Forbes: It's Time For Contrarians To Get Bullish On Gold
Article by Frank Holmes on Forbes
Gold can’t seem to catch a break. The yellow metal normally acts as a safe haven in times of political and economic strife, but in the face of Turkey’s lira meltdown, investors have taken cover instead in the U.S. dollar. On Monday, the stronger greenback pushed gold to end below $1,200 an ounce for the first time since January 2017.
Gold investors might be discouraged by its performance this year. A lot of this has to do with the fact that, so far this year, gold has had a very high negative correlation to the U.S. dollar—more precisely, a negative 0.95 correlation coefficient, according to gold research firm Murenbeeld & Co. What this means is that gold prices have been moving in nearly the exact opposite direction as the greenback.
I think it’s important to point out that, despite a stronger dollar, gold is still up for the 36-month period—and climbing even higher over the long term. The dollar has only recently broken even, whereas gold has continued to hit higher lows since its phenomenal breakout in December 2015.
The dollar could be ready to peak, with the potential for even higher gold prices. The metal is currently down two standard deviations over the past 60 trading days, so the math is currently in our favor for gold to rally.
Vanguard Just Gave Precious Metal Investors the Short Shrift
There’s another sign that gold has found a bottom. Last week, I spoke with Kitco’s Daniela Cambone about Vanguard’s decision to change its Precious Metals and Mining Fund. Starting next month, the fund’s exposure to metals and mining will be dropped from 80 percent today to only 25 percent—meaning the world’s largest fund company will no longer offer investors a way to participate, should gold and precious metals rally.
This isn’t the first time Vanguard has done this to investors. Back in 2001, it removed the word “gold” from what was then the Gold and Precious Metals Fund. The change coincided with a decade-long precious metals bull run that saw gold rally from an average price of $271 an ounce in 2001 to an all-time high of more than $1,900 in September 2001. That’s more than a sevenfold increase.
And now it’s dropping the fund altogether—at a time when gold might be ready to break out.
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