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March 2nd Episode

2024/3/2
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Michael Campbell's Money Talks

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@Mike Campbell 指出加拿大政府未能保护犹太居民免受反犹太主义的侵害,这体现了政府在维护社会福祉方面的严重失败。他列举了自 10 月 7 日以来持续不断的针对犹太人的仇恨事件,包括暴力威胁、针对犹太企业和学生的袭击等,并批评政府对此反应迟缓、软弱无力。他认为,如果针对其他少数族裔发生类似事件,政府的反应将会截然不同。他认为政府的失职导致加拿大社会出现严重的仇恨和不宽容现象,并明确表示 "加拿大已经支离破碎"。

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Mike Campbell discusses the potential missed opportunity in Canada's metals and minerals sector with Frank Giustra, highlighting the demand for critical minerals in the renewable energy revolution.

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Welcome to Money Talks. My name is Mike Campbell. I'm glad you're with us. I'm really looking forward to this. I've got one of Canada's mining icons, philanthropist also known globally, Frank Giustra, CEO, President of Fiore Group. Here's the thing. My question is, are we about to blow the opportunity in metals and minerals?

that we've just done when it comes to oil and gas. Canada has been blessed and the demand has never been higher when you talk about the EV and the renewable energy revolution. You're going to appreciate hearing his thoughts on that as I will.

Also, we're going to talk about the development industry and trying to build the new homes with Ralph VanderWaal, Easy Invest. But I want to get right to the ground. Tell me what it's like to do a project. Tell me what expenses government add on. I think you're going to find that also fascinating. Also, I've got Ozzy. I've got Victor. I've got Michael. A goofy, shocking stat. Quote of the week. All of that coming your way. But first, let me start with the most fundamental statement about the role of government.

That's so often overlooked. The first role is the protection and well-being of residents of Canada. Now, many seem to disagree and express it in a more global agenda. So that's up to you which one you prefer. But I say our government's first responsibility is the well-being and protection of the people who live here, live in Canada. And if that's the case, that they have failed miserably.

They failed miserably the Jewish population specifically. I want to go further with this. I mean, come on, there's no shortage of talk about how Canada's broken. With pushback, I know, from many who see themselves as progressive. And I'm not going to get into that big-time debate other than to say, if the level of anti-Semitism on display for the last 147, 148 days since October 7th doesn't hint that something is very wrong in Canada, I don't know what would.

I mean, the hate, the calls for violence directed at a single ethnic religious group is the very definition of a hate crime under Canada's criminal code. It is the obliteration, though, of what's long been called Canadian values. We don't necessarily know the specific, but we sure know the gist of it. Liberals have long claimed to represent Canada.

But instead, we've witnessed an explosion of intolerance, of hate, of violence directed at Jews, their businesses, Jewish students on Canadian campuses, and has been met with the weakest response, equivocation, cowardice by some of our politicians. Surrender by politicians like BC Premier David Eby, who along with the NDP caucus sacrificed the only Jewish cabinet minister in the country to extremist anti-Semitic groups.

I want you to think about this. What do you think the response would be to protests aimed directly at the eradication of any other minority in this country? What if there had been an anti-Chinese or anti-Asian or anti-Black, anti-Indigenous march? I mean, the government, along with the vast majority of Canadians, wouldn't tolerate it. Not for a moment. Politicians couldn't get on the microphones fast enough or TV, radio, social media to denounce it. And I'd be right with them, and I hope you would be too.

But come on, that has not been the reaction to the relentless stream of pro-Hamas, pro-Palestine, anti-Israel protests that we've seen. That's been fueled by a deep, imported, I want to repeat that, imported anti-Semitism, calling at times for death to all Jews, the elimination of Israel, infatata.

These protests have at times been more than tolerated. They've been outright supported by some elected officials, some union leaders, academics, and others throughout the country. Meanwhile, Jewish businesses have been vandalized. Jewish students have been intimidated on campus. Come on, even a Jewish daycare center was targeted.

while millions of Canadians' lives were disrupted by the protests, and governments barely lifted a finger to protect and prioritize the safety and well-being of Canadian residents. I want to say unequivocally, that shouldn't have been tolerated. We should not tolerate it. All actions that contravene our hate crime legislation should be enforced immediately, just like they would be if it was any other group targeted.

You know, as I stated in the immediate aftermath of October 7th and the pro-Hamas, anti-Semitism, the refusal by some to even acknowledge the blatant barbaric atrocities, this isn't the Canada I know. But you know what? I think I was wrong. I was naive. This is now a prominent feature in Canada today. And our governments have done virtually nothing to stop it, nothing to protect the residents of Canada.

In fact, they facilitated it by importing vast majority of the heightened anti-Semitism we're now seeing on our streets, our major institutions. Canada doesn't benefit from importing hate, importing conflicts from other parts of the world. We'd be better off without these people. Yet no politician is prepared to even talk about it. But we need to talk about it before it gets worse. And we got lots of examples in Europe to illustrate. I mean, the NDP Liberal government disagrees

you know, obviously, otherwise they would have called for immediate changes to the immigration slash refugee slash illegal immigrant policy. They insist on a much stronger enforcement of hate crimes. If they, in fact, thought this was a problem, they'd do that. They'd insist. But you know what? In the meantime, our country's changed. They have changed Canada. And for those of us who believed in Canadian values that are exemplified by tolerance, by forgiveness,

and certainly not hate directed at anyone because of their ethnicity or religion, well, for all of us, Canada is indeed broken. Hey, this is the Polar Plunge Day. Uh-oh, worried about it already. The Polar Plunge, if you're listening in the morning, well, we're doing it at 1 p.m. Pacific time,

Daylight time, English Bay, freezing water temperatures right, well actually it's at the all-time 10-year low within a sniff of the all-time low. We'll still be doing it and I want to say Raoul, I can't tell you how much I appreciate those people who have supported our efforts here. I mean it's worth it. It's got nothing to do with me other than I think some people would like to see me doused in cold water.

It's got everything to do with you, everything to do with the people who took a moment to donate. I can tell you, people with Down syndrome or autism, fragile X, they're regularly forgotten in our communities. The Money Talks audience has not forgotten them. And there's still time, if you want to make a donation, just go to Money Talks Plunge, moneytalksplunge.com.

And I'd be lying if I said I was looking forward to it. I'm not. But it does warm my heart to think of the cause we're doing it for and the amount of support we've got. My thanks.

