Who is Brian?

Brian is passionate about life and seeks to succeed in whatever he pursues.

Having spent over 16 years in the higher education industry teaching actuarial studies, statistics, finance, accounting, economics and risk management, Brian has an in-depth understanding of the theoretical foundations of the financial markets and how to analyse a wide range of data. While he delivered high quality lectures and engaged in academic research, he found time to invest his savings into the financial markets. For a number of years, he would make some gains but gave a lot of it back.

However, in early 2013, his fortunes would change.

Meeting with an old primary school friend one April after church, this friend opened his mind to the world of central banking and he got a glimpse into how large financial institutions would act in their own interest at the expense of the general population. From that point on, he would research deeper into this rabbit hole. From Mike Maloney to Tekoa da Silva, then to Peter Schiff, Rick Rule and Eric Sprott, he diligently read their literature and digested their interviews and talks until he could understand the dynamics of the gold mining industry.

As the gold bear market mauled many investors who ventured in this industry, he would persist, even as his losses mounted. However, he was tenacious and so managed to endure to experience the 2015-2016 gold bull market. Not only did he recoup his past losses, he accumulated sufficient funds to allow him to pursue investing as more than just a side hobby.

Since early 2017, he began to build his own database to record operational, financial and metallurgic information of various ASX-listed gold mining companies. Having gained an intuition from his past few years of success, he tested this with the data and wrote some research reports on his findings on Hotcopper in 2018. These reports were very well received and in late 2018, he commenced writing his valuation and SWOT analysis reports for selected gold mining companies and regularly posted them online via social media and stock discussion forums.

As he gains momentum on this path, he has decided to establish his own fund, the Australian Gold Fund, putting his strategy and research skill to the test under public scrutiny.

As of April 2021, Brian has accepted a contract to be an editor with Port Phillip Publishing, the Australian-based subsidiary of the well-renowned independent media publisher, Agora Financial. He will be managing two subscriber investment products focusing on gold mining stocks. You can find his company reports and analysis as a subscriber of these products. He will no longer publish these reports on this site. The portfolio performance updates will continue to be presented in this site.

The hard work has paid off and a new chapter is about to begin.

Our Expertise and Skills

Invest in Precious Metals and Mining Companies

Our fund purchases precious metals mining companies, predominantly on the ASX with a focus on producers and late-stage developers. We also purchase units in exchange-traded funds exposed to gold, silver and platinum group metals (PGM). The fund may sometimes hold, where appropriate, physical bullion and coins.

We have identified a potential to create a niche in the ASX-listed gold mining companies space. Most gold mining investment funds that are active have holdings of companies listed outside of the ASX and hence are subject to currency differentials and legislative differences. Our fund seeks to offer a unique exposure to ASX-listed gold mining companies, which nevertheless have mining operations overseas. However, focusing on the ASX keeps the fund more manageable and can exploit the advantages inherent in the ASX, which is still not being given the attention it deserves. Companies trading on the ASX may be trading at a discount compared to their peers listed on the New York Stock Exchange, Toronto Stock Exchange and London Stock Exchange. Furthermore, the weakness of the Australian dollar has made the gold price in our local currency more attractive than the gold price in US dollar terms, allowing gold mining companies with operations denominated in Australian dollars to enjoy better returns.

Mining Company Research

We build our own mining company database and access supplementary information to inform our investment decisions. Our methodology is predominantly based on fundamental analysis, although we developed our own valuation metrics. We also provide insights into our investment analysis in the form of company reports and in-depth research articles.

Unlike most investment houses who use discounted-cash flow models and price multiples to value mining companies, we use the Enterprise Value approach.

General Economic Analysis

We offer a contrarian, evidence-based perspective to evaluating the state of the global and local economy. Inspired by the likes of Nassim Taleb, Peter Schiff, Doug Casey and Eric Sprott, we do not believe in what the official statistics or expert narrative tell us. Rather, we will investigate the raw data ourselves, observe market activity in the streets and shopping malls, and test the validity of popular opinion. Our views are backed by sound statistical methods and commonsense, and may sometimes conflict with the widely accepted consensus. We dare to take the position of the minority and walk the path less taken, as we believe that to beat the crowd, one cannot be following the crowd.