Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

NFT… arrrRH

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Dear Slope people, this is a different post than my usual. If Tim decides it is worth posting please take it in the spirit intended, which is the spirit of despising bubbles and especially bubbles that are so transparent and promoted at the hands of the media/celebrity complex. –Gary

Response from Tim: Nah, Gary, I’m delighted you did this post. I think the NFT thing is insane too, with one obvious exception.

NOTES FROM THE rabbit hole…NFTrh

The NFT part is all that matters. Not the words “notes from the”, implying information delivered from somewhere. Not “rabbit hole”, implying that somewhere is a pretty different, even weird place.

You see, with my antiquated notions of sound market management, which includes investment and/or speculation in real assets, including real monetary value (gold), equities of real companies doing real things and the commodities consumed during real… okay, manufactured economic growth, it is really pretty odd that I am now seen, because of 3 stupid letters, by some as part of the newest craze in the financial markets, the Non Fungible Tokens craze.

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Gold: a Thing of Beauty

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Gold calmly continues cobbling its Handle, Miners lay in wait

You see, there is all this noise out there. It comes mostly from inflationists touting gold in the same breath as copper, as oil, and as commodities of all flavors (and aside from gold and to a degree, silver, those flavors are cyclical).

But you also see, gold is counter-cyclical in its best suit. You see on this monthly chart that gold has been forming its Handle to the bullish Cup ever since the inflation trades came to the fore in the summer of 2020. Therefore, you see that those touting gold and inflation together have been wrong for over a year now (and counting).

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It’s Not Just Copper

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Copper makes the headlines, but GYX has been bullish all along; gold awaits its time as the message from metals land is bullish, risk ‘on’ and cyclical

While copper went through its correction we have been noting each week in NFTRH that the Industrial Metals index, GYX had never aborted its bullish stance. Trends remained up and the index price held the SMA 50’s intermediate trend all the while copper (CPER, which I hold, in lower panel) worked through its summer correction.

The Industrial Metals are a primary indicator of cyclical inflation and by extension, economic reflation.

industrial metals/copper
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Coal Gaining Headlines

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Stagflation, Coal style

My definition of Stagflation is ‘inflation that works to impair the economy’ (as opposed to appearing as a benefit as it does early on) and the problem is gaining momentum in India (and China).

China isn’t the only huge Asian economy with a coal shortage now

I usually make fun of MSM sources like CNBC (MarketWatch, etc.) with their dumb, herd scattering, eyeball harvesting headlines. But this stuff is real. Per this post on my coal holding BTU…

“I know as much about coal for energy and steel making as I do about nuclear thermal propulsion. That is, basically nothing.”

Well, now I know more. Every once in a while men who stare at charts…

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Trade/Invest Macro Guide

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Below is an excerpt from an NFTRH report (#676, due out on 10.10) that has not even been written yet, outside of this opening segment that clarifies and makes some of the concepts NFTRH deals in more standard and hence, more readily understandable by more people.

Unless you are a pure day trader there should always be a reason for a given investment stance at any given time. That is because the MACRO (top-down global economic/financial backdrop) is the environment within which the micro (trades, investments) exists. At any given macro juncture there are (generally speaking) dos and don’ts with respect to micro trades and investments. From the October 10th edition of Notes From the Rabbit Hole…

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