I've been looking forward to this, getting a chance to talk with Frank Giustra. You know him, he's been a winner of the Order of Canada. So heavily involved in philanthropic endeavors though, both globally and domestically through the Giustra Foundation. I know lately he's been spending a huge amount of time as co-chair of the Crisis Group, an independent non-profit NGO committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict, obviously busy in this time of year. But I first met Frank over 40 years ago. We were both starting at Merrill Lynch, but

But here's the thing. The next thing I know, he was the head of Yorkton Securities and helping that firm become a leading investment banker for the resource industry. I mean, he has a long history in Canada's mining industry, president and CEO of Fiore Group, which focuses on natural resources. And that's what I want to talk to Frank about today. First of all, Frank, very much appreciate finding time for us.

Great being here, Michael, as always. Well, I want to just start. Let's talk the broad picture for a second. It would seem to me this is a pretty good time to be coming into mining right now. I mean, I'm thinking I just read India, by the way. I think it was on Friday. I read that India wants some huge amount of copper, you know, for what they're doing there. And that's not a rare story. I mean, I'm seeing that every second day. I feel like we're not even close to meeting that demand. So it seemed like a pretty good time to be at least looking at this industry.

Yeah, India is not alone, by the way. It's the entire planet. And here's what's happened. So at this moment in time, we're facing in the next 15, 20 years, a very severe shortage deficit of the critical minerals that are going to be necessary to get us to net zero by 2050.

I've spoken to heads of senior mining companies. I've read all the analyst reports. No one knows where these metals are going to come from. And let's talk about what those metals are. You mentioned copper. Obviously, that's the primary battery metal. But there's cobalt, nickel, manganese, graphites, and lithium. All of those are critical minerals for our energy transitions.

And we don't know where they're going to come from. And now the only country on the planet that was well prepared was China.

China has been quietly for 20 years now, two decades, have been quietly investing around the world, helping to build infrastructure and emerging economies, all for one purpose, to get their hands on the resources that they need, both energy and metals. And they've spent probably $1.3 trillion in 165 countries, 20,000 projects in low and middle income countries,

building infrastructure to secure those resources. The rest of the world woke up to this about a year ago. And I started noticing when I was approached by some American representatives a year and a half ago, suggesting that people like myself, because I've been financing mining worldwide for a long time, why aren't we

competing in Africa. And Africa has become the battleground, if you're going to call it such a thing, and where I think we're heading towards a resource war, global resource war, and the battle lines are being drawn. And the biggest

continent where those battle lines are being drawn is Africa. And as you know, as you mentioned, I'm the co-chair of the International Crisis Group, so I'm well aware of all of the deadly conflicts that are taking place. And there are dozens of them taking place across Africa, whether it's jihadists in the Sahel and the French fighting them, them backing off, then the Wagner group from Russia coming in. Now you've got Saudi Arabia, you've got Qatar, UAE, Turkey, all

All of these countries, the United States is still fighting a 20-year counterterrorism campaign that has achieved nothing except create more terrorists. But at the end of the day, you had several civil wars taking place, military coups. There were nine military coups in the last three years in Africa.

All of this is happening because there's a prize. Whether they say it or not, the prize is the mineral wealth, the resource wealth of these countries. And like the Wagner Group, which is now called, they've rebranded, by the way, since their fearless leader got blown up in a plane. They're now called the Africa Corps. But same gig. They basically lend their protectionism.

protection services to regimes that need protection either from their own people or from jihadist movements. And in return, they get mineral concessions and they make billions from this stuff. So that was that sort of the background. And you mentioned earlier, the deficit is real. Copper alone, we're going to have to mine more copper in the next 15 years than we mine the entire history of this planet.

We're going to need four times, somewhere between four and six times the critical minerals that we consume today. We're going to need them by 2040. And again, no one knows where they're going to come from. So you've got all this fighting going on, the conflicts. Latin America, where I've done a lot of business, you've got a very, the environment has changed very quickly. There's a lot of social unrest.

They're raising the taxes and royalties on mining companies at the same time that these mineral deposits are being depleted and the grades are getting lower and lower, meaning you have to move more dirt to get the same amount of ore. Peru, Chile, Ecuador, all of these places have issues. And so this is happening all of the time when the world is experiencing deglobalization.

You know, we're getting the balkanization of supply chains, French shoring, offshoring. And, you know, Canada makes statements like we will ban China from investing in our critical minerals. China makes statements like we're going to ban the export of graphites. Indonesia talking about creating an OPEC state.

style cartel for battery minerals. There are countries everywhere, even the DRC in Africa, which is one of the biggest metals producers there, especially for cobalt and nickel and copper. They're basically suggesting they want their state-owned mining company to get off-takes from the local mining companies so that they can keep the metals themselves as opposed to exporting them out. So all of this is taking place and

Here we are in Canada, second largest landmass on the planet, with almost every critical mineral that's needed exists in Canada, largely unexplored. The best mining expertise on the planet in terms of whether it's capital markets, technical, engineering, legal, accounting, environmental. We have thousands of firms that specialize. We're a global leader in mining expertise. We could be a global powerhouse in critical minerals.

And we're not doing anything about it. And we're starved for capital. The government is not really implementing the kind of visionary policies that countries like China, Saudi Arabia, now the U.S., you know, is looking to secure the metals around the world through various arrangements with other countries by, again, investing in infrastructure. And here we're sitting in Canada with all of this wealth.

and potential job creation work projects, and we're doing nothing about it. And it's just tragic. We could be an absolute global powerhouse in these minerals that are going to do nothing but go up in price. Because if you have this deficit, the only way you can meet the demand is if you raise the prices. And so that's going to happen. Things like copper and nickel and cobalt are going to go through the roof someday.

And we have all this wealth and we're doing anything about it. And it's just tragic. This is why I went public with that article about our own pension funds and our investing in Canada, which I think is absolutely tragic. And, you know, we can talk about that if you like. But there's an opportunity here. But it needs vision. It needs a bold vision. It needs leadership that I don't think we have currently. And it does need government help. And I can give you the list of things that the government can do

to help solve the problem.

Well, I mean, I find it really worrisome. We had an opportunity in oil and gas too, that we did just about everything we could not to take advantage of it. And again, I hope people are listening closely to what you're describing. On the one hand, people are going, oh yes, we know we're going to have a renewable and EV revolution. On the other, the fact is we don't even have close to the minerals necessary to take even a couple of steps because there was no planning for it whatsoever. And then three, Canada is so well positioned. I mean,

You know, the good Lord's handed us an opportunity here. We've got the resources, as you outlined beautifully. And of course, you're having direct experience this right now, looking at crises around the world with the crisis group. I mean, this is a safe place to be doing it.

