OF COURSE CNBC would be negative on gold, the Fed’s mouth piece.

Frank,
true that!!!

CASELESS IN CLEVELAND, read the article last week.

Start talking the control freak system nice REALLY ! Day are installing it NOW ! Cory WAKE UP !

There is a difference between a cashless society by choice and one dictated by government. Once again, it’s about control. I think it is certainly possible that we could be there and not by choice far earlier than Cory thinks. Already, one is looked at like a criminal if he were to purchase anything higher priced than several hundred dollars. I believe banks are required to report transactions in cash above a certain value right now. I’ve wondered what would happen to the ‘mattress’ money if this was to come about. Would your cash be c onfiscated if you couldn’t actually prove where it came from??

Al please turn up yr voice!!

After all those people who used credit cards got hacked at Target last year, I use cash now at Walmart and Target, etc. Just used cash yesterday at Walmart to buy CD’s of Jim Croce’s and Cat Stevens’ greatest hits for $7.

Not witnessing cash transactions?
I do have automatic withdraws for payments for taxes ,energy, net, mortgage.
But groceries, gas, cloths, entertainment, daily expenses etc is cash. Anything less than a few thousand. Oh ya, and all PM purchases.lol

For the autonomy of the individual, this idea of a cashless society makes my blood boil; how would we ever be able to buy a used car off our neighbour? To go to a lawn sale? Perhaps a ceftified cheque whereby we pay an additional fee. Depending on how one’s account is set up we pay transaction costs. This will bring us to a mixed system of retail and barter….meanwhile pm’s are subject to a 38%!? Capital gains tax…this government is making slaves of Americans by means of boiling them slowly. Consider also that in certain states you are recorded when buying pm’s. Going electronic (to quote the late Bob Chapman) if anyone says something negative about the president, their account could be wiped out. Meanwhile if you try to save, society is facing zero to negative interest rates. I’m seriously considering leaving north america in the next 5 years to go to a place where I can still have some liberty.

A cashless society will crush the poor and marginalized members of our society.

Good show guys. No question this is a topic that will occupy us for years to come.

You are right Al that its my belief we are essentially already in a cashless society. What other countries do is not so much our concern. It is what happens at home that matters most to us because even if other countries still transacted in cash it would generally be inconvenient to participate and hold their money given all the new restrictions on cash moving across borders.

Just thirty five years ago, modern computing was still pretty much a pipe dream outside of universities. I was learning to code on punch cards at UBC back in 1975 (? rusty memory, sorry).

But at that time if you had imagined how supercomputers would predict weather, process credit cards, synthesize music, make war, manage the data of billions of people etc etc….you were just a big, old, fat dreamer because that was all still in the future.

Well the future sure came fast, didn’t it?

As I pointed out yesterday, we now live in an age when trillions of dollars of transactions are processed each year. That is just for the US market which means cash is now the smallest part of our money economy.

Maybe it is just a comfort thing that cash still exists. We sure don’t buy much with it anymore. So Cory could be right that it will linger for many years to come and perhaps we will only know the effects of its passing as more and more shops refuse to accept it due to the inconvenience.

Banks are already discouraging merchants from hauling in wads of notes each day. Its a hassle and they want extra handling fees to deal with it. And shop keepers are taking the hint; especially as tax authorities are tending to scrutinize cash business’s more closely these days.

So the trend to cashless is already underway. And here is more proof.

Tim Cook of Apple reported in an interview on January 27th that 750 banks and Credit Unions across the US had already signed on to Apple Pay and that in just 90 days after the launch, 2 out of every 3 dollars spent on contact-less POS terminals had gone through its system.

They also reported there are now 200,000 vending machines, self laundries and parking lots hooked into the Apple Pay system. In other words, expansion and market penetration has been explosive by any standard.

Samsung meanwhile has installed more than 13 million point of sale terminals to support its own pay network. That’s a lot of merchants who have decided to give the idea a try and really, it is mind boggling how fast growth has come about.

I think we are already in the midst of the final countdown days to zero paper money.

And I agree with LPG on his idea today. The loss of cash means that holding gold and silver as a means to save is a no-brainer. It may just be the most compelling reason to support metals I have heard in years.

Lets just consider that there is a segment of society that saves come hell or high water. They do not care if there is high inflation and they do not care if rates are sub-zero. They are the mattress people and they want their money in their possession and in their cold clammy hands.

But who exactly are they? Well American Express did a survey in late 2014 and discovered that Millennial’s were the most likely to save physical money outside the bank. Sixty Seven percent of those surveyed said they hid cash in their homes. It is an incredible number. So LPG is on to something here….

If just a fraction of those shifted from paper to gold the results might be astonishing.

