"As right as everyone here seems to think Peter Schiff is, the...

"As right as everyone here seems to think Peter Schiff is, the bottom line is that he has cost his clients and followers an absolute fortune this year by effectively recommending an unhedged short on the USD."

I would be interested to see how his performance stacks up against the other fund managers.

He appears to have been advising his clients primarily into gold and offshore dividend yielding commodity stocks. As he notes gold has actually been one of the better performing asset classes (second only to a US cash/interest yielding position, maybe the Yen thrown in there too).

Other fund managers have been advising people strongly into US financials over the same period, so the strength of the US dollar would no doubt be offset by their underperformance.

Another poster has also mentioned that if you stick to your message you will eventually get a few calls correct. This may be true but its not just a case of calling a fall there is a rationale given behind the calls. In the case of the property bust and the recession Peter Schiff's reasoning behind his call was also correct. He's given his reasoning behind his view on the likely future US dollar outcome and we'll have to see if he is correct on this as well. His timing may be out, but he gets paid by his clients to put them into long positions and I don't believe history will judge advisors on their short-term timing (think of Warren Buffet's decision not to participate in the dot-com boom. He was roundly attacked as being past it at the time and accused of doing badly by his clients, until years down the track 99% of the dot-com company's went bust as did all the gains that came with them - his relative long-term performance no doubt would have stood up nicely).

I have my own views on these things and they are tempered by the fact that I have previously had an inclination to lean towards an overly negative viewpoint which has never eventuated to the extent that I have envisaged. There have always been too many vested interests in seeing a positive outcome, so I have learnt not to be too alarmist. I will happily wait around the sidelines for a bit taking positions here and there in cashed up stocks when I consider them overly sold (preferably on heavily down days).

Cheers
SBC