I'm flabbergasted. Have you talked to some of the government officials? I know you know so many in the mining industry in this country. What are they saying? Because I can't afford to lose this. Yeah, I've talked to a lot of the industry people. I've not talked to government. I tried to get a meeting with the Federal Minister of Mines and Resources, and I couldn't get a meeting with him yet. But, you know, I've only started this campaign about bringing this issue to the

public awareness only a few weeks ago when I was made aware about our pension funds. And that is the part that is just absolutely, I'm flabbergasted that we can't get our heads around that our own pension funds, which manage about 35% of Canadian savings, have decided to invest more in China than they do in their own Canadian economy.

and if you compare it you look at in the direct comparison is australia okay almost a similar economy mineral wealth they have their um they call them superannuation funds so they're similar to our pension funds and they made a decision to invest in australia uh whereas we have only

25% of the assets under management invested in Canada, they have 60%. Whereas we only have 3% of pension fund money invested in public equities. The rest is in long-term government bonds, which, by the way, is a losing trade in an inflationary environment. But we only have 3% invested in Canadian public equities. They have 25%. They protect their mining industry. One of the largest dealers here in Canada, which does mining,

Most of the mining underwriting work in Australia says every time that they do a deal, the big orders come from the pension funds, from the superannuation funds. And they have more invested, the Aussie pension funds, more invested in their lithium producers than we have in our entire mining industry in this country. And that is just unacceptable.

Unacceptable. And, you know, so with the pension funds, whereas, you know, 30, 40 years ago, they were 80 to 90% invested in Canada, they've left. We're building China's economy

To me, it's both comic and tragic that we're exporting our capital, our savings to grow China's economy when we're in a battle for critical minerals and we're not investing in our own country. And then we have the temerity to complain. You remember the takeover of tech was BC's crown jewel of mining.

And they tried to split tech into two components, the base metals and the coal company. Guess who blocked that split? The Chinese Sovereign Wealth Fund, which was one of the largest shareholders after the Japanese government and our largest mining company.

BCI, our British Columbia pension fund with $233 billion under management, didn't have a single share of tech. And then the Premier of British Columbia has the temerity to complain, oh my God, this can't happen. We can't lose our crown jewel. We're going to lose thousands of jobs.

But they do nothing about it. And we're sitting on $233 billion and they don't own any tech shares? I mean, to me, that's where the disconnect is happening. You know, there's a lot of talk. Yeah, we're going to do this. We have to do something about it. And they're not. You know, we have capital. And if you think about it,

I've been doing this for close to 45 years. As you know, we started together in this industry and I've been in the mining game for 40 years. I've made most of 95% of my wealth outside of Canada. I've invested very little in Canada because it takes forever to get anything done here. I just find this really tragic.

And, but there's a solution. There are, and I can give you the laundry list of solutions, how to fix this, but it needs bold and visionary and forward looking policy makers.

I'll get into that in a second, but first, you just reminded me. We used to have Inco here. We used to have Alcan. We used to have Falcon Bridge, Naranda, Goldcorp. There's a long list of names that I think people who aren't in the industry recognize. Well, we've lost their head offices. Well, think about the impact then. I'm just inviting people. This is serious stuff. You've impacted an expertise in the workforce. Oh, research and development.

Let alone, you know, Frank, I'm always on about this, but we demand certain public services and yet we're not prepared to earn them. I mean, can you imagine the revenue we're saying no to here? You know, and I say, we've been through this movie already. We forgo tens of billions of dollars in oil and gas. This is the opportunity of the EV and the renewable revolution, for goodness sakes. This is a government that's pushing it on the federal level. You know, fair enough. Well, God, let's take advantage of it.

I mean, I think it's a unique position, you know, as a safe country and the mining expertise. And oh, my gosh. I mean, as you see, my head's exploding here. And not to mention that this is a money making opportunity. This is a wealth creation opportunity. This is not a charity case. We're talking about the minerals that the entire planet is going to need in amounts that we don't have yet because it needs to be found, developed and mined. And that's a very long process.

But here's what's happened. So several things that have happened that have starved our industry here in Canada of capital. First of all, pension fund aside, we used to have dedicated mining funds in this country. I think in 2010, our total funds under management were dedicated just mining, were $16 billion. Today it's under $3 billion. So we've lost the institutional support for this sector.

As you mentioned, we lost our senior producers who traditionally helped not only explore, because if you think about it,

Traditionally, junior mining companies find 55% of the discoveries and the seniors find the rest, 45%. So we've lost our seniors. And they also provided funding to junior mining companies. So we've lost that capital as well. And one of the reasons, which is the part I find ironic here, is with all of this ESG movement, mining was...

a carbon emitting industry. So a lot of the funds divested of their mining holdings because mining is considered dirty, which it isn't if it's done at the industrial level. It certainly is if it's done informally and illegally as it happens in many countries around the world. But industrial miners are very responsible and they do it in an environmentally safe way. So

The ESG has caused all of these institutions to divest their mining interests, which I think is, you know, maybe they're well-meaning, these policymakers that create all these rules, but they haven't connected the dots. How do you get from here to net zero without those critical minerals?

So I call it woke without wisdom because they haven't really – these minerals are not going to fall out of the sky. You've got to go find them. You've got to develop them, and it takes capital. And like I said, the juniors, which have traditionally fallen 55% of the global discoveries, are –

I've never seen a market like this so starved for capital where it's almost impossible to raise money in the capital markets because the institutions have gone and it's just become very difficult. So that's number one problem. Number two problem this country has is permitting.

It takes 12 to 15 years to permit a new mining project. I've done mining projects throughout Africa and Latin America where it takes us between 12 and 24 months or 18 to 24 months, depending on how lucky you get. You have a set time period. There's no uncertainty.

You know that if you do everything right in your permitting process, you're going to get your permits within two years. Here it takes 12 to 15 years. Investors, that's why we're not getting any capital. We have both provincial and federal permitting process. We should streamline it into one process and make it more efficient so that these mines can get into production. There are a ton of mines here, British Columbia and the Yukon and Ontario, Quebec, that have been in the permitting process forever.

And there's so much uncertainty that investors, as you know, the one thing investors don't like is uncertainty. They need to know what is the certainty of the outcome, then they can make a decision. So you've got that problem. And then you've got the lack of infrastructure in the remote parts of Canada where a lot of these minerals exist, or we think they exist. The Ring of Fire in Ontario, up in the Arctic near Nunavut. You need roads, you need ports, you need hydroelectric power, or even small plants.

modular nuclear reactors, which I think you can use in certain very, very remote places. But that is going to require infrastructure investment. This is where the government can come in. And we can even talk about public-private partnerships, matching funds, low-interest loans, increasing the flow-through amount on the flow-through shares for remote regions to make it even more attractive for investors to take risk to find these minerals in the Arctic and other places.

