Where do you keep your Savings?

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

Got to say - the Mirch guy has been right so far. None of it changes my opinion of what is and is not a good long term investment strategy. But credit where credit is due...

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

That is what i do... i have to hide it from myself as well..

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

As soon as i've some savings i'll tell u ppl :D

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

I keep my savings with PIA or Etihaad. As a courtesy for trusting them with my money they let me travel to Pakistan. I hope i will get my savings back from them one day.
Sometimes when i dunt have savings i let them have some money from my credit cards.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

The rush towards gold is to save the value from falling prices of currencies, real estate bust as well as stock market crash. If the US (and global economy) goes into recession again the gold price will likely hit $3000 but if economies grow at decent pace for few years the gold price trend will reverse but its unlikely that gold will go below $1000 anytime soon.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

Gold is down 15.5% since this article was published. Not a great place to keep one’s savings. Does Gold have a place in one’s portfolio as an asset allocation tool - probably. Is it a good savings vehicle at any price - probably not.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

Southie, we haven't invested all our savings just in Gold as that would be unwise, also our aim is not to make a quick buck, but to safeguard our savings for the future. It is basically a decision for longterm. For this reason, the daily or monthly fluctuations are maybe not as important.

Here is an article that you might find interesting:

**
It makes sense to buy gold By MoneyWeek Editor John Stepek Aug 05, 2011

**What is gold’s true value? Both the FT’s Lex column and The Economist have had a crack at answering this in recent weeks
The Economist uses an elaborate method of taking the gold price in a range of currencies ‘backed by a sound balance sheet’, including the Canadian loonie and the Swiss franc, and comparing the current price to the historical average. Even against the ‘safe haven’ of the franc, gold is overvalued by 60% on this basis. Lex is less thorough. It notes the “price is still about 30% below its January 1980 peak, adjusted for inflation”. But then again, it adds, there’s “no reason for gold to sell at any particular price”.
What both publications share is a belief that gold is in a bubble. Underlying this is a sense that there’s something irrational, or even plain stupid, about owning gold. I find this fascinating. I think we can all agree that the world needs a medium of exchange – otherwise we’d still be bartering with one another and we’d never get anything done. And of all the raw materials out there, from copper to cocoa beans to cockle shells, gold is the best option. It’s durable, there’s not a lot of it around, and it’s not useful for much else (this lack of utility is the main reason gold is a better monetary metal than silver).
One thing it’s not is convenient. That’s where paper and electronic money score over gold. But there are times when people are willing to sacrifice convenience for safety, and right now – with every major currency in the world either valued at historic extremes (such as the ‘safe havens’ of the Swissie and the yen) or under threat of extinction (like the euro) – is one of those times.
Now, I’m not saying that gold is a sure thing, or that the market is incapable of ever forming a bubble. It’s happened before and will happen again. I don’t think it’s there yet, but the wider acceptance of gold by bank analysts is a sign that it is now mainstream. And owning nothing but gold would be silly, in the same way that investing 100% of your portfolio in oil or tech stocks or British property would be.
But what I can’t understand is this stubborn intellectual conceit that investing in gold at all is irrational. As David Fuller of Fullermoney notes in response to The Economist piece: “Trust is far more important than any fundamental metric for evaluating gold, and people have learned, or relearned, that they cannot trust fiat currencies as a long-term store of value.”
The US dollar is only 150 years old (it celebrated its birthday last month). It’s just another in a long line of paper currencies, many of which have seen their value dwindle to nothing. You have to make some heroic – dare I say, irrational – assumptions to believe the same fate couldn’t befall the dollar (or the euro, or sterling), at some point. That’s why holding part of your portfolio in gold is perfectly rational.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

Thanks MissFreudian. Article was interesting. I do not understand Gold too much - but there is merit in owning some Gold I guess as part of one's portfolio for the long term. (I prefer dividend paying stocks though :))

Good luck - may your future be Golden.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

Gold is 20% off its recent high and 10% off theh Aug 16 2011 price of 1782 when it was first recommended here. You folks who were bullish still believe it is a good investment?

The S&P 500 is 2.8% higher since Aug 16 - couple that with a 2% dividend, and it has a 15% lead over gold in the same time frame.

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Please can anybody advise if it is good
Idea to buy now? I want to buy to give to my daughters and Bahus for their wedding....it was so expensive that I didn't think I would be able to give them gold jewelry...was thinking about artificial jewelry....in our desi culture gold is given to brides....

