GOLD 'Has to Go Higher' But Stock Market in SERIOUS Danger: Peter Grandich
Summary
Gold Market Outlook: Peter Grandich predicts an epic bull market for gold, citing its outperformance over stocks and bonds since the millennium and the potential for a significant role in the global monetary system, particularly among the BRICS nations.
Silver's Potential: Grandich has shifted his stance on silver, now viewing it as a leading metal with the potential for triple-digit prices, driven by strong fundamentals and its competition with gold.
Stock Market Concerns: Grandich has turned bearish on the broad market, highlighting signals of a potential crash due to fantasy pricing, paper riches, overconfidence, and dangerous assumptions, particularly around AI and cryptocurrencies.
Mining Stocks: Despite significant gains in gold and silver equities, Grandich believes mining stocks, especially juniors, have not yet reached their full potential, with management quality and geographical location being key evaluation factors.
Copper and Uranium Insights: Grandich remains bullish on copper due to its essential role in technology and infrastructure, while he is cautious yet optimistic about uranium, emphasizing the importance of focusing on producers and near-term producers.
Economic and Geopolitical Risks: Grandich outlines several concerns, including US debts and deficits, geopolitical tensions with BRICS, and infrastructure challenges, all of which could impact financial markets and the economy.
Transcript
Hello everybody. Welcome into Commodity Culture where our goal is to make you a better investor in the commodity sector. My name is Jesse Day and on this episode I'm excited to welcome Peter Grandich to the show. A veteran of the finance industry, the author of Confessions of a Wall Street Whiz Kid, and the founder of Peter Grandich and Company. Gold has broken out of a 4-month consolidation to reach new all-time highs. But Peter thinks this could just be the start of an epic bull market for the metal along with the mining stocks. We dive into his thoughts on both gold and silver miners and how he evaluates companies worth investing in. We also dive into copper, uranium, and you're going to want to stick around to the end to hear why Peter has changed his stance on the broad market from neutral to bearish as he foresees danger ahead for the broad market and the magnificent 7. All of this and so much more ahead. So, strap yourselves in for my conversation with Peter Grand. Peter Grand, great to have you back on Commodity Culture. There sure is a lot to discuss these days, but I want to kick the conversation off with gold surging to new all-time highs and now nearly at $3,600. With all the issues the world faces economically, the untenable government debt, purchasing power being rapidly eroded, it feels like this could just be the beginning of gold's rise. What are your current thoughts on the gold market? Well, as somebody who almost five years ago decided to sell all his stocks and bonds to own physical gold, which and then give that advice to a financial planning group that I'm part of. And of all our clients, only one listened. Uh we still have a lot of people that are not in gold at all. And and I think that's one of the underlining stories that isn't discussed that for a market that's literally outperformed stocks and bonds since the turn of the millennium. So think about this if I just sidet track for a moment Jesse and it some in the financial institution will take it as it's directed to them they shouldn't. It's an overall view. First of all after 41 years in the business almost twothirds of the financial advisers given advice today were either not born or in diapers when I started and they've only been in since the millennium started. And yet if you'd ask almost all of them what's been the best performing investments, they'll tell you stocks and maybe bonds second. None of them talk about gold, but gold outperformed both of them. And yet here, as you pointed out, as we hit 3600, still not any really widespread interest in North America. And I think when you go to other parts of the world, there is look in in China, Jesse, and I I know you're familiar with this. On weekends, they go shopping to buy gold. Here we go shopping with money we don't have to buy things we don't need. So uh I I just think the underpinning even though the price is up and this is very important. Maybe others might not say this but I think it's worth hearing. So when I started in the business in the early 1980s most people perceived stocks were dead. For 13 years the Dow only traded between 700 and a thousand. In fact, a very famous Business Week front page said, "Equities are dead. Wall Street was extremely bearish." And an unknown young man came out of Gainesville, Georgia named Robert Prector Jr. with a philosophy and a technical analysis no one really knew of, Elliot Wave Theory, and said the Dow's going to 3600. And they they just prosecuted him to call him every name in the book. And then when the the market took off, he became popular. And then he made a call about the crash in 87 along with me. And the perception was how could it possibly go to 3600 let alone a few decades later 36,000 and more. So that same feelings in gold right now. People especially people that have been bullish and profiting from it. You know this 36 this is way out of line. Yeah it's great. It give you all the reason but how could it go a lot higher? You know it's not possible. You have to take that same philosophy. There's no reason it can't. In fact, I would argue it's not cheap anymore. You know, someone that was buying it at 1300, you know, seeing the tripling. But the fundamental argument for gold has never been better. We had at one time suppression by central banks who were offloading it. Now they're the biggest buyers. We had clearly not any society thinking it was money. Clearly in Asia, particularly in China, they view it as money. And of course, the bricks and that's one of my biggest bullish factors for gold is I saw the ddollarization and countries moving away from the United States economically and from their currency as bullish for gold. So I think the more important way to answer your question is not talk about some of the general stuff or inflation or even against the stock market is to admire how it's performed in an environment wasn't as conducive as it is now. So that would argue that I still think it has to go a lot higher over time but I think a reasonable target uh of 4,000. And remember, when you're in all-time highs, other than a psychological number, there's no real resistance. So, you know, pick 4,000. Yeah, that'll be a round number and so forth. And, you know, Wall Street has treated gold like kryptonite. I think half of 1% of portfolios are assumed to have some exposure to gold. Can you imagine if people just went to one or 2%? It's it's still a very very viable market for the long term. >> Great thoughts and you know the US dollar has now lost 50% of its value versus gold in the past 3 years. I think this shows gold establishing itself in its role as the dominant form of money once again. Yet most people on Main Street and as you mentioned most financial advisors can't seem to grasp this concept. Do you think gold is in the process of remonetizing and do you think it will play a big role in the global monetary system up ahead? >> Well, I think it's going to play a significant role in the bricks. They have not acquired all of this gold as a trade or personal investment. They certainly can't flip it to someone that's going to pay even more. So, so they profit from it. I think it's been accumulated. It's still probably 12 to 24 months away before they officially come out and say, "Okay, this is how we're going to trade among ourselves." And part of that is going to be gold. I don't think there's a worldwide uh situation coming anytime soon because I think things have to get a lot worse before people realize how messed up we were been with fiat currencies. I do still think that one of the ways that they're only going to be able to sell treasury bonds, especially longdated ones a year from now because I'm a big believer that short rates can fall, but long rates are only going to go higher. I think that's going to find a way that uh the Trump administration could repric its gold that it owns to whatever the current price is and also introduce longer term 40 or 50year bonds with some sort of gold backing in order to get people to buy it. I think that's going to be how difficult it's going to come for the United States to fund itself while other world bond markets as we speak are imploding as well. Perhaps even more exciting than gold's rise for many viewers of this show is the rise of silver breaching and remaining above $40. We're now close to or around at $41. Very exciting. Of course, adjusted for inflation. If we go back to the 1980 high of $50, we need nearly $200 silver today. Inflation adjusted. Now, there's a lot of hyperbole in the silver space. People throwing out big numbers. I've heard many guests on this show say tripledigit silver. I've even heard north of a thousand dollars from some guests. Um, last time we talked, you had changed your stance on silver because previously you compared it to kissing your sister, but you had pivoted now that silver appears to be waking up. We're now past $40. Do you think we could be on the verge of a major bull cycle here for the metal? >> Yeah, you're right. I made a 180 and it was profitable to treat it as the secondass citizen to gold. But earlier this year when it dipped under 30, when I looked at the fundamental argument, it was never stronger in the 41 years I've been involved. So I became a silver bug and I also said it would out it would it probably would lead gold for quite some time to come. And I think that's happening here. I think you make an excellent observation. People who are going to talk about, oh, the Hunt brothers that once went to 50 or well to get back to that, you're right. it's almost gonna have to trade at 200 for inflation. So what I have said and it it probably throws me into the silver bug camps completely is that tripledigit price of silver is a legitimate target. But first of all it's not that much more than a double from here. Uh it sounds like a lot because for a lot of years it was single digits, you know, low price, but I I think it has every reason to continue to rise with gold and the competition uh for it, the stock market. I I I have to throw this in. I I made a big change a couple weeks ago. I I was not in the stock market crash camp. I my January forecast for our clients was the stock