Via SchiffGold.com,

Last week Peter joined Oliver Renick on his show, “Market on Close,” on the Schwab Network. They discuss gold’s stellar year in 2024 and where the metal is heading, and Peter also comments on the price of crude oil, treasury yields, and the Fed’s recent rate cut. 

Peter compares gold in 2024 to gold in 1979 but notes one key difference. In 1980, the Fed raised rates, putting a stop to gold’s rise. Rate hikes are highly unlikely after the Fed’s recent announcement:

“Gold is up almost 30% so far this year. Another all-time record high today, getting close to 2700 in the spot market. This is the best year that gold has had since 1979…

…A key difference between now and 1979? That was the end of the gold bull market. And in 1980, Paul Volcker raised interest rates up to 20%.

That’s what killed the bull and brought inflation down. But the current Fed is cutting rates. It’s going to cut rates more in 2025. So, gold is just getting started.”

A 50 basis point rate cut signals that either the Fed is scared of America’s economic future, or they believe we’re already in a recession:

“Well, the Fed is very desperate. I mean, normally they wait until there’s a problem before cutting rates.

They wait for a major stock market decline. They wait for a recession. But here, they’re cutting rates even before we’re officially in a recession and with the stock market at all-time record highs, with real estate prices at all-time record highs, and with the gold price at all-time record highs.

We’ve never had the Fed start cutting rates when gold was at an all-time record high. And in fact, the record high in gold proves that the Fed’s rate cut was a mistake.”

A lot of the data that supposedly portrays a healthy economy is corrupted by the pervasiveness of private and public debt. GDP growth is one example:

“The GDP is consumers spending borrowed money to buy more expensive groceries and stuff like that. The government spending borrowed money is a big part of that GDP. And we have a massive deficit that is a consequence of this fake GDP growth…

…We do not have a good economy. We don’t have a growing economy. We have inflation. And inflation creates the illusion of economic growth. But people are getting poorer, even though the numbers are going up again.”

For more Schiff insight and insight from the Austrian school of economics, watch a recent interview between Peter and Jason Burack, host of “Wall Street for Main Street.”