Silver’s Next Surge: Why the Precious Metal Could Explode in 2026

Name: SILVER ‘About to Go Violent’ - This Is Not a Normal Move: Michael Oliver
Uploaded: 2026-01-11T04:06:26.122139+00:00
Channel: Living Your Greatness
Description: Summary and key takeaways on Silver’s Next Surge: Why the Precious Metal Could Explode in 2026, covering Introduction The latest episode of Living Your

Living Your Greatness

Jan 11, 2026

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4 min read

YouTube video ID: mrWt_05ddF8

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Introduction

The latest episode of Living Your Greatness featured Michael Oliver, a veteran market analyst, discussing why silver is poised for a dramatic move in the coming quarters. Oliver contrasted today’s $78 silver price with the $50 level from two years ago and explained that the real story is not price history but a shift in market reality.

Silver’s Dual Nature

Monetary Asset: Like gold, silver serves as a store of value and a hedge against fiat‑currency decay.
Industrial Demand: Rapid growth in solar panels, data‑center hardware, and other high‑tech applications has created a demand that outpaces supply for five years straight, widening a structural deficit.

Historical Spread Breakouts

Oliver highlighted three past periods when the silver‑to‑gold spread broke a long‑standing ceiling, triggering explosive price moves: 1. 1979‑1980 Bull Market – Silver jumped 4½‑fold in five months after breaking a spread ceiling. 2. 2010‑2011 Surge – A spread breakout in September 2010 led to a 150 % price increase in seven months. 3. 2023‑2024 Move – The most recent breakout (November) has already sent silver soaring, and the spread remains at a historic low relative to gold.

Current Technical Signals

Spread Chart: The percent ratio of an ounce of silver to an ounce of gold has been stuck for ~10 years; the November breakout suggests a new reality.
RSI: Monthly RSI topped 80 % during the 1979‑80 rally, a level that would normally signal overbought but instead preceded a massive run.
Mid‑point Corrections: Past breakouts featured short‑term pullbacks (e.g., Jan 2011) that lasted only days; similar volatility is expected now.

Potential Price Targets

Conservative View: Adjusted for monetary growth, silver could reach $200 per ounce.
Aggressive Scenario: If the spread mirrors the 6 % level seen in 1980, silver could climb to $500‑$800 while gold stabilises around $8,000.
Log‑Scale Perspective: A 10‑fold move from the historic $4‑$5 range points to a $500‑$600 target within the next two quarters.

Silver Miners vs Gold Miners

Relative Valuation: The XAU miners‑to‑gold spread sits at ~8 % (well below its historical 25 % average), indicating miners are cheap.
Expected Upside: A breakout could double the miners’ spread to 17‑18 %, implying a 2‑3× rally for silver‑focused mining stocks.
Strategic Play: Long‑term investors should favour silver miners (including junior names) over gold miners, as the former are more undervalued and positioned to benefit from both monetary and industrial demand.

Broader Commodity Landscape

Oil & Gas: Prices are historically cheap relative to the Bloomberg Commodity Index; momentum suggests a possible “V‑bottom” followed by a rapid rebound.
Base Metals: Copper and lead have recently broken decades‑long ranges, delivering 4‑5× gains in short periods—patterns that could repeat.
Commodity Index: The Bloomberg index is roughly half its 2008 peak, signalling a broader shift from equities to real‑asset exposure.

Macro Risks & Market Context

U.S. Treasury Market: T‑bond futures are hovering near 116; a slip of a few points could trigger a bond‑market implosion, accelerating fiat‑currency decay and boosting precious metals.
Stock Market: The S&P 500 is trading near $7,000; a drop below $5,600 could mark a genuine bottom, but current momentum suggests a few more months of modest upside.
Debt Crisis: Sovereign debt levels (U.S., Japan, UK) are approaching the size of the entire U.S. equity market, raising the spectre of a bond‑market crisis that would further favour gold and silver.

Investment Strategies

Direct Silver: Hold physical bullion or ETFs (e.g., SLV) to capture the monetary move.
Silver Miners: Allocate to senior miners (GDX) and especially junior silver producers for leveraged upside.
Options: Use short‑dated call options for tactical exposure; be cautious around mid‑move corrections.
Diversify into Commodities: Consider exposure to oil, copper, and the broader Bloomberg index as a hedge against equity volatility.

Personal Lessons from Michael Oliver

Stay Outside the Emotion Loop – Market ambushes are felt after they happen; preparation beats reaction.
Focus on Real Assets – Tangible commodities outperform paper assets when fiat systems erode.
Long‑Term Perspective – Even when short‑term corrections appear severe, the underlying structural deficit (supply‑demand, monetary decay) drives the long‑run trend.

Closing Thoughts

Oliver stresses that the current environment is unlike any previous gold or silver bull market because it combines monetary stress, industrial demand, and a broken price‑range paradigm. Ignoring the new spread dynamics will likely cause investors to miss the next big move.

Silver is breaking out of a half‑century price range, driven by a structural supply‑demand deficit and a historic spread breakout versus gold. Expect rapid, multi‑hundred‑dollar moves within the next two quarters, and position now through bullion, silver‑focused miners, and selective commodity exposure to capture the upside.

