In a highly controversial CNBC interview on March 18, 2020, billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman issued a dire "hell is coming" warning about the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic impact. While publicly advocating for a nationwide shutdown, his firm, Pershing Square, had already been profiting from a massive market crash hedge, which earned them $2.6 billion.

Bill Ackman believes 10-year Treasury yield could approach 5% soon
In late September 2023, speaking at a CNBC conference, Bill Ackman stated he wouldn't be surprised if the 10-year Treasury yield approached 5%, citing persistent inflation due to structural issues like high energy prices and a resurgent labor movement. He suggested this was a "different world" with historically low interest rates, and that the Federal Reserve would struggle to return inflation to its 2% target.
Yes, Bill was already short USTs when issuing his dire warning and covered shortly after the market moved.

He does have a tendency to “talk his book” on CNBC looking to affect the overall market to his benefit. I’m not a fan of this practice but he is not alone in those that try to instill fear and create big market moves after establishing positions (look what Meredith Whitney did to the Muni market).

I’ll pass on ACKY on principle.

I know Gold isn't a stock but MAN it has been on a run lately!!

I think it has more to go. Many drivers for the long gold short dollar move
- Fed will cut rates 150-200 bp, lower short rates tend to pull down USD, lower USD boosts gold
- Inflation risk will rise as Fed turns to employment rather than inflation; gold is a hedge vs inflation
- Other Central Banks are diversifying from USD, especially China; foreign government demand for Treasuries is weaker; they are buying more gold
- Foreign private demand for Treasuries is still strong, but increasingly they hedge USD which pressures it down
- If US exports less, or if less trade is done in USD, then less trade-related demand for USD. The latter is gradually happening; when the financial structure is ready, it could happen suddenly.

If it hits $4000 I'm selling!!

I've been looking into data center focused ETF's. My head hurts! I'm trying to find an ETF that invests in data center infrastructure but there's a lot to sort through. It's easy to find the ETF's holding companies like NVIDIA, AMD etc. but that's not what I'm looking for. I'm having a hard time finding one that invests in the energy side of data centers. Most of the ETF's related to energy invest in companies like AEP or other big name power providers.

I've never gone for the paid subscription stuff but I'm wondering if Morningstar and Seeking Alpha might not be a bad thing to pay for this year.

I don’t see it going down anytime soon. Silver is up and now the platinum group metals are spiking.

I've noticed the spike in silver as well. I'm liking it!

Morningstar is not that useful in my opinion. Granted I already have all the financial data from other sources.

Seeking Alpha is useful, you can pretty quickly get a sense of the bull and bear cases for a stock, see related news and company earnings presentations and read transcripts of earnings calls. The opinions on a given stock will be all over the place of course, but it’s good to read different views. And it’s only about $300/yr.

I invested in gold and silver in 2018. They have appreciated 185% and 235% in US dollars respectively (and increasing weekly). In reality the value of the metals have not appreciated, but rather, the US dollar has depreciated and will continue to do so due to our irresponsible and unsustainable debt. The US dollar has been the premier currency of the world for over 80 years and we are at the end of our cycle. All fiat currencies throughout history have proven finite.This scene has been repeated over and over throughout history. We're hardly alone at this time, no currency on earth is based on anything tangible anymore and eventually commodities (especially gold and siver) will be the only real wealth again. It's hard for us to wrap our heads around this because the Dollar has been king our whole lives but it's happening and happening now.

Compare gold to a basket of other currencies, or other assets. Some of their move in USD is USD weakness, most is simply appreciation.

When looking at ETF's, just how far down the rabbit hole do you go? For instance, I look at ZAP and see a few of the holdings mirroring the things I'm looking at but do I dive into all the holdings? Another one is VOLT. Both have similar holdings. Both newer ETF's. Roll the dice, toss darts?

I really don't like throwing darts with my investments, I worked too hard for it.

I am a student of Buffett and Bogle, and invest most of my money in something that on a 5 year timeline the risk is approaching zero. For me that is the entire US economy- Total US Index funds and also the S&P 500, either traditional fund or ETF. When the market is jumping I do nothing, when the market is flat I do nothing, when the market goes into a tailspin with a lot of irrational fear, I pull some cash from my money market and buy in at a 20% discount like last April. Woot!

