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I've been quite happy with the very dark, pro-Gold, anti-stock, advisors I've been following for the last three years, such as James Dines, Elliott Wave and bits and pieces such as Sornette's analysis above.

As I've explained repeatedly (in other threads), gold is a very bad investment unless you subscribe to the dotcom theory of economics. The total cost of production for the average ounce of gold is $190 give or take $10. And that number is expected to fall, possibly as low as $150 for reasons that are beyond scope here relating to some excellent new resource models. Due to improvements in gold extraction and discovery, the production of gold has been very flexible for at least a couple decades now. At $300/oz, the mining companies could easily increase production ten-fold and still be profitable. In other words, it has become a purely commodity market that doesn't act like a commodity because people still act like gold has inherently inflexible production, which was true for most of its history but isn't true now due to the state of gold mining technology.

Some day sooner than later, the price of gold will collapse from its currently absurd price to a level reflecting a genuine commodity market. When that happens, a lot of people banking on gold will be very unhappy and the gold mining companies won't be remotely as profitable.

For those really interested in metals, I suggest avoiding metals that have flexible commodity production capability, which includes both gold and silver. In this sense, gold and silver should be treated the same as copper or iron production. All metals of this resource type are subject to a slow but steady decrease in value with the current state of mining and extraction technology, even ones that were formerly "rare" and "precious".

If I was going to stock up on physical storage implements of dense value, I usually suggest platinum. It has much more value industrially than gold or silver, has high value density (dollars/oz), the production is still relatively inflexible, and the market price reflects the actual commodity cost of production. Platinum will likely retain its value very well for economically sound reasons.

I agree on gold, I always wince when I hear the endless hawking of gold on talk radio show commercials. I think we are on the cusp of some good opportunities in the market, and I'm waiting for a good chance to jump back in. Of course, it would be nice for some more recovery on my existing portfolio (semiconductors, ouch!), but its doubled since the start of the year, and its poised to gain some more.

That being said, I am going to look for a good finance guy to work with to get my money working for me.