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Full Transcript YouTube

Welcome back everyone to Living Your
Greatness and I am joined today again
with Michael Oliver. And I want to start
off before I welcome Michael Oliver just
to say happy new year and so good to see
you.
>> Good to be back, Ben.
>> Always good to see you, Michael. And
it's just crazy to look back that the
last time we spoke, silver was at $50,
gold was at $4,00.
And it's less about the price because
even though today now we see silver
about at $78 and gold at just shy of
4,500.
I'm more concerned right now of things
coming to truth and coming to light. And
I would love to get your opinion on what
was it that happened back when we last
spoke and where we are today and where
you see things going because I know both
yourself as well as Eric Sprat who
really appreciates your work. I know you
both believe that in the next two
quarters there's going to be a lot of
change for the precious metal space.
>> Yeah, particularly silver. We've done a
lot of studies in MSA momentum
structural analysis using our own
unorthodox unorthodox methodology. But
again, we've been around since ' 92.
Okay. But what's going on in silver now
is not normal.
And don't expect it to be normal. Most
technical analysts when they analyze any
given market, they they look back
through the last couple years in that
market and they see norms like, oh,
excessive overbought, oversold,
uh, swing objectives, things like that.
And they're still living in that world
with silver. And I think they're making
a big mistake. Silver
as a money. Remember, don't forget, it's
money. It's not just silver is like
surfing on a wave, but it's really on
two waves. The one that's the big one is
the monetary aspect of silver and gold.
That's the major differentiating
asset value underlying those those
metals. But silver also has the
industrial aspect which is exploding
because you know we know demand for
silver in a couple high-tech categories
and all the data centers and computers
and uh solar panels and so forth and so
on. It's it's in demand that is
outpacing supply and has been for 5
years now and it it continues to
increase meaning the the deficit
increases. So it's got a real problem in
that regard. So that's the other wave
that most people are focused on that oh
the silver demand because of this that
and the other. They're forgetting it's
money and it's very undervalued to its
mama metal gold historically.
Uh and this is one of the trigger levels
that caused silver to do what it just
did in the last eight weeks.
I'll explain it to you. Silver es and
flows versus gold. It goes up in value,
down in value, and you can plot it on a
chart. And we do it a little
differently. We don't do the ratio. We
do it, we divide an ounce of silver into
an ounce of gold, and we get a percent.
And if you go back over 50 years, like
to 75, and plot what was the best
reading that silver had that year,
monthly close versus gold, what was the
peak relative performance reading? And
we plot it. Okay. Well, back in the 79
to 80 bull market in silver, which was
still within that range, the half
ccentury range of four bucks to 50, four
bucks to 50, uh that surge in 79 and 80,
which in the last five months of that
ongoing bull market already for silver
and gold, silver went up four and a half
fold in five months, reaching 50 bucks
for the first time 1980. Okay.
What caused that already existing bull
trend in silver to go ape on the upside
and do it bam like that? Totally changed
the nature of the reality that was under
expected. Okay. And then in 2010 and 11,
silver had already been going up for
years again along with gold, but you
know, layered type go, you know,
advance, frustrating for the bulls, but
still up up. And then suddenly in
September of 2010 through April of 2011,
so at six, seven months, silver doubled
in a half in price.
In September 2010, it was like in the
20s, suddenly went to 50 again, you
know, bam, bam, bam. And it did it for
years of advance. Suddenly in the last
couple quarters, it went crazy again,
stopping at the top of the old what is
now a 50-year range. Was a 50-year
range. What caused that explosion? Why
didn't it just go up to those highs in
the same manner that had been going up
already? Why did it go crazy? When you
plot the spread of silver versus gold
during those times, you'll see that
there was like a ceiling.
I'm talking technically now. on that
spread chart every month you'd plot the
difference B and there was like a a
shallow ceiling that prevailed during
that bull market of silver and gold
where silver just couldn't get above a
certain level in relation to gold and
suddenly it popped above it and that
would have been in like the summer of
2000 uh 1979 and when it did that's when
the price of silver went berserk
quadrupled in a half in five months and
then in 2010 it was September of 2010
already going up in price. Silver was in
the 20s. And that spread also broke out
over a ceiling that any idiot drawn a
chart could see if you plot the spread
chart the way we do. And boom, in 7
months it doubled in a half. Okay. Same
thing happened this time except even
more clear on the spread chart. Even a
wider base spanning 10 years of sealing
of silver to gold. Silver to gold.
couldn't get above that that ratio that
that percent
and the November close broke out above
it. Bam,
suddenly silver goes crazy.
Uh
that span of time we find in a lot of
other markets in those rare periods when
a market has been stuck in a range for
multiple years, decades. Copper did this
for example. It had been in a range from
50 cents to $1.50 50 in the 1970s,
1980s, 1990s into the year 2005.
And in the latter part of 2005, it it
broke out above that range and in a
matter of a couple quarters went to
$4.50.
Bam, buck 50 to$450 on its own. It
wasn't associated with, for example,
other based metals. It did it on its
own. Wasn't even associated with what
gold and silver were doing then. A year
and a half later, lead did the same
thing. You could plot a lead chart going
back multiple decades and it was in its
old reality. And when it broke through
that in a several quarters, boom, it
quadrupled in half in price. All
compressed within a couple quarters
again on its own. Wasn't associated with
the copper move even. So, we've seen
these events occur in other markets
where an old price reality which has
existed so long you can't believe it.
You're bored by it. You think it's the
real reality to live forever. It
doesn't. And when the market moves into
a new reality, sometimes it does it in
an in an exaggerated manner, in a speedy
manner. We know this in other markets,
like you know, we see bubble tops in the
stock market and we've a lot of people
look back on them and say, "Gee, I
should have known that." And sure
enough, the collapse that followed was
pretty dramatic.
Uh.com topped to the dot the 2002 low.
NASDAQ 100 dropped 82% in two years
fully wiping out the entire dotcom
bubble. Okay. Uh
2007 to9 similar type process. But the
point is that when a market has done
something in error either excessive on
the upside or excessive on the downside
in this case for silver caught in a
50-year range when you can look at every
other market in the world copper, lead,
gold, they weren't caught in that
50-year range.
Copper's range was 50 cents to a buck
50. It's living in the 450 level. Now
it's five something, you know, uh almost
six. Uh
when you stay stuck in that kind of
range and yet silver for some reason
stayed in that range for 50 years
despite copper breaking out of its range
in 2005, lead in 2007 and gold at each
of its bull markets would vastly exceed
the prior high. you know, it was 850 in
1980, then it was 1920, and you know,
now it's 4,000, etc. So, why was silver
contained? What's going on there? It
made a mistake. Now, maybe it was a
coerced mistake in in effect, you know,
manipulation, and we understand that
where the certain banks in association
possibly with central banks might have
been playing a game to try to keep it
capped down for some reason. Ultimately,
that failed. Okay. But when silver
unleashes itself as it has now, I expect
in the next couple of quarters
since that spread breakout that probably
you're going to see a dynamite move that
will drop jaws. It's not going to be
incremental.
You're going to a new reality and it
wouldn't shock me that it's in several
hundred dollars. And you know there like
Eric Sprat I think I I gave a talk after
he did in Toronto back in October and he
noted that you know if you deflate
silver or adjust it to the monetary
growth you know it probably be 200 bucks
you know it would be fair just to match
the old highs when you factor in the
decay and the the quantity of the number
of dollars in existence. Uh well heck
yeah. Well let's say that's a new
normality a new reality that would make
sense. Well, but when markets go from
excess, they quite often one way or the
other, they go excess the other way in
the process of getting to the new
reality. I think that's where shoulder
is right now. And so the people who are
constantly saying, "Sell it, take
profits. It's going to go back to 50.
It's got to go back to this old high
here or there or whatever." And then,
you know, like, you know, a week or so
ago, we dropped 15% in silver in like
two and a half days.
and a couple days later you're back to
the high.
What are they thinking? Don't they
realize that this is not a normal
advance? You don't get these multimonth
corrections anymore. Now they're
measured in days.
And frankly, we expect to see silver
uh reach I'm my minimum is like 200, but
I wouldn't be shocked. But if it
approach 500, tell you the truth. And
