Down the road at the Wanderers this week they pitched a tent over the cricket pitch on which today’s test match has begun. Heaters inside the tent were being employed to convince the grass that it was still summertime and not just 6 weeks to midwinter. The groundsman promised a “result pitch”. Seeing how many wickets have fallen already, he was dead right and the scepticism that many of us have had about cricket in May seems justified. It’s cold and it gets dark so early that there’s no time to have a beer before the game ends.
Artificial heat has not, however, been necessary to keep the bulls all pumped up and rampaging through the markets. The letters that make up the words “all-time high” are getting quite worn out on key boards. And the thesaurus is running out of similes for soaring and breakout. Some astonishing volumes have been going through the markets and it is clear that greed has out-gunned fear and that prices are out-pacing earnings. All very satisfactory, but it becomes ever more important to keep vigilant and watch for individual holdings that could be getting significantly overweight.
Goldmine quarterly reports began appearing this week and despite the gold price going ever higher, very few companies have managed to report a profit, yet the gold mining index is up 25% in the past 2 months. Mystifying. That’s why I prefer to ride this bull run aboard the NewGold ETF; I don’t need to worry about whether anyone’s hedge book is making or losing money. And if it all does go bear-shaped I can (supposedly) ask for the certificates to be exchanged for actual ingots of the yellow stuff. Pop a few of those in the pocket and run?
It’s not that I have a particularly apocalyptic view of the future, but for some time now an enthusiastic young man at the traffic light has been pressing me to take a leaflet that invites me to learn to speak Spanish. While I would have thought that the second language of the future was probably Chinese, perhaps the idea of a bolt hole in Central or South America has some appeal. Europe itself is awfully close to too much enriched uranium in the hands of intellectually impoverished dictators on both sides of the pond. The Pacific Islands were racked by another huge earthquake this week and as a keen surf fisherman, the prospect of facing a tsunami while reeling in supper is not enticing.
It has gone rather quiet on the interest rate front. The UK and Europe kept theirs unchanged and local talk seems to be generally agreed that there’s not any need to tamper with our repo rate at this stage either. Cars and houses are selling like hot boerie rolls. And while some retailers are making the obligatory warning noises, no signs of actual penury are evident. `Business Day this morning submerged readers with an enormous ultra-glossy magazine that insisted that in order to keep up with the man who runs the monopoly that we are obliged to support, I must have a platinum and gold bangle. And a R22 000 lampshade.
With the prospect of power cuts looming in this early-starting winter I think that woolly blankets and paraffin lamps are more my style while we listen to the rugby and the GP on the windup radio.
Have a fine weekend.
James Greener
5th May 2006
