Now We Can Finally Start Buying The Gold Miners

"...But the bottom, says Rule, has finally arrived. In a long interview just released by Kitco, he sounds unreservedly bullish. Some excerpts:

Given the enormous size of the US treasury market and the small size of the gold market, a small transfer of funds from Treasuries to gold — which we are seeing in the last three months — has an outsized impact on the gold market. Gold and gold equities currently occupy between 1/4 and 1/3 of 1% of the savings and investment matrix in the US, while the comparable number in 1980 was 8.

What I am arguing for is a total or partial reversion to the mean which if it occurred would take gold as a part of the savings and investment matrix from 1/4 or 1/3 of 1% up to as high as 1.5%. That relatively small gain in market share would have an absolutely dramatic impact on gold and gold stocks. Will it occur immediately? No. Might gold retest support before it continues? Yes. But I believe that we are beginning to witness a little tiny bit of disintermediation out of Treasuries in favor of gold, and I think that is extremely bullish.

Another thing to remember is that the certificated gold products, the ETFs, GLD in particular, have witnessed dishoarding. That is they have witnessed really substantial selling for 18 months. But lately there has been an absolutely incredible influx of cash into GLD. The consequence of that is that GLD has to take on gold or has to take on gold depository receipts.

Remember that for the last six or seven years the paper market has driven the physicals market and the paper market itself has been driven by the ETFs. ETF demand is positive now rather than negative, so the ETFs are stocking rather than destocking gold. I am inclined to believe that the paper markets will now take gold up the same way the paper markets took gold up in 2009 and 2010 rather than taking gold markets down.

The gold mining industry had a very close brush with capital inadequacy and the increase in demand for gold equities is going to be met by an absolute rush of bought deals among the seniors and intermediates. I think the offer that you saw the other day of Franco Nevada is indicative of what you are going to see. [So] no hurry on the big and intermediate miners. Longer term (a year or year and a half), gold miners at all levels I think will be relatively attractive.

I expect the mining industry to avoid making disastrous mistakes for at least two or three years. The consequence of an increasing gold price and increasing free cash flow per share that is not wasted for two or three years should be an increased cash flow on a per share basis. I suspect that an increasing gold price and increasing corporate performance will have a very good impact on gold equities.

Remember that when gold moves, the first thing that moves is gold itself. Listeners underinvested in gold need to address that and begin to buy.

The second place that you go is, of course, the high-quality senior producers with balance sheet flexibility that can generate free cash and growing revenues. It is important that you do not buy the waterfront; that instead you buy the best issuers. I would draw your attention to names like Franco Nevada, Goldcorp, Randgold; companies that have a history of operational efficiency, capital discipline, good balance sheets, and relatively low costs. One then can apply the same discipline in the intermediate size producers which generally come up after the big producers.

Of course, the most spectacular moves are always going to be in the speculative stocks. I suspect that we will not see a move, a real move, in the speculative stocks for as much as nine months. Of course, extra caution is required buying the speculative names. But for those listeners who have been in the game as long as some of your listeners have, who have paid the tuition, who pay attention to the numbers with regards to the juniors rather than the narratives, I think this will be a spectacular market. It is really important to understand the depth and severity of the bear market and what that means for the bull market.

In the juniors, measured by the TSXV [Toronto Venture Exchange], is a market that fell by half and then it fell by half again and then it fell by half again. This is a market that is down by 90% in real terms which means it is precisely arithmetically 90% more attractive than it was in 2011. This is a market that can double and make up as a consequence of doubling 15% of the decline that it suffered. This is a market that has a long, long way run if you select your stock correctly."

at  http://dollarcollapse.com/precious-metals/now-we-can-finally-start-buying-the-gold-miners/