there's certain other factors in play in
that regard too we could we could talk
about if you want to.
>> Yeah, I would love to hear more about
those factors and also if you could also
elaborate on what else has been
suppressing this metal for so long not
just in terms of the charts but even
other fundamentals cuz I'm also seeing
too other bullish factors like even
China hoarding silver like crazy and
this whole silver war coming out. So
what are some other factors on top of
that?
>> I don't know what's been restraining
silver except that we do know there has
been deliberate attempt to keep it down
>> banks and so forth. Uh and and I think
there's actually been some convictions
you know and and marketplace convictions
justice department so forth of attempt
several years ago of attempt to you know
manipulate the market. So but we don't
analyze silver from that point of view
the fundamentals. We know we have a
supply demand deficit. We've had that
for 5 years. Why is silver only now
responding? Well, pent up pent up
pressures. Uh uh the ongoing demand by
China essential for their solar panels.
You know, they they're 80 90% of the
global solar panel production and silver
is essential in that. And also, you
know, we hear all about these AI data
center, you know, power centers, so
forth. Well, silver is essential in that
here, there, and everywhere in micro
form and larger form. It you can't get
rid of it. It's it's essential because
of its its nature of the metal. Uh and
so those demand factors are continuing
to grow
and it's not been priced into silver,
the supply demand issue. And so if it's
made an error and not already responding
to that by incremental growth to respond
to that ongoing demand, which it's not
done, then when it catches up, it just
does it in a maniac way. And actually,
it's rational because it gets from point
A to point B where it should have been
anyway perhaps 10, 20 years ago, and
does it in a lightning form. And copper
did it, lead did it, gold does it every
bull market. In fact, you know, a point
about gold right now, the mama metal,
it's not primarily industrial. It's
primarily money. Okay? You had in of the
last 50 years since the government
legalized it, quote unquote. Uh, you had
the bull market. It peaked in 2000, but
dropped into two, excuse me, in 1975
when it was legalized. As soon as it was
legalized, it peaked and dropped to $103
in mid 1976. That was a bare low, 50%
pullback.
From that 76 low at 103, it went to 850
in three and a half years. Okay.
Eightfold gain bare low, bull high.
Okay. Then for multiple decades, it went
sideways. But where? The two three $400
level. Okay. Well off the 850 high, but
still way above the old reality. It
prevailed in the 1970s and so forth.
In 2001, it made a low at around $260.
And a decade later, it was 1920. Another
eightfold move, bare low, bull high
under conditions that aren't anywhere
approaching the fundamental realities
that are now underlying gold. Okay.
Gold's bare low this time was in 2015 at
1,50.
Eightfold says somewhere about 8,500.
Okay. We're 4,500.
We're only a four-fold move.
We're only half the dimension of the
prior two bull markets. What if gold
does it again, which is hardly like a
shocking thing to have another
eight-fold move? Okay, big deal. Uh,
wow. Where would silver be if let's say
silver now runs rushes up to let's say
2% even
an ounce of gold? Oh wow. What would
that be? 8,000 gold 2%. You get the
point. What if gold doesn't stop at its
old eight-fold move again? Because
something different's going on this
time. And what if silver instead of
going to where it's been in the last 50
years, that relationship has at least
been 2% in 20 of the last 50 years.
Divide silver into gold. At least been
2%.
We saw a low this year at about 1%.
Dirt cheap free silver compared to gold.
Okay.
If silver doesn't just go to the norm of
2% which it's been 20 years of the last
50 and does what it did during the bull
trends. If you go back and look at that
spread relationship in 79 to 80 it was
6.5%.
Or in 2010 to 111 it reached over 3%.
That's a doubling from where it is right
now.
Okay. So, instead of 2% of the price of
$8,000 gold, let's say, assuming gold
only does the norm, uh, what about 3%?
What about 6%.
Which is what it did in the last two
bull markets. We're in a bull market
now. So, why should wouldn't the spread
go up and at least challenge the spread
relationship it had in 1980,
2011? Heck, prices above those highs,
why shouldn't maybe the spread
relationship also go up and challenge
those highs? So the ceilings come off
silver both in its relationship to gold
and its own technical situation. Uh so
it's a monster and and if you don't
treat it that way and if you treat it
like oh RSI is overdone you'll miss the
move.
In fact, the fact is that if you do
monthly RSI, a popular so-called
momentum metric, we ignore it, but it's
popular. In the 79 to 80 move, RSI on a
monthly basis got above 80%, which is
the upper, you know, overbought level
for a year.
So, when it first got to 80%, if you
said, "Oh, I'm out. It's overbought."
You missed the entire move from like the
teens to 50. Okay? you missed the whole
move. So take your norms, throw them out
the window. We're not in a normal
situation. That's our assessment. And
admittedly, yes, if we get what we
expect in the next 6 months, then yes,
we'll be more cautious about perhaps
locking in, especially leverage
positions or call option positions. I
don't think silver is going to ever
collapse again. It may collapse, let's
say it goes to 400 bucks in 6 months and
drops back to 250. Yeah, it'll collapse.
But going back down to this old reality
is not going to occur. It's leaving it.
It's going to much higher levels. And if
you're not there for the next 6 months,
I think you're going to miss it.
>> Michael, I am curious to ask in terms of
this new reality of silver
>> going triple digits and that being
normal.
>> Sometimes people question, yeah, but
what if it gets pulled back? Sometimes
in bold markets, you know, there's these
corrections. you had mentioned before
that yeah it's so strong that it could
take a couple days to already recover.
So if if people are tuning in right now
and they're more concerned about they
understand silver's value and gold
they're in it for the long term but they
are worried about maybe the short term.
What would you like to speak about
because I know you have a lot of
conviction in the next six months
>> in the middle of those two postspread
breakout surges where silver broke out
versus gold
and and it went crazy. Okay, basically
let's call it two quarters. They were
slightly different in terms of months
but basically ballpark two quarters of a
move. Okay, they went up huge in
percentage terms but in the middle of
each move time wise about let's call it
three months into the move. Okay, you
need to get more cautious about a
stumble
because at each of those times there was
a midpoint stumble. Not like what we
just saw where it was two days and over
with, you know, which is going to be
normal now. Expect to see 10 15% swings
in silver maybe by the hour. Okay, but
it two days down and you thought it was
going back up and sure enough it's back
to the high two days later. Okay. But in
the middle of both those moves, there
was a what you could call a correction.
And I think it was January of 2011 after
the September 2010 spread breakout.
Silver surged. And in January 2011 on
price charts, it had a monthly reversal.
Mean it made a new high but closed down
on the month. So all the technicians
say, "Oh, that's a reversal. That's the
top."
There was no follow through to the
reversal the next month. And you start
you really exploded after that in 1979
in the midst of that mid79 to 19 January
80 move there was also a stall it wasn't
a monthly reversal but it was several
weeks drop and then congestion
so you know if you've been call options
then timesensitive
>> or in 2011 in January 2011 when you had
a midpoint pullback
It would have been important to sort of
pay attention especially if you have a
sensitive time sensitive leverage
position. Now if you're invested without
leverage like in miners or silver
bullion I think you need to ignore it.
Don't take profits.
It's a midpoint correction. We might get
one.
I don't know these dynamics this time.
You know remember we're outside that box
now. Those corrections occurred still
within that four bucks to 50 range.
Okay. So, there was a midpoint
correction even in those surges, but
we've come out of that 50-year range.
So, you know, maybe there will, maybe
there won't, but I'm cautious that there
could be.
If you take an arithmetic chart, meaning
a regular dollar chart of silver and go
back 50 years, you'll see that range,
monthly chart, high, low, close, okay?
You'll see 50 bucks, four bucks, 50
bucks, you know, etc., etc.
If you take the dimension of that range
in dollars, it's like a $45 range or so.
Let's call it 50 bucks. Okay? You add 50
to 50, the breakout point, you're going
to 100.
And we know that there's a lot of
traders out there who like to play these
big round number games. Like remember
3500 on gold? They stalled it for five
months there. Big round number. 3500.
Let's sell it. Sell it. Uh silver was
stuck at $35 for a whole year. late 24
to early 25. Uh
whenever you get the round numbers, they
tend to like to play games there. Well,
it happens that that's an arithmetic
orthodox
swing measurement of silver added to the
breakout point. We say, "Hey, I'm going
to go to 100, which is to double the
range." Okay.
If you take a logarithmic scale chart,
which is far more important here, a
ratio scale chart, which again, gold
continues to blast out on that, you
