The ethics of newsletter writing

We had a fantastic dinner last night. I come from a large family and all were present last night for a total of 24 adults, including parents, siblings and their significant others. We had people from very diverse walks of life including two lawyers, two finance professionals, a philosophy major and one cop. So it was a good place to start an ethics/legal regulation debate.

I have previously discussed my new blog writing stint to them and I have most of them as regular readers. We have discussed Gary Savage before although never in such a large setting. We got around to discussing the ethics of writing newsletters for a living.

After a lot of debate, we almost unanimously we agreed that for people selling a newsletter,

1) All trades should be logged externally so no one can back track on what they said.

2) Full disclosure should involve actual trades placed for one's own account. Warnings when subscriber recommendations are not matched by placing same trades for one’s own account. So if a newsletter writer tell you to put 10% in JNUG but puts only 1% of his account money in it....a disclosure/warning should be issued. 

3) Full disclosure should involve all holdings of personal wealth. For example, it is easy for me to blow up 0.1% of my money on JNUG while espousing a 50% exposure to newbies.

4) Full disclosure as to what percentage of one’s income is dependent on subscribers versus other sources including trading.

5) A "cut-off" for losses at which point all subscription fees are refunded. 

6) The Disclaimer when subscribing should mention all this and should add that the disclaimer is rendered VOID if the newsletter fails to follow any of these. Meaning not following the rules above means you can get sued.

Gary's subscribers should encourage him to voluntarily follow these in order to improve his reputation. My suspicion is that no one who has "millions" sells newsletters for a living. Certainly does not go around begging people to sign up for a $10 trial offer.   

To Gary Savage:

Think about this Gary. You have caused people to lose a lot of money. Between the email and blog discussions I have had and the Smartmoneyexposed website, you have cost people millions. Many are suicidal. You have shown a remorseless, arrogant, approach while destroying lives. How would you feel if someone scammed you and you no longer could spend your days climbing? Sure you have a "Buyer beware" disclosure. But you never bring up the possibility of loss in your comments/commentary. You also know how wrong you have been. You have called for $20,000 Gold and 400 SPX a USD crisis multiple times, a Yen Crisis (after it had already declined), about 50-100 calls for a Gold bottom, 50-100 calls for a USD top and severe decline.  Yet every call is made with 100% certainty. If you are wrong like you have been for the last 5 years and Gold even has a mild bull market, people will lose a lot of money following your recommendations in the 3X funds. Is this what you want to be? As you go past your 57th birthday? (BTW you look quite young for your age. The rigors of trading 3X ETFs have not done any damage, perhaps because you do not trade them personally?).  If you really have those personal millions, and you don't "need" this as you have said time and again, close down your subscription. In trading as in life, our most powerful weapon is our ability to change our mind. Use yours.