One of the best investments of your time you will ever make.

I couldnt agree more.

If you have never watched the Crash Course series of videos, I highly recommend that you do. The creator of the Crash Course is a gentleman named Chris Martenson who is a former international Fortune 300 executive, holds a PHD specializing in neurotoxicology from Duke, and an MBA from Cornell. He is a friend of mine and an outstanding researcher and analyst. He has taken what was for me over 7,000 hours of personal study on economics, geopolitics, monetary policy, energy, and history and condensed it into a series of short, extremely easy to watch and understand videos.

Where Chris truly stands out is in his ability to take vast quantities of data and complex subjects, and explain them in a way that a 10 year old can understand.

Taking the time to watch these videos, and eventually study them to truly absorb the concepts may be one of the most valuable investments you ever make in your lifetime.

Click on the pic below to get started, you will be glad you did.

The Crash Course Video

If you would like to speak directly with Duncan during this conference, please contact AFE.

About the Shorex Wealth Management Forum:

http://www.shorexsingapore.com/

For the fourth time, the world’s leading Shorex wealth management forum is coming to Singapore to address the growing need of the Asian market for private banking, asset management and international tax planning solutions and services. The event is an exhibition and conference offering a unique platform where professionals can network to explore new services, products and ideas in wealth management.

Last year, the Shorex Wealth Management Forum attracted 30 exhibitors and sponsors and 1294 participants from Singapore, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Korea, Taiwan, the Emirates and China. After 10 years of success in Geneva as the most credible European platform for professionals advising HNWIs, Shorex is holding for the fourth year its sister forum in Singapore, the undisputed centre of wealth management excellence in Asia. The event mainly focuses on professional advisors to HNWIs, institutional investors but also welcomes ultra net worth qualified investors invited by our private banking partners. The event is expected in 2012 to attract over 50 exhibitors and 1400 delegates.

International Convention & Exhibition Centre
1 Raffles Boulevard, Suntec City,
Singapore 039593
DATES: Tuesday 22nd & Wednesday 23rd May 2012, VENUE: Suntec Singapore – Level 2 – Ballroom 2 & 3

The April 2012 issue #39 of the AFE Global Insider is now available for download free of charge.

In this edition, AFE’s Director of Treasury Simon Heapes addresses the many instances of what we fondly refer to as “leprechan gold deals” that are often circulated through the internet. Simon reveals how many are suckered into these scams, how to identify them, and how to avoid them. I cover current geo-political “Gold Drivers” and we take a hard look at the current environment as well as the factors which will cause gold to rise or fall over the long term.

You can download the AFE Global Insider #39 here free of charge. Please enjoy with our compliments.

I must admit that AFE’s Duncan Cameron has truly outdone himself in this edition.

On the very first page of his report this month I was rocked by the sheer force of only a few paragraphs in terms of the understanding of what exactly is happening in our economy today and why it is so important to protect ourselves in this financial environment.

For anyone who wants to understand one of the primary reasons why gold is so favorable as a store of wealth, one needs simply read this edition of the GI where Duncan explains over a detailed 13 page report the history of the debasement of currency going back as far as 2600 years and compares it to where we are today.

If ever you wanted to show someone why their paper money is buying less gas, less food, less electricity, less of everything every single year, they need only read this article.

I highly recommend it, and recommend even sending it to your friends and loved ones.

Please enjoy this March edition of the AFE Global Insider with our compliments.

You can download Edition #38 of the AFE Global Insider here

Since our last newsletter our view on the direction gold and silver would go has been borne out. As predicted, earlier this week gold was trading in the $1790 per ounce range, with silver as high as 37.58. This was clearly too frothy, and during the morning hours of Wednesday Feb. 29th gold was hammered down a staggering $80+ per ounce and silver dropped close to $3. Today we have seen gold recover to $1720.90 and silver is back up to $35.09.

Even with this healthy pullback, the fundamentals in the markets have not changed. QE (money printing) on a gargantuan scale continues to be the rule of the day from Central Banks, which guarantees that the value and buying power of paper money will continue to drop, and the price of real things such as food, fuel, and gold will continue to ris throughout 2012.

There has been no solution to the debt problems of western nations aside from printing more money (also known as issuing more debt). This is clearly not a solution, as any thinking person can determine that you cant fix being in too much debt by going deeper into debt.

The result is a gradual erosion of buying power. If cash is making up a large part of a portfolio, it might be prudent to consider that a significant portion of the buying power represented is dwindling away at a constant rate. The only form of money that has proven to negate this effect and actually provide added buying power for the last 12 years is gold (and silver).

In this issue of the Global Insider, Duncan Cameron covers a wide range of issues from sovereign debt to short term technicals. AFE Treasury Director Simon Heapes also provides some astonishing insight into the work ethic, savings, and investment cycles.

