's a movie that's made by, for and about black people, you can be almost certain in today's world that white people aren't going to come off very well. I mean, we're going to be the bad guys. So just.

[A]

Just like apparently in this DiCaprio film, it sounds like.

[B]

Yeah, what sounds like it. Exactly. I'm kind of tired of Western civilization being made out to be, you know, the worst thing that's ever happened, when in point of fact, it's the best thing that ever happened. And the same with America. America's horrible. We had slavery. Now, actually, America is the best thing that's ever happened in world political history. So, you know, most of these movies and the people that make them are just. They're just bent with serious psychological problems, among other things.

[A]

No doubt about it. All right, question for Doug. Now that gold is a tier one asset, do you Think that gains on gold could, could stop being taxed soon? Are any, are there any other tier 1 assets taxed? How could gold be taxed as a collectible when it's a tier one asset? Are we just paying taxes on inflation, which is no gain when we're taxed on gold when it takes more dollars to buy it? Is there anything in the Trump strategies that indicates they might want to stop taxing gold?

[B]

Well, I don't think Trump has a strategy. Trump has an idea to do whatever seems like a good idea at the time or what he feels might be a good idea at the time.

[A]

So what his mind tells him.

[B]

Yeah, what is. And, and we're safely guided by his morality, which is the other thing.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And going wrong. So look, tier one, that's just something that banks can own or central banks can own and so forget about that. It's got nothing to do with taxes. I mean, you buy something and you sell it later for more money. The government wants part of that money and.

[A]

Well, they would if you did it. If you own Treasuries and sold them for gain, they would want to tax. So it's true on assets.

[B]

Absolutely. And the interest on your Treasuries as well. And people say, well, that's not true of municipal bonds. Well, yeah, that's true.

[A]

There are exceptions.

[B]

There, there, there, there are exceptions. They make these, these BS exceptions, but forget about it. So I think it's an irrelevant question.

[A]

Yeah, it almost seems like taxes have to go up. Right. In general, I mean, I don't.

[B]

Listen, where's the government going to get the money? They really can't borrow it anymore because the Chinese or anybody, they're not buying, they're selling bonds. And so the government can get money by selling its bonds to the Federal Reserve, which buys them with printed up money. So. And taxes, of course you can get taxes. So inflation is going to pay most of what the government's expanding spending.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

It's going to be about.

[A]

Okay. Has Doug looked into investing in the Japanese stock market? He says Hugh Henry is an old hedge fund manager, keeps talking about investing in the Nikkei.

[B]

Yeah, and he may be right. And frankly, I'm, I'm remiss in not having paid any attention to the Japanese or the Chinese stock markets. And of course there are a lot of problems with the Chinese stock market. Go. That's a whole different subject. But it might be cheap and might, it might be a great buy at some time with all kinds of problems. Same with the Japanese stock Market, but I haven't followed it, I'm, I'm ashamed to say.

[A]

Yeah, I hear it's historically cheap. And the other thing that's interesting about it is just that, you know, Trump setting up all these bilateral trade agreements and, you know, building these pipelines for critical minerals and in processing and things like that. And Japan's like a key partner in that idea. And so these, you know, big Japanese industrials could really benefit from government largess in this process.

[B]

Yeah. And there is something else that's going on. It's the interest rates in Japan have gone from near zero levels for a long time, a couple decades, and now long term paper in Japan is going for 3, 4%. So why is that important? Well, first of all, it's hurt the owners of Japanese bonds because interest rates go up, bond prices go down, number one. Number two, what's been going on is the carry trade. People borrow money in Japan at next to nothing and then take it abroad where interest rates are higher and invest it there. But now that interest rates are going up in Japan, people can't do the spread so easily. So they're going to sell assets in the west and bring it home to Japan. So it's a distortion which is being unwound. So that's an argument for Japanese stocks going up, among other things. So probably worth looking at right now. Yeah. Since we're talking about trillions of dollars that the Japanese have borrowed to invest in the west and they're going to be unwinding that as interest rates go up and they can't get borrow the money for free anymore. That's an argument for stuff. Stocks marginally going down in the west, up in Japan, down in the west. Have to look into that more, but it's worth looking at.