market was going to be either side of unchanged. I told people to avoid US equities, get into world funds. I love the Chinese market, but a couple weeks ago, stuff just screamed that we could now we were very vulnerable to a hard fall or even a crash. And that has been competition to gold and silver and also cryptocurrencies. And so, a lessening of the bull move or an actual decline, as long as it's not a total crash, could only aim the gold and silver. You know how I know that, Jesse? I left the metals and mining industry as a main place of business for myself in 2013. I dipped myself back in five years ago when I got very aggressive in gold and mining stocks and all, but I'm hearing from people in the last few weeks that I haven't heard from 10 or 20 years and saying, "Hey, I was looking up metals and I saw your name. I thought you left the business." And then of course the follow-up question is all the same. So, what do you like? And and I think we're just at that stage now where other than that little audience that always confined ourselves to we used to call ourselves the hard asset crowd. I don't think we say that anymore. It's being broadened out to generalists and I think that's going to vote to help the metal prices higher as well. >> And now a quick break to hear from our sponsor. Ark Silver Gold Osbium owner Ian Everard is considered one of the most honest and levelheaded gold and silver dealers in the United States. Praised even by his competitors. So give him a call today to take advantage of the specials right now. Silver kangaroos 2023 1oz coins mint fresh only $247 over spot. Mint fresh silver maple leaves 2025 coins 1 ounce $2.87 over spot while supplies last. Reach out today at 3072649441 or by email at ianarchsggo.com and make sure to tell him that commodity culture sent you. And now back to the interview. So in addition to the metals themselves, we have seen the gold and silver equities start to enjoy a significant rise with both the GDX and SIL ETFs up around 80% year to date. Obviously completely obliterating the major indices. You'd think such an incredible performance would be driving media headlines about the coming boom in precious metals miners. Firstly, what is your current assessment of the miners here? And secondly, when do you think Main Street and the financial adviserss that we were talking about earlier will wake up to this gold and silver mining stock bull market? >> Well, much of the mainstream financial media in the US is tied to the hips of the financial service community. They're not going to write things go against it. They're advertisers, you know. So I I never expect them to be write glowing stories about that because gold and silver have been treated like krypton knife since I've been in the business by the financial service industry and I don't expect that to change until the public overrides that demand and says hey listen I'm listening or I got this neighbor and they're killing it and ya yada yada yada yada and so that's when I think the public will come to it. The mining stocks even the expiration and they're two different species and I'll address them both. the mining stocks. As I said earlier, when I got out originally sold some of my physical gold in the beginning year at 3500 to buy the major gold producers, which greatly outperformed the performance of the physical gold, they have many quarters ahead of just unbelievable legitimate printing money through free cash flow. And what will happen for them and what will keep that sustained for them is as we peter out in the stock market here and we're seeing a lot of companies now not meeting the low-end earnings estimates so they can always say they beat them. Uh these generalist money managers are going to hear about these mining companies. Look at Pneumont Mining. Maybe today, as you and I record, depending on if Palentin gets hit enough and pneumont is rising, it's going to be the best performing stock in the S&P 500. Right now, it's number two. And so, that means it's outperforming 498 other general equity stocks. And yet, I would tell you that if we looked at people's portfolio, not half or 1% have new mining in it. So, there's still so much upside demand for mining shares and they should do well. But where I went to uh and it's the most riskiest and speculative end of it and remember Wall Street created the word speculating so don't really call it what it really is and that's gambling where you have to be mentally and financially prepared to lose part of all your capital. But the juniors is really where we're going to see a a really bang for the buck. We're already seeing that in some incidents. And the reason is the world has not only shrunk to where companies can go and without too much risk and try to find the metals that are so critically needed now everybody realizes but the amount of money that has not gone into that industry to find these things and remember even if you hit it tomorrow that you just went to a rock and drilled and it doesn't work that way it takes several years of expiration at all. It's probably anywhere minimum depending where in the c in the world 10 to 15 years before it comes out and pours the first metal and all. So when that recognition is realized by everybody and everybody realized how we're scrambling, you know, a a gentleman made a good point to me the other day and I and it was Sam Lee, one of the it's actually the largest stock that I own, North Aop and Gold. He's just on a trade mission for Canada to uh Korea, South Korea and Japan. And he made a very good point is even though they're worldrenowned for producing so much of the stuff we need, technology stuff, appliances and all of that, their entire base of metals that they need is from outside their country. They don't have any real own supply their own. So here we have the world is scrambling for critical minerals and all. There's not been a lot of money put in them. I think that's going to make expiration companies become darlings for a period of time. And the majors, their currency is so strong now because of their stock. They're not going to try organic growth. They're just going to go out and buy because we're still seeing good deposits selling for as little as $20 an ounce. We're gold at 3600 and going higher. So, uh, to answer your question, I'm sorry for being long-winded, but I just think the mining shares and the expiration stocks, their day in the sun to where everybody's seeing it hasn't even arrived yet. >> Well, I'd love to get some insight into how you evaluate gold and silver mining companies. So, maybe you could shed some light on some of the things you look for in a company and some red flags as well that investors should be wary of when evaluating. Perhaps we could focus on the junior space here. So let me start with I suffered the worst ever loss I ever had by a factor of probably five or 10 as much. How much it was lost on a junior company this year that two years ago I would said was one of the best possibilities to be involved in. And the lesson continuing to learn even into my 42nd year in and around the financial arena was management is always the key at the end of the day. I mean projects are great but you could have a great project but if the management isn't good and and and that's the hard lesson that I learned there and so the absolute first focus is sorry but past success breeds future success very hard to give someone I I know there's young people and they may be successful and all but I think you have to be with an established group and this was the other hard lesson that I learned here you need to see them with their own hard-earned money, substantial shareholders. It just seems my two largest holdings, both management teams, have cornerstone investors and themselves and a board that own anywhere from 25 to 50% of all the shares and they paid for it, not some cheap option somewhere or something and all how they've act. If you compare how they act and think to this other company where management had almost zil nil. So management is key and putting their own money where their mouth is key. Now the third thing is important also is where they're looking now. The world is greatly shrunk. If you and I were at a gold show and I used to speak to them regularly at 25 years we could have spun the globe went like this and say yeah we can go there Jesse. Not anymore. In fact, much of almost all of my ownership other than one particular case is tied to North America. And that doesn't mean you can go anywhere in North America. Forget California, you know, that's not a place you're ever going to want to to be exploring and all. But so I I just think that management, it starts with management. Uh I know it's hard because this is a it's a very small industry. There's a handful of names that are always put out there. And because they're always out there, people assume they're experts and they assume they're experts. They made a lot of money. You'd be shocked how much the so-called bigname experts actually lost over time. Um, they suffer the Fonzi uh terminal illness that I gave away 20 years ago and didn't have anymore. And that's be able to say I was wrong. But, uh, remember that junior resource stocks failure is the norm. I have 10 companies now that are out there as junior resource stocks. two to five years from now at least half of them will have gone to zero or not come close to achieving what we thought. So if you buy them and hold them two to five years from now half the people are going to say I hate that guy grandage which they do now. But the bottom line is you got to remember that failure is the norm in this business as well. So you have to have a diversified portfolio or at least bet strong as I feel I have on a winning team that's put up a lot of their own money. >> Let's talk about copper. Another metal I know you've been bullish on. It's been quite the roller coaster. For copper, we got to all-time highs way up around $5.80 a pound, largely driven by the Trump administration's announced copper tariffs, only to get the rug pulled when Trump revised the plan to include tariffs only on copper pipes and wiring and not on the raw metal itself or copper concentrate. copper plunged around 17% in a single day on that announcement of the revised tariffs and now we're at around $4.60. Um, your thoughts on these recent developments and what the future looks like for copper. Well, one of the things I was telling people back then is not to get caught up in that because if you looked at the copper price outside the United States, it was in the 430 to 450 range that whole time. And so that was the more appropriate pricing of it. My copper forecast