Naam

1 hour ago, Lacessit said:

True. The R value is always what counts. I surrender.

if it's not a blatant marketing lie.

53 minutes ago, Brunolem said:

Let's just not forget that shares, included those of AIG, were propelled into the stratosphere thanks to trillions of dollars freshly printed by the Fed and other central banks.

let's not forget that without AIG's bailout the 2008 Lehman hurricane would have been demoted a moderate thunderstorm. by the way... shares, bonds and most other financial assets were not propelled into stratosphere by trillions of printed dollars. they just bounced back to near former levels by the end of 2009. lucky were those who had the guts to get in again in spring 2009 (double, triple, quadruple profits in a single calendar year).

44 minutes ago, Brunolem said:

Ain't that a wonderful magical world we are living in? 

yes it is... for those who are embracing reality and acting accordingly prudent as best as they can but based on their means instead of moaning, criticising, barking up irrelevant trees and expecting Armageddon early next week.

16 minutes ago, Brunolem said:

I'd rather have my insurance close to me, and not depending on more or less trustworthy institutions (AIG) 

 

There is no guarantee that the government will fork out another 180 billion dollars (AIG) in order to save players insured with exotic financial products once again... 

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Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke reported that the $182 billion bailout of the American International Group made him angrier than anything else in the recession. Bernanke said that AIG took risks with unregulated products like a hedge fund while using cash from people's insurance policies. Bernanke added that the government had no choice but to bail it out. Its demise would have created the same kind of economic collapse that occurred when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt in September 2008. 

 

Fortunately, the long-term cost of the bailout was much less than the initial payout. In fact, taxpayers made a $23 billion profit when the Treasury sold its last shares of the insurance giant. 

https://www.thebalance.com/aig-bailout-cost-timeline-bonuses-causes-effects-3305693

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Brunolem said:

There are many wellknown investors who recommend to buy gold today... on top of the Chinese and Russian central banks which are buying hands over fists. 

 

These are not paranoid people or entities. 

not only today but since years. that must be the reason why gold lost 30% of its value since 2012.

22 minutes ago, RocketDog said:

4 hours ago, Naam said:

Minted in Mexico City, the Mexican Gold Peso coins contain 90% pure Gold and 10% copper.

https://www.apmex.com/category/13206/gold-50-pesos-1947-prior

Sorry to disagree, but if the coin is genuine and says it's 0.999 fine then it has at most 0.1% non gold content. 

lost your reading glasses?

2 hours ago, RocketDog said:

Paper is drawn out of thin air. Precious metals are mined, and have historically been used to represent wealth. 

 

The idea of paper currency representing wealth has been a more recent ambitious deceit that started the rise of the banksters to the seats of power they hold today.

 

And it all started with them storing real gold for people and giving them paper receipts. 

 

Clever ruse, no? 

 

Still works beautifully today for many naive folks. 

Good luck with that. 

still works beautifully today for many successful folks. i earned paper currency, saved paper currency, invested in paper currency, paid for homes, cars and everything else in paper currency, when my wife goes shopping she doesn't pay with gold bullion and our domestic staff is happy to have their salaries in paper currency.

you Sir are a dreamer and lack touch with reality. but you have my blessing.

3 hours ago, soalbundy said:

4 hours ago, Naam said:

as an expat living in Thailand i care less about its politics or leaders than friends of mine who regularly spend their holidays here.

I didn't say we care, just that we know, or think we know, what is going on. I view what is going on here with amused disinterest, with the exception of the exchange rate. 

Spider Mike seems to care.

On 2/8/2019 at 9:04 AM, Skeptic7 said:

An interesting aside...it only ever stayed in the 50s for a grand total of (approx) 28 days. (image below) It was down to high 30s within 2 months, then moved from mid-30s to low-40s for quite some time. 

 

Those were the best days of my life! Besides getting a glorious exchange rate...everything here was DIRT CHEAP. Good times...damn good times. 

