Bitcoin Holds Near Record, Ether Surges Amid Crypto Rally

This article by Joanna Ossinger for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here it is in full:

Bitcoin held near a record a day after breaching $34,000 for the first time while Ether, another digital currency, also surged as the crypto rally continues.

Comments of the Day

05 January 2021

Video commentary for January 4th 2021

Eoin Treacy’s view

A link to today’s video commentary is posted in the Subscriber’s Area.

Some of the topics discussed include: yield curve steepens, financial repression fuels the precious metal and crypto rally, China firm, Wall Street weak

December Research Letter

Thanks to a subscriber for this report from Crescat Capital which contains a number of interesting charts. Here is a section:

Contributing to the supply shortage, the number of major new gold discoveries by year, i.e., greater than 2 million Troy ounces, has been in a declining secular trend for 30 years including the cyclical boost between 2000 and 2007. At Crescat, we have been building an activist portfolio of gold and silver mining exploration companies that we believe will kick off a new cyclical surge in discoveries over the next several years from today’s depressed levels.

Gold mining exploration expense industrywide, down sharply since 2012, has been one of the issues adding to the supply problems today. Crescat is providing capital to the industry to help reverse this trend.

Since 2012, there has also been a declining trend of capital expenditures toward developing new mines. From a macro standpoint, gold prices are likely to be supported by this lack of past investment until these trends are dramatically reversed over the next several years. Credit availability for gold and silver mining companies completely dried up over the last decade. Companies were forced to buckle up and apply strict capital controls to financially survive during that period. Investors demanded significant reductions in debt and equity issuances while miners had to effectively tighten up operational costs, cut back investment, and prioritize the quality of their balance sheet assets.

Eoin Treacy’s view

Supply Inelasticity Meets Rising Demand was the catch call of the commodity-led bull market between the early 2000s and 2011. Once identified it represents the beginning of a new bull market.

It takes time to convince investors there is a new bull market. By the time that happens prices have been trending higher for years already. Then it takes time to find and build new mines. That can take anything up to five years. Over that time, the firmness of prices convinces more and more people that the trend of demand dominance is irreversible so miners come under a great deal of pressure to expand capital expenditure or to buy out other operations. That generally occurs around the same time that new mines come online and contributes to a triple waterfall decline. Supply…