“Just put it in your pants and walk across the border.”
“What? No,” I said.
“It’s not that big of a deal. You’re not going to get caught. Just put it in your pants, and just walk across the border. You’re American. They won’t give you a hard time.”
He was probably right, but I didn’t want to take the chance. I held my ground, “No, man, I’m not going to do that. It’s just too risky.”
He answered right away, “There is no other option. Unless you have a better idea, that is how it has to go.”
“Look,” I said, “First of all, I don’t want to put anything in my pants. Second, there are metal detectors at the border, so I can’t just walk through the detector with a bunch of gold in my pants.”
There was a long pause… he finally said, “Yeah, that’s true, but you’re American. You don’t understand what that means. They’re not going to give you a hard time.”
I replied, “Yeah, you might be right. But, I just don’t want to take the chance. It’s not worth it.”
“You will double your money. Guaranteed.”
I looked at him, “That may be true. But I’m out.”
–
That was about a year ago. I can only assume that it has gotten worse.
I’m talking about Venezuela. There is a serious crisis going on there, if you haven’t been paying attention.
These two guys are major [four-letter-words]:
Source: BBC
They’ve wrecked the economy of Venezuela beyond belief.
Everything from toilet paper shortages to food shortages.
In fact, in the past year, 74% of Venezuelans have lost over 16 pounds in weight.
And inflation is absolutely out of control.
To put the problem into perspective, the cost of chicken has risen 700% this year alone.
Imagine your food going up in price 7x… that’s unbelievably devastating to an economy and more importantly to one’s stomach.
Source: Forbes
Many media outlets, economists, and observers are forecasting the collapse of Venezuela.
Venezuela’s crisis highlights the importance of gold.
The Venezuelan bolivar is becoming as worthless as the Weimar Republic’s mark or the Zimbabwean dollar – which is eventually nothing more than the paper!
Source: RHP
Ironically, Venezuela has HUGE gold reserves.
No, not in a bank – they’ve actually been selling that gold in exchange for US dollars. The problem is that if you waste your money on ridiculous government spending, you end up in the same position you started! They’ve actually wasted so much money that even Russia is pissed. Russia is currently holding a Venezuelan oil tanker hostage because Venezuela is delinquent on debt payments.
The HUGE gold reserves that Venezuela has are in the ground (second most known gold reserves in the world). As in, you’ve got to actually mine for the gold.
And that’s how this “opportunity” basically fell in my lap, as I wasn’t even looking for gold in Venezuela.
I was in Colombia researching and investigating some real estate investments.
While at dinner with some friends, I was approached by someone who had a connection in Venezuela.
The basic story is this:
Many Venezuelans are mining for gold in any way that they can. Some are simply digging illegally, some are going to work for state-run enterprises, and some… well, some are robbing others of their gold.
The situation is beyond f-ed up.
Source: DW
The gold that is being produced (mined legally, illegally, or just stolen) is in the form of dust.
Right now you can buy gold in Venezuela for half the price of the spot market. That means, you can buy sacks of gold dust for half what it’d cost in coin/bar form.
Source: DW
Here are the dirty details…
Well, first this is unbelievably dangerous for everyone involved for obvious reasons.
You’d be buying from either someone who is extremely desperate to put food on their table or from some criminal who just stole the gold (who also might just be trying to put food on the table).
And you’re not just going into the local Walmart to do this deal. You have to meet the seller in Venezuela because most of the citizens can’t leave the country for obvious (and terrifying) reasons.
So, as a buyer, you’d have to go there with a sack of cash (they prefer US dollars) to buy the gold. And you can’t just easily book a flight there, as most airlines have cancelled their flights into Caracas.
Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, is one of the most dangerous places on earth right now because of what is going on there. With your sack of cash to buy gold, you are a perfect target.
And… even if you were able to successfully make the transaction, you’d have to actually leave the country. If you were caught with a sack of gold in customs, I have no idea what would happen.
Although I could speculate about all kinds of possible outcomes (some of which would result in sitting in some Venezuelan prison, which doesn’t sound fun) I think the risks are obvious.
—
I share this story for two reasons:
#1. To show the disaster that is going on there.
#2. To illustrate the importance and value of gold.
I’m not predicting a scenario similar to Venezuela in other parts of the world… but… the question does arise.
“How will your wealth be protected in a worse case scenario?”
Gold investors (also known as ‘gold bugs’) are often accused of being alarmists and dooms-dayers.
Personally, I fall somewhere in between.
One one hand, I have massive confidence in human ingenuity and faith that our society will continue to progress. We will always be moving forward and accomplish unbelievable feats.
On the other hand, I’m also a realist. I travel quite a bit and I am exposed to the harsh realities of the world. Those realities are that humans encounter hurdles that are often difficult to get over. Some parts of the world seem to have more hurdles than others, but at one time or another we all encounter significant challenges.
To assume that you will never meet a time in your life where you or your wealth is at risk implies that you are either extremely lucky or naive.
I’ll be sharing with you an interesting way to invest in precious metals very soon. It’s something I’ve never seen before.
In the meantime, you can check out the “No Excuse Guide To Buy Silver.”