 

Now dirt isn't even cheap here...

1 hour ago, Brunolem said:

Western governments disparage gold because they have barely any left. 

 

Look how difficult it was for Germany to bring back a part of its holdings left in the good hands of the US! 

 

None of these countries is willing to have its reserves audited, and for good reason... it's either gone or what is left doesn't belong to them. 

 

Only two countries have been seriously stockpiling: Russia and China, and they are not shy about it. 

 

They see the storm coming and the demise of fiat/fake money, starting with the whole powerful USD. 

 

To rebuild a new system, a large pile of gold will help inspire trust. 

 

The West, for its part, will probably go full totalitarian, confiscating once again all precious metals and making it illegal to own it (hello FDR), while at the same time printing with total abandon worthless currencies that the hapless masses will be forced to accept. 

 

Nothing new here, History doesn't repeat, but it rhymes... 

the usual dreams of the goldbugs all based on assumptions drawn out of thin air.

5 hours ago, TunnelRat69 said:

We have little over two KG's of gold in both jewelry and some 2 oz bars, some of this was bought back in 2010.............missed a good sale in 2012 when it was 1900, but didn't have that much.  I have a Mexican 50 Peso coin........stamped .999  a friend of mine sold it too me for $700 when gold was $1100............I never saw a 50peso coin before and thought it was an ounce, it it stamped it says 37.5gr so I guess thats about 1 & 1/4 troy ounces??  

Minted in Mexico City, the Mexican Gold Peso coins contain 90% pure Gold and 10% copper.

https://www.apmex.com/category/13206/gold-50-pesos-1947-prior

11 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

As expats we have our finger somewhat on the pulse of what is happening here, a tourist from London, Paris, Berlin, couldn't care less about politics or the morality of their host countries leaders, they want sea, sun and fun for three weeks.

as an expat living in Thailand i care less about its politics or leaders than friends of mine who regularly spend their holidays here.

10 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

I think you are confusing expat thinking with tourist thinking. As expats we have our finger somewhat on the pulse of what is happening here, a tourist from London, Paris, Berlin, couldn't care less about politics or the morality of their host countries leaders, they want sea, sun and fun for three weeks. Investors will park their money where it will give them a profit, they don't have to live here. The Baht is not only stable it is rising, large foreign reserves, good trade balance, infrastructure investment and the population is quiet, whether through fear or apathy doesn't matter, 'Pecunia non olet' (money doesn't stink) as the Roman emperor Vespasian once said. Money and tourists will graze where its quiet and the grass is green.

6 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

One positive outcome from all of this latest election news, will be that the country will likely become a pariah worldwide, and the baht could take a major hit. Not a good thing for the Thai people. But, for once, good news for ex-pats. 

keep on dreaming

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Our house was built some 15 years ago, and the septic tank is now full. As my wife puts it, in her sometimes eccentric but essentially logical English: "everybody pooh too much for a long time, now no room!"

-after a certain period of initial use (usually one month) a septic tank is full, it stays full and is normally never emptied. that is if you have a septic tank and not a Thai engineered whole in the ground to accept your family's poo, pee and other discharges.

-when the septic tank is full the solids stay in the tank and oeverflowing liquid drains into another tank or a drain field where it percolates into the ground.

-in the septic tank mother nature with the help of several godzillions of bacteria are busy 24/7 to dissolve and liquify the solids that can be flushed out too.

question: what is your problem? toilets backing up? just the fact that your wife thinks you poo too much? or you think the tank should be emptied?

8 minutes ago, Otis Cribelcoblis said:

I bought low.  It went up 130+, I sold - I bought in again at 1205 per ounce or thereabouts.

this [possible] explanation is not a part of your opening post. without it your OP deserves the attribute "misleading BS". don't you agree?