There's a laundry list of things you can do here. But again, it requires a government that understands the game, knows what to do, and is bold enough and has a vision like China or Saudi Arabia. You know, Saudi Arabia has this Vision 2030. China has this Belt and Road Initiative. These are long-term visions that require long-term capital. So they have their sovereign wealth funds that have these long-term visions.

view on investing, our pension funds could act in the same way because pension funds traditionally take a long-term view. So that's why I've been harping on this whole pension fund thing because it's capital that is currently sitting in either invested in economies elsewhere, private equity,

ETFs, you know, index funds, which, you know, I don't do anybody any good. And long term government bonds. I mean, how are you going to grow an economy by investing long term government bonds? That's the we need a different type of investing mentality in this country.

I'd say a couple of things jump out immediately. First is back to the irony. This is a government that talks about renewable resources. This is a rather renewable energy. They talk about electric vehicles by 235. And I can tell just between us, Frank, the biggest blowback I've ever had doing the broadcasting I do for 40 years is

was talking about, oh, that's all good. Where are you getting it from? I think literally, I would talk the practicality of it and been very keen on the minerals for a number of years, because I felt it was inevitable we were going in the direction. But

But it was like the people who were pushing it didn't even understand, well, you will need copper, you know. It was that elementary. And I don't see any progress. I know the government in the last budget finally talked about, you know, critical minerals and had a fund set aside. But it's got to be put into action, as you say. It's nothing without...

I just find that so ironic that they're the obstacle. Yeah, they're definitely the obstacle. Michael, that fund, which you just mentioned, only $300 million is available so far and only half of that money is available for what I'm talking about, going out there, finding and developing it.

the the actual mineral ore bodies the rest is about you know downstream infrastructure and all sorts of things it's not a lot of money that's not we're going to need literally billions of dollars and some of us got to come from outside of government and i think again our pension funds are sitting on i think three and a half four trillion dollars of canadian savings and to me

You have to invest in your own country somewhat. I mean, it's ridiculous. We're investing almost zero in our own country. You know, sure, of course, you have to maximize returns. That means you have to look at markets all over the world. But, you know, again, use the Australian example. They've kept their industry at home. They won't allow...

Brookfield tried to take over Origin Energy, the company in Australia, and their Aussie pension funds blocked it. And they came right out and said it. The reason we're not going to... We don't want to lose this. This is going to be an important part of our energy transition, this company. We don't want to lose it. They were very clear about it. And look at us with tech. We couldn't even find the votes to stop because the Japanese and the Chinese owned the majority of tech. And so, again, I think...

We have to be sensible and we're not being sensible. You know, you have to be practical and know how you're going to get from A to B. And I don't see that anywhere. I just see a lot of talk. And, you know, it's tragic because we could create a lot of wealth for this country, a lot.

And that's a key we'll leave with is that the amount of jobs we're talking, government revenue. If you want the EV revolution, the trends, you know, the renewable energy trends, you need this stuff. We need to get practical. We're 10 years late in that, in my opinion, but we need to get practical. Frank, you've gone a long way, though, to help clearing that up. And I hope you keep doing it. And I'll tell you, one of the things they should do is phone Frank Giustra. And I'm being serious.

phone people like yourself long, you know, and you wrote your article with Pierre Bisonette, you know, people who've been in the business. We have those people available to the government. So it takes leadership. And so far it's been lacking. Frank, not from you though, but we appreciate very much. I'll keep, I'll keep at it, Michael. Well, do, do, do please. But very much appreciate you finding time for us. My pleasure as always.

A reminder, you can hear that interview or see that interview on YouTube with Frank Giustra. Just go to our YouTube channel, click on, or you can just type in Frank Giustra Money Talks in the search engine, but you can watch it on YouTube is my point. Time now for the quote of the week. Barry Weiss is a former New York Times columnist who created a media storm in quitting the newspaper, claiming that its editorial voice had been captured by those who felt it

they alone understand the truth and all must comply. I mean, she now moved on to the very popular podcast, Honestly, which I recommend, by the way, along with Substack for her. I invite you to spend a couple minutes, though, and listen to her description of the new ideology that's trying to replace what I guess we'd call small-L liberalism in America and Canada. She gave it to first-year students at the University of Austin. In her words...

The new ideology replaces persuasion, the purpose of argument, with public shaming. Moral complexity is replaced with moral certainty. Facts are replaced with feelings. The rule of law is replaced with mob rule. Ideas are replaced with identity. Forgiveness is replaced with punishment. Debate is replaced with disinvitation and deplatforming. Diversity is replaced with homogeneity of thought.

Inclusion with exclusion. Excellence with equity. In this ideology, disagreement is recast as trauma.

So speech is violence. But violence, when carried out by the right people in pursuit of a just cause, isn't violence at all, but in fact justice. In this ideology, bullying is wrong unless you bully the right people, in which case it's very, very good. In this ideology, information that does comport with the narrative is recast as, that does not comport with the narrative rather, is recast as disinformation.

In this ideology, education is not about teaching people how to think. It's about re-educating them into what to think. In this ideology, if you do not tweet the right tweet or share the right slogan, your life can be ruined. In this ideology, intentions don't matter. In this ideology, you are guilty for the sins of your father.

In this system, we're all placed neatly on a spectrum of privilege to oppressed. Victimhood in this ideology confers morality. In this ideology, the equality of opportunity is replaced with equality of outcome as a means of fairness. If everyone doesn't finish the race at the same time, then the course must have been flawed and should be dismantled.

By the way, I don't believe for a moment she could have got away with that at the New York Times. But I think it is food for thought. Massive changes here. People should consider them. In fact, I say you must. Decide if you agree and support the new ideology or traditional small-l liberal thought.

I'm going to bring Mike Levy in right now. You know, Mike, I think we're all waiting for that big slowdown in the economy and not saying it's not coming, but I was looking at the Canadian banks, the banks earning this week, and they're not sensing it yet. Well, they sure aren't, Mike. And just pardon me taking a quick look at them.

Five of the big six came in above expectations, and some of them way above expectations. Back in Nova Scotia, earned $2.2 billion. That's about $1.68 a share. Analysts were expecting $1.61.

Bima was the only one that was down, as I say, of the six. RBC earned 285. Analysts are expecting 280 a share. National Bank earned 922 million, 259 a share. Analysts were expecting 236 a share. And I can go on and tell you about all of them, but it was a very, very pleasant surprise.

But Mike, I think one of the things- Let me interrupt for a sec because I want to make sure people understand why do they care? They say, well, I don't have that in my RRSP or I don't have that in my stock portfolio. And I'm saying, yes, you do. Because who are the biggest owners? Well, you look at, of course, the Canada Pension Fund. And if you're lucky, you have a business pension fund. And if you're lucky, it's a government pension fund. Well, provincial, I mean, or municipal. Point is, the big banks are so well represented in all of those pensions. So if you're lucky enough

to be part of a company pension plan, or of course you're part of the Canada pension plan, this is all good news to you. You like your shares to be strong and the earnings to be strong and the dividends to be strong. And that's really what you're talking about here, Mike.

