Comment by HideousKojima

My first two rules of investing are:

#1 Don't bet more than you're willing to lose.

#2 The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.

These are widely known and I make no claims of originality. However, your story about gold market manipulation brings up a corollary to my #2 rule that I do take credit for: Never underestimate the extent to which governments and other vested interests will go to in order to keep markets irrational for as long as possible.