Time is on our side, yes it is

When we lay out the legitimate case for hard assets versus financial assets, inevitably the questions arise as to the timing. Our response to these questions is always consistent: We don’t know. We have spoken at length about the futility involved in forecasting, particularly forecasting the onset of such a significant secular shift. However, the constant communication and information flow of today places pressure on investors ,which in turn, many times causes them to  overestimate their  own timing instincts. We point out to people, that more emphasis should be placed on where one wants to position themselves rather than exactly when.  The emphasis should be placed on the how and where rather than the when. We also stress to investors that the information flow regarding the beginning of this secular shift will be subtle and almost completely anecdotal. We can attest that these comments  offer little comfort for most investors, as they find it difficult to wrap their minds around such “soft data”. Investors are much more comfortable pointing to an event, or series of events, as evidence of a shifting investment paradigm.  We are firmly not in this camp however, instead suggesting that the divergence in returns and flows towards hard assets, and away from financial assets, will take place in a more nuanced fashion.