was fairly simple to begin year was just on either side of four. First half between four and four and a half, second half between four and a half and five. Uh and finish the year at the $5 level. We're moving back towards that. We have more of a realistic market because of this falsehood of this tariff. But there was one good thing that came out of that tariff. People who never even it was pretty easy to spell copper, I was going to say, but people that didn't really know how important it was in our lives and so forth and so on started to open their eyes and ask, well, why is this copper price so high? And it's brought a renewed interest. And one of the things people have concluded here, not only of the great shortage of it and demand, but the majors aren't about to go and spend billions of dollars on projects, especially some very risky places in the world, unless there's a sustained price much higher than the current price now. So that's why I think it's just going to work up to five and eventually five will be the low and probably in one to two years we're going to need six or maybe even seven to see real renewed big capital come into it. Therefore, meaning the ones that are have availability to deliver in the next few years, they're going to sell at a premium. So, I think that market is more of a slow but steady higher. And keep in mind, if you want to buy into this don't worry, be happy crowd on Wall Street, how AI is just going to continue and they're going to be centers all over the place. You need copper. You can't do without it. And our electrical grid system in the United States is so old and antiquated. I like the joke that I think Thomas Edison installed some of it directly himself. So there's going to be just a continuous need for copper and again very very bullish. And the ideal play and again I'm going to tout my own horn my largest holding ship north copper and gold is both a gold and copper play. If you can find that because the gold is such a strong monetary price now, it'll fuel the development of that company because copper tends to spend more money to develop it and you know and cost and all and so if there's a lot of gold with it there's going to be an attraction and what's interesting majors like barrack and I know I'm so old when it was called American Barrack uh they have basically said publicly that they need to be looking at copper plays now. So the world majors are more focused on copper as well. So all in all very very bullish. >> Yeah, interesting thoughts. And certainly you're right about the grid in the United States. It needs major upgrades to facilitate these data center buildouts and just in general and and I think copper is obviously the metal that will benefit the most from that. I want to pivot to uranium for a moment. Obviously the equity is putting in a great performance lately. Um the spot price seems to be recovering from a bottom of around $63 in March to where it now sits around 76. Uranium miners are facing problems everywhere. We spoke about this on your program um when you interviewed me, but everybody from KazadMrom, you know, the world's largest producer facing sulfuric acid shortages, other issues. Kamico now announcing uh that perhaps they will have to go to the spot market to purchase pounds to fulfill long-term contracts. Boss Energy, Encore, Global Atomic. I mean, when you go down the list, all these companies are facing issues producing any sizable amount of uranium to meet the rapidly growing demand. Um, this also makes picking stocks in the sector very tough. you know, when a lot of people were very bullish on companies like Global Atomic, like Encore, and then those um equities suffered tremendous draw downs when they had difficulties with Global Atomic in the case of ramping up to build their mind to bring it into production with Encore when it came to their mining and and producing uranium as well. Um, are you currently invested in the uranium space? cuz I know a while back when we spoke you said you were out you'd already made um profits because a lot of people don't really think about the fact that we've already had quite a tremendous run in uranium stocks and if you were in earlier 2018 up until you know a little while ago you've already made a lot of money I think in the last four years 5 years the URMM ETF is up over 200% and many of the individual equities far more than that um are you still involved in the uranium sector are you on the sidelines at the moment What what are your thoughts? >> So you're correct. So despite a 25 year career at one period of being active in the metals and mining, I never played the uranium, but in the 201819 I turned on an interview one day and I think it was Lobbo who was talking about uranium at $20. I said when I left it was like $80. What happened there? Long story short, I got very involved. loaded up chemical at $8 and had a bunch of stocks and they went up 100 to 500%. And I got out when uranium hit 107, but I got out around 100. Earlier this year in March, they were like guys were throwing in the towels. The guys that used to launch rocket ships are now beating each other up online, you know, and just crying and whining. And I said, you know what? Here's six or eight stocks. if folks if they come back to these levels, buy them. And I think it was five that actually did. And then in two months time, they doubled. In fact, the five that I ended up picking went up an average 97% each. About three or four weeks ago, I don't remember exactly. I I said this, if you're an Iranian bull, which I know you are, and you're not worried about losing a lot of money in the stock market and all, holy stocks are going to go a lot higher. It's a near-perfect storm. You said it in our interview. Other than a nuclear catastrophe right now, that industry is just set to keep going. The the fundamentals could never be more bullish even than the from the first run. However, what I said is and I said because what I'm doing and whatever I do, I share to our clients and followers, I'm going to take profits in them because I want to raise cash because now I've also no longer think the stock market is just going to be flat. There's a danger of a hard fall or a crash. I want to take these profits to have some cash. And also, if I'm right about that, they may become soft again. And if they did, we'll look at them for a third time. And if they didn't, so be it. But if you're just own them for that industry, there's no reason to run. You know, you made a very good point. I don't think people realize this. Imagine this. And Kam goes the bell weather, even though I know Cassan is still, you know, a big player and all. the number one producer in North America is so short of it that they're going to have to go in an open market, which we already know is tighter than tight can be just to meet their obligations. H how could you be bearish? How could you be looking for a tremendous fall if that's what they have to resort to? So I think the argument and I know you you've been and and I want to say this even though I know this is the second part of our home at home. When it was going up you weren't putting out rocket ships and when it was going down you weren't whining. You've had a very steady approach and that's how I think you have to play this market. There's no reason to think uranium and I think people get too caught up on the spot thing. They don't understand how much more important contracting and so many of these utilities after the next couple years don't have any ample supply and if all these AI centers and all these things these guys have to find a bunch of new uranium and most of the people out there are playing uranium stocks explorers that even if they're forage to find a huge deposit and all that's so many years away they may miss this boom. So unless I I guess the the caveat I would say Jesse is producers or very near-term producers should be the bulk of the ownership of uranium stocks if you're going to believe there's reason to be bullish in it. There's really nothing to suggest. Even though they've had a tremendous run already this year, barring a collapse of the general stock market, they should just continue to work their way higher. >> Yeah, completely agree. And I think position sizing is very important. You're right, sticking to the big ETFs, the big producers, the physical itself as the main portion of your uranium portfolio. So you have that kind of foundation and then you can use smaller amounts of capital for speculations on juniors or maybe even a little bit of gambling money to throw into some explorers if if you enjoy the thrill of of that sort of thing. >> And let me just add this too. I I invested in one of those juniors. I I was one of the initial investors in it and then when it ran to a dollar I they refinanced that company's gone. It did it didn't work out. Meanwhile, uranium win if I would have put that in the spat or even cameo and all I'd be making money. So yeah, you're right. I think you need to focus on the significant producers and near-term. >> Absolutely. Uh, I know you've been uh talking about we you spoke a little bit earlier about the broad market and how you weren't necessarily thinking we were in for a big crash earlier, but perhaps you've pivoted your your stance a little bit. You recently made a post on your blog highlighting a video that explains what happens before stock market crashes and you called it one of the most important posts you've ever made. So, walk us through what you're seeing when it comes to the current state of the broad market and the potential for a crash up ahead. Okay. So, I I'm still part of a financial planning group here just for US residents. Uh we have a little bit over a billion in asset management. And my view was a few weeks ago that the stock market now is coming to a position of peril that didn't exist a couple months ago. Even though I was not long US equities, I didn't think there was a hard chance that they could fall a lot. Like I said earlier, I felt the at the beginning of the year it would end up flat. However, so many things that would take us hours to talk about changed my mind on that. And one of them is this video which uh speaks to and I think it's important that it found and looked back over 300 years of the four biggest crashes that ever occurred worldwide. And they all had four signals that were now flashing for the US. One is fantasy pricing. That's where record valuations people throw out the book. They don't even look at any of the standard ways of deciding whether something is valued or not. And they find new ways of giving reason that I should still own it and be buying