Are there political cyclical tracks left behind in the price of inflation defense assets like for example gold?
This is not an investigation in the normal sense as will become clear below. More like a presentation of some relationships which may or may not be primarily inter-causal. It’s not looking at any particular presidential or royal person, but because I will use dollar based gold charts, it appears to focus upon the US. I said “appears” because .... well ... what one politician does in for example the US, maybe another politician in .... oh ... let’s say Japan or the UK or even the EU ... that other politician just might consider that thing a clever thing to do too. You know: birds of a feather and so on.
So rather than read all the newspapers, and blogs, and political biographies, and cross reference their contents to decisions, which create events, which make investors alter their asset allocation decisions I decided to take a different approach. One disliked by many for good and bad reasons, but you know it works too.
If you look at them in a certain way, presidents and congresses and parliaments are large societal collective organisms. I like to think of them that way for research purposes. It’s enabling for me. They are so big, they might be considered the elephants of society.
Let’s imagine we are trying to locate elephants hidden in the bush. We can do it many ways.
How about we take the secret service “James Bond” approach. “Q” will build us an artificial elephant with cameras and microphones hidden inside. It will cost a vast amount, but what the heck, the taxman just gets us more money when the last lot is gone! Our drone elephant will make itself know to the herd with a credible cover story and infiltrate the elephants, and relay regular reports back so we can study their behaviour, motivation, and private conversations. And if it’s discovered we can point to the made in China sticker carefully stuck on it’s backside and make a plausible denial!
But the voice on the phone said to me: “Sorry the secret service are busy, and won’t help. They’re all off doing ... uh .... something ... err .... somewhere right now. Please call later and we can set up a meeting.”
We could take the NSA approach! There is a private company Blackie, Blackbridge, Blackpebble or something like that and they can recruit this wonderful force of sniper taggers just for us. A contractor (no government employee would be allowed – it’s the law!) will shoot a GPS location device into each elephant, and then we can get NASA to launch a satellite (it’s small dammit ... the budget’s no problem!) which detects the tags, and relay that information to our HQ bunker in .... well I sure would like to tell you, but you don’t have clearance. Yes. I can see that that would work.
Or alternatively we could be naturalists. We would buy the latest behavioural research on elephant and their habits. Then we would know what they do, and where they tend to go at different times. That would narrow down the possible locations to only a few, and we send out our scouts and viola!
That sounds likely to succeed.
How about this. We make like predators. Those lazy lions and crocodiles are taking it easy all day at the water hole. Those big elephants need to drink a lot and they’re sure to come to the lions & crocs eventually when they have to. We could wait there too. But our elephant stakeout operatives might get mud on them, and dirty their suits, or be eaten by a lion. Health & Safety Dept would be sure to nix it. That one’s right out!
How about this? We become like trackers.
We get someone to follow the tracks left behind by all the Presidents and Politicians, I mean the elephants of course, and see where they went and what happened in those places. But the legal department says this has a problem. Like for example if the presidential elephants all go to a certain place, and a whole load of stuff happens, then we won’t have a smoking gun! They can deny they had anything to do with, I mean they had means, motive, opportunity, but where ‘s the witness?
Well if it’s just our own private investigation, we won’t need one. Will we? So trackers we are then. Just for this article you understand! We will follow the massive piles of political – I mean elephant - poop until we find .... err ... it’s source I guess. Also: that last sentence works on so many levels ....
And so dear reader, after my lengthy preamble I give you your first elephant sized footprint: the 4 year Presidential cycle in US gold prices:
Well I find that interesting.
Plausible denial and the scientific method – you figure which - requires that I mention there is absolutely no proof this has anything whatsoever to do with the activities of anybody from anywhere, and the 4 years length is circumstantial and unproven.
I hear a little voice saying: “But if there actually is a Presidential cycle in gold, well what about Presidents who serve a second term eh? Gotcha! Now you had better retract your insinuations mate”
Well my reply as an expert tracker of invisible giants would be to reply something like this: Maybe. I think I had better look and see if there are other footprints out there in the ... err ... bush.
So let’s see. A second president or parliament would not have such a long “bedding-in time delay” I mean, their connections are already made. Their hiring and firing of crony/friendly/supporting experts is already done during the previous term. So what exactly are we looking for? They will “get into their groove” much faster the second time compared to the first, as it were. With less delay. So maybe there could be another cycle which could be double the length of the 4 year cycle, but a little shorter than that. And maybe it’s only there some of the time ... like when a second term administration is creating piles of poop as it does whatever it does while lurking in the bush. Am I getting my creatures mixed up do you think?
Let’s see. I found this 7 ¾ year cycle in gold. I wonder what causes that?
Moving on there seem to be many political forces out there which carry on activities which influence the price of gold. Congressional elections leave their footprints every two years it seems.
Who would have thought that would be there?
If one were to integrate the political components of the gold price movement what would one find? The answer is something like this:
I thought you might like to see that for laughs. It’s funny, yes? Aaah, but is it funny ha ha or funny peculiar? You be the judge. Who the joke gets played on matters a lot in such things.
Not that there is any proven connection between the fine upstanding bodies and personages mentioned above and the price of gold. I’m sure there are many thousands of intermediate steps between the two. Sort of like friends of cousins of contractors of contractors of contractors I expect. Now if only elephants wouldn’t create such a gigantic mess my job would be so much cleaner. I suppose one can dream.
argentus maximus
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The author posts daily commentary on the gold and silver markets in the TFMR forum: The Setup For The Big Trade. More information about the author can be found here: RhythmNPrice.