[A]

Okay, a couple questions for you here from one guy. He says, what's your view on Kevin Warsh as potential Fed pick? Is he genuinely a hawk? And does that even matter at today's debt levels? More broadly, do you think Trump is playing a two level game? Publicly attacking the Fed to signal support for lower rates while privately favoring tighter policy to protect the dollar and using the Fed chair as political cover, much like the dynamic we've seen with Powell?

[B]

Well, what two level? I, I thought Trump was playing 7D chess. Forget about two levels. So look, I don't think it makes any difference, frankly, who they appoint as the chairman of the Fed these days because the government has to sell the Fed a couple trillion dollars worth of their paper every year. Plus they've Got to roll over trillions of dollars of past borrowing which are maturing in the next few years. So that's just gotta happen. So what difference does it make what the Fed chairman's personal views are? I frankly, rather than appointing Kevin Warsh, who I'd really never heard of before, I don't follow these people. I think he should have appointed Kevin Costner. There's more name recognition and Kevin Costner is an actor and actors are skilled liars. They can say anything with a straight face. So I think he would be a better for all the difference than Kevin, whoever it is.

[A]

That's awesome. Okay. And Doug, was the recent silver pullback a routine correction or the result of paper shorting combined with COMEX margin hikes? Do these episodes change the long term setup for silver or are they simply designed to flush the weak hands and enable accumulation at lower prices?

[B]

Well, there was at one point very recently a $20 spread between silver in the west and silver in China and India. But I think it's narrowed and it's gone back to zero to like, I.

[A]

Think it's like at 8 now is last I heard this morning.

[B]

Yeah, it's closed, which is what you'd expect because the Chinese apparently I have export limitations on silver. You got to get approval. So you can't export silver from China, but you can import it to China. And if I had a bunch of silver in the west that I could buy at 75 and sell it to the Chinese at 95, I mean, I'd load up a plane with it and I, I guess that's what people are doing. So it was an anomaly because what is said is that there's really not that much silver in the West. But wait a minute. I guess that's true in good deliverable form. But if that's the case, why was silver in the west trading for less than it was in China? Well, I guess China is what uses the silver.

[A]

I mean, all of the industrial needs are there, right?

[B]

All of those photovoltaic cells that use huge amounts of silver all made in China. All the electronics used lots of all made in China. So it's all used over there. I presume it's whatever the Chinese price is, is the real price because that's where the use is taking place. And was there not that much good deliverable silver in the West? I mean, I don't know. It's a, it's a financial market where people are making long and short contracts with only a rough relationship with the amount of silver that can actually be delivered. So I don't know, but it appears to have straightened itself out.

[A]

Well, in this, you know, the, the price action that we saw in silver with, you know, a bunch of shorts opening up on the futures exchange and really driving the price down is exactly goes back to what we talked about with Bitcoin at the beginning and the financialization. This is what that scares me about, Bitcoin getting way, way more involved with all that. Because none of that had anything to do with the actual price of physical silver. You know, it was the trading around it. And you know, markets can get really distorted. I think when you have this, you know, there's, when it gets over financialized like this.

[B]

Yeah. It turns into a casino where people are buying and selling stuff for reasons that don't have much to do with the actual usage. You know, it's hello New York buy, hello Chicago buy, hello Los Angeles sell. New York and Chicago are buying.

[A]

Exactly. And there are insiders that know a lot more about what's going on and have a lot more firepower and you know, can really use leverage to their advantage. So I think it's, you know, it's not really like an even playing field market either because of that.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I prefer unlevel playing fields, but that's only when I know that I'm on the high ground. Otherwise I don't want to be there because I'm, you know, it's like in a poker game, if you don't know who the mooch is at the table, it's you.