it, including the greater uh fool theory that simply somebody's going to want to pay more. And nothing in my career proves the greater theory fool theory than mecoins because I would rather have a pile of crap that I can go in my backyard now and use it as fertilizer that Memcoin brings. absolutely nothing other than you got to believe in the greater fool theory. Somebody's going to want to pay more for this and that's why I'm going to own it. So fantasy pricing is one. The second is paper riches. When people get very wealthy on paper and anybody been in the junior market knows what that could be like in some of the cycles we start to think that it can go on forever. I think AI and crypto matches that. And the classic is this time it's different. And you get this such an overconfidence that you forget all the standard rules and all until an event that comes and shakes confidence. And then overconfidence is the number three rule that we see. Now sentiment-wise, recent sentiment numbers show the public buying equal equities unlike any other levels in past times. While institutionals and corporate insiders, the people that you want to call smart money, well, I think anybody, no one knows more about a company than a corporate insider, are aggressive selling stocks. And that is typical and we saw that most in the uh tech bubble. And then the fourth is what it's kind of coined dangerous assumptions. We saw that in do you know people some people a lot of people weren't even around at that point. But what happened there was this great new technology which changed the world comes along. We saw that in railroads. We've seen that in past things in radio and television when it first came out. People flock into them and then they get what's called technology hubris. This is the one. And that's what AI is now. AI is Superman. We're going to fly through history and make all sorts of money. It's just going to go up up and up. and the uberus gets so strong that they can't see these typical signals of trouble ahead. And so that's how those four points, at least to me and others, some others have made real caution now for the general stock market and a real legitimate possibility. Not saying it's going to happen or if it's going to happen, it's going to be tomorrow, maybe a month now. It's kind of like bottle rockets, you know, you can shoot off if you remember as a kid. Most of them go this way. Occasionally there's one that kind of goes a lot further. You get excited, but it goes pop and it comes back to earth. And that's why now especially concerned about the US general equity market and how people should remember this. As concerned as you are of the stock market, the bond market is so much more important, so much more bigger, so much more important how it plays in the economy. And we're seeing trouble, not just here with that, but particularly around the world on places that used to come over here and buy our debt, but now have such problems of their own that we may not see them as buyers anymore. That's why I say even though the Fed and when Trump puts his person in, he does or she does whatever he wants done and they can lower short-term rates again lower, don't be surprised that long-term rates will still go higher. >> Yeah, very well said. And interesting to note that Howard Marks in his latest memo called current market valuations very worrisome. I believe he used some language like that which is actually really significant because every question that Howard Marx answers in an interview or or when he releases his memos is a really long way of saying I don't know but he does it in a way to educate you and he's very cautious about making predictions or saying are we in a bubble are we not well here's some data that could suggest either or that's often his approach um obviously he's a genius he's like my investing hero but in this particular instance In his latest memo, he said, "I've now switched my stance from being uncertain to considering this a worrisome situation for the broad market." So, I think that's significant. I know you've been concerned about a number of factors currently infect affecting the US and the world, including the political climate, the cost of living crisis, a retirement crisis, and more. As we sit here today, what are you most concerned about when you survey your home country of America and the world? Well, I have 11 factors. It's out there on my blog. It's on my ex page that I consider crucial negatives. Uh it's still led at the top debts and deficits. You know, just remember just earlier this year in the early days of the Trump administration, him and Musk were almost putting out hourly posts on how Doge was not only going to pay off the deficit, but it's going to pay off the debt as well. That's gone. And now it's just insanely increasing dramatically. And debt is not just limited to the federal government. It's throughout a lot of states that have fiscal crisises that don't have printing presses, but also on the consumer and corporate level. You know, this is an important thing, Jess. 86% of ownership of assets in America is hold by the 10 10% wealthiest people in America. That remaining 14% is in the next 40% and half of America doesn't have any real assets to speak of. We're in a K economy eventually. So much of that weight that's struggling twothirds of Americans working paycheck to paycheck, borrowing so much now that they literally borrow just to get some food delivered to their home. Uh they're going to pull down that strength from the upper. And Wall Street, by the way, the real Wall Street, they just cater it to the 10%. Younger financial advisors, not with a bigger book of business, yeah, they focus on that remaining 40, of course, they don't really care about the 50 because they don't have anything to invest to start with, but the bulk of America is hurting economically and that's pulling down the economy and eventually pull down the stock market as well. On the geopolitical concern, I as you know I made a decision uh at the end of 20 that the bricks were going to come a formable force in the world trade and also lead us to see world trade move away from the United States and also the currency. And so when Trump came out with his big stick and basically became a bully, I said that was going to be a grave mistake of his that he should have came out with an olive branch. And here we are several months later after all the 90 trade deals and 90 days stories. Ludnik and Navaro who are just two big lap dogs for Trump telling us about all these deals that were coming. It's coming back to bite them and at a time when the economy is always getting weaker as well. And I guess that the the the two others that don't get spoken about that are at the bottom of the list that I think are crucial and the bottom one could actually move to the top scarily. I believe we have an infrastructure crisis in America. Here uh you may not hear it where you are but every day in New Jersey there's a water main break there. It's infrastructures bridges are unsafe and it's happening all around the world country and we have not we have the cost to to to fix it is going to be tremendous. But natural disasters and I'm not here to talk about climate control or what's right and wrong. For whatever reason, natural disasters are not only increasing, but because the infrastructure is already poor, they're causing that much more damage and dollars, like the fires in LA and all that kind of stuff. But the one item that's really not politically correct to talk to, but I know you want me to answer your question fully. Uh there's a great movement in Western civilization by a group who not only thinks ideologically different than we do, but believe that if you don't believe what they do, not just you should live over there and we'll live here, but you shouldn't live at all. And we're seeing that now through parts of Europe. We're seeing it in Canada. And there's this great change in civilization itself. And shockingly, Americans have not recognized it in the same way people in the United Kingdom and France and Ireland and Canada didn't recognize it 10 or 15 years ago. And I think in a few years time here in America, it'll move to the forefront even on the political stage. Even though right now if you speak in the manner that I have, you would be called someone that's you know a phobia person of of this particular change. So there's a lot a lot of negatives. It's hard to find positives and therefore I think financial assets which basically the stock market's been in a long-term bull market for 45 years. The bond market peaked a few years ago and I think the stock market now is peaking as well. Well, Peter, tell us where people can hear more from you. I know you're very active on X. So, uh, shout out your account there as well as your YouTube channel where you do great interviews. Um, you're fantastic on the other side of the microphone as well. And also Peter Grandich & Company. >> Well, thank you very much. But for that group, that may be part of that group that I spoke about. I'd rather not give my address or anything, but but the bottom line is you're right. My ex page is where most of my work is done now in the twilight of my career. I don't consider myself a great interviewer. I appreciate you saying that. I'm much more comfortable on this end of the mic than on your end. Uh but I do do interviews and interview people such as yourself that I think are just bright young minds out there that people need to hear. I do that through a YouTube channel. And then there's my website which is a blog, but it's more related to the financial planning business that I'm involved in here in the United States. >> Great. I'll put links to all of that in the description below. It's been a great conversation, Peter. Thank you so much for coming on the show. >> Thank you, my friend. God bless you. >> And thank you for joining us today. As a reminder, this episode is brought to you by Ark Silver Gold, Osmium. Take advantage of their specials today. Silver kangaroos 2023 1oz coins only $247 over spot. Silver Maple Leafs 2025 1oz coins just $2.87 over spot. Well supplies last. Go to arcsggo.com. Contact Ian Everard today at 3072649441 or by email at Ianarchsg.com and make sure to tell him that Commodity Culture sent you. Be sure to pick up your Commodity Culture merch link in the description below. Everything backed by a 100% quality guarantee. And I'll see you guys in the next episode. Commodity Culture is a series on commodities and natural resources. If you would like to see more, be sure to subscribe and hit the bell notification so you're always up tod date with the latest episodes.
