Keith Weiner is concerned about the level of debt in the US, saying the overarching number of more than US$33 trillion breaks down into an unsustainable burden of US$330,000 for every working person in the country.

‘What cannot be paid will not be paid. This is going to be a horrific crisis — but not today,’ he said.

In his view, investors should look to gold to protect their wealth. ‘Are people going to get richer by holding gold? Perhaps. But they’re going to get poorer by holding dollars, that’s for sure. So that’s really why I think people should be owning gold,’ noted Weiner, who is the founder and CEO of Monetary Metals.

He sees two ‘enormous forces’ influencing gold. One of those is the issue of forced sellers — these are people who don’t want to sell their gold, but have to because of financial stress. The other is strong buying from non-western nations.

‘Gold has been bought massively in certain parts of the world, (and) gold has been liquidated in many places involuntarily. Then you see a gold price that doesn’t seem to want to get out of a range of US$1,900-something (per ounce) to US$2,000-something. But I think we’re not in the bear market of 2012 to 2018,’ Weiner explained.

‘We’re in a bull market. Maybe with volatility and uncertainty and a lot of sideways motion. But I think we’re in a ‘buy the dips’ market, which is not where we were in 2012 to 2018 — that was a ‘sell the blips’ market.’

Securities Disclosure: I, Charlotte McLeod, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.