know, eight-fold move, eight-fold move.
It's just, you know, like that. Silver's
been capped. If you take it an a
logarithmic scale chart, you have a
t-fold range there. Four bucks to 50.
Take the low price multiple times 10.
Okay? It lived in that range for a half
a century. Okay? You break out at 50.
What's 10fold?
500 bucks. So don't be shocked that this
move in silver in the next 6 months or a
year, but most of it compressed I think
in again in a couple quarters could
reach something like that. Not the silly
arithmetic
everybody sees the chart type move. Oh
50 bucks we go to 100. That's where you
take your profits. So, it wouldn't shock
me that maybe around that idiot level,
you're going to have some gameplay.
Of course, right now we're trading
either side of 80, so you know, another
20 bucks or so. Uh, so I'm sort of ready
for that mentally, but I also know that
if that occurs, especially soon in the
move, like only in 3 months of upside,
then you're only halfway through that
surge, and this is a midpoint correction
on the clock at least. Uh, and it
wouldn't shock me that if you go to near
a 100red or 96 bucks or whatever you
want to do somewhere around there and
get a correction,
it's when you turn through that, you're
really going to go electric. But there
could be a correction there. And MSA is
focused on trying to define that if we
see the evidence. So, for example, the
other day, last week, when we had this
15% drop in silver, we said, "Boo, it's
not a drop." And everybody's screaming,
"It's a top. It's over with. It's going
to have to correct for 6 months and go
back to 50. We said baloney. And this
time around, instead of taking two weeks
to get back to the high like in October
where it spent a whole month laboring,
if you'll recall, had a sharp drop, but
it took it a long time to get back up.
Took it two days. Bam.
That's the nature of the market you're
dealing with. Realize it. Uh be there.
And if you got options, I've got options
in my account. I'm going to be cautious
somewhere in the midpoint of that clock
and especially if we get up around a
hundred, I'm going to be looking for any
reason that tells me yes, there's some
technical reasons to assume you could
get a, you know, a $15 spill here or
something like that. U so that's my
thought on that issue.
I'm curious to get your opinion on that
issue of maybe price falling
dramatically
if that were to happen.
Isn't that also an opportunity though to
add to your position on
>> if you're not already in? Yeah, I quite
agree. Yeah. So, if you do get that if
you do reach that level, the idiot level
rapidly, like you know, next month,
let's say, uh that's very early in this
explosive cycle. Uh
yeah, if you're not in, you might want
to look at trying to capture where that
turn turns back up again, which is
pretty hard to do, by the way, because
when silver turns back up, like we just
had the other day, it was like bam, you
know, bam
>> in two days.
>> Couple of days. Yeah. Right. So, it's
hard to do. It's not that easy. You have
to really look at micro technicals. And
uh our view right now is on the macro
and we we we sense we assess we continue
to that this is different this time. If
you treat it as normal you're going to
miss it.
I really appreciate that answer and as
you know I'm all about education and
I've been getting a lot now sometimes
from Gen Z's or even from friends who
live in Montreal who are more aware of
what's going on probably because they've
been hearing me talk about gold and
silver for the last 5 years but a lot of
times they're almost like yeah but I
feel like I missed the boat then what
would you say to people like that? Well,
yes, you have in the sense that MSA
turned long-term bullish. We've been
bearish and bullish on gold over over
the 30 years. Okay. For instance, in
2011, it peaked late in the year.
January 2012, we were major bearish.
Stayed that way till February 2016
weeks after it made its bare low and
stayed bullish since. So we got bullish
at,40
price go of gold in February 2016 based
on annual momentum and nothing since on
annual momentum has said it's over. Yeah
big corrections but nothing said the
trend is over. It's still up. Okay. And
now it's in the acceleration phase. But
that spread relationship of silver to
gold is exceptionally potent right now
because one it's the breakout has just
occurred and sure enough what was the
price response? Silver went crazy. Okay,
no surprise to us but to a lot of people
it was. The spread told you I'm going to
blow my cork versus the mama metal.
Okay, but that just occurred.
So yeah, it's it's quite a few quote
dollars arithmetically speaking above
the breakout over 50 bucks where the
spread was when it broke out. But it's
really just begun and now 6 months from
now you can't say that. But I think now
you can say that uh it's still not too
late because silver valuation to gold is
off the page still dirt cheap and the
spread technicals tell us that
historically silver's on its way to a
rampage versus gold. So, even if gold
just goes up to the normal high of 8,000
and takes you 6 months to get there and
everybody says, "Oh, that's got to be
the top." Well, it's matched. It's done
it twice before. Maybe it's going to be
different this time. We got we got a
crisis on our hands of major
proportions. This time we got government
debt crisis here, Japan, UK, etc. where
the government bonds, the the core of
the asset world
could come into doubt.
And you know, like President Williams of
the New York Fed in mid November
made a speech or a press conference and
he said the Fed is going to start buying
bonds.
And his explanation for that was, and we
know they've been because you look at
what they've been doing lately, they've
been buying the hell out of Okay. uh he
said only because of ill liquidity in
that market not because they're afraid
it's going to collapse but because and
rates explode uh but ill liquidity
that's that's a nice way to avoid the
issue but they're very concerned about
it the Japanese are too I mean we have a
government we don't have a mortgage
crisis this time we government debt and
that is bigger than the entire US stock
market and they've been buying and
buying and buying since November and
bonds have gone nowhere except sideways.
And our assessment of T- bonds right
now, which is the quiet one. The quiet
one. Watch out for him. But he wakes up,
he could do violent things.
It's been 118 to 114
and a half for like since November.
Right now, we're trading at 116. All
they're buying has not boosted the
bonds. They've just gone dead sideways
in price. Meaning the yields on 30-year
are at the highs, just sitting there,
not breaking back down. no relief on
long-term debt and and and subgroups in
the stock market like commercial real
estate, which is a huge subgroup, which
is very anemic sector,
has been going sideways in the middle
for the last year, in the middle of its
10-year range. It hasn't made new highs
with the S&P. It hasn't broken down yet.
Everybody thinks, "Oh, well, it hasn't
broken down. It must be okay." Uh-uh.
Watch the T-bonds because if they roll
over like they're 116 now, you don't
ever want to see 111 again.
Look at a price chart and say, "Well,
we've seen 110. What's the big deal
about 111?" Our momentum structures say,
"You go there, you're going to get an
implosion." Admittedly, they're going to
come out with fire hoses
back at Japan, Fed, you know, etc.
Central banks are going to go ape and
they're going to print money like crazy.
Well,
what's the beneficiary of them
destroying the money unit?
Gold. Silver. Real money benefits from
the decay of fiat money. And that's the
history of gold and silver as well. So,
that's the other wave underneath here.
And watch the T- bonds because if they
can't control that market and it slips
just a handful of points on the T-bond
futures, we're looking at March futures
right now. 30-year bonds. They're at
116. You don't want to slip off even a
couple points, especially four points,
because they're going to blow the bottom
out of it. You're going to have a panic
in the bond market, which is not on
anybody's horizon right now. Everybody's
looking at what's Nvidia doing. Okay,
who cares? Yeah, Nvidia ultimately is
going to pay the debt for being the the
excessive sector, the AI sector, but it
probably won't be the provoking one.
And frankly, right now, we view the
stock market as stable and likely on an
intermediate basis to probably even go
up a little bit more, maybe get well
into the first quarter before we see any
rollover at all. And I don't see, by the
way, what a lot of gold and gold miners,
investors are afraid of. Oh, if the
stock market goes down, we go down. No,
it doesn't. Few times in history, gold
and miners suffered. October of 2008 is
the most conspicuous single standout
month where the stock market already a
year off of its bull market high already
substantially off of its bull market
high which was October 2007. Okay, so
October 2008 it had what you could call
a crash month and gold and silver joined
and soed the miners
and gold turned around within a few
months was back to the high new highs.
stock market continued down through
2009.
But had happened after that crash in
October of 2008, which did gold was ripe
for a correction at that point, by the
way. It had been going up massively for
years and so it was due for a nice sharp
break. And so it had one and everybody
thought, "Oh man, the end of gold." No,
in a matter of months, it was back
making new highs and S&P continued down.
So that that myth ended. Yes, there was
a one month that stood out as in sync.
But look what happened January through
April. Gold rose, stock market broke
