"Following Doug Kass' Prediction Of A 25% Drop In Gold, Here Is How His Other Recent Forecasts Have Fared"

On July 1 MarketBeat had a post "Doug Kass Calls Another Bottom. He Missed the Top, But Still." which appears at first glance to have turned out okay unless you know that on his twitter feed he started talking shorts within six weeks. As far as I can tell the guy uses the old boiler room technique of calling for opposite results so that he can always point to a prognostication that foretold whatever transpired.
My comment at the time:

Matt,
There are retail stockbrokers with ten times the assets under management that “Dougie” has.
We gave him a look and were not impressed.
A manager is either a pro or a promoter, there aren’t many who can be both.
For the record, we followed Faber’s lead and called the bottom on March 10. Big whoop.
MarketBeat was pointing out the MBS and CMBS problems in Spring ‘07 and the disconnect between equities and debt in August ‘07, two months before the top and three months before Kass.

 Here's another of his calls, back in '08:
Kass Shorts Berkshire on Investment Style: Barron's (BRK.A)

From ZeroHedge:

Last night Doug Kass appeared on CNBC's Fast Money and caught the attention of the few who were watching the show with his gloomy prediction that gold would drop by 25% in the next year. As we noted last night, Kass' "thesis" was nothing more than a recap of the bearish half of the "All that glitters" letter released by Oaktree's Chairman Howard Marks, and not even a mention of the bullish section of the letter. That's fine. In fact, we welcomed this development as it at least partially offset the bullish sentiment on gold espoused by Kass' partner at The Street Jim Cramer, whose glowing recommendation of gold has had us very concerned about the price action in the precious metal into year end: after all there is no surer kiss of death that Cramer liking something. That said, as for Mr. Kass' predictive abilities, we would like to present his prior set of forecasts, specifically his prediction for 2010 issued a year ago almost to the day. With a predictive "hit rate" of about 25%, it is rather safe to assume that gold's path to $2,000 and higher is probably quite safe...
Doug Kass' entertaining set of prediction for 2010.

1. There is a glaring upside to first-quarter 2010 corporate profits (up 100% year over year) and first-quarter 2010 GDP (up 4.5%). It grows clear that, owing to continued draconian cost cuts, coupled with a series of positive economic releases and a long list of company profit guidance increases in mid to late January and early February, there is a very large upside to first-quarter GDP (up 4.5%) and, even more important, to S&P profit growth (which doubles!). The upside on both counts is in sharp contrast to more muted growth expectations. While corporate managers, economists and strategists raise earnings per share, full-year growth and S&P target estimates, surprisingly, the U.S. equity market fails to respond positively to the much better growth dynamic, and the S&P 500 remains tightly range-bound (between 1,050 and 1,150) into spring 2010.
2. Housing and jobs fail to revive. An outsized first-quarter 2010 GDP (up 4.5.%) print is achieved despite a still moribund housing market and without any meaningful improvement in the labor market (excluding the increase in census workers) as corporations continue to cut costs and show little commitment to adding permanent employees.
3. The U.S. dollar explodes higher. After dropping by over 40% from 2001 to 2008, the U.S. dollar continued to spiral lower in the last nine months of 2009. Our currency's recent strength will persist, however, surprising most market participants by continuing to rally into first quarter 2010. In fact, the U.S. dollar will be the strongest major world currency during the first three or four months of the new year.
4. The price of gold topples. Gold's price plummets to $900 an ounce by the beginning of second quarter 2010. Unhedged, publicly held gold companies report large losses, and the gold sector lies at the bottom of all major sector performers. Hedge fund manager John Paulson abandons his plan to bring a new dedicated gold hedge fund to market.
5. Central banks tighten earlier than expected. China, facing reported inflation approaching 5%, tightens monetary and fiscal policy in March, a month ahead of a Fed tightening of 50 basis points, which, with the benefit of hindsight, is a policy mistake.
6. A Middle East peace is upended due to an attack by Israel on Iran. Israel attacks Iran's nuclear facilities before midyear. An already comatose U.S. consumer falls back on its heels, retail spending plummets, and the personal savings rate approaches 10%. The first-quarter spike in domestic growth is short-lived as GDP abruptly stalls....MORE