Well, it absolutely is. And I've got to say that it was a pleasant surprise. And as you said, most people do not realize that if they have a pension plan, their Canadian CPP, or if they have pension plans where they work, or they have mutual funds, you've got the Canadian banks in just about every single one of them.

Okay, so let me ask you about another aspect, though, because, of course, we are worried about a slowing economy, especially the consumer backing off. You know, so the banks always take into account the possibility that not all their loans are going to be kind of well handled. You know, there's going to be some defaults. So I always have a look at that. Did you check that out on these earnings?

Well, I sure did, Mike. And I've got to tell you that loan loss provisions by the banks have been, I mean, very well stated. But the banks seem habitually to come in with these loan loss provisions lower than actually those that they're taking. And

And they, or if the economy turns, they then go back to the bottom line profits. And just let me give you a couple of examples here. Bank of Nova Scotia took $962 million in loan loss provisions. Well, if they don't use up that whole $962 million to pay off some of the bad loans, then they're going to go back to the bottom line of the banks and you, as

As an investor or with a pension plan, you're going to benefit from bank shares going up. You're going to benefit because their dividends will go up. So all in all, what the banks did this last quarter compared to a year ago has been pretty good news.

Yeah, I mean, cautious. That's why they take loan losses. But I love you making that point, Mike, that if things aren't as bad as they've allowed for, that goes right back to earnings. So yeah, it took away from earnings in this last quarter. It'll add to the earnings when they decide, yeah, things have improved. So I'm just saying that's a key point for investors.

It really is. And Mike, the forecasters have been really overstating what they think the banks are going to, the hit the banks are going to take because of the economy right now, the higher interest rates, people not doing as much business, not taking out as many mortgages or mortgages for a higher amount. And the fact is they've been wrong. The banks have been

I mean, just doing a really good job of keeping house, of keeping track of everything that they are out on a limb for. And they tend to overstate and it tends to come in under. And again, that's very good news. Now, the only forecast that gives me a little bit of a step back is the analysts are saying profits will drop going forward year over year by about 12%.

But they continue to be wrong as the banks overperform. Well, we'll be there monitoring. You think they're keeping an eye on it. Michael Levy's keeping an eye on it, too. Mike, you go out and have a great week. Thanks, Mike. You also.

I'm proud to say a big subject that we've been talking about for a number of years on Money Talks because of the social problems it causes. It's the lack of housing, the lack of affordable housing, the lack of affordable rents. I know, it's an old song, and it seems like the various levels of government are just maybe discovering it.

Well, I thought it'd be interesting to go to somebody who's actually in that business, working hard on it. Ralph VanderWaal, he's the founder, CEO of Easy Invest. Now, this is what they do. They're sort of a boutique investment dealer out of Richmond, British Columbia. You know, has its own mutual fund trust, the Western Canada Monthly Income Fund. But what they do is develop local real estate projects. Ralph, let me start by just saying thanks for joining us.

Hi, Mike. Thanks for having me. Something we talk about on Money Talks is this incredible demand for housing thanks to non-permanent visas coming in, your temporary visas coming in for students, for workers, and of course the new immigration target set in October 2000 saying you're going to have record immigration. I mean, all of that's obviously now pushed such a squeeze on housing.

It's incredible, Mike. I've been in real estate investing for 20 years. I've never seen anything like it. In my presentations, I call it the biggest train wreck in Canada's history. That's the bad news if you're trying to get into the real estate market. If you're in the real estate market as an investor or as a developer, which we are both, it's just the holy grail. I mean, there's a massive imbalance between supply and demand for housing.

Yeah, it's funny because you could say, hey, you know, how do you know you've got a good market? Well, my goodness, look at those numbers. I mean, I know you guys had written and talked about that CMHC report coming out last September. You know, that's where it really grabbed people saying, hey, you know, we don't only going to have the 2.6 million houses across the country. We need a heck of a lot more than that.

I think the number they came up with recently is we need an extra 3.5 million homes by the next seven years just to keep up with affordability. That's on top of the 2.6 million homes that are already on the books, but I think they're low on the number. Yeah, you're right. I think CIBC would agree with you.

they came out and said, hey, you forgot to count about 1.4 million people. The number is more than 5 million above, as you say, and that's the key to get above the 2.6 million that was already planned by 2030. I mean, as we said, great environment for people like yourselves who create housing. But then we've heard another thing, too. I mean, I've talked to lots of people in the development business who,

And it just seems like so many times our municipal, provincial, federal governments are working counterproductively to that with this huge, you know, sort of levies or regulatory delays or things. Give me from the ground level what kind of stuff you're dealing with that way.

Well, first of all, there's the cost and then there's the capacities of municipal places, cities where you develop. For example, when we went for our building permit in Maple Ridge, we took about $300,000 worth of drawings to the city there. And my architect, after delivering them in paper, said, where do I send the digital files? And are you sitting down for this? He said, we don't have the capacity to receive digital files. Yeah. And that's in a city of over 100,000 people.

And then they take a good nine months to approve your building permit. In that meantime, the cost of capital continues, which gets added on to the final cost of each unit.

On top of that, you've got the massive cost of doing business in Canada. If you want, we can talk about the numbers. Let me come back to the first though, because again, it's somewhat overlooked. Permit delays, we hear about that all the time. Governments have acknowledged that, and yet, as you said, you've already purchased the land. Yes.

You know, the clock's ticking. It's your expenses are going up while you have to sit idle waiting for permission to build the units governments tell us they want. I mean, all of this is it's back to that sort of confused train wreck, you know, there. And then, as you say, yeah, give us an example of some of the costs they throw on. Why? Because as the end user, I'm the one paying for it.

I'll give you an example of Maple Ridge. I'll share with you we bought the land for $7.3 million. It's a beautiful piece of land overlooking the Fraser River. It's very unique but there's some extra cost you got to keep into account. We have a deposit of $1.3 million with the city for engineering work which they hold without interest for a couple of years. Eventually we do get it back. The transfer tax in BC was $285,000. The federal GST on the land purchase $377,000. That we do get back during construction.

Then the annual property taxes, around $29,000 for two years. Developer cost charges are a whopper. That's roughly $435,000 that you don't get back. Park fees, $15,000. I'll add it up for you, $2.4 million, or over $67,000 per unit. After we get some rebates of the GST, that comes down to roughly $750,000 or $21,000 per unit. Right.