GOLD 'Has to Go Higher' But Stock Market in SERIOUS Danger: Peter Grandich
Summary
Transcript
Hello everybody. Welcome into Commodity Culture where our goal is to make you a better investor in the commodity sector. My name is Jesse Day and on this episode I'm excited to welcome Peter Grandich to the show. A veteran of the finance industry, the author of Confessions of a Wall Street Whiz Kid, and the founder of Peter Grandich and Company. Gold has broken out of a 4-month consolidation to reach new all-time highs. But Peter thinks this could just be the start of an epic bull market for the metal along with the mining stocks. We dive into his thoughts on both gold and silver miners and how he evaluates companies worth investing in. We also dive into copper, uranium, and you're going to want to stick around to the end to hear why Peter has changed his stance on the broad market from neutral to bearish as he foresees danger ahead for the broad market and the magnificent 7. All of this and so much more ahead. So, strap yourselves in for my conversation with Peter Grand. Peter Grand, great to have you back on Commodity Culture. There sure is a lot to discuss these days, but I want to kick the conversation off with gold surging to new all-time highs and now nearly at $3,600. With all the issues the world faces economically, the untenable government debt, purchasing power being rapidly eroded, it feels like this could just be the beginning of gold's rise. What are your current thoughts on the gold market? Well, as somebody who almost five years ago decided to sell all his stocks and bonds to own physical gold, which and then give that advice to a financial planning group that I'm part of. And of all our clients, only one listened. Uh we still have a lot of people that are not in gold at all. And and I think that's one of the underlining stories that isn't discussed that for a market that's literally outperformed stocks and bonds since the turn of the millennium. So think about this if I just sidet track for a moment Jesse and it some in the financial institution will take it as it's directed to them they shouldn't. It's an overall view. First of all after 41 years in the business almost twothirds of the financial advisers given advice today were either not born or in diapers when I started and they've only been in since the millennium started. And yet if you'd ask almost all of them what's been the best performing investments, they'll tell you stocks and maybe bonds second. None of them talk about gold, but gold outperformed both of them. And yet here, as you pointed out, as we hit 3600, still not any really widespread interest in North America. And I think when you go to other parts of the world, there is look in in China, Jesse, and I I know you're familiar with this. On weekends, they go shopping to buy gold. Here we go shopping with money we don't have to buy things we don't need. So uh I I just think the underpinning even though the price is up and this is very important. Maybe others might not say this but I think it's worth hearing. So when I started in the business in the early 1980s most people perceived stocks were dead. For 13 years the Dow only traded between 700 and a thousand. In fact, a very famous Business Week front page said, "Equities are dead. Wall Street was extremely bearish." And an unknown young man came out of Gainesville, Georgia named Robert Prector Jr. with a philosophy and a technical analysis no one really knew of, Elliot Wave Theory, and said the Dow's going to 3600. And they they just prosecuted him to call him every name in the book. And then when the the market took off, he became popular. And then he made a call about the crash in 87 along with me. And the perception was how could it possibly go to 3600 let alone a few decades later 36,000 and more. So that same feelings in gold right now. People especially people that have been bullish and profiting from it. You know this 36 this is way out of line. Yeah it's great. It give you all the reason but how could it go a lot higher? You know it's not possible. You have to take that same philosophy. There's no reason it can't. In fact, I would argue it's not cheap anymore. You know, someone that was buying it at 1300, you know, seeing the tripling. But the fundamental argument for gold has never been better. We had at one time suppression by central banks who were offloading it. Now they're the biggest buyers. We had clearly not any society thinking it was money. Clearly in Asia, particularly in China, they view it as money. And of course, the bricks and that's one of my biggest bullish factors for gold is I saw the ddollarization and countries moving away from the United States economically and from their currency as bullish for gold. So I think the more important way to answer your question is not talk about some of the general stuff or inflation or even against the stock market is to admire how it's performed in an environment wasn't as conducive as it is now. So that would argue that I still think it has to go a lot higher over time but I think a reasonable target uh of 4,000. And remember, when you're in all-time highs, other than a psychological number, there's no real resistance. So, you know, pick 4,000. Yeah, that'll be a round number and so forth. And, you know, Wall Street has treated gold like kryptonite. I think half of 1% of portfolios are assumed to have some exposure to gold. Can you imagine if people just went to one or 2%? It's it's still a very very viable market for the long term. >> Great thoughts and you know the US dollar has now lost 50% of its value versus gold in the past 3 years. I think this shows gold establishing itself in its role as the dominant form of money once again. Yet most people on Main Street and as you mentioned most financial advisors can't seem to grasp this concept. Do you think gold is in the process of remonetizing and do you think it will play a big role in the global monetary system up ahead? >> Well, I think it's going to play a significant role in the bricks. They have not acquired all of this gold as a trade or personal investment. They certainly can't flip it to someone that's going to pay even more. So, so they profit from it. I think it's been accumulated. It's still probably 12 to 24 months away before they officially come out and say, "Okay, this is how we're going to trade among ourselves." And part of that is going to be gold. I don't think there's a worldwide uh situation coming anytime soon because I think things have to get a lot worse before people realize how messed up we were been with fiat currencies. I do still think that one of the ways that they're only going to be able to sell treasury bonds, especially longdated ones a year from now because I'm a big believer that short rates can fall, but long rates are only going to go higher. I think that's going to find a way that uh the Trump administration could repric its gold that it owns to whatever the current price is and also introduce longer term 40 or 50year bonds with some sort of gold backing in order to get people to buy it. I think that's going to be how difficult it's going to come for the United States to fund itself while other world bond markets as we speak are imploding as well. Perhaps even more exciting than gold's rise for many viewers of this show is the rise of silver breaching and remaining above $40. We're now close to or around at $41. Very exciting. Of course, adjusted for inflation. If we go back to the 1980 high of $50, we need nearly $200 silver today. Inflation adjusted. Now, there's a lot of hyperbole in the silver space. People throwing out big numbers. I've heard many guests on this show say tripledigit silver. I've even heard north of a thousand dollars from some guests. Um, last time we talked, you had changed your stance on silver because previously you compared it to kissing your sister, but you had pivoted now that silver appears to be waking up. We're now past $40. Do you think we could be on the verge of a major bull cycle here for the metal? >> Yeah, you're right. I made a 180 and it was profitable to treat it as the secondass citizen to gold. But earlier this year when it dipped under 30, when I looked at the fundamental argument, it was never stronger in the 41 years I've been involved. So I became a silver bug and I also said it would out it would it probably would lead gold for quite some time to come. And I think that's happening here. I think you make an excellent observation. People who are going to talk about, oh, the Hunt brothers that once went to 50 or well to get back to that, you're right. it's almost gonna have to trade at 200 for inflation. So what I have said and it it probably throws me into the silver bug camps completely is that tripledigit price of silver is a legitimate target. But first of all it's not that much more than a double from here. Uh it sounds like a lot because for a lot of years it was single digits, you know, low price, but I I think it has every reason to continue to rise with gold and the competition uh for it, the stock market. I I I have to throw this in. I I made a big change a couple weeks ago. I I was not in the stock market crash camp. I my January forecast for our clients was the stock market was going to be either side of unchanged. I told people to avoid US equities, get into world funds. I love the Chinese market, but a couple weeks ago, stuff just screamed that we could now we were very vulnerable to a hard fall or even a crash. And that has been competition to gold and silver and also cryptocurrencies. And so, a lessening of the bull move or an actual decline, as long as it's not a total crash, could only aim the gold and silver. You know how I know that, Jesse? I left the metals and mining industry as a main place of business for myself in 2013. I dipped myself back in five years ago when I got very aggressive in gold and mining stocks and all, but I'm hearing from people in the last few weeks that I haven't heard from 10 or 20 years and saying, "Hey, I was looking up metals and I saw your name. I thought you left the business." And then of course the follow-up question is all the same. So, what do you like? And and I think we're just at that stage now where other than that little audience that always confined ourselves to we