One of the guys who I read and respect a great deal is Marin Katusa over at Casey Research. He is their energy specialist and has spent much time in the past year making the case that the next decade for oil could closely resemble the past decade for gold. I tend to agree. It is the lifeblood of economies and the reason that war is waged (at least, pretty often). So, I am on the lookout for vehicles that capture the trend. One example that I currently own (in moderation) is an Australian-listed company that has large stakes in oil projects across the Middle East and Africa. They play where others are probably scared to go, and that’s kind of how I like it.
Anyway, I bring it up because, in parsing through the logic of why I’m doing the above, it got me thinking about general investing themes. And one area that gets a lot of attention every time a new round of QE is announced is commodities. While I think they are likely to do well as a group, I do not plan to get exposure to every single one. Nor is it necessarily easy to do so. I like gold (as stated many times) and so own a nice amount of physical and some miners. I like oil (“black gold”) and am seeking out ways to buy in. But, after that, it is less straightforward.
Take water. Everyone needs it, but not everybody has access to it – and I’m not trying to corner the market on Poland Spring. So, instead, I own a Canadian listed mining services company that hits on all three of my favorite food groups (gold, oil, water). I have also been looking at a Singapore-listed company that focuses on water desalination, with a heavy helping of exposure to China and its billion-plus population. The point being, for investable themes that should work, creativity is sometimes the name of the game in order to get into the game.
Agriculture is also an interesting idea, but I don’t want to buy a farm. Still, you can’t argue, food is kind of important. If you ask Kuppy, it’s about the manufacturing of machinery. Marc Faber has mentioned a fund that buys land in Brazil. Me? Well, I’m still looking at the options.
In any event, those are some of the things on my radar.