Then when you sell the units, the end user obviously pays GST on their unit. That adds another $1.6 million. So the government on all three levels take $2.3 million on a piece of land, which costs $7.3 million. Unbelievable. Yeah, and I really hope people listen to that. I've always been, I'm not putting words in your mouth, so please be clear, everyone listening. But it's driven me nuts when I hear politicians say,

talk about their caring and their deep concern about affordable housing. And then you turn around, you talk to someone in the business like you people at Easy Invest, and you hear that list. And as you say, either you're paying it

or I as a consumer, the end buyer is going to pay it. And there's other, there's even other attachments to that on top of that. I mean, first, you know, one of the things, sorry, Ralph, I'll digress for a sec. But one of the things I talked about a week or so ago was we forget the biggest problem with affordability is that's the amount of tax taken off my paycheck

that I need to be able to afford a down payment and then monthly payments. I mean, we forget that's at about a 50% level when all taxes are taken into account for the average Canadian, you know, sales taxes, et cetera, gas taxes, let alone your income tax. Sorry, as you can tell, it drives me nuts because they're telling me they care about affordability. And then you give us a list like that. And you know, it's jaw dropping. It really is.

So as a developer, especially with the interest rates being a lot higher than they were a couple of years ago, it forces us to outsource all materials as far as we can. And I really don't like doing it. I love Canada. I love supporting Canadians. We employ hundreds of people on these development sites, but we have to save costs. So for example, when we do our building model, we get quotes here in Canada and then we get quotes in China and we get quotes in India. And the cost savings are over 50% if we outsource to other countries.

But if you want to keep the cost down, you've got to do stuff like that. You know, I mean, if you want to pass it on to the consumer with the desire for affordable housing, make your units more attractive, you know, you've got to be searching. And, you

Interesting point there. There's very few places you can do that, like areas. I mean, your material cost is tough to outsource too far because you've got transportation costs. You might have tariffs if you come from the U.S. But as you say, there's nothing you can do about the tax burden coming from three levels of government. So there's really a narrow corridor for you to say, I wonder if we can save a few bucks here.

It's the only way to go. At the end of the day, our investor capital is looking for a good return without too much risk. So if the return is not where we want it to be, then we'll just simply have to get out of this industry and invest somewhere else. So that's what we have to do. Let me ask specifically, because people around us, you say you do investors and you do development both.

Just tell me the kinds of things or amenities or what that, first of all, what do people want right now besides affordability? Is there anything else you say like, we do a lot better if we do a two bedroom or a three bedroom than if we do a one bedroom, you know, that kind of stuff? Or, you know, what is the road structure like that kind of stuff?

Our next project is really geared for families. Most condominium developments in the outlying areas of Vancouver, such as Maple Ridge or Abbotsford, are not very large units. They tend to be 750, 800 square feet. Our units in Maple Ridge are designed larger. They all tend to be 1,100 and 1,200 square feet. Most of them are two and three bedrooms, and almost all of them have a den. We're really applying to families that are being pushed out of the greater Vancouver area.

And what about transportation? I mean, that's the first thing that comes to my mind is how do you get from there back if you have to go back to the city, although I love the work at home or some hybrid version, so you don't have to commute near as much. And to me, that opens up, you know, suburbs far more. But what about other considerations?

So as you know, the city of Vancouver is densifying lots of areas under Bill 44 and Bill 47. They're all based on transit, and that's what we looked for in Maple Ridge. So we found a site that has the West Coast Express stopping at the front door. So the theory is that the families that live there, maybe they'll have one person work from home and maybe one person commute either by car or by transit.

The other thing, by the way, just because I was reading, you weren't telling me this, but I was reading about Easy Invest is you're actually past, you know, the formal permit process, you know, the first permit process like you've got. So because that is a risk. I mean, I know that from personal experience that you've got to get those permits. So I'm just talking to investors right now. That would be an attractive component is where they're at with that permitting process.

Absolutely. So in the past, I've done lots of projects where we take raw land through the rezoning process and then the development permit and the building permit process. I have steered away from that. In fact, I joke to people when they come up with a piece of land that needs rezoning, I said, I'm a rezone-aholic. I got a 1-800 number I can call if I wake up in the middle of the night and I want to rezone something. Because in Canada, that's a minefield. You

You never know what's coming at you. And I have many clients when I was in investor relations in the past that went through rezoning and spent sometimes up to 10 years waiting for rezoning in certain municipalities. So I don't do that anymore. We buy properties that either have the zoning or the zoning is in progress.

Yeah, it's something to check on again for investors when they're looking around within that. Well, as I say, I mean, could you think of a more bigger demand for the products that you put out than the current housing market? And I don't see any sign of it actually having some sort of dramatic improvement. We're so far behind on that. So, yeah, great business to be in. But I really appreciate you taking time sharing the perspective you have from the ground up. Thanks, Mike. Always a pleasure.

Ralph VanderWall is a co-founder, CEO of Easy Invest. And I want to tell you about something here. They've got two seminars coming up this week, Tuesday and Wednesday. You just go to mikesmoneytalks.ca, two webinars, Tuesday and Wednesday, mikesmoneytalks.ca, 6 o'clock.

Pacific Standard Time, 6 o'clock. Or is that daylight time by next year? I don't even know when the hell that changed. 6 o'clock. Check on your watch that way. But you'll find it right there on Money Talks, by the way. Go to Mike's Money Talks dot CA. But please enroll because there's always limited just with the technologies. There's a limited number of people that can go. So it's Tuesday and Wednesday.

more on this, more on the whole development industry and opportunities within the investment side of it. And Ralph will be there, of course. So take advantage. Mike's Money Talks.ca.

Time now for the shocking stat of the week, and it's straightforward. Get ready to pay more, a lot more, for anything chocolate. Chocolate bars, boxes of candy, chocolate-coated ice cream bars, hot chocolates. I think you get the idea. Everything chocolate. And we'll probably see a lot of shrinkflation amongst us, although that's very difficult for StatsCan to measure in our inflation stats, but we'll get shrinkflation. We'll look at that chocolate bar and go, wait a second, what happened to the king size?

Why? And here's the shocking part. Cocoa prices are up 120% in the last year. I just love that when I saw it shocking to say that would have been an investment opportunity I didn't take. But 120% why? Because demand continues to outstrip supply, which is getting hit by bad weather and disease.

I mean, this will impact virtually every Canadian consumer, given that a Mintel survey last fall found that 86% of respondents had eaten some chocolate in the last three months. According to the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation and Agriculture, the average Canadian eats 6.4 kilograms of chocolate per year. That's the equivalent of 160 bars. So yeah, the price is going to be felt, that kind of an increase.

And with apologies, by the way, to all those who are attracted to oversimplification when it comes to high food prices. That price increase is definitely not because of greedy grocers, but we'll still be paying it anyways.

