Investment expert warns of financial collapse this year, says to invest in a secure, rural farm

(NaturalNews) What's the most valuable commodity you can have in your investment portfolio? Cash money? Gold? A "safe" 401K?

Sure, all of those are good, numerous financial experts have said, noting that diversifying one's portfolio - not keeping all of your financial eggs in one basket -- is always a good idea.

But one investment guru says the primary thing you will need to survive the next great economic disaster -- one he says is looming -- is land and, in particular, rural land, where you can be safe from the outrages that will be committed in the urban centers and were you can produce your own food and provisions.

As reported by a number of outlets, the world is going crazy with its printing of fiat money -- trillions of dollars worth of paper, essentially, that only has value because "the global financial system" says so. What if that "system" were to fail, though?

Even so, the trillions being printed -- first by the U.S. and now being planned by the European Central Bank (a strategy called "quantitative easing") -- are largely having an effect on asset prices since, as noted by the website SHTFPlan.com, "most of that money ends up in the hands of private banking cartels that continue to manipulate financial markets world-wide."

QE all over, all the time

The site further notes:

And though their activities have given investors and the general public the perception of success, the reality is that we are in serious economic trouble. Otherwise, why would central banks need to forcibly keep interest rates near zero and continue to slam massive amounts of cash into equities and other markets?

Because of what is happening in the financial markets, contrarian investor Marc "Dr. Doom" Faber is suggesting that leery investors begin looking at ways to "short sell" actions of the world's central banks.

In an interview with MarketWatch (MW), Faber says that at some point in the near future people all over the world are going to realize that what's been pawned off to them as sound economic policy (all of the QE) is really just a sham. And when that happens, he says, all confidence in the central banking systems of many countries will be lost -- and when that happens, very few investments will survive the financial fallout.

However, Faber says positioning yourself correctly will enable you to ride out the storm.

"I'm positive [that] gold will go up substantially [this year] -- say 30 percent," said the author of the investment letter Gloom Boom Doom (GBD) Report.

"My belief is that the big surprise this year is that investor confidence in central banks collapses," he said at Societe Generale's global strategy presentation in London recently. "And when that happens -- I can't short central banks, although I'd really like to, and the only way to short them is to go long gold, silver and platinum. That's the only way. That's something I will do."

Gold reached an all-time high of $1,900 an ounce in September 2011 but has fallen 35 percent since then. Faber thinks the coming fate of the world's financial system will make it more valuable again. And already this year, as MW reported, investors are liking gold; it's value has increased 4.1 percent in 2015.

Land is key

"We simply have highly inflated asset markets. Real estate is high, stocks are high, bonds are high, art prices are high, and interest rates and short-term deposits are basically zero," Faber said. "The only sector that I think is very inexpensive is precious metals, and in particularly precious-metals stocks."

In recent GBD reports, Faber has elaborated on what he sees as a worsening global economic and geopolitical system.

In the end, he says, the best investment for Americans wanting to protect themselves from the financial storm -- which still could be a few years off, he says -- is self-sufficiency and land.

"That's why I'm telling everybody, you ought to own some land... Because paper money and bonds are very vulnerable over the next five to ten years," he advised.

Read more Marc Faber predictions here.

Sources:

http://www.shtfplan.com

http://www.theguardian.com

http://www.marketwatch.com

http://www.moneynews.com