[A]

Yep, exactly. All right, next question. If, if someone in the west has physical silver or gold, is there a way to sell it on the Shanghai Exchange without physically putting it in a bag and going there? Is that even legally possible?

[B]

Yeah, it's legally possible. You just have to, I guess you have to declare it when you cross a border. I guess. I mean, the silver isn't technically money, but yeah, sure, you can do that. But like I, I think the arbitrage is pretty well gone right now.

[A]

Yeah, it is. Okay, question for Doug. Do you think anything resembling a modern economy could exist if practices like fractional reserv banking and, or usury were illegal? And he means usury and just simply debt in this, in this pure sense of debt. If it were illegal.

[B]

Yeah. Well, two different questions. In the first place, what's called uzery usury? I mean, why should that be illegal? I mean, does that mean that if you lend money at 3%, that's okay, 6%, that's okay. 12%? 20. Well, maybe you shouldn't. Who's to say? I mean, this is arbitrary. So this whole concept, he means it.

[A]

As a binary thing and like just that, lending itself at all. If that, if lending were illegal, could we have a modern economy of lending period at interest were illegal?

[B]

No, I don't think you could. I don't, I don't think. I don't think you could. There was the first part of that question you.

[A]

Yeah, it was about fractional reserve banking.

[B]

Oh, look, fractional reserve banking is, is criminal fraud. It's basically using something which the government has arranged to allow you to lend the money. The way fractional reserve banking works, in essence is you lend a dollar to somebody, charge interest, what happens to that dollar? Well, the person spends the dollar and whoever is the receipt of that dollar that was lent to the first guy, the first guy spent, it's deposited back in the bank, you lend it again to a second guy and to a third guy. So that, that's what fractional reserve banking is about. And it's basically fraudulent. And if anybody wants the dollar, you got one dollar. But what about the other people that have deposited the dollar back? They want their dollar too.

[A]

So, right, something like there's $90 lent for every $10 on deposit or something like that.

[B]

Right, yeah, which, which, which is why it's said that all the banks basically in the world are bankrupt because. But they're not, because it's all paper money that can be created and it will be created out of thin air so that the banks don't go bust. So yes, things will be just fine if we use species as money. I mean, I've written a lot about this in my books, as a lot of other people have. So. No, not only would things work fine, they work much, much better. We'd have a much more stable world, a much more productive world, but we don't.

[A]

So. So the basic question is we could have something resembling a modern economy without fractional reserve banking, but not without lending.

[B]

Yeah, well, there are two different questions.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Look, the government shouldn't be involved in the economy at all. And fractional reserve would not be possible without a, a central bank to make it possible. And lending is something that always goes on.

[A]

So it's important. I mean, credit is super important. You know, then I'd say the foundation of money was basically credit. Really. You know, there's a book about it. I can't recall what the name of it is, but basically it's like, you know, when the king would Want his people to plant grain, there'd have to be supplied some upfront capital or at least, you know, something that would make it so that they could still feed themselves while planting the grain and working the crops and waiting till the next season when harvest could come in. So what was that initial credit granted to them to cover their, you know, their living expenses essentially, while producing something valuable was critical in this whole scheme to make it work. I mean, without the creation of the credit as a source of it. And that's debt.

[B]

Well, yeah, this really started actually, this whole thing with credit is that you lent the money to the farmer and it was a short term loan that would be paid back. When he borrows the money to grow the grain, grain comes in, you pay the money back. I mean, it was self. Was a self liquidating loan on a loan perpetuity. So there's a lot that can be said about this and it's very interesting. But the current system is unstable and held together with chewing gum and bailing wire.

[A]

Yeah. And I think it gets. So there's a trend here emerging in this podcast about the financialization, financialization of Bitcoin causing the wild swings of Bitcoin recently. I think that the financialization of silver is why we see that slam all of a sudden, all at once, it drops so much so fast because of the derivatives complex around it. And then with the fractional reserve banking, same kind of thing, same kind of derivative type activities.