used to call ourselves the hard asset crowd. I don't think we say that anymore. It's being broadened out to generalists and I think that's going to vote to help the metal prices higher as well. >> And now a quick break to hear from our sponsor. Ark Silver Gold Osbium owner Ian Everard is considered one of the most honest and levelheaded gold and silver dealers in the United States. Praised even by his competitors. So give him a call today to take advantage of the specials right now. Silver kangaroos 2023 1oz coins mint fresh only $247 over spot. Mint fresh silver maple leaves 2025 coins 1 ounce $2.87 over spot while supplies last. Reach out today at 3072649441 or by email at ianarchsggo.com and make sure to tell him that commodity culture sent you. And now back to the interview. So in addition to the metals themselves, we have seen the gold and silver equities start to enjoy a significant rise with both the GDX and SIL ETFs up around 80% year to date. Obviously completely obliterating the major indices. You'd think such an incredible performance would be driving media headlines about the coming boom in precious metals miners. Firstly, what is your current assessment of the miners here? And secondly, when do you think Main Street and the financial adviserss that we were talking about earlier will wake up to this gold and silver mining stock bull market? >> Well, much of the mainstream financial media in the US is tied to the hips of the financial service community. They're not going to write things go against it. They're advertisers, you know. So I I never expect them to be write glowing stories about that because gold and silver have been treated like krypton knife since I've been in the business by the financial service industry and I don't expect that to change until the public overrides that demand and says hey listen I'm listening or I got this neighbor and they're killing it and ya yada yada yada yada and so that's when I think the public will come to it. The mining stocks even the expiration and they're two different species and I'll address them both. the mining stocks. As I said earlier, when I got out originally sold some of my physical gold in the beginning year at 3500 to buy the major gold producers, which greatly outperformed the performance of the physical gold, they have many quarters ahead of just unbelievable legitimate printing money through free cash flow. And what will happen for them and what will keep that sustained for them is as we peter out in the stock market here and we're seeing a lot of companies now not meeting the low-end earnings estimates so they can always say they beat them. Uh these generalist money managers are going to hear about these mining companies. Look at Pneumont Mining. Maybe today, as you and I record, depending on if Palentin gets hit enough and pneumont is rising, it's going to be the best performing stock in the S&P 500. Right now, it's number two. And so, that means it's outperforming 498 other general equity stocks. And yet, I would tell you that if we looked at people's portfolio, not half or 1% have new mining in it. So, there's still so much upside demand for mining shares and they should do well. But where I went to uh and it's the most riskiest and speculative end of it and remember Wall Street created the word speculating so don't really call it what it really is and that's gambling where you have to be mentally and financially prepared to lose part of all your capital. But the juniors is really where we're going to see a a really bang for the buck. We're already seeing that in some incidents. And the reason is the world has not only shrunk to where companies can go and without too much risk and try to find the metals that are so critically needed now everybody realizes but the amount of money that has not gone into that industry to find these things and remember even if you hit it tomorrow that you just went to a rock and drilled and it doesn't work that way it takes several years of expiration at all. It's probably anywhere minimum depending where in the c in the world 10 to 15 years before it comes out and pours the first metal and all. So when that recognition is realized by everybody and everybody realized how we're scrambling, you know, a a gentleman made a good point to me the other day and I and it was Sam Lee, one of the it's actually the largest stock that I own, North Aop and Gold. He's just on a trade mission for Canada to uh Korea, South Korea and Japan. And he made a very good point is even though they're worldrenowned for producing so much of the stuff we need, technology stuff, appliances and all of that, their entire base of metals that they need is from outside their country. They don't have any real own supply their own. So here we have the world is scrambling for critical minerals and all. There's not been a lot of money put in them. I think that's going to make expiration companies become darlings for a period of time. And the majors, their currency is so strong now because of their stock. They're not going to try organic growth. They're just going to go out and buy because we're still seeing good deposits selling for as little as $20 an ounce. We're gold at 3600 and going higher. So, uh, to answer your question, I'm sorry for being long-winded, but I just think the mining shares and the expiration stocks, their day in the sun to where everybody's seeing it hasn't even arrived yet. >> Well, I'd love to get some insight into how you evaluate gold and silver mining companies. So, maybe you could shed some light on some of the things you look for in a company and some red flags as well that investors should be wary of when evaluating. Perhaps we could focus on the junior space here. So let me start with I suffered the worst ever loss I ever had by a factor of probably five or 10 as much. How much it was lost on a junior company this year that two years ago I would said was one of the best possibilities to be involved in. And the lesson continuing to learn even into my 42nd year in and around the financial arena was management is always the key at the end of the day. I mean projects are great but you could have a great project but if the management isn't good and and and that's the hard lesson that I learned there and so the absolute first focus is sorry but past success breeds future success very hard to give someone I I know there's young people and they may be successful and all but I think you have to be with an established group and this was the other hard lesson that I learned here you need to see them with their own hard-earned money, substantial shareholders. It just seems my two largest holdings, both management teams, have cornerstone investors and themselves and a board that own anywhere from 25 to 50% of all the shares and they paid for it, not some cheap option somewhere or something and all how they've act. If you compare how they act and think to this other company where management had almost zil nil. So management is key and putting their own money where their mouth is key. Now the third thing is important also is where they're looking now. The world is greatly shrunk. If you and I were at a gold show and I used to speak to them regularly at 25 years we could have spun the globe went like this and say yeah we can go there Jesse. Not anymore. In fact, much of almost all of my ownership other than one particular case is tied to North America. And that doesn't mean you can go anywhere in North America. Forget California, you know, that's not a place you're ever going to want to to be exploring and all. But so I I just think that management, it starts with management. Uh I know it's hard because this is a it's a very small industry. There's a handful of names that are always put out there. And because they're always out there, people assume they're experts and they assume they're experts. They made a lot of money. You'd be shocked how much the so-called bigname experts actually lost over time. Um, they suffer the Fonzi uh terminal illness that I gave away 20 years ago and didn't have anymore. And that's be able to say I was wrong. But, uh, remember that junior resource stocks failure is the norm. I have 10 companies now that are out there as junior resource stocks. two to five years from now at least half of them will have gone to zero or not come close to achieving what we thought. So if you buy them and hold them two to five years from now half the people are going to say I hate that guy grandage which they do now. But the bottom line is you got to remember that failure is the norm in this business as well. So you have to have a diversified portfolio or at least bet strong as I feel I have on a winning team that's put up a lot of their own money. >> Let's talk about copper. Another metal I know you've been bullish on. It's been quite the roller coaster. For copper, we got to all-time highs way up around $5.80 a pound, largely driven by the Trump administration's announced copper tariffs, only to get the rug pulled when Trump revised the plan to include tariffs only on copper pipes and wiring and not on the raw metal itself or copper concentrate. copper plunged around 17% in a single day on that announcement of the revised tariffs and now we're at around $4.60. Um, your thoughts on these recent developments and what the future looks like for copper. Well, one of the things I was telling people back then is not to get caught up in that because if you looked at the copper price outside the United States, it was in the 430 to 450 range that whole time. And so that was the more appropriate pricing of it. My copper forecast was fairly simple to begin year was just on either side of four. First half between four and four and a half, second half between four and a half and five. Uh and finish the year at the $5 level. We're moving back towards that. We have more of a realistic market because of this falsehood of this tariff. But there was one good thing that came out of that tariff. People who never even it was pretty easy to spell copper, I was going to say, but people that didn't really know how important it was in our lives and so forth and so on started to open their eyes and ask, well, why is this copper price so high? And it's brought a renewed interest. And one of the things people have concluded here, not only