James Turk talks to Egon von Greyerz

Great video with two very good physical metal investors. It is a long video (28 min), but good information. Click here. These guys have been in precious metals since the beginning.

They talk about gold and silver as real money vs. global fiat currencies. They also talk about gold over silver as an investment. Although silver is volatile, buy whatever physical metal you can afford as a base, and then work towards having both metals. Under the current environment, it is better to have some physical silver than no physical metal at all. If you have lots of money to invest, buy physical gold first.

Egon speaks in-depth about the Swiss franc and Swiss banking.

Gold and Silver update

As we march closer to Martin Armstrong’s turning date on his Economic Confidence Model of June 13-14, 2011, gold seems to be holding above $1500 and silver above $35. Currently at $1536 and $38.

We will wait and see how that date plays out for all markets, including gold and silver.

Richard Russell is urging his subscribers to buy silver again. Click here. He also is suggesting EFT funds of silver, so this is a short term play, which gg doesn’t like. Only buy EFTs for short term trading and only 10% of your precious metals holdings. This is the money you can afford to lose. If you can not afford to lose money, hold your precious metals investments in physical gold and silver in a private vault for the long term. GG  bought some silver coins a couple of weeks ago, but she is waiting for that June 13-14 date to decide to buy more or not.

Starting to see the Japan impact

As groovygirl has stated before, Japan was the third largest economy in the world and a major player in the “just-in-time” global supply chain. American business will soon be using the word resilience in the first paragraph of their annual report instead of profit. One, because the economy has taken another turn and there is no profit to be had. And two, if you don’t have a product, there is no possibility for profit.

Click here for zerohedge’s post about Japanese car exports dropping 68% in the month of April. That is a major impact on world GDP.

And while this would be the ideal environment for US carmakers to grab market share, the fact that many are missing critical Made in Japan components in their supply chain means that there is a broad-based supply drop.

Ah, the fallacy of the Western system of production. Soon, everyone will learn the hard way.

Many more downgrades of Japan the last few weeks. What was their first clue, the shutdown of reliable electricity to major areas of the country or the continued release of nuclear radiation?