When gold was first discovered at Sutter’s Mill in the foothills of California’s Sierra Nevada mountains in 1848, thousands of people dropped everything and headed west with dreams of striking it rich. Within a year, San Francisco was transformed from a sleepy outpost with a few dozen… Read More

On Jan. 26, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released a report showing the United States had about 482 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of recoverable natural gas reserves in shale formations (not counting conventional basins).   That’s a big number by any measure — enough to fuel U.S. Read More

Six months ago, I wrote an article  profiling vertically integrated oiler ConocoPhillips (NYSE: COP). One of Conoco’s strengths is that its reserves are accessible in areas that Bill O’Grady of Confluence Asset Management refers to as “places where you’d want to raise children.”… Read More

Depending on when you were born, you might remember Muhammad Ali when he was a young fighter in his prime during the mid- to late-1960s. Or, if you’re too young to recall but have seen footage of his fights from those days, then you’ll understand why so many sports fans… Read More

The past decade has been great to gold investors… At $1,640 an ounce, gold is trading roughly 460% higher than its spot price just 10 years ago. The incredible run makes gold the best-performing… Read More

It wasn’t long ago that investors had to choose between hot IPOs or stocks that paid dividends. The good news is that there have been a slew of dividend-paying IPOs in the past year, making it possible to obtain, from the same investment, high yields and the nice returns that… Read More

“Good things come to those who wait” is an adage I’ve always subscribed to as an investor, although it may be hard to believe if you’re heavily invested in natural gas right now. The stocks of natural gas firms have seen their share of woe in 2012, with many already… Read More

I’ve received quite a few emails recently from my Scarcity & Real Wealth subscribers regarding hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. It’s clear that many of them have been reading up on the subject. And they should. Because even with stricter regulatory burdens on the horizon, this could well… Read More

Although energy stocks have been hot as a group — already jumping nearly 13% so far in 2012 — individual performance is all over the board, ranging from double-digit gains to double-digit losses. And just because a stock is up a lot doesn’t mean it’s worth getting excited… Read More

Let’s face it: natural gas prices are low. Very low. Despite the recent three-week rally in futures, prices remain in the gutter. The recent rally in futures prices came on the heels of reports that domestic supplies… Read More