China Calls For Free-Trade Deal With Canada Within A Decade. “We’re Not Coming To Control Your Resources” Chinese Ambassador says. Globe and Mail Canada Gears Up for China Uranium Exports. Globe and Mail Brazil Stands Ready To Devalue Currency Following QE3 Inflows. Bloomberg Conrad Black: Canada’s front-row seat for the American disaster. National Post Inside… Continue Reading

Fed Wants Inflation Now, Will Clean Up ‘Mess’ Later: El-Erian. CNBC Gross Sees No End to QE3 Until U.S. Unemployment Drops to 6%–From The BLS Stated Rate of 8.3%. Financial Post Brazil’s Mantega Warns of Currency War, Calls QE3 ‘Protectionist’. CNBC Bananas, World’s Most Traded Fruit, Headed Higher In Price. Bloomberg ‘Smart’ Money Targeting Low-Priced Coal Assets. Globe and Mail Gold… Continue Reading

“He, by announcing a story which everyone knows not to be true, told the truth by the very fact that he did not claim to be relating real events.” -Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana, Book V:14 Lived From 620-564 BC Fabulist, Storyteller Credited For Writing Over 684 Fables, Known as “Aesop’s Fables” Aesop’s fables… Continue Reading

I was retold a story yesterday by my father, a classic, which I refer to as “The Elephant and the String”. Hearing it again reminded me that as we grow older, the classic wisdom’s and stories we’ve heard since childhood, and especially those from our parents, take on a more significant meaning. Indeed as the years pass,… Continue Reading

A story of disaster and resilience not often told outside historic downtown Chicago is the story of the Great Chicago Fire and the legendary retailer who rose from it’s ashes.

Quiet, Understated, Marathon-Running Retail Banker Antony Jenkins Brought In To Run Barclays. Bloomberg Scotiabank Makes $3.13B No-Frills Bet on ING. Financial Post After Bloody, Violent Strike, Lonmin Miners & Management Make Amends, Prepare To Resume Mining Operations In S.A. Bloomberg SkySurf, Founded By Ottawa Businessman Raed Almasri, Bought Canadian Air-To-Ground Internet Service Rights For $2.1… Continue Reading

“You get a sale at Wal-Mart or Nordstrom, and they’re lined up at midnight to be the first ones in the door. When Wall Street has a sale, everybody says, ‘Oh gee, it might go lower’.” – Marshall Berol I had the chance to speak with Encompass Fund’s Marshall Berol yesterday. The Encompass Fund is heavily… Continue Reading

QOTD: “Under promise and over deliver is smart. Over promise and over deliver is talent.” D’Arcy Stuart, Odgers Berndtson Kansas Farmers Prepare to Plant Winter Wheat in Driest Soil Since 1991. Bloomberg Carlyle Group to Buy DuPont Unit for $4.9 Billion. CNBC RBC, CIBC and TD hike dividends as profits surge. Financial Post.  18 brilliant… Continue Reading

QOTD: “You hang around for as long as I have and they start giving you awards… Twenty years earlier they wanted to put you in jail.” Peter Brown, Chairman of Canaccord, BCBusiness George Kalmar, Prominent Toronto Businessman and Holocaust Survivor, “Who Arrived With A Pregnant Wife and Just $7.50 In His Pocket” Passes Away Peacefully At The Age of… Continue Reading

Cameco Acquires BHP Australian Uranium Deposit For $430 Million. Globe and Mail Harper’s Chief of Staff Faces Conflict of Interest Questions Over Barrick Gold Links. Financial Post “Electricity is the Only Commodity in the World That Isn’t Really Stored…When Storage Becomes Cheap and Massive, ‘The Impact Will Be Huge.'” Bloomberg Some Suggest Putin’s Net Worth… Continue Reading

QOTD: “This is one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Neil Armstrong Iconic Astronaut Neil Armstrong Passes Away. Fox News Hedge Funds Moving Back Into Commodities. Bloomberg Cameco buys while uranium valuations are low. Financial Post Hertz Buying Dollar Thrifty For $2.6 Billion In Cash. Bloomberg. New York Times’ About Group Moves… Continue Reading

Meet the Israeli middleman said to have ‘stripped and flipped’ First Quantum’s DRC mine. Mining Good news. Some fees for the street. Sandstorm Gold increases bought deal to $130 million. Yahoo Gold Fields CEO: Reduction in Guidance, Two Operations Are Struggling(video). Bloomberg A Grandmother “Whose Birth Date Could Not Be Confirmed”, Discovered As Brazil’s Wealthiest Woman, Controlling a… Continue Reading

I’ve always felt listening to be a focused endurance activity. It’s different than a debate and different from a session of small talk. I further liken it to searching for something in the dark. We are looking around when we listen, getting to know the environment of the other person’s mind, drawing out as much information as… Continue Reading

Twenty-two years ago, two men dressed as Boston Police Officers walked into the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, bound and gagged the young security guards, and walked out of the museum’s side entrance 90 minutes later, carrying a few hundred million dollars worth of art. It was the largest art heist ever in modern times, and… Continue Reading

“We have to get confidence back… if we can get that confidence back, I think the sentiment will change and you’ll have people investing in gold equities again.” I had the opportunity to sit down on a call with Stephen Letwin this week, President, CEO, and Director of IAMGOLD Corporation, one of the world’s largest… Continue Reading