Short Attention Span Theater

"Analysts": in every field will say just about anything at any time as long as it is outrageous, inflammatory, and insulting, because it's about the only way they can cut through the noise and momentarily seize the attention of an audience that has the attention span of a flee.

In the financial arena you do get the thoughtful commentary of a Michael Pettis or a Richard Duncan, but few readers even know who they are because you have to have the attention span sufficient to reading a whole book to begin to understand their arguments.

Rather, everyone is familiar with blowhards like Martin Armstrong, Peter Schiff, Jim Kramer and Stuart Varney who continually tout their own brilliance while making extraordinary pronouncements on every market under the sun, falling all over themselves to come up with numbers, theories and harangues more extreme than anyone else and insulting anyone and everyone who doesn't agree.

Why?  Because it gets them attention, and when their numbers don't pan out, they just issue new extreme pronouncements figuring nobody will remember anyway.

And most of the time they're right about one thing: Nobody remembers.

The same is true with those running for public office - especially President.  Thoughtful debate is pointless.  Nobody will listen, especially not the media.  So you get Donal Trump - who when he was simply trying to be loved in NYC was pro choice, pro immigration, pro welfare, pro China.  Now that he's running for Republican nomination: abortion is murder, immigrants are rapists, welfare if for moochers and the Chinese are all greedy cheating bastards.

Why not?  It gets attention.  And if anybody doesn't like it, he'll change it when it's convenient.  Nobody will remember in 10 seconds anyway.

We get what we deserve.  And the incredible thing is the trend to short attention is accelerating.  Now there are novels like those of James Patterson where every chapter is a single sentence.  News sites like Drudge where articles are simply headlines and links.  Networks like Fox and CNBC where analysis is a series of screeds.

The "analyst" who hates the loudest win 

And try to get a thirteen year old off their screen for more than a minute at a time and you'll see the face of the future. 

Gold Gurus Babble:

On the whole Gold Analysts are the Most Bearish since 2002 according to the Financial Times: You'll recall that in 2002 gold was at its low point.


Jason Zweig of the Wall Street Journal has pronounced gold nothing but a "pet rock."  Back in 2011 at the peak of the market he declared it an excellent time to buy gold stocks as they were sure to rocket much higher. 

Peter Schiff has been touting his dollar collapse into hyper inflation theory which will send gold to $5000 and higher for many many years.  As the dollar continues to strengthen and deflation takes hold he is undaunted by facts on the ground and continues to hold fast to his theory.

Martin Armstrong has been touting his $680 gold bottom.  He was in a jail cell for securities fraud in 2011 but he first declared gold would reach $12000, and when it started to crash he switched to saying gold would reach 660 by 2013, by which time the Dow would double.   Now that he is wrong, he says that all his predictions are contingent on the markets "electing bearish reversals in conjunction with phase shift reversals within recurring time frames."   Since nobody on earth knows what that means except Mr. Armstrong's self proclaimed Self-Aware Super-Intelligent Computer, given to him personally by the the Time Travelers from Alpha Centurion it's not really possible to ascertain whether he will ever be right.


John Laforge of Ned Davis research, another $660 gold predictor here in 2015, had this to say in 2011 right at Gold's Peak: ""Gold's bull run reflects a lack of trust and credibility in governments and central banks worlwide to stop printing paper money at will.... Until governments start enacting more sound money policies, gold should continue to rise. "

SOC GEN BANK: the streets biggest Gold Bear predicts gold to fall to $800 by 2017.  Back in 2011 at the hieght of the Gold Bull SOC GEN Analyst David Wilson on Bloomberg called for gold reach $2000 within six months and then head on to $3000 not long after: check it out at: .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PS3GoUuqboM

GOLDMAN SACHS gold analyst Jeffrey Curie is also among the streets most bearish here in 2015,  He is calling for gold to fall well below 1000 by the end of the year.  Back in 2012, a year into the gold decline, he was still the most bullish analyst on the street calling for gold to rise back to $1800 by the end of the year.

Obviously there's a lot of noise competing for your dollars to buy their research.

But, in truth, there is no "Fair Value" for gold - or for anything else for that matter.  It's all perception.

Gold measures the perception of Trust in the Financial Stability of prevailing governments.

Right now at $1100 there's a lot more trust than in 2011.  And a lot less trust than in 2000.

We're rapidly approaching the amount of trust there was in government in 2008: right before the global financial system collapsed - only to be bailed out by the greatest transfer of wealth from the private citizens to the Big Banks, in the history of the world.

How much trust do you have?