I'm going to go straight to the real estate section right now and who else but Ozzy Jurek greets me there. I know he's excited. We've got the Polar Plunge coming just a few hours away. Ozzy's just been such a great sport about all of this. But also, he's committed to helping raise funds for people with intellectual disability from 2 years old to 82 years old. So,

I'm looking forward to Aussie. I mean, this is my highlight of the year when I say you and lederhosen. I mean, nothing can beat it. So I'm glad you're still making time for us today because there's a couple of things that are on my plate right now. I mean, I'm still astounded at for all the government announcements they make. It's so easy to point out things that would discourage affordable housing. And, you know, we talked earlier with Ralph about the obstacles. But I mean, you've been looking across the country.

Well, the crazy thing is the government says we need to be affordable, we need more building, and then they blame the industry and the developers, we're not building enough. And then they add 30% of the cost of every condo and every house as government, and they have unregulated inward migration. And the result is very clear. It's not just BC, but across the country we have developers and builders getting into trouble.

In fact, Tarion, which is sort of the Ontario watchdog or the insurance agency that managers say if you made a deposit on a presale and they want to get your money back. Mike, they're facing a historic 90 million in claims as Ontario builders are defaulting amid the economic strains that they have right now.

Yeah, it's just flabbergasting, actually. It's just flabbergasting when you look around. And then you've got, for example, in British Columbia, they've turned around and said, we're going to have a flipping tax. First of all, they don't have any data whatsoever that says that'll improve the real estate market, and I'll ask you that in a second. But let's inform everyone across the country, because as we know, one province does something, everybody has a long look to say, hey, maybe we could raise some money that way. So tell us just quickly about that so-called flip.

flipping tax that the NDP government's going to put in? So it's actually a 20% tax on property owners that sell within a year of purchase. And it's actually for two years, but it's sort of a declining from 20% down depending on which months in the second year you sell. The devil is always in the detail, Mike, but I'm just thinking, let's presume I'm a guy, I want to buy a million dollar pre-sale. In a high rise, it takes between five and seven years. I usually put $200,000 down 20%.

Let me say this. I'm hoping to make $100,000 profit, but now the federal government takes profit if I sell it in the seventh year at a rate saved. My tax rate is 36%. BC takes the flipping tax at 20%, at 5%, at commission, and you're spending 70% of that $100,000 anticipated profit, and you've taken a chance, even though you helped building the building.

Now Mike, why not just put it in the bank? When Citi offers 5.9% right now, the banks are in the 5.5 to 6% range. Make 6% for seven years or $90,000 without any headaches.

Yeah, again, it's so flabbergasting because, of course, now all the questions come, which will put a halt to some of these pre-sales right now until they're cleared up. And that's suggesting investors will believe it. But, I mean, when does the meter start on that one-year and then two-year kind of time frame? Is it when I sign the pre-sale agreement? Is it when I sort of take possession of a completed unit?

You know, those questions to me at least are outstanding. Is it going to apply to my principal residence if I'm going to plan to live there in the future? You know, what is it?

Well, this is the most number one question because when the government said that they will also apply the flipping tax to assignments, that means that the date that you say and sign on the purchase of this condo in the sky five or six, seven years ago, from then on, every assignment that you sign would vary the cost if they fall within that ratio.

But that's out to be some clarity to be pending. But the interesting thing is that Tom Davidoff, who's the director of UBC's Center for Urban Economics, he said, I don't expect this tax to make a great deal of difference either way. And he said the federal government instituted

Yeah. Good for you, Mr. Davidoff.

Yeah, but in the meantime, the uncertainty alone as just an individual investor, you know, the uncertainty because of that, the uncertainty for the development industry. I think this is going to throw, you know, cold water, a blanket, you know, in one of the provinces is having this huge immigration challenge, you know, a fire.

Affordable housing has been an issue for a number of number from feels like forever to me. But this is going to discourage people to invest, discourage builders to build at a time when we're already, as you pointed out, right at the outset, seeing some dislocation between those, you know, you've got some builders canceling projects or putting them on hold, etc. This certainly doesn't help.

No, or simply going bankrupt like in Ontario. I mean, normally in Ontario they spend under $1 million a year. Now they're at $90 million. I mean, there is some real problem there. Ozzy, let me finish with talking to you about a few names here. So just sit back for a second. Adam, Matt, and Megan Bodine Ball, Kevin Connett, Spencer Goodwill, Sharan Sethi, Bob Blanchard, Mary Jane Smythe,

It's always nice to hear me pronounce any name fresh like that. Eson Mock Fisk, Evan and Robert Jarvis, Scott and Lee Grant, Lucas Gill, Dave and Jane Braithwaite,

Keith Lumby, Marcus von Berg, and our own Dustin Noble, of course. And I hope Vlad Newell isn't traveling, but he was with us last year. Hope he is this year. These are all the people who are going to jump in with you, me, former Premier Gordon Campbell, and of course, Rob Levy from Border Gold. All of us are going to join it. It is going to be one major party, courtesy of the Jurok Star Quality Association.

So we'll be down at English Bay. We'll be right across from the Sylvia Hotel. We're going to be there about 12:30. I've got all sorts of treats planned for people. We've got coffee ready to go. Be there about 12:30, half an hour in advance of the plunge. Not that we're going to go exactly at 1:00 or 1:01, but get a chance to chat with... I'm looking forward to getting a chance to chat with all our fellow plungers. And I know they want a couple of pictures with you, Ozzy.

because they need an attractive, young, European-origin man in short shorts.

Later, Hosen. So, Ozzy, I'm looking forward to it. Those are all the people who have been kind enough and brave enough to join you and I and Premier Campbell. Well, there's also, Mike, my partner, Ralf Kays, and Brent Roberts is also coming with a group. So we're going to have fun. Now, Mike, I want to ask you, what would you call a polar bear that loves to lie about in the sun? Well, you would call him a solar bear. But what would you call a polar bear with no teeth? A gummy bear.

And that's a sample of what people will get today with Ozzy. Again, one o'clock, English Bay, across from the Silvio Hotel. Well, that's when we're plunging. Be there at 1230. Have a little chat with us or whenever you can make it, of course. But we'll be there at 1230. Take a few pictures. Have a little chat. Have a little treat.

Oh, it's going to be the event of the year, social event of the year, Ozzy. And I can tell you, everybody at Special Olympics appreciates all of the support you continue to give, not just here, every year in the golf tournament, despite the fact you've never played golf, or it looks that way when you actually show up. But we look forward to it, Ozzy. See you soon. You bet. I look forward to it. To be over.

I'm going live to the trading desk now. Victor Dare joins me. Vic, you know, last week you started off by saying you're sort of waking up in a cold sweat thinking of the casino market. Well, nothing I saw this week is going to change that view. I mean, the optimism is, well, for some people it's frightening, the degree of optimism. I mean, and we've had these bouts over the last several years where all of a sudden euphoria is certainly the dominant trend.