[B]

That's right. And it's the guys on top with political power to get to take advantage of the fractional reserve banking and so forth. They get the money that's created out of nowhere, first at its old value. And as much as they want to, little guy doesn't get any of that. He gets to borrow it at 20%.

[A]

Exactly. Well, maybe Trump's got him down to 10.

[B]

Yeah. No, kiss it all, make it better.

[A]

Let's see. Says hi fellas. Thanks. Long overdue for my subscription. They upgraded, paid, but thrilled with the content already. Thanks for all that you do. Question. In the event of a stock market crash due to a financial reset or other reasons, will the miners hold up alongside a rising stagnant gold price, or will they tank with the overall market? Do you think precious metals also decline meaningful in this event? If this could happen, where would you find safety?

[B]

Well, it's kind of a good question. Where do you find safety?

[A]

Well, like what happened in 2008 with this, with the stock market liquidation that it basically occurred. What happened then with gold and gold stocks over the subsequent months and years.

[B]

Well, people owe dollars. We're in a debt heavy world where lots of people owe lots of dollars and if somebody stops paying, they gotta scramble for those dollars to pay their debt. So that's why the dollar can go up in spite of more being created all the time because people need it right now to pay their debt or they're going to have their asset repopped. So that's on the one side, short term thing. On the other hand, the government, the Federal Reserve are always creating more dollars constantly, way so short term, long term, long term you got to count on the dollar reaching its intrinsic value which is 0 short term. I need dollars now to pay my mortgage.

[A]

So you know that means stocks could be sold off, Gold stocks and gold could be sold off as all were during the financial crisis. Right, they all were. But, but they did rebound differently, didn't they?

[B]

Yeah, they did. And I think, I think the world is going to go towards, as things get more unstable, people are going to want to get away from the instability, which means, which is happening now why central banks are buying gold. They don't want to hold other people's fiat currency, other people's debt. I mean they want to own the real deal. So that's the way I'm going to play. I just don't know how high gold is going to go at what point. But you know, how much money are they going to print? How unstable is the world going to become? I mean these are imponderables.

[A]

Well, we can see they've got to print what, another 2 or 3 trillion this year.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So.

[B]

Well they have, they have to, there's no way out.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And they've got to refinance all the debt that's rolling over.

[A]

A lot of that's going to end up on the Fed balance sheet. Probably, probably.

[B]

So I think this would be more printing than most people give credit to, frankly. And, and who was it that this is kind of interesting. Who has it said this the other day, did we even talk about this the other day? That maybe the US and.

[A]

Oh yeah, you said Frank brought it up.

[B]

Yeah, Frank used to brought it up, right? Maybe, yeah. I mean Trump doesn't understand economics, but he likes gold, I guess, you know, he's, it's shiny and you know, it's a, it's a crap.

[A]

Just look at the Oval Office. It's everywhere now.

[B]

Exactly. That's so he, he likes gold. Maybe he's figured out, you know, and Frank presented the juicers, presented this very wisely. Maybe so hey, let's just print up some money and buy a bunch of gold. So maybe that's been going on too. And maybe that German gold that came to the U.S. i don't think they're ever going to get it back. Just like Argentina is never going to get its gold back. Which Malay idiotically shipped more to London. Why, why, why would you do that? The reasons they gave were, well, we can lend it for interest, which is really stupid, like 3% on a gold loan and it's safer and more secure. Wait a minute.

[A]

It's not safer. I mean, it's definitely not safer. So safe it's in your own vaults.

[B]

Yeah. Who knows what these, what's, what's going on here. But we're, we're just, we're just, we're just little people. We don't know what, what our betters are doing.