of the great shortage of it and demand, but the majors aren't about to go and spend billions of dollars on projects, especially some very risky places in the world, unless there's a sustained price much higher than the current price now. So that's why I think it's just going to work up to five and eventually five will be the low and probably in one to two years we're going to need six or maybe even seven to see real renewed big capital come into it. Therefore, meaning the ones that are have availability to deliver in the next few years, they're going to sell at a premium. So, I think that market is more of a slow but steady higher. And keep in mind, if you want to buy into this don't worry, be happy crowd on Wall Street, how AI is just going to continue and they're going to be centers all over the place. You need copper. You can't do without it. And our electrical grid system in the United States is so old and antiquated. I like the joke that I think Thomas Edison installed some of it directly himself. So there's going to be just a continuous need for copper and again very very bullish. And the ideal play and again I'm going to tout my own horn my largest holding ship north copper and gold is both a gold and copper play. If you can find that because the gold is such a strong monetary price now, it'll fuel the development of that company because copper tends to spend more money to develop it and you know and cost and all and so if there's a lot of gold with it there's going to be an attraction and what's interesting majors like barrack and I know I'm so old when it was called American Barrack uh they have basically said publicly that they need to be looking at copper plays now. So the world majors are more focused on copper as well. So all in all very very bullish. >> Yeah, interesting thoughts. And certainly you're right about the grid in the United States. It needs major upgrades to facilitate these data center buildouts and just in general and and I think copper is obviously the metal that will benefit the most from that. I want to pivot to uranium for a moment. Obviously the equity is putting in a great performance lately. Um the spot price seems to be recovering from a bottom of around $63 in March to where it now sits around 76. Uranium miners are facing problems everywhere. We spoke about this on your program um when you interviewed me, but everybody from KazadMrom, you know, the world's largest producer facing sulfuric acid shortages, other issues. Kamico now announcing uh that perhaps they will have to go to the spot market to purchase pounds to fulfill long-term contracts. Boss Energy, Encore, Global Atomic. I mean, when you go down the list, all these companies are facing issues producing any sizable amount of uranium to meet the rapidly growing demand. Um, this also makes picking stocks in the sector very tough. you know, when a lot of people were very bullish on companies like Global Atomic, like Encore, and then those um equities suffered tremendous draw downs when they had difficulties with Global Atomic in the case of ramping up to build their mind to bring it into production with Encore when it came to their mining and and producing uranium as well. Um, are you currently invested in the uranium space? cuz I know a while back when we spoke you said you were out you'd already made um profits because a lot of people don't really think about the fact that we've already had quite a tremendous run in uranium stocks and if you were in earlier 2018 up until you know a little while ago you've already made a lot of money I think in the last four years 5 years the URMM ETF is up over 200% and many of the individual equities far more than that um are you still involved in the uranium sector are you on the sidelines at the moment What what are your thoughts? >> So you're correct. So despite a 25 year career at one period of being active in the metals and mining, I never played the uranium, but in the 201819 I turned on an interview one day and I think it was Lobbo who was talking about uranium at $20. I said when I left it was like $80. What happened there? Long story short, I got very involved. loaded up chemical at $8 and had a bunch of stocks and they went up 100 to 500%. And I got out when uranium hit 107, but I got out around 100. Earlier this year in March, they were like guys were throwing in the towels. The guys that used to launch rocket ships are now beating each other up online, you know, and just crying and whining. And I said, you know what? Here's six or eight stocks. if folks if they come back to these levels, buy them. And I think it was five that actually did. And then in two months time, they doubled. In fact, the five that I ended up picking went up an average 97% each. About three or four weeks ago, I don't remember exactly. I I said this, if you're an Iranian bull, which I know you are, and you're not worried about losing a lot of money in the stock market and all, holy stocks are going to go a lot higher. It's a near-perfect storm. You said it in our interview. Other than a nuclear catastrophe right now, that industry is just set to keep going. The the fundamentals could never be more bullish even than the from the first run. However, what I said is and I said because what I'm doing and whatever I do, I share to our clients and followers, I'm going to take profits in them because I want to raise cash because now I've also no longer think the stock market is just going to be flat. There's a danger of a hard fall or a crash. I want to take these profits to have some cash. And also, if I'm right about that, they may become soft again. And if they did, we'll look at them for a third time. And if they didn't, so be it. But if you're just own them for that industry, there's no reason to run. You know, you made a very good point. I don't think people realize this. Imagine this. And Kam goes the bell weather, even though I know Cassan is still, you know, a big player and all. the number one producer in North America is so short of it that they're going to have to go in an open market, which we already know is tighter than tight can be just to meet their obligations. H how could you be bearish? How could you be looking for a tremendous fall if that's what they have to resort to? So I think the argument and I know you you've been and and I want to say this even though I know this is the second part of our home at home. When it was going up you weren't putting out rocket ships and when it was going down you weren't whining. You've had a very steady approach and that's how I think you have to play this market. There's no reason to think uranium and I think people get too caught up on the spot thing. They don't understand how much more important contracting and so many of these utilities after the next couple years don't have any ample supply and if all these AI centers and all these things these guys have to find a bunch of new uranium and most of the people out there are playing uranium stocks explorers that even if they're forage to find a huge deposit and all that's so many years away they may miss this boom. So unless I I guess the the caveat I would say Jesse is producers or very near-term producers should be the bulk of the ownership of uranium stocks if you're going to believe there's reason to be bullish in it. There's really nothing to suggest. Even though they've had a tremendous run already this year, barring a collapse of the general stock market, they should just continue to work their way higher. >> Yeah, completely agree. And I think position sizing is very important. You're right, sticking to the big ETFs, the big producers, the physical itself as the main portion of your uranium portfolio. So you have that kind of foundation and then you can use smaller amounts of capital for speculations on juniors or maybe even a little bit of gambling money to throw into some explorers if if you enjoy the thrill of of that sort of thing. >> And let me just add this too. I I invested in one of those juniors. I I was one of the initial investors in it and then when it ran to a dollar I they refinanced that company's gone. It did it didn't work out. Meanwhile, uranium win if I would have put that in the spat or even cameo and all I'd be making money. So yeah, you're right. I think you need to focus on the significant producers and near-term. >> Absolutely. Uh, I know you've been uh talking about we you spoke a little bit earlier about the broad market and how you weren't necessarily thinking we were in for a big crash earlier, but perhaps you've pivoted your your stance a little bit. You recently made a post on your blog highlighting a video that explains what happens before stock market crashes and you called it one of the most important posts you've ever made. So, walk us through what you're seeing when it comes to the current state of the broad market and the potential for a crash up ahead. Okay. So, I I'm still part of a financial planning group here just for US residents. Uh we have a little bit over a billion in asset management. And my view was a few weeks ago that the stock market now is coming to a position of peril that didn't exist a couple months ago. Even though I was not long US equities, I didn't think there was a hard chance that they could fall a lot. Like I said earlier, I felt the at the beginning of the year it would end up flat. However, so many things that would take us hours to talk about changed my mind on that. And one of them is this video which uh speaks to and I think it's important that it found and looked back over 300 years of the four biggest crashes that ever occurred worldwide. And they all had four signals that were now flashing for the US. One is fantasy pricing. That's where record valuations people throw out the book. They don't even look at any of the standard ways of deciding whether something is valued or not. And they find new ways of giving reason that I should still own it and be buying it, including the greater uh fool theory that simply somebody's going to want to pay more. And nothing in my career proves the greater theory fool theory than mecoins because I would rather have a pile of crap that I can go in my backyard now and use it as fertilizer that Memcoin brings. absolutely nothing other than you got to believe in the greater fool