New Series of Posts on Personal Health

This series will address a variety of topics on personal health - measures that one can take to improve one's ability to live an active life.

The first posts will be organized around physical well-being:

• sleep (getting sufficient sleep and employing "creative dreaming" to get insights which are unencumbered by rational thought processes during wakeful hours)
• movement (body mechanics) - this will be subdivided in several sub-topics: feet, balance, posture, preparation for physical activities such as skiing, golf
• breathing
• diet
• exercise (here I'm talking about measures one can take to develop a constitution which is capable of sustaining prolonged activity as opposed to body building, one of the most useless approaches to a fully functional body.  

The posts will chronicle my journey:

• the experience of relearning how to walk after encountering leg pain which laid me up for two days in Burgos while I was walking the Camino de Santiago de Compestella - also lessons learned in making plantar fasciitis a distant memory
• exercise, posture and movement routines which laid to rest a diagnosis by a leading surgeon that I would suffer from debilitating back pain by the age of 40 (imagine getting this news at 16 years of age!)
• learning how to use the power of sleep
• dealing with joint problems without the aid of NSAIDS and surgery
• learning how to listen to my body and to become more efficient when skiing, golfing etc. 

As opposed to being prescriptive, the posts will simply hint at a direction which might be explored by others.  As in the realm of investing, it always pays to check the credentials of informants and their motives for offering "advice" to consumers.

Sadly, the area of personal health is filled with ill-informed individuals/ideologues/charlatans, and snake oil salesmen whose advice/services/products can be dangerous to one's health.  The literature is replete with "born again" individuals who made dramatic changes to improve their physical well being.  Many of them have no room for the possibility that other regimes can lead to healthful results.

The medical community sometimes has very different viewpoints on various aspects of health.  It is not surprising:

• many companies (e.g. footwear manufacturers) sponsor research which presents a favourable views on their products and services (always check to see if the research is peer-reviewed by reputable institutions)
• sometimes, new research takes time to be accepted by a community which is, by nature, conservative in its outlook (for good reasons)
• many studies are small in scale (size, time) and for this reason, do not have the "weight" to influence the wider community even though results might be useful
• the politics of funding has a great influence on the direction of research.

In light of this, it is prudent to place more weight on peer-reviewed findings.  

However, I have found that the writings of people who have a long and successful history of treating endurance athletes are valuable. They share a variety of characteristics:

• the authors have many years of treating high performance athletes
• their "prescriptions" emphasize natural movement and function as opposed to drugs and equipment
• they leave the gate open to interpretation and experimentation and place the onus on the individual decision as opposed to prescriptive dogma

One Final Observation

People are different.  They respond differently to diet, exercise and the demands of daily life.  It literally pays to bear this in mind while charting your path forward.  

You can start by watching this:

The Truth About Exercise

Whether you're running, swimming, cycling, or hula hooping, we have always been told that doing regular exercise will improve our bodies and is one of the keys to a healthy and happy life. Our one-size-fits-all approach to maintaining an active, healthy lifestyle is very rarely questioned, but with recent advances in genetic testing technology and brain stimulation techniques, scientists are uncovering the new and surprising truths about what exercise is really doing to our bodies, and why we all respond to it differently. In this programme, Michael Mosley uses himself as a human guinea pig to discover the truth about exercise

Some Noteworthy Trends: Blockchain - a very significant development and The End of Moor's Law: the next frontier

Blockchain

http://www.wired.com/2016/02/ibm-and-microsoft-will-let-you-roll-your-own-blockchain/?mbid=nl_21716

You will hear a lot more about blockchain.  You can Google "blockchain" to learn more.

It is possible to invest in this technology.
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/120315/5-ways-invest-blockchain-boom.asp

http://www.blockchaintechnologies.com/blockchain-investments

My search is just beginning ... a more detailed posting will be made in a few weeks or so.

The End of Moore's Law

An observation made by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore in 1965. He noticed that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits had doubled every year since their invention. Moore's law predicts that this trend will continue into the foreseeable future.
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/mooreslaw.asp

However, it appears that the trend is slowing for two reasons.

Manufacturing costs have risen significantly (see next URL)

The beginning of the end started about a decade ago when the size of transistors – less than 90nm, or a hundredth of the width of a human hair – led to overheating. The problem was solved by limiting the speed of the processors, so they couldn’t generate too much heat. But the problems continued.

Transistors were set so close to each other that they were interfering with one another’s functions. They are now approaching a size so ridiculously small at 28nm or below, that they won’t follow the normal laws of physics such as gravity – they will soon be impacted by “quantum effects” which means their behaviour becomes unpredictable, and we can’t use them in nuclear power stations and rail networks.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/02/25/end-of-moores-law-whats-next-could-be-more-exciting/?WT.mc_id=e_DM91975&WT.tsrc=email&etype=Edi_Cit_New_Tue_9Sections&utm_source=email&utm_medium=Edi_Cit_New_Tue_9Sections_2016_02_26&utm_campaign=DM91975

The above-noted article notes:

What we now need from our devices is better battery power, energy efficiency, better connectivity and design.

