BFI Consulting

In our last edition of our BFI InSights, we looked at the new role gold is playing as an anchor in today’s global financial system. We made the case why precious metals in general have a promising outlook for the months and years to come. Over the course of the summer, gold has moved decisively higher, pushing through some very important resistance points and currently prices are trading around USD 2’615, so in recent weeks there has been a more than 10% gain for the yellow metal. However, as explained in our last update, the action in the gold market can’t be seen as isolated from all the other ongoing developments around the world.

The global financial, monetary and economic landscape is once again shifting and the changes that are already underway are bound to have a significant impact on investment strategies. After much speculation and anticipation, the Federal Reserve recently announced its decision to cut interest rates by 50 basis points, very likely signaling a return to a more dovish policy direction.

As September rolled into October, tens of thousands of Bank of America customers found themselves logging into their accounts only to see that those accounts were temporarily unavailable…or even worse, with a zero balance! Some were stranded without access to their direct salary deposits, while others couldn’t pay rent on time. Let this be a warning the computer glitches are a glaring reminder of why “jurisdictional diversification” needs to become part of your vocabulary!

It probably goes without saying that when you plan on buying physical bullion, you need to choose the dealer you are going to purchase from and store with well. Like any investment, that can be hard enough to do, but in a recent (and yet another!) case out of the U.S., apparently even choosing a reputable, recommended dealer isn’t enough. Once again, the victims are U.S. retirement account holders that were simply trying to protect their wealth.

Bank stability is something too many people have taken for granted for too long. After the last global financial crisis of 2008 and the subsequent recovery, many naively believed that all serious systemic vulnerabilities have been addressed and bank collapses - or even worse, contagion scenarios - would be wildly unrealistic in the future.

Consumed largely by recent US political news – the assassination attempt on Donald Trump and Joe Biden stepping down from the presidential race – it has been easy to overlook other important developments that can impact an investors’ big picture. One of those is the threat of de-dollarization, as US sanctions on Russia continue to make the BRICS countries, as well as others, wary of being hand-cuffed to the US dollar.