theory. Somebody's going to want to pay more for this and that's why I'm going to own it. So fantasy pricing is one. The second is paper riches. When people get very wealthy on paper and anybody been in the junior market knows what that could be like in some of the cycles we start to think that it can go on forever. I think AI and crypto matches that. And the classic is this time it's different. And you get this such an overconfidence that you forget all the standard rules and all until an event that comes and shakes confidence. And then overconfidence is the number three rule that we see. Now sentiment-wise, recent sentiment numbers show the public buying equal equities unlike any other levels in past times. While institutionals and corporate insiders, the people that you want to call smart money, well, I think anybody, no one knows more about a company than a corporate insider, are aggressive selling stocks. And that is typical and we saw that most in the uh tech bubble. And then the fourth is what it's kind of coined dangerous assumptions. We saw that in do you know people some people a lot of people weren't even around at that point. But what happened there was this great new technology which changed the world comes along. We saw that in railroads. We've seen that in past things in radio and television when it first came out. People flock into them and then they get what's called technology hubris. This is the one. And that's what AI is now. AI is Superman. We're going to fly through history and make all sorts of money. It's just going to go up up and up. and the uberus gets so strong that they can't see these typical signals of trouble ahead. And so that's how those four points, at least to me and others, some others have made real caution now for the general stock market and a real legitimate possibility. Not saying it's going to happen or if it's going to happen, it's going to be tomorrow, maybe a month now. It's kind of like bottle rockets, you know, you can shoot off if you remember as a kid. Most of them go this way. Occasionally there's one that kind of goes a lot further. You get excited, but it goes pop and it comes back to earth. And that's why now especially concerned about the US general equity market and how people should remember this. As concerned as you are of the stock market, the bond market is so much more important, so much more bigger, so much more important how it plays in the economy. And we're seeing trouble, not just here with that, but particularly around the world on places that used to come over here and buy our debt, but now have such problems of their own that we may not see them as buyers anymore. That's why I say even though the Fed and when Trump puts his person in, he does or she does whatever he wants done and they can lower short-term rates again lower, don't be surprised that long-term rates will still go higher. >> Yeah, very well said. And interesting to note that Howard Marks in his latest memo called current market valuations very worrisome. I believe he used some language like that which is actually really significant because every question that Howard Marx answers in an interview or or when he releases his memos is a really long way of saying I don't know but he does it in a way to educate you and he's very cautious about making predictions or saying are we in a bubble are we not well here's some data that could suggest either or that's often his approach um obviously he's a genius he's like my investing hero but in this particular instance In his latest memo, he said, "I've now switched my stance from being uncertain to considering this a worrisome situation for the broad market." So, I think that's significant. I know you've been concerned about a number of factors currently infect affecting the US and the world, including the political climate, the cost of living crisis, a retirement crisis, and more. As we sit here today, what are you most concerned about when you survey your home country of America and the world? Well, I have 11 factors. It's out there on my blog. It's on my ex page that I consider crucial negatives. Uh it's still led at the top debts and deficits. You know, just remember just earlier this year in the early days of the Trump administration, him and Musk were almost putting out hourly posts on how Doge was not only going to pay off the deficit, but it's going to pay off the debt as well. That's gone. And now it's just insanely increasing dramatically. And debt is not just limited to the federal government. It's throughout a lot of states that have fiscal crisises that don't have printing presses, but also on the consumer and corporate level. You know, this is an important thing, Jess. 86% of ownership of assets in America is hold by the 10 10% wealthiest people in America. That remaining 14% is in the next 40% and half of America doesn't have any real assets to speak of. We're in a K economy eventually. So much of that weight that's struggling twothirds of Americans working paycheck to paycheck, borrowing so much now that they literally borrow just to get some food delivered to their home. Uh they're going to pull down that strength from the upper. And Wall Street, by the way, the real Wall Street, they just cater it to the 10%. Younger financial advisors, not with a bigger book of business, yeah, they focus on that remaining 40, of course, they don't really care about the 50 because they don't have anything to invest to start with, but the bulk of America is hurting economically and that's pulling down the economy and eventually pull down the stock market as well. On the geopolitical concern, I as you know I made a decision uh at the end of 20 that the bricks were going to come a formable force in the world trade and also lead us to see world trade move away from the United States and also the currency. And so when Trump came out with his big stick and basically became a bully, I said that was going to be a grave mistake of his that he should have came out with an olive branch. And here we are several months later after all the 90 trade deals and 90 days stories. Ludnik and Navaro who are just two big lap dogs for Trump telling us about all these deals that were coming. It's coming back to bite them and at a time when the economy is always getting weaker as well. And I guess that the the the two others that don't get spoken about that are at the bottom of the list that I think are crucial and the bottom one could actually move to the top scarily. I believe we have an infrastructure crisis in America. Here uh you may not hear it where you are but every day in New Jersey there's a water main break there. It's infrastructures bridges are unsafe and it's happening all around the world country and we have not we have the cost to to to fix it is going to be tremendous. But natural disasters and I'm not here to talk about climate control or what's right and wrong. For whatever reason, natural disasters are not only increasing, but because the infrastructure is already poor, they're causing that much more damage and dollars, like the fires in LA and all that kind of stuff. But the one item that's really not politically correct to talk to, but I know you want me to answer your question fully. Uh there's a great movement in Western civilization by a group who not only thinks ideologically different than we do, but believe that if you don't believe what they do, not just you should live over there and we'll live here, but you shouldn't live at all. And we're seeing that now through parts of Europe. We're seeing it in Canada. And there's this great change in civilization itself. And shockingly, Americans have not recognized it in the same way people in the United Kingdom and France and Ireland and Canada didn't recognize it 10 or 15 years ago. And I think in a few years time here in America, it'll move to the forefront even on the political stage. Even though right now if you speak in the manner that I have, you would be called someone that's you know a phobia person of of this particular change. So there's a lot a lot of negatives. It's hard to find positives and therefore I think financial assets which basically the stock market's been in a long-term bull market for 45 years. The bond market peaked a few years ago and I think the stock market now is peaking as well. Well, Peter, tell us where people can hear more from you. I know you're very active on X. So, uh, shout out your account there as well as your YouTube channel where you do great interviews. Um, you're fantastic on the other side of the microphone as well. And also Peter Grandich & Company. >> Well, thank you very much. But for that group, that may be part of that group that I spoke about. I'd rather not give my address or anything, but but the bottom line is you're right. My ex page is where most of my work is done now in the twilight of my career. I don't consider myself a great interviewer. I appreciate you saying that. I'm much more comfortable on this end of the mic than on your end. Uh but I do do interviews and interview people such as yourself that I think are just bright young minds out there that people need to hear. I do that through a YouTube channel. And then there's my website which is a blog, but it's more related to the financial planning business that I'm involved in here in the United States. >> Great. I'll put links to all of that in the description below. It's been a great conversation, Peter. Thank you so much for coming on the show. >> Thank you, my friend. God bless you. >> And thank you for joining us today. As a reminder, this episode is brought to you by Ark Silver Gold, Osmium. Take advantage of their specials today. Silver kangaroos 2023 1oz coins only $247 over spot. Silver Maple Leafs 2025 1oz coins just $2.87 over spot. Well supplies last. Go to arcsggo.com. Contact Ian Everard today at 3072649441 or by email at Ianarchsg.com and make sure to tell him that Commodity Culture sent you. Be sure to pick up your Commodity Culture merch link in the description below. Everything backed by a 100% quality guarantee. And I'll see you guys in the next episode. Commodity Culture is a series on commodities and natural resources. If you would like to see more, be sure to subscribe and hit the bell notification so you're always up tod date with the latest episodes.