Energy with-out Oil Weblog

This few weekends ago there was a convention called the Wealth Forum at the Palais de Congress in Montreal. There were a few highlights, as far as I was concerned, the most notable was the fact that Kitco.com is headquartered in Montreal and sells gold to the public in some very useful sizes. they have a credit card that has a small metal bar attached in a number of sizes, 1, 5, 10 and 25 g cards are all available as gift ideas or investment pieces. They sell just over spot with a small commission of (I believe) 1.50 for the sale. I am sure they are making something from their stores of gold at previous lower prices, but this is a good deal for the retail purchaser of gold in quantities anyone can afford. The one gram size was quoted as about 35.00 to purchase. You can give me something like that any time for any occasion….

www.kitco.com

They even have accounts where you can hold physical gold in their vaults for investment and savings purposes. Being from right around the area, this is a wonderful resource for putting away the pennies for a brighter future.

Another very interesting find was a Geothermal play on the TSX Venture board, SRA - Sierra Geothermal Power Corp. I listened to the presentation by the President and CEO, Gary R. Thompson, they seem to be quite well versed in the Geothermal Geology and have situated themselves in the highly active Nevada region. They are drilling very deep through the mantle of the earth to use the Geothermal potential to create electricity for California where the demand is huge and growing. They have two proven wells dug, but are still in the pre-production phase, so if it goes, the potential is huge. The problem is that it is still early exploratory with nothing scheduled to go on-line until 2009, and of course as with anything else, one has to expect unforeseen delays.

Since it is pretty much exploratory, it can disappear just as easily off the face of the earth. But as a focus on energy without oil, this is a pretty pure play that will eliminate coal fired electrical plants in a very green way. For that very concept, I will consider putting some patient money down and see what happens in the next five years. You can bet I will track it as a something to watch in my watchlists, even if it isn’t on anyone else’s radar for a while.

The final interesting possibility is a gold play on the TSX Venture coming out of Australia - Queensland Minerals Ltd - CA.QML. I don’t claim to be a good investor, and purchase things on gut feelings most of the time. I loved Australia, and this was just a great way to reminisce about the two visits I have had there, and the wonderful things they have.

But the most important things I heard over the series of seminars was from a banker from Belize who made a fewe comments that seem important for Nort American’s to hear. He said that the US dollar is strict fiat money, there is nothing backing it but the good will of the US, and since that country is now the largest debtor country (thanks in the greatest part to Bush and Cheney and a;ll their oil pig cronies), we are pretty much watching the demise of a superpower. Robert Kiyasaki and most of the Rich Dad-Poor Dad people I have seen in the past few years backed that up. They, as well as Warren Buffet are all heavily into gold and silver as a play at protecting the integrity of their investment power. ForRich Dad’s predictions for 2008, go to the site for the predictions by his advisors.

The banker made a much more illuminating comment though, he said move your money to Euros, the Euro is backed about 17% by gold right now, so it is firmly on a gold standard and he mentioned that by 2010, the Euro will be backed by about 25%. In 2007, the Euro gained 27% against the dollar, and I am willing to bet that it will not do too shabby against the dollar again this year.

Time to get pretty defensive if you are forced to deal with the US dollar as your currency. Even the lowly Canadian Looney has risen dramatically against it. Better buy gold while you are able to, before the government decides that it made a miustake by allowing US citizens to own gold. You are going to need it to barter with when the greenback is worth a wheel barrow full for a loaf of bread. When they do repeal the right to own gold form the citizens, I bet they forget to return the dollar to a gold backed currency, until they do that, the world is in for a seriouly bumpy ride.