That’s because there’s not much middle ground. Most investors are either fanatical or supremely skeptical. If you have any doubt, check out the comments - and all the wonderful names I got called - on our website.

But since I’m a glutton for punishment, and since gold moved in exactly the opposite direction I predicted, it’s time for an update and a little clarification.

A Morsel of Clarification on Shorting Gold

Let me start off with a morsel of clarification. I don’t hate gold. I own it, or more accurately, an interest in gold via gold mining shares. And I believe a small allocation (5% to 7%) has a useful place in a well-diversified portfolio. Over the long haul, studies confirm it helps increase returns while minimizing risk. A benefit we can all agree is desirable.

But over the short-to-intermediate term - the next six to nine months - I think gold is a terrible investment. After breaching the $1,000 per ounce mark again, as I suggested would happen to my subscribers on February 2, it is overdue for a retracement back to roughly $700 per ounce.

Those of you who expected it to drop the day after I suggested shorting gold need to understand that “short term” doesn’t mean “this week.” Just because it moved higher doesn’t negate the point of the recommendation.

Long story short, I view shorting gold as a way for me to hedge my long-term holdings. For traders, it’s a profit opportunity to consider. And whether we see eye to on this is irrelevant. Ultimately, the market will be the great arbiter of our differences.

For kicks though, let’s address a few of those minor points of disagreement…

Shorting Gold is Not Really Contrarian

A small army of you suggested I was being an “arbitrary” contrarian when I suggested that it was time to start shorting gold. That no evidence, just a warm and fuzzy feeling, existed to back up my call.

Are you kidding?

Sure your “Cousin Vinnie” as chronic poster Todd opined, the trash collector or the newspaper boy might not be investing in gold. But the rest of the lemmings certainly are…

• Investments in coins and bars increased 811% in the fourth quarter, according to the World Gold Council.

• Headlines abound in the mainstream press like this one from The Financial Times - “Gold primed to be ‘mania asset.’”

• Wannabe gold bugs are paying - willfully I might add - 20% premiums for coins and small bars. Forget buying gold, we should all become coin dealers!

• Investors - like teenage girls at New Kids on the Block concerts in the late 1980s - can’t reach out and touch the SPDR Gold ETF (GLD) enough.