I made a bad call on gold on August 12th

 Over a month ago, in my August 12, 2024 post, I said it was a good time to take profits in gold, for anyone who had bought some when it was below $2,000 per ounce (troy ounce) a couple of years ago, or if you were really smart and bought in late 2018 when gold was under $1,300 per ounce.  Gold was just over $2,500 when I made that call, August 12th, now it's around $2,620 per ounce. 

Disclaimer 

I still believe there will be a sizable drop in the price of gold once this recession really becomes apparent.  But I missed the peak.  I thought gold may drift up to maybe $2,550, then we'd see a drop before too long.  I do still believe in this basic scenario.  I believe we are in recession, and that it will become visible to everybody very soon.  I think we've been in a recession since about October or November of 2023.  Official recessions are never called while they are happening, the official designation happens many months, perhaps years, after a recession ends.  

Now, I doubt any of the 12 or 15 people who read that gold post actually acted on it.  If I had sold gold at $2,500 myself, having bought it at $1,285 to $1,950 an ounce, I wouldn't be worried at all.  That's a healthy profit, and I believe we will see gold well below $2,500 per ounce again, in late 2024, or the first few months of 2025.  But my call missed the peak, and gold may drift even higher before the drop I believe we will see.  

Again, anyone holding gold for the very long term, I said in that post not to sell.  Holding some gold over many years or decades is a smart move, overall.  

Again, you never lose money by taking profits, which was my call in gold on August 12th.  But, I misjudged the peak, and it may surge higher as we head into the readily visible stage of a recession.  I believe this will be a major recession, I've been writing about a coming great depression for over 4 years now, and I still believe that will be the case.  I still believe that the craziest days of this economic cycle are still to come, and there are many major issues, like widespread commercial real estate values, and historic levels of debt throughout society, still have to be worked out.  

Thoughts on Apple, Facebook, and three metaverses

 I think right now is a really good time to sell a couple of stocks, and a good time to buy some cryptos.  

Disclaimer

These are all calls looking several months out, 4 to 18 months from today (8/30/2024).  I think we are on the verge of a major stock crash, likely to happen in September, maybe October 2024.  I think we are already in a recession, and will see the major stock indices drop 30-45% in the next 6 to 8 months.  Five of the Magnificent 7 stocks (Apple, Amazon, Google (Alphabet), Facebook (Meta), Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla) are now down roughly 10% to 50% from their all time highs.  These two, Apple and Meta (Facebook) are still hanging in there, just off their highs.  For now.  Since I see a major downturn coming, I think it's a really good time to sell these:

Apple- $ 229.00

Facebook (Meta)- $ 521.31

(with today's prices, as I'm writing this post)

I think these stocks will hit the long term bottoms in the next 4 to 8 months.  The recession will lead to another major bailout, probably after the election, which will pump new money back into the economy.  That influx will start stocks rising again, my guess is sometime between December 2024 and April 2025.  When these stocks bottom out, several months from now, it will be a good time to buy them for the long term again.

With crypto part way into Crypto Spring, but stalled by the recession and economic slowness, the crypto coins for three metaverses have dropped to ridiculously low prices.  I'm looking at these as a something to buy now and be willing hold for at least 9 to 18 months.  Once new money gets injected back into the economy (after the inevitable bailout caused by the recession/economic crisis) Bitcoin will eventually start rising again.  When that happens, when Bitcoin moves above $75,000 per BTC, and keeps going, it will be time to start keeping an eye on these cryptos.  I think APE, SAND, and MANA can easily go 10X from these current prices, maybe higher.  It would be smart to take some profits around the 3X to 5X point on these.  If you know how it safely buy and hold cryptos, I think it's a great time to buy these three cryptos:

Apecoin (APE)- $ .64  (64 cents per token)

Decentraland (MANA)- $ .27 (27 cents per token)

Sandbox (SAND) - $ .25 (25 cents per token)

I also think it's a good time to pick up Solana.  It's had a good run, but with its popularity for NFT's (which will also come back in a big way, when the big money starts sloshing around the system), but I think Solana could kind of turn into a "new Ethereum," and could double, and maybe even run up to $1,000 or more, before this next crypto bull run ends.  

Solana (SOL) - $ 137.92

These are just my thoughts.  Always do your own research and due diligence before making any investment decisions, and contact any professionals needed.  Read the Disclaimer linked above.  

It's a good time to sell physical gold or take some profits

 In my opinion, the next few days, maybe the next 2 or 3 weeks, is a good time to sell physical gold or take profits.  

Disclaimer

The Big Picture right now is that we seem to be sliding into the visible part of a recession that probably started in October or November of 2023.  Remember, especially you Millennials and Gen Z people, recessions are officially called months or years after they happen.   

Here's where we are now.  The stock markets appear to have peaked around July 11th or so.  That could be a short correction, but it's looking pretty serious so far, in the context of everything else going on.  The unemployment rate is beginning to tick up.  The official inflation measurements have been heading sideways or slightly down.  Several different major businesses, from fast food to retailers to drug stores, have announced their customers are running out of money, and are seriously looking for deals on nearly everything, even food.  The Fed (Federal Reserve) was even hinting that they might lower lower interest rates at the recent FOMC meeting in late July.  Those and many other things signal a recession is imminent.  By imminent, I mean that we've been in a recession for months, and the powers at be will have to acknowledge it soon, it will become visible to everyone, the "Oh shit!  We're in a recession" moment. 

When we head into a recession, officially, and The Fed lowers interest rates, the stock market generally heads down, and the price of gold usually goes with it, for a while.  I think that's about where we are now, as the gold price topped $2,500 today.  I think gold is having a last hurrah before the shit storm really hits.  