down this year. How come gold didn't
collapse? Gold went up. Like what did
gold do? It peaked in April 3500. Stock
market made a low. They weren't in sync.
I don't think the stock market in the US
is about to have a crash type event. I
think what's more likely to happen in
our assessment of the S&P and the NASDAQ
is that this upside crawling effort that
we've had for like four months now where
every month you get the S&P up over
6,900 and it sells off but doesn't go
anywhere. 6,900 four months in a row I
think you'll probably get over 7,000 and
go on who knows maybe we get a decision
from the Supreme Court on Friday that
says we're going to block the tariffs in
some way and the market thinks oh boy oh
boy it goes up. It doesn't look right
technically to roll over yet. And when
it does roll over, I don't see the
danger of a rapid roll over at this
point. I'm suspecting you are going to
have to get into the second quarter
before the S&P ever gets back down to
numbers that we would define as uhoh,
the bottom comes out. And those numbers
are down well below where we are right
now. But you got to get in the mid
5,000s again, like 5,600 before you
trigger numbers that say, "Okay, I can
implode." And so, yeah, you I think the
S&P is likely to go up for a few more
months, which means, hey, if you're in
gold miners, no problem from the stock
market if you believe in that that
correlation myth, which is very few
examples in history validate that, by
the way. And even when it does roll
over, I don't see it being sudden and
dramatic until
you get back down toward those levels.
Remember, in April, we got to 4,800 on
the S&P. I'm saying if you get back down
now to 5600
anytime this year, uhoh, the floor could
come out. But that's a long way down
there. And the process of getting there
could be laborious, meaning not panicky,
which means probably if you're using
that as your scare
thought that I'm in gold miners, I got
to be scared of the stock market. I
wouldn't be scared. I don't think you're
going to get drama out of the stock
market on the downside until you get
back to that level. And that could be a
process. we may be well into the
six-month period of the the silver
explosion with miners also exploding. Uh
and the stock market's still just
copacetic
and no threat to the miners. Uh anyway,
that's that's my thought on that issue
is that the stock market's not a threat
right now. It is a threat if you're an
investor. I don't think you should be
long the stock market. I think it's
topping. It's been topping since
January. And I think the new highs are
just teaser highs which also occurred in
2000 in 2007 where you look like you
topped and made a new high about 10 15%
and you know a year later you you fell
apart anyway. So from an asset point of
view if you're in miners
as a category and I I emphasize them
right now too. I think they're going to
beat gold uh going forward this year. I
think they're going to be the better
place to be than gold is just like
silver is going to be better than gold.
Uh but I don't think the stock market is
a threat to them at this time.
So knowing that gold and silver is the
place to be and knowing that it
dramatically performed last year, I'm
curious to ask you if we look at now the
ways that we can invest like for example
the miners you were just talking about
them.
>> Do you think they're undervalued right
now? Do you think they've already
prices? Could you could you talk more
about that?
>> I don't have the chart in front of me,
but we've run it many times.
>> Go back to 1986 when the XAU index
began. GDX only began in 2006, so it
doesn't have that much history. XAU is
the Philadelphia Gold and Silver Miners
Index. It's not an ETF. It's an index.
back then in the 1980s, 1990s into 2008.
So for multiple decades, if you divided
the price of XAU into an ounce of gold,
you ended up with a percentage readings
that were on the bottom side about 17 to
18%
would be low
for the XAU value to gold and the upper
side was like 35%. So it lived in this
almost 20 point range of spread readings
up and down up and down but holding its
value at let's say the midpoint of
that's about 25% or so. Okay, quarter of
the value of an ounce of gold.
2008 it broke down relative to gold on a
spread basis. You could plot the spread
chart. You could see the floor come out
and it dropped all the way by the bare
market low in 2015 when both gold and
the miners made their actual price lows.
That spread dropped to 4%.
Okay, it had been living in an average
of 25%
for decades up and down around that
level
and its valuation to gold and it dropped
to 4%. I mean, what do you think it's
going to do? go to zero.
Miners are worth nothing. Okay, that's
effectively what it did. And since 2015
low, that spread has rallied up to 8%
over just over eight and dropped back
down to about five. Rallied just up over
eight again. This is be 2021. The high
reading then was 8.6%.
And it fell back down again and now it's
back up to about 8.2%.
So, this is the third assault in that
10-year wide range of spread readings.
Still very cheap. We're talking 8% now,
okay? Versus an average back in those
decades of 25%. So, it's still dirt
cheap compared to gold. We think this
rally is going to blow through the top
of that box,
that 8% to 5% zone.
And when it does, it's likely to go
double at minimum in terms of its
relative value to gold. just to get to
the bottom end of what had been the
multi-deade range with lows around 17
18%.
So if we're 8% plus now we're going to
double go to like 17 18 just to bump the
bottom of the old relative performance
readings and I think that's likely to
occur fairly quickly. It's just like
that silver gold ratio spread
relationship that broke out in November.
Silver beat gold dramatically in price.
the miners are now positioned to do the
same thing. And my son Brad has pointed
out to me, I didn't know this, but in uh
February, there's going to be a lot of
minor earnings reports.
They're going to be shockers
because I mean, if if you're the kind of
investor who depends on that kind of
nonsense to whether to buy or not buy,
what are its earnings? Okay,
those are based on the price of an ounce
of gold versus its production costs
largely. Okay. And you know, 6 months
ago or so, gold was where, you know,
3,000 or something. Okay. 3,5 all of a
sudden we're 4,500
with production costs stable. I mean,
oil's come down. This has gone stable
anyway. And so the production cost, the
main cost is not rising. And yet gold
has exploded. So the earnings would go
through the roof. And no doubt a lot of
people who depend on that kind of stuff
for affirmation are going to say, "Gee,
I got to be in this." Wouldn't it be
coincident that that spread breaks out
between now and early February
and then those earnings come out, people
say, "Now I got to buy the miners. Now I
believe in them because, you know, the
earnings look good." Uh, and you get a
gusher. So I'm expecting technically and
from a valuation point of view, again,
we're 8% compared to a reality that
existed before on an average of 25%.
Wow, how cheap are they going to get?
They've already said I'm not going
lower. The issue is when do they break
out? And I think it's coming. And within
the miners, I'd further accentuate the
silver miners over the gold miners
because they're even cheaper in historic
valuation and they have the technicals
to do a whoo.
>> I have a question around silver and gas
and oil. Yeah,
>> if we look at like in 1980 was the last
time when silver was more than oil and
gas.
>> So I'm curious to get your perspective
even if we're early right now to be
talking about just oil and gas. What's
your opinion on oil and gas?
>> Natural gas has already come well up off
its lows on a percent basis. Oil is not
I mean natural gas was down like a buck
and now it's four bucks. Okay. So, no,
it's not up to 10 again, but it it had a
huge surge off it low. So, it's a
different category. Um, crude oil and
things related to it are very depressed.
In fact, if you ran spread charts of the
price of oil versus the S&P or price of
oil versus gold, you know, price of oil
versus silver, etc., it's off the page
cheap. It's like, you know, what are you
going to do? Go be free? Okay. Now, we
have news events right now that no doubt
are influencing people and I've seen a
lot of analysts on TV who are quote oil
experts saying no oil is going back to
40
uh supply demand situations very heavy
and this Venezuela thing more oil is
going to come you know etc so and all I
can say as a technician is uh watch
yourself because as oil has come down
after that $130 high in 2022 And
interesting, it peaked right after the
war began. Russia Ukraine war. It didn't
go up because of it. It peaked shortly
after. It had been going up for a whole
year before that, a year and a half. In
fact, up to 130. Most of that occurred
before the war even started. And then
when the war started, which surprised a
lot of people,
oil peaked and collapsed from 130 down
into the 70s. And basically for the last
several years, gold has gone sideways.
23, 24, 25 in that 70, 80, even 60,
lower 60 range. Okay? So just sort of
boring, but dead and very cheap. Less
than half the price of its peak in the
2022 high. Now it's gone down in the
upper 50s, now the mid50s almost.
And I have a sense that you're about to
have I hope we're going to do this a
plunge like a little vortex type plunge
where you know oil goes down to 52 or 50
or something and people just screaming
it's going to collapse going to collapse
because the technicals are set up on oil
ours our technicals where we run
momentum studies of long-term
measurements of oil.
There is a massive trend structure. If