This is the most boring investment strategy on the planet but has delivered far greater ROI than nearly all of my real estate investments. Keeping 15% in a MM account on the side allows me to weather a 5 year downturn where I never have to sell low, but provides some quick cash to buy at steep discounts when irrational fear causes prices to fall. No tenants, no property tax, no repairs, no speculative stocks going to zero, no crystal ball at all. Just a long term gain with very low risk. I prefer to grow rich slow. YMMV

One example but there are many to invest long term and sleep like a stone at night.

Average Ann ROI- 1 Yr... 3 Yrs... 5 Yrs... 10 Yrs
VFIAX............ +15.83 +19.49 +14.70 +14.56

But why are the precious metals appreciating so rapidly in all currencies? And why have all the central banks here and around the world been gobbling it up at unprecedented rates in the last few years? Isn't that an indicator that something is changing?

The Fed has been printing dollars like Monopoly money for 5 years, devaluing the dollar heavily which is why gold is on a run. For 10 year returns gold has had a similar ROI to the S&P500 but if the dollar stabilizes, gold appreciation will grind to a halt while the US economy will still grow. I held gold through the 80s and 90s and it was flat as a pancake. Twenty years at $400/oz with zero appreciation, ugg. Gold is a store of value long term but does not produce anything. At it's core gold is currency speculation which can feed you or bite you.

https://www.investopedia.com/thmb/u64lJ9LTkb5SfCtA-gjcVT6vMSg=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/GOLD_2023-05-17_09-51-04-aea62500f1a249748eb923dbc1b6993b.png

Yeah but this is world wide and not just the US dollar. And how can the dollar possibly stabilize with such an astronomically large accumulated debt? Printing up more dollars out of thin air has been our answer to solving our problem for years and it's a unsustainable solution. It's worked since the '70s but we've kicked that can to the end of the road. The human brain cannot comprehend what a trillion is. One million seconds in time is 11.565 days, one billion is 31.69 years, a trillion seconds amounts to over 31, 000 years...and we are 37 trillion dollars in debt! How can we possibly even come close to a sustainable balance? We can't. We've been F'n up too long and the whole world is losing faith in the all mighty dollar. No one wants to buy our T bills anymore and that spells the end to our reign. Gold and silver were the standard of wealth for 5,000 years before the last measly 80 years. Could we be going back? What else is there?

If you like gold, buy gold. I still think the downside risk of gold is greater than the entire US economy, just like in 1980 but... I have been wrong before.

If you looked at the US economy as a business and ran the numbers, I doubt you would buy stock in that business. And that is precisely how the rest of the world is viewing the US economy. This point in time is way different than the '80s. We were one trillion in debt then. It has ballooned to 37T and counting. 1 trillion dollars pays the annual interest on our debt now

Well, I thought the dollar was completely sunk in 1981 and bought gold at $400/oz but apparently my crystal ball was fogged up. The folks who bought in 1980 at $800/oz had to sit on that 50% loss for 30 years and I don't have 30 years to wait. If you still like gold, buy gold. You do you.

CBs buying gold to reduce US Treasuries exposure, for geopolitical reasons (New Cold War, China wants a global financial system free of US dominance, Europe/other Western also increasingly distrustful of US), economic reasons (less trade with US) and risk reasons (unpredictability of US policy/actions). Not so much selling Treasuries outright as buying less of them and, in China's case, shifting to shorter duration. Investors (some of them, only) buying gold as hedge against market weakness, USD weakness, rate cuts, Treasury oversupply, and as speculation. Other precious metals simply following gold in speculative moves.

I'm not negative on gold, I owned it in 2019 for the recession I was expecting (then Covid happened), I own it now (for now).

2019 is about when I bought a bunch of metal. I remember paying almost $1400 an ounce for gold and now it's pushing $4000. Silver at $14 and now it's pushing $50. There's plenty of room for both to run yet, especially silver. When the AU/AG ratio comes down to 50-1 I'll trade a lot of silver for gold. I'm long on silver now expecting a 4 or 5x appreciation from today's $46.57 within a years time. Some forcast even higher. It's all speculation of course but I see the metals and mining stocks as a really good bet right now.
We'll see