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

^ if you want to buy for daughters/bahus, I'll say buy it in small amounts.... just my personal opinion. Since gold prices are falling, you will cost-average the gold. But remember, as mentioned above, the gold-purchase for 'safety/investment' should not be for short-term (a few weeks/months).

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

^^ I have no opinion, other than to say Gold is down 22% from its peak and 13% from when it was recommended here by some. Clearly it is cheaper today than it was than.

IMO, Gold at 1782 when it was recommended here was neither a good short term nor a good long term investment. The price one pays for any asset matters. Even as an asset allocation strategy, it would not have been wise to establish a position at those levels.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

This old tradition of giving gold in our culture is just another way of giving the children some financial security in my opinion. So that much hasn't changed. The only difference is that now girls don't really like wearing gold jewellery, so getting gold in another form makes complete sense. obviously you buy what you can afford.

We have been subscribing to Moneyweek magazine since the last 2 years or so, and surprisingly enough, everything published in it so far has been pretty accurate. They are quite leftist compared to WSJ and FT. If you read carefully below, the latest from them regarding Gold, it might help you make up your mind.

Is this the end of the gold bull market? No By Dominic Frisby, Moneyweek, Dec 14, 2011 *
**Hang on to your gold

Despite all the havoc in the eurozone recently, gold has been having a rough time of it. It fell 3% on Monday, and another 2% yesterday.

And now some are calling the top of the market.

My editor, John Stepek, has just sent me a Bloomberg article featuring US newsletter writer Dennis Gartman, who always seems to get let out when gold has a big sell-off.

He declares that "we have the beginnings of a real bear market, and the death of a bull".
So do we?
What were you doing during gold's last bear market?
Well, gold is up about 16% on the year so far. So no bear market there.

This compares with an S&P 500 which is ever so slightly down; a FTSE 100 that's down around 10%; a commodities index that's also down around 10%; a US bond market that's up about 17%; and a US dollar which is ever so slightly up.

If we use the definition that a bear market is a market that is down 20% from its highs, then Gartman may well be right. I don't say it will happen, but there is a very good chance that gold could fall more than 20% from its early September high of $1,920 an ounce.

This would be perfectly normal. Gold has had three 20% corrections since this bull market began in 2001. Once in 2006, again in 2008, and just three months ago in September – yes, just three months ago. If you look at intra-day prices, it fell from a high on 6 September of $1,923 to a low on 26 September of $1,535. I make that 20%.

The problem is, when it made that low – at about 9.15 am, if I remember rightly – I was out walking the dog on Wandsworth Common. I'd just dropped the kids off at school, and now I had my dog ball thrower in one hand, iPhone in the other and was staring at the Kitco App, thinking "ooh, I should buy some silver". (Silver had fallen to $26).

Smartphone technology is wonderful. It makes many things possible. But this wasn't the ideal moment to be implementing these sorts of decisions – even if I had previously sold at $1,920, which I hadn't.

By the time the US markets were opening, both gold and silver had already rallied. The former then closed the day above $1,600 and the latter above $30. The bear market was over. I'd pretty much missed it.

What were you doing during gold's last bear market? I was walking the dog.
If trading these market swings is your game, that's all fine and dandy. Myself, I just don't have the time or the mental discipline required for this kind of approach, full time. I have a trading portfolio, which I sometimes play with, yes. But I also have a much larger core holding which I don't touch. I have other things in my life I want to concentrate on.

So, first, I look at the fundamentals for gold. Have these changed? No. If anything they've intensified. I won't go on about them here save to say we are going through a generational monetary unravelling and in such a situation you want to own gold. You may well also need your metaphorical tins, guns and bomb shelters at some stage, but I do not have a buy signal on those just yet.

Then I like to look at a chart.

The 144-day moving average loses its magic
The wonderful 144-day moving average is back in the spotlight. This is the red line on the chart below, marking the average price of the previous 144 days. It has, since the crash lows of 2008, continuously caught the lows in gold. Why 144? Don't know. Ask Leonardo De Pisa. But it has worked brilliantly.

When I began writing this article, we were sitting right on it. I wrote,"these things don't work forever and I've an inkling it's not going to hold this time". Gold promptly fell through it.

For now, technically, the issue with gold is the trend line coming down off the September highs, which I have drawn in red on the chart below. However, coming up underneath and offering support we have the one-year moving average in green and that rising blue trend line.

