I came across this great new bead jewelry line a while back, Halia. With the beads and beading simply exploding over the last couple of years, thank you Pandora, I wasn’t terribly surprised to a slightly more elegant bead jewelry line to appear.

Halia offers the fairly usual assortment of silver charms and cable bracelets, many with gold accents, but what I really like are the carved gem charms. The carved gems are made in stones such as amethyst, carnelian, and blue topaz and look simply elegant. The other beads that really grabbed my attention are the Murano Charms.

The Murano beads come in many colors and patterns and are simply stunning. I may pick a few up for myself.

Halia beads are reasonably priced, starting at about $19 each, and most definitely worth taking a closer look at the next time you are shopping for some charms.

Are you still clinging to your gold investments? It’s time to seriously consider dumping them. The writing is on the wall. That’s my opinion. But let’s take a closer look at what needs to happen for you to realize a gain. At today’s prices, you’d have to believe…

- The US dollar is going to completely collapse and be replaced as the global currency.
- That inflation is going to return to double digits.
- That nations in debt (US included) are going to default.
- That the almost infinite supply (yes, I said infinite) dries up.
- That all the sovereign wealth funds of the world become insolvent.
- That the IMF and Central banks do not flood the market with a sell off.

If you truly believe all these things are going to happen I’d suggest buying things like canned food, water, weapons, etc., that you can actually use in your cave.

Gold is soaring to historic highs. I have long suggested a ‘false demand’ fueled by speculation, self interest, and the powerful motivating factor called greed, has been and will the driving force behind the price of gold. We saw the very same motivators drive Wall Street… until the walls came tumbling down because the underlying fundamentals were simply not there to support them. Is gold headed down that same path right before our eyes?

I read a very interesting commentary by Jon Nadler, a senior analyst at Kitco Bullion Dealers Montreal this morning that is definitely worth a read…

Carry On-Greed Knows No Bounds

For the first time in more than 20 years gold has hit the $800 per ounce mark. As little as 3 years ago gold was just $400 / oz. While there are a lot of reasons for this dramatic rise in price, one thing is sure, it has affected the cost of jewelry and will continue to as prices continue to climb.