Peter Schiff

Infobox Celebrity
name = Peter Schiff

---

imagesize = 150px
caption =
occupation = author, economic adviser, fund manager, investor
website = [http://www.europac.net www.europac.net]

Peter Schiff is the president of [http://www.europac.net/ Euro Pacific Capital Inc.] , a brokerage firm based in Darien, Connecticut. Peter adheres to the principles of the Austrian School of Economics and the Ludwig von Mises Institute [http://www.mises.org] . Schiff frequently appears as a guest on CNBC, Fox News, and Bloomberg Television and is often quoted in major financial publications.

Schiff points to the low savings rates of the United States as its worst malady, citing the transformation from being the world's largest creditor nation in the '70s to the largest debtor nation at the turn of 2000. His extremely bearish views on the US Dollar, the United States stock market, bond market, and the United States economy have earned him the nickname "Dr. Doom." [http://www.europac.net/prophet.asp]

He was an economic adviser for the Ron Paul campaign to win the 2008 Republican Party nomination for the Presidency. [ [http://www.ronpaul2008.com/press-releases/171/peter-schiff-named-economic-advisor-to-the-ron-paul-2008-presidential-campaign Peter Schiff Named Economic Advisor to the Ron Paul 2008 Presidential Campaign — Ron Paul 2008 ] ] Schiff writes a weekly commentary about current economic conditions. His father is tax protester Irwin Schiff.

Schiff wrote a book called "Crash Proof" - 2007 (ISBN 978-0-470-04360-8) and also hosts a live internet radio show called " [http://www.europac.net/radioshow.asp Wall Street Unspun] .""Prophet of Doom? Darien market bear says U.S. investors' ship is sinking," article by Julie Fishman-Lapin in "The Advocate" of Stamford, Business section, August 6, 2006, pp. F1, F6]

Education

Peter Schiff was born in New Haven, Connecticut and was raised in Manhattan and Miami. He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1987 with a degree in finance and accounting.

Career

Schiff began his career in financial consulting with Shearson Lehman Brothers. [http://www.europac.net/team.asp] Official biographical sketch of Schiff at Euro Pacific Capital Inc. Web site, accessed August 20, 2006] He launched Euro Pacific Capital in 1996 when he bought a broker-dealer in Florida without clients or revenues and then reincorporated the business in California. In 2005 Schiff relocated to Darien, Connecticut in order to find brokers "who think like him," according to an article in "The Advocate" of Stamford, Connecticut. The New York Metropolitan Area, he said, has the biggest concentration of brokers in the country, making it easier to recruit them, he said.

The company retains an office in Newport Beach, California as well as in Phoenix and Medford, Oregon. Schiff said in August 2006 that he planned to open offices eventually in Manhattan and somewhere in the Midwest.

Schiff holds NASD Series 4, 7, 24, 27, 53, 55, and 63 licenses.

In an August 2006 interview Schiff generated much controversy when he repeated his long-held investment thesis: "The United States economy is like the Titanic and I am here with the lifeboat trying to get people to leave the ship ...I see a real financial crisis coming for the United States." On May 16, 2006 in debate on Fox News, Schiff accurately had forecast that the U.S. housing market was a bubble that would soon come to bust. [ [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60CLQse27p8] Peter Schiff's accurate forecast of the housing collapse] On December 13, 2007 in a Bloomberg interview on the show "Open Exchange", Schiff further added that he felt that the crisis would extend to the credit card lending industry. [ [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5786330387747098530] Peter Schiff's accurate forecast of credit card market trouble] Following this observation, it was soon reported on December 23, 2007 by the Associated Press that "The value of credit card accounts at least 30 days late jumped 26 percent to $17.3 billion in October from a year earlier at 17 large credit card trusts examined by the AP... At the same time, defaults -- when lenders essentially give up hope of ever being repaid and write off the debt -- rose 18 percent to almost $961 million in October, according to filings made by the trusts with the Securities and Exchange Commission." [ [http://money.cnn.com/2007/12/23/news/economy/credit_card_crunch.ap/] December 2007 Associate Press Story on Credit Card Defaults validates Schiff's gloomy predictions]

Schiff also references the role of the US consumer in the world, saying that the US consumer thinks he's doing the world a favor by consuming what the rest of the world produces. He is quick to point-out that this relationship will come to an end, in his view, much sooner than people imagine, and with negative consequences for the US. Schiff has been quoted as saying: "Consumption is its own reward for Production" -- meaning that without production, the US cannot indefinitely sustain its ongoing consumption. Schiff, and other adherents of Austrian economics, promote "savings" as "the engine of economic growth -- not consumption."

Peter Schiff heavily endorsed Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul [ [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UuivYdiS5w Peter Schiff's endorsement for Ron Paul] ] and started an e-mail campaign [ [http://dailypaul.com/node/6092 Peter Schiff's e-mail campaign asking for donations to Ron Paul] ] asking his clients and colleagues to donate the legal maximum of $2,300 to the Ron Paul presidential campaign. Schiff has more recently endorsed Murray Sabrin for the US Senate seat in NJ. [http://www.murraysabrin.com/PressReleases.aspx?ID=42]

Peter Schiff has written a book called "Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse" in 2007 about how to respond to the falling US dollar and the looming - and more and more publicly ongoing - crisis and how to invest in order to turn a profit even in an economic downturn for the US.

Ron Paul 2008 Campaign

On January 25, 2008, Peter Schiff was appointed as an economic adviser in Ron Paul's presidential campaign. Schiff made the following statement concerning Paul's economic revitalization plan:

::We need a plan that stimulates savings and production not more of the reckless borrowing and consumption that got us into this mess in the first place. Ron Paul’s plan is the only one that amounts to a step in the right direction. If you want meaningful change - for the better that is - Ron Paul is the only candidate capable of delivering it. The others merely promise to continue the failed policies that are at the root of our current economic problems. [cite news |title=Peter Schiff Named Economic Advisor to the Ron Paul 2008 Presidential Campaign |url=http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS255917+25-Jan-2008+BW20080125 |work=Reuters.com nline News |publisher=Reuters |date=2008-01-25 |accessdate=2008-10-08 ]

Footnotes

External links

* [http://www.europac.net/dollardoom.asp Euro Pacific Capital Inc., with picture of Peter Schiff]
* [http://www.europac.net/archives.asp Peter Schiff's investment commentary]