you looked at the price of oil you don't
see it. you just see this layered
decline.
But when you look at our momentum
charts, you see a multi-point like a
7point downtrend on quarterly momentum,
which is a fairly long-term metric that
has been banged and banged and banged.
And you also see a ceiling that's about
coincident with where that trend line
comes through. You don't see it on the
price chart.
Oil right now wouldn't have to go up but
a solid handful of percentage points
from where it is now. not not double
digit percent,
okay, to
price levels that most people wouldn't
regard as a breakout during this quarter
and you're going to break out over that
stuff. And when I see a structure like
that built, it's as if you saw a price
chart with a sevenpoint trend line
that looks tired. It's been going down
too long and you know the structure is
right there. It wouldn't take much to
break out. You get excited. Oh boy, this
looks like a breakout pending. You don't
see it on the price chart, but you do
momentum. I think oil is about to make
possibly a vortex low where you make a
low with some headlines, you know, like
what's going on now. They think, "Oh,
well that's going to the oil just going
to puke." Okay, fun that fundamental
analysts are right. And you when you
come out of there probably without a
reason, no headline, just I'm done.
Okay, it vortexes out of there. And this
is often the way markets turn. They
don't do it with a headline. They do it
just because, hey, I'm tired. I'm going
up. I'm too low.
You could vault out of there where
suddenly oil becomes a component. It is
a component of the Bloomberg commodity
index, but it's the most lag component
within the entire Bloomberg which is
advancing. Now, the Bloomberg commodity
index, as far as we're concerned, has
begun a second major bull leg. Started
in October, price of 106, we're now
trading 113 or so. Um,
oil is the weak component, but it looks
like it has the attributes to do a real
Vbottom type turn and not only make an
exhaustive low, a panicky looking low
like it's going to collapse to never
neverland and just turn out of there and
and shoot up, you know, 20 $30 very
quickly and shock people. So, right now,
our view on oil is don't buy it yet, but
be inclined to think about that.
Because if you especially if you can get
that kind of panic low where then you
hear nothing but on CNBC and elsewhere
about how it's going to go to, you know,
that's it's going to 40. It's it's no
good. Trump was right. You know, all
this stuff where you could come roaring
out of here in that market. And I'm not
going to explain why. I don't know why.
I don't care why. I'm measuring the
dynamics. And it says I I'm I'm cheap.
I'm cheap in relation to everything
else. Like you said, silver versus oil.
But how about if silver stays at that
level, but oil goes up?
And so silver goes up more and just
stays at that. You get the point because
that that spread relationship could
change. If oil goes up, silver could
stay at that relationship and go up
continue as well. Okay? Uh but oil is
dirt cheap and it it looks like it could
explode about here. So that's a market
I'd be watching for again an ambush type
event.
I really appreciate that explanation
because I do feel as a contrarian and
valuebased investor, it's always
important also to be thinking about
where exactly should we be watching with
her capital and other opportunities. Uh
so even though I'm very bullish as well
on gold and silver, I do find it's
important to be aware of other markets.
Are there any other commodities?
>> Yes. Yeah. Oh yes. In general, in
general,
>> broadly speaking, if you recall the late
'7s, or you probably don't, okay, but in
the late '7s, we had a worldwide
recession called stagflation and
commodities late, but join gold. Gold
made its low in 76 and went up through
1980. In 1977, the CRB index, which is
the key commodity index, then turned up
as well. So a year behind gold, okay,
and joined and had a powerful move with
gold up through 1980. The stock market
was in the meer. It was what every
brokers called it a wasteland. I
remember I was a commodity broker then
with credential b and all the stock
brokers in the office hardly even came
in the office anymore. Their phones
weren't ringing. The stock market was a
wasteland. It go up and down but
wouldn't go anywhere for like a decade.
But anyway, during that time,
commodities exploded in a global
recession, which most people say, "How
can that happen?" Well, it did because
when they print money, it went
somewhere. And when it goes into the
cheaper assets that are perceived to be
lower risk, greater reward, gold was
certainly one, it always benefits from
when you go into a recession or
depression, the central banks print.
Okay. Well, I think we're facing that
right now. And I'm seeing
measuring the Bloomberg commodity index
versus the S&P for example, it looks
like oil does versus silver. It's off
the page cheap, but it isn't going down.
It's been stable. The Bloomberg
commodity index has been stable for like
couple years now either side of about 2%
of the price of the S&P.
And there's some levels on it that look
like it could turn up. But on a net
trend basis, Bloomberg has already in
our assessment turned back up from its
first leg that peaked in 2022. Had a 50%
correction back to its bare low which
occurred in 2020. Went sideways for a
couple years and now has broken out. I
think it started now. Oil is the weakest
component admittedly, but a lot of other
components are quite firm. Base metals
are quite strong as you know. If I were
an investor one, I would have a lot of
it in monetary metals. And if you don't
want the leverage, fine. Just buy
miners, buy bullion ETFs, or buy
bullion. Don't leverage.
Commodity complex looks like an
investment arena that is in the early
phase of a turn. So, you're not late.
Especially when when crude oil does that
flip that I think it's going to do.
That's when suddenly you're going to be
aware that oh my real world assets are a
place to be. Stuff that's in the ground
or just above the ground. Grains, foods,
cattle, oil, copper, you know, stuff
that you can step on and touch, not
paper assets that have this dream world
built around them. You know, AI is going
to change the world. Yeah, it might do
that just like.com did, but it had an
82% bare market in 19 in 2002. Remember
that. Okay, the com uh AI could do the
same thing. But I think people are going
to turn their heads to
that which is real and cheap off the
page. Not only relative to the stock
market, but relative to its own prices.
Like the Bloomberg commodity index right
now is 113, let's say. Okay. Uh what was
its high in 2008? 237.
Okay. So we're half the price of where
it was in 2008. And in 2011 it made a
secondary high at uh two 170 something.
And again we're at 113. So even now
commodity prices are still low relative
to themselves much less the stock
market. And all our technical signals
are saying shift from the asset
preference of stocks
other gold miners and mining stocks and
and commodity related stocks and shift
into commodity related stocks
a related base metal mining related oil
related especially when oil makes that
turn I would suddenly take a strong look
at oil some of the oil sectors which are
also fairly depressed XLE is not, but a
lot of the subsectors within the oil
complex are fairly depressed. And so if
I were an investor, not not thinking out
the next 6 months, but the next couple
years, not wanting to use leverage, I
see that as a bargain basement, safe
place to be.
So if you don't want the volatility, but
you want to buy low and sell high,
that's buying low. And I think it's it's
it's proved itself. I'm not going lower.
only issue is when am I going up and I
think that's begun.
>> I appreciate that explanation, Michael.
And I'm curious to ask a follow-up
question on that. I've been in the space
for 5 years in the precious metals. I've
al I've also invested in the
>> major and junior minors. Obviously, a
lot more risk, right? So, if someone was
new right now listening to this
conversation and they have the
conviction that you and I both have, but
they're maybe overwhelmed with
>> how to even just put a little bit of
their money.
>> Yeah, I would focus
uh silver's going to be volatile, but
the miners, especially the silver mining
component of the gold silver mining
sector, is the most depressed. And I
think it is the one that could have the
most extreme volatility and price gain
on the upside in terms of multiple
gains. See, we're I'm talking about
silver going into a couple hundreds. I
think that's going to happen. Well, the
silver miners, if you look at GDX right
now, the gold mining ETF, it does have
some silver miners in it, by the way,
but it is well out above its 2011 price
high. Well above it. It blew through
that a couple months ago, and it's it
levels well above that.
Still, the silver miners ETF
is still below its 2011 high. Its high
back in 2011 was a high close in the mid
80s, I think. And we almost matched that
last month, but didn't quite exceed the
high close, monthly close, but the high
monthly trade back then was like 94.
This is 1911 when gold was up at the
1920 bull market peak. Okay. Sill was at
94 top trade. Where have we been in the
recent surge? Just above 90. They sold
it. Said, "I'm going to sell the old
high." Okay. They got a nice drop down
to the low 80s. We came back up near 90
yesterday. Didn't quite touch it again.
I'm going to bet if you touch 90 one
more time on sil. This is just price
because momentum already says be long.
Long-term momentum says be long. This
beast is yet to do its thing. You touch
90 one more time and the guys who've
