Question: Where is the price of petroleum going? Eric Sprott: Long term, up… I can see it hitting $200 or $300 or $400 a barrel. — Barron’s, Aug. 18, 2008 Eric Sprott runs the Sprott Offshore Fund, a fund that’s delivered sizzling returns of 32% per year since 2002. Certainly, timing is important, ...read more

The bell of American finance has cracked. It was a long time coming, as I’ll show you. The biggest change in the American economy in the last generation or so has been the rise of finance at the expense of making things. This seemed to work for a while, but ...read more

In a scene from Douglas Adams’ Life, the Universe and Everything, Arthur Dent and his alien friend Ford Prefect end up at a cricket match in modern-day England. A crowd of spectators is enjoying the game when a giant spaceship descends from the sky and hovers directly over the field. ...read more

Contrarian thinking is an important ingredient to investment success. Running against the crowd often produces investment success…but not always. The essence of a contrarian investment approach is, as author Humphrey Neill memorably put it, “When everyone thinks alike, everyone is likely to be wrong.” “Everyone” in Wall Street parlance usually means ...read more

“Gastown, Vancouver’s oldest neighborhood…founded on the shoulders of desperate alcoholics by an entrepreneurial bar owner.” — Anthony Bourdain, No Reservations It might be too much to say Vancouver got its start with a bunch of alcoholics, but there’s no denying that Jack Deighton, or ‘Gassy Jack,’ as he was known, had a ...read more

“Taking the long view, we are running out of dirt.” — David R. Montgomery, geologist Over the summer, Iran bought a large amount — more than ONE million tons — of wheat from the U.S. That’s something we’ve not seen in 27 summers. In Iran’s case, a tough drought cut the wheat harvest ...read more

Frank Holmes is the CEO of U.S. Global Investors, a money management firm honed in on the commodity bull market. I had dinner with him recently at the Blue Water Cafe in Vancouver. Over salmon and flying squid, as well as an excellent local ale, we again hashed out the ...read more

Every morning, I descend on my bevy of newspapers, which I cheerfully digest over a hot mug of tea. This week, the headlines of all the newspapers carry the same story: The U.S. government’s takeover of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Does this really promise big change in the ...read more

While in Vienna last month, I grabbed hold of the international edition of The Wall Street Journal. Over a classic Viennese breakfast of coffee, a boiled egg and pastry, I stumbled across an interview with Ted Forstmann, titled, “The Credit Crisis Is Going to Get Worse.” I hadn’t seen Forstmann’s name ...read more

Zanzibar, Dar es Salaam, Mombasa, Mogadishu, Mumbai, Mangalore…all trading cities along the fabled rim of the Indian Ocean. These eastern African cities thrived between the 12th and 18th centuries, with ships sailing in and out on monsoon winds. They will thrive again on the tailwind of a long-term bull market ...read more