Global Investing

It was Goldman Sachs who famously predicted oil prices to reach $200 a barrel last year, but there are a school of bullish investors who forecast a substantial rally in gold.

Take Gold and Energy Advisor, which predicts gold will soon reach $2,500 an ounce (from today’s $895) then to $5,000. The Florida-based firm argues that gold is the only asset class that’s not only private (as opposed to state-owned), but also liquid, portable, fungible, divisible, and valuable enough that a small amount can store a massive amount of wealth.

It also argues that of $11.5 trillion stored in offshore accounts and other assets, if one percent were transferred into gold, that would be almost four times the entire annual investment demand for gold.

Perhaps not as bullish, but Investec Asset Management also reckons that gold could perform well in either an inflationary or deflationary environment.

Investec also argues the potential areas of concern for gold investors: an increasing supply of recycled gold and the potential return of the “Goldilocks” scenario, where the economy sustains moderate growth and inflation in a “not too hot, not too cold” environment.

Deflation seems to have replaced inflation as the public enemy No.1 these days.

This might give relief to quite a number of people, including those who thought the resurgence of inflation could take us back to the 1970s.

“We thought we would be wearing platform shoes again, like in the 1970s,” says Philip Saunders, head of investment strategy at Investec Asset Management.

“A potential return of inflation is not something people are worried about but maybe that’s what people should be worried about,” he told participants at an investment outlook briefing in London.

Graphic evidence from Investec Asset Management (below) highlighting the demise of the carry trade. It shows returns from borrowing low-yielding currencies such as Japanese yen to buy high-yielding ones over the past 7-1/2 years or so.  There has been a roughy 50 percent decline since the end of July.