Now, if you buy gold to hold it forever, which is a very smart thing to do, then don't sell it.  But let's say you had the urge to buy gold back in late 2018, when it dropped down to around $1,200- $1,250 per ounce.  Let's say you bought two ounces then.  The price has basically doubled, maybe a bit less after the premium you paid over spot price.  If you sell one of those two ounces, then you got your money back.  The remaining ounce of gold has been paid for.  In effect, it's free, you have nothing in it.  You can sell half of your gold, and put that money into some other investment.  

If you missed the 2018 drop, like most people, but bought gold a couple of years ago, when it around $1950 an ounce, you're up around $500 per ounce, roughly 25%.  You can sell a bit of it, get some of your money out, and invest that money in something else.  This reduces the amount per ounce that you have in the remaining gold, and frees up some money for another investment.  

My thinking is that gold may go up a bit more, to maybe $2,550 per ounce or so, MAYBE.  But we'll see more economic crises happen soon, and the recession should become completely obvious, in September or October 2024.  When that happens, stock will drop a lot, and gold will head back down for a while, too.  In addition, we will likely see a bit of deflation, actual falling prices on many items, in late 2024, or early 2025.  This is another reason the price should drop.  At that point, it will again be a pretty good time to buy gold (and quality stocks), when they hit bottom.  All of this DOES NOT apply to silver, which seems to be on its own track right now, and is off its highs.  

Again, these are my personal opinions.  Do your own research, due diligence, and consult any professionals needed before making any investment decisions.  Also, read my Disclaimer, linked above.  

Apecoin- Yuga Labs/Bored Ape Yacht Club's crypto

Here's the longest podcast/interview with two of the Board Ape Yacht Club founders, Gargamel and Gordon Goner, on Full Send podcast.  This is nearly an hour and a half long, and the best interview I've seen with these guys, though it's a year old right now.  

   

Disclaimer 

Starting with the launch of Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT's in the spring of 2021, they put out other NFT series, bought Crypto Punks and Meebits, and then created the Otherside gaming and NFT metaverse.  The Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT's were launched in April of 2021, and, according to Google, Yuga Labs, now just over three years old, has a $ 4 billion market cap.  Apecoin is the crypto coin they created as a currency inside the Bored Ape/Otherside ecosystem.  Unlike a LOT of cryptos out there, the crew at Yuga has been actually building and creating a whole variety of projects, a solid ecosystem, and are actually focused on building a real community, and not just saying that like many crypto projects just looking to get rich quick.  Do your own research to find out more about Apecoin, Bored Ape Yacht Club, and Yuga Labs.  

My first investment idea here on White Bear Investment Ideas blog is to buy Apecoin.  

Apecoin is the Yuga Labs crypto for Bored Ape Yacht Club and Otherside.  As I'm writing this, Apecoin costs 61 cents per unit.  You can buy it on crypto exchanges, like any other crypto.  Always use safe practices when buying crypto, and there will be a gas fee charged as well, so keep that in mind.  After buying any crypto, you'll want to transfer it to a hard wallet for safety.  If you don't know how to do that, get online and learn how to buy crypto safely, should you choose to buy some.  

Apecoin on Coinbase (price chart)  

Why I like Apecoin:  I liked Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT's, just for the pictures of the apes.  I was just starting to learn about crypto and NFT's in the fall of 2021, and the Bored Ape NFT's had gone up from a $200 mint price to a floor price of around $25,000 to $30,000 per Ape NFT.  The highest price paid for a Bored Ape NFT is $3,408,000.  Unlike most NFT's, anyone who buys a Bored Ape NFT also owns the Intellectual Property for that APE, and a number of people have done all kinds of projects using their Bored Apes.  

The time frame:  I think Apecoin will hit $6-$7 or higher by mid to late 2025, or maybe early 2026.  This is a buy now, forget about it, and hold for a year or more investment idea.  

Where I see Apecoin going:  My general outlook is that, right now, in early August 2024, is that we are heading into a major recession.  I see stocks heading down through most of the second half of 2024, and crypto may drop a bit more, too.  But I think crypto, overall, is pretty bottomed out already.  Bitcoin was at $54K yesterday, and has bounced back up to around $62,000 today.  

With the recession, interest rates will start going down over the next year, as will inflation.  The banking system/economy will hit a serious crisis point, and the major bailouts will start.  At some point, The Fed will start buying assets like U.S. treasuries again, and will work to createand pump new money into the system again.  The Fed will do this in attempts to get the slowing economy going again.  Once that happens, money will flow into stocks again (early to mid 2025?) and then into crypto.  When the money supply starts growing again, a bunch of money will flow into Bitcoin, and this current crypto bull market will head up again.  

After BTC, Eth, and the major cryptos start heading up again, flippers and investors will start going deeper into crypto alt coins/shit coins, and a whole bunch of alt coins will start shooting up in price.  Apecoin, backed by all the actual products Yuga Labs has created, and is creating, will shoot up.  

Apecoin peaked at about $27.90 per coin shortly after the mint.  Then it dropped and hovered from about $4 to $7 per coin through much of 2022.  My outlook is that Apecoin should easily pop up to $6 to $7 per coin in the later part of this crypto bull cycle.  So that's 10X to 12X rise from today's price.  I wouldn't be surprised to see Apecoin pop to $15 to $20 or more in late 2025 or 2026.  But I think $6 to $7 per coin is a completely reasonable price once money flows into the economy, and crypto, again.  

So that's my first investment idea on this blog.  As always, do your own research and due diligence, and contact anyone professionals needed before making investment decisions.  Read the Disclaimer, linked above.

I do not own any Apecoin at this point, mostly because I'm homeless, and can't even open a crypto account for the time being.  I do not have any personal or business connection with Yuga Labs, Bored Ape Yacht Club, or any of the people involved with these projects.  

There are no paid links in this post.