Under a mattress, in the freezer: Why so many are hiding cash — CNBC
http://www.cnbc.com/id/102377632

I just had a detailed conversation with Al on the matter, so a few things.

1) on the topic of cashless/gold, for whoever wants to read a bit more on what was said, there are a few posts under Gary’s podcast today (some food for thought, FWIW).

2) the reason why I see a cashless society (or the move toward it as it is a process) as a “gift” for the price of precious metals is the confluence of
a) lack of alternatives to paper cash
b) small ownership of PMs as a %age of total assets for both households and investors and
c) the current price of PMs such as Gold and silver where probably 50% of producers are currently losing money.

The thing is that the paradigm and the narrative on precious metals is not conducive for a move up, nor is exactly the current price. BUT….
… once people will SLOWLY (it’s a process) realize that their cash is TRAPPED within the banking system, then they will (slowly) try to take it out of the financial/banking system.

By elimination, I believe that what most will favor are equities and precious metals/gems (stones). The main difference between equities and PMs are the absence of counterparty risk for PMs. A big plus for PMs when the narrative starts to shift.

Once the public and some investors slowly realize the EMBEDDED risk to their capital/assets of being in the banking system (and to a certain degree in the financial system), THEN the paradigm will start to shift.
THEN the narrative will start to be different.
THEN the precious metals will start to be bid.

As the screw is slowly being turned on households and capital holders in different parts of the world (EU, USA, Switzerland – other countries/regions I can’t say but I’m confident the list is longer than just the EU,USA, Switzerland), the risk is shifting more strongly against capital holders of cash in bank accounts and to a certain extent to some bondholders.
When the REALIZATION that the risk is shifting start to hold ground… then it becomes an entirely new narrative/paradigm for the marketplace. When the paradigm shifts, capital flows change, and some forgotten/cheap asset prices start to get a bid again.

Just keep in mind it’s just a process. Things are unlikely to change in one day, one week, or one month.

The lowest PM prices over the next few months, the better for me as an investor w. a multiyear time frame in the PM space (bullion and publicly listed PMs equities).
The better because it increase my chances on this dissimetry of risk that I perceive in the PM space.

It is a bit like those hedge fund managers (such as Mark Hart) who bought CDS on Greece in the late 2000’s at 10-15bps… The risk profile was hugely dissymmetric and in their favor.
It took a few months for them to make money on these CDS, but then, it became a 50x slam dunk in their favor in just a few quarters.
Before, the narrative/paradigm was that Greece was fine, and that the country risk (as per gvt bond yield) was similar/close to the one of Germany. The market was mispricing the risk.
When the narrative started to shift because obviously reality had been misperceived for so long (as reflected by a long mispricing of the risk) then it was game over and RING RING for Mark Hart and other hedge fund managers who had bet similarly to him.
If they had bought the CDS at 40, 50 or 100bps, they would still have lost made money (assuming they had held all the way down to 10-15bps). But at 10-15bps the cost of insurance, the investment/trade was almost a guarantee of a slam dunk when the narrative would change.

That’s why, for the PM space, I like the risk/reward profile. And that’s why I would LOVE to see lower prices for the PM and the equities. To me, it would be like moving from 50bps on Greece’s CDS toward 10-15bps. That’s why I still keep a good amount of drypowder and hope for lower prices. However, I am cognizant that MAYBE the low is already in gold (but I have no idea) and therefore I have a plan, and a plan after the plan.

Hope this clarifies my thoughts a little bit.

GL to all investing/trading.

LPG

Doc regardless of big up days or big down days gold refuses to have any meaningful follow thru….its whats missing for both bulls and bears

Wed FOMC or US GDP could completely reverse all of todays gains OR give gold and the miners the follow thru thats much needed especially regarding the miners who are lack luster today giving the lower levels gold and silver bounce from and their % gains

The two main drivers behind a cashless society are global governments looking for every TAX cent and more importantly it removes global bank runs as the world goes digital….G7 countries will be cashless

The timing of the daily moves smell of manipulation.
http://www.kitco.com/charts/livegold.html

I find it sad/ironic that an American bank (Citibank) which is cahoots with the U.S imperial project and the Federal reserve were allowed to purchase such a key and sensitive asset? Why wasn’t this “gift” of gold not offered to China or Russia? Maybe it was? You have to wonder if there are other political reasons behind such a maneuver? Is Venezuela trying to repair broken bridges with the U.S?

or has the coup already begun?

Doc, I think the Canadian dollar is going to break down again before it hits .84

Of course it has Confused, Venesuala is on the “list”.
The Americans are not happy with Ukraine and isis isn’t big enough.
The Americans are looking for a bigger target, check Paul Craig Roberts.
It could easily have been “provide the gold or we invade”, as you say, why not the Russians or Chinese.