You can download Global Insider Issue #37 here

Please enjoy with our compliments,

Alex Stanczyk
Anglo Far-East Bullion Co.

Alex Stanczyk will be speaking at THE 5th ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON ANALYSIS OF INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL MARKETS

Attendees for this meeting will be ministry level government officials, directors or senior managers from Chinese banks, investment companies and state-owned enterprises.

This is event is by invitation only (P.R.C.)

China’s Policy Choices and Overseas Investment Strategies under Threat of New Global Recession
批准单位 国务院发展研究中心
Authorized by Development Research Center of the State Council, PRC
主办单位 国务院发展研究中心金融研究所
Organized by Financial Research Institute of the Development Research Center
State Council, P. R. China
时间地点 2012年1月7-8日 北京国宾酒店
Date and Place Jan.7-8, 2012，Presidential Beijing hotel，China
会议语言： 中文/英文
Language： Chinese/English

We are currently seeing a deep correction in the gold price since recent highs this fall. This correction comes as the Eurozone’s credit crisis deepens and capital flees the Euro thereby pushing up the USD.

The strength of the USD gain over the short term has been a powerful driver forcing most commodities downward.

Copper        -20.15% YOY
Cocoa         -28.71% YOY
Cotton      -43% YOY
Lumber      -21.35% YOY
Soybeans      -12.53% YOY
Sugar         -29.8% YOY
Wheat         -20.55% YOY
Natural Gas      -24.17% YOY

One of the few gainers in the commodity space is oil, at +15.33% YOY for Brent Crude.

Globally, major stock markets have also been hit hard this year.

USA S&P 500     -8%
UK FTSE        -13%
France CAC 40    -25%
Germany DAX 30    -21%
Switzerland SMI    -15%
Sweden OMX    -22%
Japan NIKKEI225    -19%
Australia ASX    -15%
Hong Kong     -22%

Gold is one of the few assets this year that is up YOY with current gains of 15.56%.

The current push of the USD upwards to over 80.10 cannot be sustained as the US requires a weaker dollar to stimulate GDP growth through exports. This portends more Quantitative Easing (printing money).

Combine this with the current massive round of QE (Printing) in Europe, and we have the foundation for higher prices of commodities globally over time.

In this edition of our Global Insider, Duncan Cameron and I provide a firsthand view of what is happening in the Chinese gold market as we report from the 6th Annual China Gold and Precious Metals Summit.

From my experience at this conference, the appetite for gold among Chinese investors is just getting started. With China gobbling up close to 750 tons of gold this year, it is proving to be a source of demand that has exceeded annual Gold ETF investment globally. Personal conversations with Chinese Government Officials indicate that the policy direction will be away from real estate and equities, and the Chinese people will be encouraged to buy long-term wealth-preserving assets. This means gold, among other possibilities.

Please enjoy this month’s Global Insider with our compliments, and our wishes for a Merry Christmas and New Year.

You can download this months edition of the AFE Global Insider here: http://www.anglofareast.com/downloads/global-insider/afe_december_2011.pdf

Duncan Cameron and myself are in China for the 6th Annual Gold and Precious Metals summit where I will be speaking, and then attending meetings with Chinese Government Officials and heads of Chinese Fund Management companies.

The view from China is one of dis-belief, that it is possible the governments of the western world have allowed themselves to get into such an incredible financial mess. On the one hand, China wants the west to succeed because China’s massive export sector relies upon both Europe and the US to have strong economies and lots of happy consumers to buy Chinese goods. On the other hand, highly placed members of the Chinese government are fully aware that depending on the west may be a fools errand and are actively taking steps to become less dependent on exports and further develop the domestic economy.

It is refreshing to see that instead of un-realistically assuming that a never ending series of budget deficits will somehow pay for retirees for ever, they are taking a very practical approach and advocating their citizens invest in long term wealth protection to provide for citizens future retirement. This is critical to the social stability of what is emerging as the new super-power of the world. There is perhaps the highest level of acute attention to this here in China as anywhere else in the world. The last thing China wants is after 20 years of incredible progress, to have it come unwound because of pie in the sky expectations that stock markets or ponzi scheme government retirement plans will prevent social unrest if these systems fail. The Chinese have seen how the western financial models ends up, and they don’t want to copy them.

In this edition of the AFE Global Insider, Duncan does an excellent job of assessing the Geo-political spectrum. He covers the topics of MF Global, Golds performance versus other currencies, his view on the Sydney Gold Symposium which includes an interesting entry on the “Moses Principle”, as well as the evolving situation in the Eurozone.

You can download the latest GI from this link: http://www.anglofareast.com/downloads/global-insider/afe_november_2011.pdf