I just don’t see much short term upside to the market.
Usually when people cite the shortage of retail gold coins, they do so to justify a prediction that the price of gold will be going higher. They claim that the bulk price of gold (whole, delivery ready, gold bars) is being suppressed on the COMDEX future markets by big banks trying to hide their inflationary money printing, and that the retail shortage of gold reflects a genuine shortage of available physical gold at the currently suppressed price.
However, you are citing the retail shortage and concluding the exact opposite, that there does not seem to be much short term upside to the market.
Could you elaborate on how you come to this conclusion?
In any case, the explanation I find most persuasive for the current retail shortage of gold coins is that there has been a strong increase in demand for these coins which has overwhelmed the available production facilities.
I figure that the price of gold bars has been caught by two opposing forces: the short term collapse of all commodities and the longer term expectation that all debt-based paper fiat currencies are going to heavily damaged by the current financial panic and related bailout (money printing) efforts. The first force has pulled gold down, but not as far as other commodities, because the second force has begun to push the price upwards.
Could you elaborate on how you come to this conclusion?
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Gold coins are just a segment of the market, and are the one which is the easiest for small speculators and investors to enter and where those folks are concentrated at.
Its my opinion that heavy investment from small speculators is a bearish signal- particularly when the overall gold market isn’t also moving forward.
The little guy is almost always the last one in during major moves in financial markets-retail sales represent the little guy in gold.