John Hathaway of Tocqueville Gold Fund writes one of my favorite annual investor letters. Here's a snippet from his latest shareholder letter.
While many observers feel that the gold rally has been over done, is too crowded, resembles a bubble or whatever, the simple fact remains that central banks of the Western democracies appear on course to debase paper currencies. On the one hand, currency debasement is the path of least resistance to grapple with the seemingly intractable fiscal issues of record deficits and unchecked growth in entitlements. On the other hand, persistent economic weakness translates into political pressure for central banks to pursue extremely lax monetary policies. Under these circumstances, it is hard to argue against the notion that some exposure to gold offers protection against monetary damage still to come.