been selling that old 2011 high at 90
bucks round it off are going to finally
realize oh this ain't working and I
think the silver miners could go berserk
just like silver does and outpace the
gold miners. So if I were buying right
now in miners and I have a lot of them
I'm I'm emphasizing silver miners.
I've got call options on silver SLV.
Uh but I've got also call LEAP options
on some of the major silver miners, but
I'm also buying a lot of the junior
silver miners because I think that
category could go berserk in percentage
charts even more so than the gold
miners.
And again, I think a lot of that could
occur in a couple quarters.
I appreciate that, Michael. And Michael,
I want to move to a question that's a
little bit more personal. You have 50
plus years of experience, which is like
insanity when it comes to experience in
the markets. And I'm sure there's
lessons you've learned as an investor,
but also lessons that you've learned
that's taught you about life. I find in
finance, we don't just learn about how
to become a better investor, how to know
oursel better, but we also think of
lessons that we can apply to our own
personal life. What are a couple lessons
that you'd like to share?
>> Well,
obviously obvious you want to be on the
right side of major market moves because
that helps your personal life. Okay. And
right now
there's not a lot of emotion in the
stock market, for example, right now.
Either way, you know, we had a wave of
doubt about AI a few months ago, but
that's dissipated pretty well because
Nvidia popped back up in the mid-range,
not to the highs again, but mid-range.
It feels comfortable. So, that that
fear,
anticipation of a drop is dissipating.
And so, it's getting comfortable again.
And I think emotion is a big issue here
for any investor because usually the
emotion comes after you get ambushed,
not before. So, most people don't
anticipate the ambush. And so when there
was all this attention on an ambush and
AI, it didn't happen. It didn't happen.
And I don't think it's going to happen
for a while. Maybe in a couple months.
And by then, every especially if the S&P
makes a new high, which it's trying to
do right now. And if especially if,
let's say, the tariffs are in some way
impaired by the the Supreme Court
decision and then people say, "Oh boy,
party's on again." You know, it's that
comfort level that when that changes and
you go to emotion,
that's when bad stuff happens in the
real world, not just markets. So right
now, if you're an average investor, if
you're not long gold, a lot of them
aren't, especially in the Western world,
US especially,
uh, you're at least smiling because,
hey, S&P was up 15% year to date,
about 10% above the highs of early 25,
but 25 ended up being an up year by
small double digit percent. So, hey,
it's comfy. So, my retirement account,
if I look at it, and if it reflects the
S&P, hopefully, you know, let's say it
did, a lot of people are still smiling.
Hey, man, I had a positive year. Good.
Good. I weathered that. It's great. Only
thing that looks good on your horizon is
your retirement account. You already
you're past due on your credit card.
Many people are, or you're maxed out on
your credit cards. Uh you're having a
problem with your mortgage payments.
uh
all kinds of debt related problems are
occurring. We know about it. We hear
about it
and yet you got that one positive thing.
So it keeps you smiling
and and the gasoline prices too, right?
Trump said he'd get them down and
fortunately that part of the consumer
expenditures
is doing what he said it would do. Okay,
watch out on that though. So but what
happens if all of a sudden those get
upended?
Then emotion comes into play because
then you got nothing to smile about.
Your wife just gets laid off. You have
to go work at Walmart and you're 65. Uh
your credit cards, you know, you're past
due. You don't know what to do. You're
borrowing money on these all I hear are
ads on on radio all the time about we
could help you with the IRS. I didn't
think people had problems. Uh we could
help you with your debt problems. That
must be 50% of the ads I hear on the
radio sound like a lot of people are in
trouble and yet we're told everybody's
happy. Okay, but anyway, when that stock
market breaks, that's when the motion
comes into play. And that's when the
real world data points go dark real
quick. And when emotion hits, and I
think it's going to hit worldwide, not
just us. We're not the only bubble.
Europe is somewhat of a bubble. Stock
market. Japan is definitely a stock
market bubble. India is a stock market
bubble.
But when that breaks, that's when you
get the real world negatives and the
emotion comes with it. And that's when
all of a sudden, and I think this is a
huge bubble, bigger than we've ever seen
in the US history, stock market bubble.
And when they break, other things break
too.
People get fired. Uh, you know, things
that you didn't expect to happen happen.
And it goes dark and suddenly it's 52
card pickup. And when you have emotion
entered, that's when doubt occurs about
institutions.
What's going to happen next?
Is any alternative in the political
world really an alternative?
We thought such and such was going to
happen when Trump got elected and
suddenly a lot of things he's doing are
opposite to what he said he would do. So
a lot of the GOP are abandoning him
even. So all of a sudden the Democrat
party is totally fractured. It doesn't
know whether to go moderate or go
radical left. It's split between the
two. So, it's really two parties right
now. Republican party is peacemeal by
peacemail suddenly saying, "Hey, he he's
not doing what he said." I'm going back
to Reagan and Goldwater principles, but
Trump isn't that. So, that party is
fracturing.
So institutions you think are forever
aren't forever and it's hands in the air
and then suddenly there's doubt about ah
federal reserve didn't do a good job you
know they either print or they don't
print or they create bubbles stock
market bubbles because of their monetary
bubbles and they're not in control of JS
you know okay and suddenly that
institution comes into doubt u other
institutions other notions income taxes
I'm not advocating Believe me, I'm just
saying when people hurt, they get laid
on their income tax. And I hear nothing
but ads about you're late with the IRS,
we'll help you. I didn't think there was
a problem. Well, if all of a sudden the
American public gets hurt in a way that
suddenly they not only can't pay their
credit cards, but they have to ask for
extensions on their tax payments, plans,
or they simply don't file and hope for
the best. you know, uh that's when
extreme emotion hits and concepts of
normality go out the window. And I think
we're probably going to face something
like that this year, especially once the
stock market not only rolls over, but
hits those trigger levels, which I think
they'll do, but it might be mid year.
But that's when all of a sudden
emotion comes into play. So, I've not
really seen this before. In 2007 through
nine, we saw a good chunk of it, you
know, but it only lasted for a year or
so. And then they printed, printed,
printed. And finally, at that point, the
stock market was cheap enough. It had
been, oh, you know, 1575 and it went to
669.
Okay. So, it was cheap enough to where
you could buy it again. And the money
printing they did finally helped the
stock market. Of course, gold was
already on its way. Uh anyway,
don't be surprised by something like
that occurring this year. So that's one
thing I've I've not really seen, but I
anticipate is something outside the
markets partly caused by the markets.
But also, what happens if suddenly
there's doubt about owning US government
debt?
You know, a lot of countries around the
world own a lot of it and quit buying it
and maybe they'll divest themselves of
it. What if the American public no
longer views that as a safe place to be?
You know, one of the major banks just
came out, the C CIO of one of the I
forget which one was it, Morgan Stanley,
I think, came out with a thing. We need
to get rid of the 6040 principle.
60% stocks, 40% bonds is a quote
balanced portfolio. He said we need to
go 60 2020 20 with gold being 20. That
was a hell of an admission.
timid, but but a correct sense that
something's wrong with that so-called
safe category. If that ever comes into
doubt, wow,
you know, it's like it's like a global
war almost in terms of the consequences.
So
don't be shocked if something like that
materializes when these ambushes occur
from areas even other than AI
like the T-bond market or suddenly crude
oil explodes for no unknown no reason
except it's dirt cheap. Okay. Uh or
suddenly the dollar index which is
already in a bare trend by our
assessment starts to downside again in a
big way which I think it will. all kinds
of assumptions about normality go out
the window. And that's the world I think
we're fake is facing in 2026. And I
think silver knows it. I think gold
knows it. And so this is not normal.
This is not a 1980 bull market in gold
or a 2011 bull market in gold. This is
something different because of what's
going on elsewhere. So as an investor, I
think you need to be aware of that. I
am. It's not happened before in such a
big way, but I think it could be this
time.
If this is such a historic time, which I
also believe we are in that and there's
really a financial awakening coming, I
feel like it's even beyond that. I even
think there's a spiritual awakening
coming too for people because there's
going to be a lot of challenges really
really challenging who people are, how
they show up, how they treat each other.
And I I think I have one question I've
been wanting to ask you for so long is