Yeah, the market sentiment, I'd describe it as it's almost giddy bullish with what's happening in the stock indices and the whole crypto universe. I mean, I think Bitcoin is up double from last fall and up 4x from the week before that, that sort of thing. It's very bullish. Right this week, certainly high tech are

their big cap tech has been kind of leading the rally. But I'm also seeing like every Tom, Dick and Harry is getting a bid. You know, people are buying anything that's been left behind thinking they're getting a bargain. In a way, it kind of reminds me of the run up we had in late 2007 when they took out the 2001 highs and people were buying, you know, whatever they could get their hands on. And this the sense seems to be.

We had this prospect of seven cuts back in December. By February, they'd scaled it back to three cuts and it didn't really matter because we were never going to have a recession anyway. That seems to be the prevailing mood. You just can't make a mistake here. Option volatility is really cheap. Nobody's worried about anything. As I said last week, Mike,

you can buy puts if you want to hedge your position, they're practically giving them away. Well, let me give you the other side. And because what's sort of interesting is because there was a lot made of this at Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett, they never had more cash on the books. In other words, they can't find anything they think is great value. But, you know, we talked and I know you put this up on your blog to victoradare.ca where, you know, you've got insider sales too, you know, in major companies, they're thinking,

hey, that price is pretty good. I'm going to take advantage of it. Yeah, I think, you know, depending on your time frame, you have to kind of pay attention to insider buying and selling. This week, I mean, the big names were Walmart, JP Morgan, Meta, Amazon, of course, the past couple of weeks. Bezos sold several billion dollars worth of stock. I mean, maybe he needs money for a new boat or something. Who knows? But you started with Buffett.

Buffett can't, and he's a value investor, fair enough. He can't find anything to put his money into here except, well, you know, T-bills at 5.5% don't look bad to Buffett.

Okay, let me, sorry, just because time's always short, and that's why I invite people to go to VictorAdair.ca and look at the blog, but I got to go to gold, because here's another thing. It's kind of interesting. Crypto's had a wonderful run here. You know, gold didn't join in. You know, you look at stocks. We've just been talking about their run recently.

I just find it fascinating that the gold stocks have not been major participants here, despite the fact that I know it's one day. But, you know, we saw it go above 2000 again on Friday, I think it was.

Yeah, gold actually had an all-time high weekly close this week. That's the gold on the futures market in New York. But basically, gold has been ignored here while the enthusiasm is going on in the other markets. In the gold ETFs, we've seen net selling for the last three years, despite where the price is, because stocks are sexier and Bitcoin's even sexier than that.

And the gold share market, Mike, has just woefully underperformed gold bullion. And the bellwether, you know, I almost feel bad to say this, but Numont, which is the biggest gold company in the world, their shares were 86 bucks when the Russians invaded the Ukraine. They traded at $30 this year, this week, I should say. And that's a five or a six year low. Now they've been plagued with different problems. They're trying to tidy up their affairs.

But they have got like zillions of reserves and they're, you know, viable company and all that. It might, and we don't give investment advice, right? But you kind of look at Newmont and think at 30 bucks, you know, maybe that's worth taking a look at. Well, and we talked with Frank Giusta earlier in the show, as you heard, you know, and Frank echoed Peter Grandich and many others. They'd never seen the junior market like this.

You know, it's just been comatose. There's so little money going into that sector. And yes, it's right through to a senior like Newmont. I mean, that's a tremendous drop. Come on, you know, 86 high and a $30 low this past week. Wow. 65%. And if I've got 30 seconds, I'll tell you part of the reason the juniors, particularly the goals, but anything junior can't get any money is because of passive investing.

where most of the market money that's going into the market now goes into passive, where they buy, you know, sort of the broad market. And the juniors aren't even on the radar screen. So, you know, that's just...

There's no hope there right now. As you say, we're not making a recommendation. We don't know everyone's individual circumstances. I'll just tell you, you say, Mike, what are you doing for a hobby? I'm shopping to buy the entire company right there. I have my criteria. Of course, that's what the stock market's all about, but your point's well taken. Vic, I'll invite people, as I said, to go to victoradair.ca, victoradair.ca.

CA. Check out the latest charts. See what Vic's thinking. In the meantime, Vic, have a terrific weekend. Thanks, Mike. And you won't be polar plunging, I want you to know, and so I insist that you think about us in the cold water coming up shortly. If people are listening to this on Saturday morning, 1 o'clock, English Bay, the tears will be flowing. Time now for this week's Goofy Award, and I'll tell you, it's a beauty.

In Canada, there's an estimated 70,000 vehicles are stolen every year. I mean, that's why it's become a big issue politically. Of course, anything can become a big political issue. But come on, 70,000 stolen vehicles, a billion dollars a year in theft claims with literally tens of thousands of stolen cars put in containers shipped out of Canada.

In Ontario and Quebec alone, an estimated 42,000 cars were stolen last year. So the Port of Montreal and the Canada Border Servants Agencies are on high alert. As Black Locks reports, 60% of the vehicles that end up at the Port of Montreal were stolen in Ontario, and they're put in steel containers shipped to countries in Africa, Mideast, and Europe.

And the government, of course, is on the case, at least according to them. But here's the problem, and it's goofy. There are only five officers at the Port of Montreal, and they're responsible for searching over 580,000 containers a year for stolen cars. And to make matters worse, it's like it's taken out of a Monty Python skit. Canada Border Agency says that the X-ray scanner used for the containers only works about half the time.

which may help explain why only 1,038 vehicles were intercepted at the Port of Montreal last year out of, what, 42,000 stolen in Quebec and Ontario. But here's the capper. Customs officers can only seize six stolen cars at a time. Why? Because all the waterfront parking is taken up, and that's all they can accommodate, according to the President of the Customs and Immigration Union. So when they get their six spaces full,

There's not any need to search any more containers because they don't have anywhere to put the stolen cars. I'll bet there's parking spaces, by the way, available in those countries in Africa, the Mideast and Europe. But what I love is to think about those people who want the government to do more and the lack of efficiency to spread in other areas of our lives. Come on, really think about it. This is like a comedy skit. As I said, we really do get the government we deserve.

P.S. I personally deserve better. What about you? Hey, that's all the time we have. And if you're listening, of course, on Saturday, we're Polar Plunging at 1 o'clock in English Bay. There is still time to help us out and donate by going to moneytalksplunge.com.

MoneyTalksPlunge.com, MoneyTalksPlunge.com. And in the meantime, I hope you do join us on Money Talks Tweets and Michael Campbell's Money Talks on Facebook. Even better if you tell friends about it because the more informed you are, the better it is. That's good for all of us there. And you can go to Mike's MoneyTalks.ca. I hope you have a terrific week.

We're sunsetting PodQuest on 2025-07-28. Thank you for your support!

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