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David Fuller and Eoin Treacy's Comment of the Day
Category - Precious Metals / Commodities

    Gold Claws Back Some Ground After Early Morning Flash Crash

    This article from Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

    The recent slump highlights a worsening outlook for the bullion on fears that the strong rebound in the U.S. labor market could see the Fed pull back stimulus sooner than expected. Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan’s said that the central bank should start tapering asset purchases sooner rather
    than later.

    Bullion was down 1% at $1,745.31 an ounce by 12:20 p.m. in London, after earlier touching the lowest since March, and coming close to its lowest in more than a year. In the futures market, over 3,000 contracts changed hands in a one-minute window -- equivalent to over $500 million notional value -- as
    activity surged in a typically quiet trading period.

    Gold “recovered in the course of trading as bargain hunters took advantage of the low price to enter the market,” said Falkmar Butgereit, a senior trader at refiner Heraeus Metals Germany GmbH & Co. KG. Still, “many investors now fear that the Fed will soon start tapering bond purchases, raising expectations of interest rate hikes in 2022/2023.”

    Attention will turn to fresh economic data later this week to gauge the health of the recovery from coronavirus, as well as inflation. The consumer price index due Wednesday is expected to show a smaller increase than the previous month as pressures on supply chains caused by reopenings ease. That may lend support to the view held by the Fed that inflationary pressures will prove transitory.

    Also key to the outlook is the rise of the delta variant in the U.S., which could complicate the country’s economic rebound. New Covid-19 cases have jumped to more than 100,000 a day on average, returning to the levels of the winter surge six months ago.

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    Trend Compendium 2050: Six MegaTrends that will shape the world

    Thanks to a subscriber for this report from Roland Berger which may be of interest. Here is a section:

    Manmade global temperature increases can only be limited to 2°C if significant additional efforts are undertaken to become carbon-free in 2100

    Is the limit of 2°C enough? To keep the global warming below 2°C had long been regarded as the right target measure to limit the most dangerous risks. More recently, 1.5°C has been considered safer, which requires rapid, far-reaching, and unprecedented changes across all aspects of society.

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    Email of the day - on investing for the long term.

    Would be very interested in your thoughts for positioning an investment portfolio (retirement monies) at this point in time. It is increasingly difficult for me to envision what could spark a leg up in the US equity markets in the near term. A leg down at some point feels more probable, yet I am not one for market timing. Nevertheless, increased uncertainty and volatility look to be on the menu for an extended period of time as the markets and Fed wrestle with the curtailing of the liquidity which has fueled the market's run. Is simply pruning equity positions and building cash the most reasonable course of action?

    The FullerTreacy service is outstanding and all the more valuable at times like these. Thank you for your thoughts.

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    Brazil's Frost May Kill Young Coffee Trees, Hurt Crops for Years

    This article from Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

    The freeze will have the greatest impact on coffee trees under 4 years old. Because of their fragile root systems, trees younger than two usually need be eliminated, while trees between 2 and 4 years old often have to be drastically trimmed and won’t produce the following crop year, said Regis Ricco, a director at Minas Gerais-based RR Consultoria Rural.

    The consulting firm has been providing technical loss reports to growers who are going to seek debt renegotiations due to the frost damage. In some regions, farmers lost everything they had.

    “Some farmers will have a difficult situation as they got loans from banks to fund irrigation systems, plantings and machinery,” Ricco said. “The impact is stunning.”

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    Enel installs 6.1 MWh vanadium redox flow battery in Spain

    This article from PV Magazine may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

    Canada-based vanadium mining company Largo Resources has announced that its U.S.-based unit Largo Clean Energy has signed its first supply agreement for its VCHARGE ± vanadium redox flow battery system, with Enel Green Power Spain, a unit of Italian renewable energy company Enel Green Power, which is itself part of the Enel group. Under the terms of the deal, Largo Clean Energy will provide a five-hour, 6.1 MWh system for a project in Spain whose start-up is scheduled for the third quarter of 2022.

    The company's VPURE and VPURE + vanadium products come from one of the three largest vanadium mines in the world, the company's Maracás Menchen mine, located in Brazil. These compounds are used to develop's Largo's  VCHARGE ± vanadium redox flow battery technology.

    Largo Clean Energy began, last year, the development of its vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) technology based on 12 patent families previously owned by U.S. storage specialist VionX Energy, whose assets it acquired for $3.8 million.

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    The Future of Space Is Bigger Than Bezos, Branson or Musk

    This article from Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

    Here are just a few of the less remarked-on recent stories out of the private space industry. First was the stock market debut of a company called Astra Space, which, backed by venture capitalists, built a viable orbital rocket in just a few years. Its goal is to fly satellites into orbit every single day. Shortly after Astra went public at a value of $2.1 billion, satellite maker Planet Labs—which uses hundreds of eyes in the sky to photograph the Earth’s entire landmass daily—announced its plans to do the same, at a value of $2.8 billion. Firefly Aerospace has a rocket on a California pad awaiting clearance to launch. OneWeb and Musk’s SpaceX are both regularly launching satellites meant to blanket the planet in high-speed internet access. Rocket Lab, in the previously spacecraft-free country of New Zealand, is planning missions to the moon and Venus.

    The SPAC frenzy has been particularly kind to the private space industry, including some of the companies named above. Easier access to public markets has helped draw billions of dollars from excited investors to an industry once dependent on governments with vague military objectives or expansive views of public works. Partly as a result, the number of satellites orbiting the Earth is projected to rise from about 3,400 to anywhere between 50,000 and 100,000 in the next decade or so—and that’s even if these companies just fulfill the orders they’ve received so far.

    It seems likely the estimates will slide a bit, given that those kinds of numbers would require rockets to blast off one after another from bustling private spaceports all over the globe on an extremely frequent basis. But whatever the precise timing, the message will remain unchanged: Private space is here. This month’s space tourism race is just escape-velocity window dressing on a much bigger, more transformative set of changes. The results of these shifts will be unpredictable, except that ego and greed will likely be as present as ever. Nonetheless, the evidence on the non-ground suggests we should consider the possibility that this emerging industry might turn out OK.

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    Email of the day on tin

    What is your view on the tin chart?  https://uk.investing.com/commodities/tin-streaming-chart

    Looking at the LSE the only tin share I can find is AFRITIN MINING who produce in the safe jurisdiction of Namibia. Additionally, they are due to release an estimate on their lithium resources mined as a by-product at the same time.

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    On Target July 15th 2021

    Thanks to Martin Spring for this edition of his report. Here is a section on the best wartime assets to own.

    Conclusion: The best in-country stores of wealth are non-ostentatious property, such as remote farmland or vineyards. Just make sure the mortgages are paid off.
    Jewellery and gold are crucial since they can be readily exchanged for daily necessities.

    The best out-of-country stores of wealth are equities, jewellery and land. They should be located or stored in safe jurisdictions, protected by geography, rule of law and a strong national defence. The United States, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Switzerland come to mind.

    Don’t be tempted to sell just because news goes from bad to worse. And maintain a well-diversified portfolio of stocks.

    Those are the key investing lessons from the Second World War.

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