The new ‘More than Moore’ road map will need to work backwards – what devices and applications do people want, and how can the chips we make support them efficiently?

The technical aspects of the issue are fascinating.  Given the intellectual and financial resources currently being allocated to these pursuits, it is inevitable that some breathtaking advances advances will be made in the near future.  The advent of more efficient and compact batteries, for example, will revolutionize the power distribution grid, especially in areas of the world which are "under-serviced".

However, I believe that the most significant advances will be made in the conduct of human activity: social and economic innovation enabled by technological advances has the potential to change radically, the way we communicate and do business.  Blockchain is only the start.

Gold - An Investment Strategy

Gold has been dismissed by many as a relict of the past - an artifact of times when banking systems were not well developed and where there were few alternatives for people seeking security for their stashes during turbulent times.

In North America, especially, the literature is filled with such commentary.  It is there that people have never had the recent experience of war and other wealth destroying events such as famine, disease and other agents leading to social insecurity such as widespread corruption and the absence of the rule of law.

The simple fact is that the majority of the world's population holds a different view and regards gold as a store of value during hard times.  This view is starting also to take hold in North America.

Recent market instability has raised investors' interest in gold.  If you believe the supply/demand functions in the global market for gold (some people don't) this is reflected in the price of gold.

http://www.goldpriceoz.com/goldpricegraph/usd-gold-price-per-ounce-3-months-history.png

This increase has been reflected in the performance of the S&P TSE Gold Index

Gold-based equities in the Financial Log Book have performed nicely in recent months.

Company	Purchase Price/Date	Current Price 12/02/16	% Increase YTD	% Gain/Loss Since Purchase
Abitibi Royalties RZZ	2.57 2015-11-20	3.4	1.2	31.4
Silver Wheaton SLW	12.37 2007/09/04	21.15	23	71

Speculation in several other companies has been profitable.


Here is a list of companies on my radar screen.  It was developed as a result of looking for enterprises with characteristics noted later on in this commentary.

Asanko Gold
Franco Nevada
GoldQuest Mining
McEwan Mining
Premier Gold Mines
Pretium Resources
Oceana Gold
Integra Gold

The companies generally share the following characteristics:

• great management with a good track record
• operations in stable jurisdictions where the rule of law prevails
• lower all-in sustaining costs 
• good balance sheets and/or an ability to secure additional funding for development

I prefer companies with active operations and a income stream. Why?

• technical/operating risks are lower with the result that additional funding can be secured at lower rates
• in some instances, production can be ramped up relatively quickly to profit from higher prices during boom times

There are some exceptions to the above-noted generalities.  Asanko Gold is in a fairly stable African country but the upside potential warrants the additional risk of geopolitical uncertainty.  Pretium Resources is scheduled for production in 2017.  It is fully permitted and appears to have good access to funding.  Its main attraction is the size and quality of its high grade reserves and the prospect that they will be increased over time.

A host of other variables figure in my decisions:

• The possibility of a take-over.  Some companies are likely take-over candidates.  Small to mid-sized companies with significant reserves sometimes fall within the sights of larger entities seeking to replenish their reserves with less risk than greenfield exploration activities.  In this respect, I look for small mines (preferably under development) which are adjacent to larger ones.  Sometimes the attraction of reducing costs through the sharing of processing facilities leads larger companies to absorb their smaller brethren.  This is interesting:How Are North American Gold Miners Placed?
• I prefer companies which are located in established gold fields. The reasons: an established infrastructure which lowers costs, an established social fabric which facilitates regulatory approvals, community support and access to labour.

I like companies such as Franco-Nevada, a gold-focused royalty and streaming company.

Our business model is to grow the royalty portfolio with acquisitions of high quality, high margin assets limiting our downside exposure but retaining the full upside potential of higher commodity prices and/or new exploration discoveries.

The company has great management.  It is well worth viewing the most recent investor presentation: http://www.franco-nevada.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Antapaccay-Precious-Metals-Stream.pdf

In these times when miners are desperate to secure financing, streaming/royalty companies are well-positioned to secure profitable contracts.

A position  in Franco Nevada was established on 2014-08-22. Since then, the price has increased by 23.9 percent (12/02/16).  I continue to hold this company.  The investor presentation outlines the company's interests - they warrant serious attention by investors seeking to invest in specific companies.

I have invested in most of the afore-mentioned companies from time to time and have taken profits as opposed to hanging on for more.  The only exception is with the royalty and streaming companies where I plan to hold on through what I sense will be a cyclical rebound in the precious metals market.  In essence my strategy involves:

• short-term speculative ventures and profit taking based on my sense of the market action
• longer-term investments in companies with proven revenue streams from a variety of mines located in stable jurisdictions

The result has almost negated the impact of declines in some holdings noted in the Financial Log Book.  

Note:  Other than generalized observations, I will not record this speculative activity in the Financial Log Book.