[A]

Yeah, I'm just trying, yeah. In terms of her question, I'm just trying to recall exactly what happened in 2008. Like, if I recall, you know, in the financial crisis, stocks got hit hard. Gold, you know, came down from its high, which I think it was around maybe 1100 or so. And then it got all the way down to in this like 670 range somewhere in there in February or March. And then it bottomed and then it started working its way back, way well ahead of the stock market in terms of rebounding and, and then gold stocks, you know, followed behind that. And so if we had a repeat Crisis like of 2008, I would expect it to work out the same. But also, I think you can make an argument that it's different this time in that gold is dear to people who are not price sensitive whatsoever, these central banks. And so there's kind of a new floor in gold. You know, there's more, there's more buying activity there than, you know, we would have had in a 2008 environment. For sure. Everyone went to Treasuries at that time.

[B]

Yeah, there was a time when central banks kind of the meme with them was we hate gold. I mean, Canada sold all its gold, England sold all its gold. And that meme has changed.

[A]

Yeah. So it could be different anyway. There's no true safety in that environment. But the question is, what'll happen after that market event? You know, after that market event, probably more printing of money trying to reinflate the system. And which gold and gold stocks will be direct beneficiaries of. I mean, the stock market itself will be a beneficiary of that. But ultimately the fact that the dollar is going down, gold relative to the dollar is going up. And there's really like nothing stops that, you know, there's no, there's, there's no change to that no matter what happens in the short term with the market action. Would you agree with that?

[B]

Yes, I would. And there's a new trend in motion and I think we should make the trend our friend.

[A]

Yeah. Like you said before, sit tight and be right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

All right, one last question. How tight stop losses do you recommend for gains in mining stocks? This is obviously a new subscriber. You know, the last resistance level or 10 or 20% down. It's not sure how tightly to follow the stock rises with stop losses. Now if I understand you don't use.

[B]

I personally, I personally don't, don't, don't use them. Well now I'm not using them because, you know, I'm think I'm in the right, right place. But you know, I've got a lot of gains in a lot of these stocks and I don't want to because if I sell my stocks, I'm gonna have to pay taxes. And you should never make investment decisions where taxes are a major consideration because tax gains can evaporate if you do that. So I'm not a trader. Traders need stop losses.

[A]

So look, and these stocks are highly volatile.

[B]

They're highly volatile. But. Well, I'm, I'm not gonna, I'm not planning on selling any of my stocks until I see the. Some kind of equivalent of a golden bear tearing apart the New York Stock Exchange.

[A]

And that'll on the front page of like the Wall Street Journal or something.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. So I'm just not going to clutter my mind up with these fluctuations in the meantime in between time. Yeah.

[A]

And I think it's really dangerous. I mean, part of the stop loss thing, you enter your stop at like, you know, people could see the, you know, when you had that big silver smash that occurred, all the, all people's stop losses are entered into the market. So like these guys know, hey, we add more shorts now we can knock out this next tier of stops.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I can't tell you the number of times where I've had a stop loss. And it's weird. Like my stop loss where I got had to sell my stock was the bottom tick of the market that day and it ended up close the day higher. You know, I mean it happened so many times.

[B]

That's right. No, if, listen, if you're a little guy playing around where elephants are dancing. I mean, chances are you're gonna get stomped on, so don't do that. I mean, buy something that's good where it's. You think you're. It's pretty clear what the trend is and just hold on to it so that I, I don't believe in stocks. I'm not. Stop losses. I'm not using them right now. That's my answer.

[A]

Yeah, and we don't. We don't generally use them in the portfolio at all. So. Yeah, it's just. Just because of the natural volatility that exists in these things.

[B]

And I'm. I'm looking forward to the time when I can look at the market and say, sell all this crap. We're going to buy something else that's cheap, whatever it's going to be at the time. Right.

[A]

That's a long way away.

[B]

These are not heirlooms, but at the same time, they're going up for good reason for some time, so.

[A]

Okay. Well, good, Doug, that's all the questions we have for today. Thank you very much. I hope you have a great weekend and we'll be back next week with more.

[B]

Same to you, Matt. Look forward to it.

[A]

Thanks.