1 minute ago, Otis Cribelcoblis said:

I lost you.  There's no need to change it into Dollars once you have 800,000b.  At that point, the exchange rate doesn't matter.  Gold moves and hopefully up not down.  It went up, it went down, and now up again. 

you have to change your gold to fund your THB 800k. this gold would have fetched on 31 jan, 19 only 792,600 Baht, i.e. you lost 7,400 Baht plus the fees buying and selling gold.

no more fairy tales please!

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Otis Cribelcoblis

Advanced Member

 

Posted January 31

8 months ago I bought some gold.  Enough gold to fund the bank account to the tune of 800,000 baht. 

 

In the last few months, my gold has appreciated 2770 Dollars as of today's value.

 

How much would I earn by leaving that 800,000b in a Thai bank for 6 months?

 

Anyone here willing to toss that amount of money or am I the only one concerned?

-gold may 30, 2018 was USD 1,302.-/ounce, gold jan 31, 2019 USD 1,321.-/ounce

-USD/THB may 30, 2018 32.01, USD/THB jan 31, 2019 31.25

-THB 800,000 bought may 30, 2018 USD 24.992.- = 19.20 ounces gold

-Thai Baht value of 19.20 ounces gold jan 31, 2019 = USD 25,363.- = THB 792,600.-

where's the beef man?

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Khaeng Mak said:

In the past a much repeated mantra among posters here on this forum was that the baht was strengthening because it is pegged to the Greenback.

12 hours ago, Naam said:

since mid 1997 that "mantra" is pure refined BS². look at the USD/THB chart.

 

 

and i forgot to mention that this is not the only "mantra among posters here on this forum" which is BS² if not BS³ when the comments pertain to finance in general and especially exchange rates. oh well... 

On 2/4/2019 at 6:55 PM, Khaeng Mak said:

In the past a much repeated mantra among posters here on this forum was that the baht was strengthening because it is pegged to the Greenback.

 

However last week the baht kept moving up while the Greenback correctly against other currencies.

 

So are we in a new paradigm now? And if yes, why?

 

Or is the "pegged with the USD" mantra just BS?

since mid 1997 that "mantra" is pure refined BS². look at the USD/THB chart.

5 hours ago, Montecristo said:

I am not quite sure I understood the requirement: keep 800,000B in a Thai bank account? That's around 25,000 USD. That makes no sense. Why would anyone keep 25k in a bank? What's the interest rate? Under 1%?  I like stock that have high yield, nice dividends at the end of the year. I am getting between 5-8%. Basically, do I have 25k to give as a present to a Thai bank? Of course not.  Someone wrote here: METV, and some travel back home, plus surrounding countries. Sounds like a plan. Maybe even one of surrounding countries becomes a place of more permanent residence.

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I like stock that have high yield, nice dividends at the end of the year. I am getting between 5-8%.

with a currency that lost 4.5% per annum vs. Thai Baht for the last 4 years plus the missed interest plus the hassle of visa runs.

1 hour ago, sumrit said:

And I see you've also joined the group that reads 14 pages of a thread about a hypothetical question. Hope you secretly enjoyed every single post on here.????

i only read your first post who's content was boring. just now i read your "solution" post who's naïveté amused me and i smiled. looking forward to read your solutions for

-changing Thailand's climate to a more moderate one.

-allowing expats to vote.

-teach all Thais (age 6 to 96) to conduct a simple conversation in decent English.

9 hours ago, sumrit said:

These comments on here are generally what I expected when I started this Thread. There are some good posts by people who genuinely recognize there is a problem that has massively increased over recent years. There are also others that, in my opinion, bury their head in the sand and ignore the problem or pretend it doesn’t exist. While a third group think there isn’t a problem anyway.

there's another group (to which i belong) who find it quite boring to waste time answering hypothetical questions like yours.

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Roy Baht said:

I agree. Obviously, a lot of people can't afford to put a big lump of cash in a bank and not touch it for 5 months and I sympathize with that situation. But the people who brag about their great wealth overseas then complain that they can't squeeze a paltry 800K baht out of their butts because they are "savvy investors" are full of it.