Jean-Philippe Decarie, La Presse ( Google translation )



The last time I met Pierre Lassonde, he was president of Newmont, largest gold company in the world. It was 10 years ago and an ounce of gold traded at U.S. $ 300. He created a stir by declaring that gold would trade in the next 12 months at a price of U.S. $ 350. A prediction that has yet proven.

Since that meeting in 2002, much has changed, but Pierre Lassonde has never lost faith nor passion that has always grown at the place of the precious metal.

He first left Newmont in 2008 to take a year off and later retired. But after a few months in the south of France, he understood that it was not for the lazy.

So he bought the company Franco-Nevada he had founded in 1983 and had sold to Newmont in 2001 at a cost of $ 3.2 billion. "I paid 1.2 billion to buy Franco-Nevada and it is now worth 5 billion," he calculates with a twinkle in his eyes.

He is now chairman and he is still passionate about gold, quest, trade and especially her great development potential.

Pierre Lassonde was visiting in Montreal yesterday to lather the fundraising campaign of the new building of the National Museum of Fine Arts of Quebec since he is chairman of the board of MNBAQ and co-chair of its fundraising campaign.

Like all investors, Pierre Lassonde has closely followed all last summer meteoric rise of gold prices, which reached the record mark of U.S. $ 1,920 at the beginning of September.

Although the precious metal has lost its luster and has since closed down again yesterday to U.S. $ 1661, this decline is only temporary as Pierre Lassonde.

"I have caught you in 2002 when I told you that an ounce of gold would cross the $ 350 mark. Well, I'll surprise you again - for the same reasons - telling you that an ounce of gold would eventually reach the value of the Dow Jones. It's simple, it's mathematical.

"When you look at a graph of the changing price of gold and the Dow Jones over 100 years, we realize that gold has always displayed a price equal to the index . In 1934, after the great stock market crash, the ounce of gold was exactly the number of points the Dow Jones. In 1980, an ounce of gold was U.S. $ 800 and the Dow was at 800 points, "he states.

The only period where the correlation between the two references was completely out of phase took place between 1980 and 2000, after the advent of larger bull stock market history.

"In 2000, the Dow was worth 42 times the price of gold. The greatest distortion of history. The gap has only narrowed since. Gold will make up the Dow Jones. Today, the Dow is at 13,000 points, it could be the goal. Note that the index may drop to 8000 or 10 000 points, "says Pierre Lassonde.

The engineer and philanthropist will engage more in our issue of Saturday.