The trouble with trading
As well as three 20% corrections, gold has had a further four 15% corrections since this bull market began in 2001. If you want to trade them, fine – if you can do it. If you want to ride them out – also fine. But if you do trade these swings, the risk is that you fail to buy back and you lose your position. Then, all you can do as gold rises is watch and declare that gold is a bubble.

In April-May 2006, gold suddenly launched from around $540 to $730. That was too much, too soon. Gold gave it back pretty quickly – by late May, if I recall – and spent the next 18 months consolidating and edging higher. It wasn't until October 2007 that we saw new highs.

From July 2007 to March 2008 gold went from $640 to $1,033. That was too much, too soon. By October 2008, it was back at $680. It wasn't until October 2009 that we saw new highs – again a full 18 months after the first high.

My take on today's action is that we're seeing a similar pattern repeating. In July of this year, gold set off from $1,500 on a move that saw it $400 higher by September. Again, it was too much, too soon, and now we have the inevitable correction.

We can expect many more months of whipsawing, frustrating, consolidating action. I don't think we'll see new highs for a year or more. If these horrible markets get even more horrible, if fear and panic spread, if liquidity runs dry and nations serially default, we could easily sink to $1,500, to $1,250 - $1,000 even.

But gold could just as easily set off on one of its runs, which always seem to come when you're least expecting it, and hit $3,000 or $5,000.

So hang to your hats, my friends – and your gold; trade in and out, if you're good at it – don't if you're not. But your physical… Don't let anyone near it, least of all yourself. In a few years time, you'll be very glad you didn't.

*

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

"We have been subscribing to Moneyweek magazine since the last 2 years or so, and surprisingly enough, everything published in it so far has been pretty accurate. "

Highly doubt any magazine has such a terrific track record.

This article looks in the rear vire mirror and says Gold is up 15% - and is not in a bear market. If this magazine recommended Gold at 250 I would salute it. But to say at 1920, it is not in a bear market and hang on, it is just a bunch of bull crap.

One other poster here had stated at 1780, that one of his contacts in the know said God is the place to be. Since then, Gold is down a lot - and we have not heard from him or his contacts.

For each such article, one can find other articles that say the opposite.

Some may be pumping up Gold because they may want to get out and sell to unsuspecting people. So buyer beware

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

I read the article more carefully. It makes the case for a long term bull market in Gold from an economic perspective. Then it mixes in Technical analysis - something abt a 144 day moving average, support, resistance etc.

The main message I got out of it, dont trade in and out. Gold could easily go down to 1000 or it could go up to 3000-5000.

It preaches long term buy and hold strategy - but spoils that message with technical analysis mumbo jumbo.

I am not economically savvy to predict what will happen in future and how that will affect Gold prices. But it is a mistake to promote Gold as an investment at these prices. Yes, Gold (may) have a role as a part of one's portfolio. So if you had Gold, and it has ballooned to a higher pct of your assets, then time to sell a bit and get the asset allocation in line with desired pct.

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

forgot to add - and if you dont have any Gold in your portfolio, you may want to start building position in Gold slowly till it reaches the desired target (5% of total assets or whatever your financial planner suggests after looking at your individual situation, risk tolerance, age, and other factors)

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

I was talking in the context of Gold, not everything else. As far as gold is concerned, it did pretty much predict correctly. But the question is, have you bought any gold yourself or not??? :D

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

underneath the pillow

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

i keep my savings in my mothers pocket

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Re: Where do you keep your Savings?

First, let me say at the outset, I learn a lot about a genial and calm style of writing from you - and try (sometimes unsuccessfully) to incorporate it.

Allow me to state the reason for my confusion - you had indicated "everything published in it for 2 years turned out to be correct". It was not clear you meant everything related to Gold.

Let us assume everything about Gold was true in that magazine for the last two years. I would respectfully submit that 2 years in a bull market is not a long enough time to judge a magazine's record. During the 1997-2000 Tech boom, every Amar Akhbar and Anthony was a bull - and they were right for 2-3 years - till the bottom fell off.

IMO, one should look at the long term record of any publication. And long-term in my book is more than 2 years, more like 10-15 years.

I would be curious to see what the magazine's recommendation was when Gold was at 250 about 7 years ago.

No, I have not bought Gold, because I do not understand it. And I do not chase any asset class that has had a huge run-up.

As always, I hope your future is Golden, MissFreudian!