it seems to me that you really really
care about humanity. You you really care
about not only people becoming
financially well or being prepared, but
it seems like just like the way that you
speak about your son and you think
highly of him. Seems like you're also
concerned about the everyday person and
humanity. I'm curious to get your
opinion on why you do what you do, why
you show up with a lot of integrity for
not just yourself, but even for others.
>> Well, I don't mix this into MSA's work.
We're strictly technical. And there have
been times I've been bearish on gold.
So, you know, even the mama metal that I
view as real money, there have been
times we said, "No, be gone. It's going
down." That was 2012 through 15 u at
other times as well. Uh but so I'm
flexible on that. So even though I have
certain guiding notions um and you want
to get into it uh when I was in grad
school working on a master's uh in 1971
23
uh I wrote a thesis called anarcho
capitalism and at that time I was a
friend of and and communicated much with
Dr. Murray Rothbart who was in New York
City. I was in South Carolina
>> and we communicated via mail and I went
up and visited him in fact interviewed
him uh on the sound interview that's
available on the Mises Institute site.
Uh
he was considered the founder of modern
libertarianism. In fact, the Libertarian
Party, I think, emerged in late 71 after
I'd already already met Rothbart and uh
and since it stumbled around the
Libertarian Party and fluctuated being
semi libertarian, libertarian, you know,
I don't really have a great interest in
it, but
it's a new idea and it has when things
come upended
among statists,
you know, whether so-called right or
left And neither one of them seemed to
work.
And I'll give you an example again when
I wrote that in 72 and it was master's
thesis. I think it was 723. Uh that was
well before the term Murray Rothbart had
used it once but in his correspondence
to me he said you'll be the first one to
write a thesis on. So I did uh and I
merged the philosophical thoughts of
Rand but took away her politics which
was simply limited government founding
father type notions uh but still
progovernment have government and
substituted them with Murray Rothbart's
economic politics which totally
libertarian meaning ultimately we can
evolve away from that. No we're not
going to do it overnight and it's not
violent. No it's just it doesn't seem to
work. uh we've gone through all kinds of
cycles of extreme right, extreme left,
moderate, and so forth, and they all
tend to implode at some point because of
errors they create. Well, in Argentina
over a year ago, Javier Malay got
elected president.
He's an economic academician type guy.
Young guy, looks like a rock and roll
star with black hair swings. And he he
won the youth vote there massively and
effectively
castrated the two dominant political
parties that had existed there for
decades back and forth like Republican
Democrat. These were competing like
socialist type parties. And so Argentina
went from the seventh biggest economy in
the world back when I was a kid, okay,
to almost a backwater third world
country in recent decades. It suffered
from constant inflation. I mean massive
inflation. Uh the government there, the
prevailing government was intrusive in
every way. They had rent controls to try
to keep quote prices down, but the
prices in the rent market were just it
was choking to people who needed to rent
a home. And so it was a real problem in
that regard. Food prices going through
the roof because the decay in the money
in it and so forth. And finally young
people, not not old people, but young
people who had seen what their parents
have gone through for decades said,
"We're tired of this You know, get
rid of it. Something new." And he came
into place and said, you know, I want us
to get rid of this peace meal. Not
overnight. We're not going to destroy
government. But he's phased away so many
elements of government rule like rent
control and what's happened to rents
over the last year. They've come down
down down down
by absence of government control and and
certain hygiene methods whatever else
ever else they imposed on the public and
on the economy and in other arenas as
well. And I know Trump has embraced this
guy, but Trump doesn't realize what this
guy really is because this guy is not
what Trump is. Trump is a a big defender
of the state as he's proven since he's
been elected. He uses government in
various ways,
sometimes the same ways that his
predecessors did, like wanting to do
certain things, therefore I'll make it
an order. We'll do it. Okay. Uh Javier
Malay was an interesting example of a
country of civilized people that had
gone into decay because of continued
growth of government. And he said
enough, let's get rid of it. And then
just recently there was a congressional
election not not of him but people in
you know supporting him the question was
would they win and continue to support
him they won even more in the offyear
election the people support him even
more because they like this hands in the
air we didn't know what he was going to
do we just know he was going to tear it
down so to speak now that's a micro
example and maybe it won't be replicated
but there are people like him in other
parts of the world and including South
America America. Uh, and it wouldn't
surprise me if this economic downturn
that I think we're going to see,
including the doubt that goes with it,
will lead in certain countries here,
there, maybe even here, who knows? Uh,
people saying, "Hey, you know, this
Democrat Republican thing just goes back
and forth and yet nothing really
changes. I get taxed.
My my lifestyle doesn't increase. My
income can't keep up with the ongoing
monetary degradation." And we know Trump
wants to degrade further because he
wants to print print. He wants money to
be free, you know, etc. So, it's not
going to change in that regard. And so,
maybe there's a point at which if
there's a motion
possibly help provoked by downturn in
the stock market or certain other things
that
hands in the air and so you end up with
outcomes you don't expect,
you can't anticipate.
Uh hands in the air type outcome. I
don't know. I just think there's enough
things going on out there right now that
could cause that type of wave effect
outside of the markets that people
aren't anticipating.
And it's not necessarily going to be
bad. You know, sometimes when things
don't work, you know, hands in the air
is a good idea. Start over again. You
know, we'll see. Uh so my analysis of
market suggests this this is what's
going on here. And we're not at the
tipping point in terms of causing that
pain to be egregious yet. It's getting
close,
but uh you know, I think the downturn in
the market will probably be that
provoking moment where you can say,
"Okay, there the clock just began."
We'll see.
>> Sometimes when we hear information like
this, it could be overwhelming. And you
know, before we sign off today, how
would you like to maybe end this on a
positive light? And are there any final
words, Michael, that you want to even
share with anyone that's watching?
>> No, I think, you know, reality is
reality, okay? And it changes sometimes.
Sometimes it changes dramatically
because things that have gone before
shouldn't have happened. And you know,
reality snaps back and it goes toward
usually changes like this are better.
You know, you reject something might
have been better than the thing before,
but still isn't working, you know. So,
man does progress. Okay? And so, uh, you
know, my book, Anarchco, New
Libertarianism, anarcho capitalism, you
can go to Amazon and buy it. Uh, that
that philosophically explains what I'm
talking about, but it doesn't deal with
the specifics of today. It's very broad.
Uh, but I'm seeing it in the technicals
and again, I don't allow those thoughts
to drive my analysis at all at MSA. In
fact, I don't talk about this except
with you, okay? I rarely ever talk about
this back issues. Uh but the the events
I see shaping up look like the kind of
events that could create many Argentinas
around the world where the old stuff
gets in extreme doubt
and it's not just market chaos, it's
emotional chaos and sense of what's the
right thing to do? What do we need to do
that's new?
you know, a new coming as they call, you
know, whatever.
Okay,
enough said.
>> Michael, I really want to take this last
little bit of time to really thank you.
Thank you for everything that you do,
not only even on this conversation that
we've had today, but how you choose to
show up in the world as a heart-based
leader. you you you truly are inspiring,
you know, a wealth of wisdom in the
financial world, a voice I trust, a
voice that I know people like the great
Eric Spratz trust. So, yeah, I would
like to just take this last little bit
of time to thank you for being here
today. And, uh, yeah, if there's any
final words, uh, now's your final
chance.
>> No, no, our site is oliversa.com.
Uh, if you want to subscribe, you tool
around on the site. We explain in fair
good depth on our site about our method.
You know, what's it all about? How is it
different? And if you want some sample
copies, uh you find my picture on the
site and I got my email address below.
Just hit it and or my son Brett, he's
there and request sample reports. Be
glad to send them. And I will totally
echo that because I find I get them
every week and it's educated me
tremendously and it's given me more and
more confidence to be in control of my
emotions. So, Michael, thank you for
popping that in too and uh again, thanks
for being here today. Always a pleasure
speaking with you.
>> Thank you, Ben.