“When the story comes out about this,” our colleague Bob Byrne said during a private meeting last week, “it will be absolutely wild.”

Famous authors will pen books about it. Famous directors will cast stars for it. Netflix executives are soon to circle.

Bob might even get a mention.

Because this is a story as old as time — the hunt for gold.

And, like most gold hunt stories, it’s also a story of violence, extreme danger, black markets, transformation, and… dare I say… hope.

(See? All the ingredients for a binge-worthy Apple TV special.)

Bob, if you don’t know, is a senior strategist here at Paradigm Press.

Before linking up with James, he was a private trader for twenty years. (But if you ask him what he really was, he'll tell you he was a risk manager.)

These days, he vets private deals for wealthy clients.

That’s what led him to Colombia… to vet an opportunity I bet not 1 in 50 million people know about.

Yet.

And it has everything to do with Colombia’s illegal mining business.

It’s Bigger Than You Think

You might have an idea of how big illegal mining is around the world.

You’re wrong.

It’s bigger — and wilder — than you can imagine.

Just a few examples:

In the Philippines, as much as 95% of mined gold is sold to smugglers and trafficked out of the country illegally, often to Hong Kong.

In Mongolia, “ninja miners” run illegal mining operations and smuggle over 90% of the country’s gold to China.

In Sierra Leone, the gold trafficking problem became so enormous that the country cut its mining tax in half for small miners. (That didn’t really fix anything. But, hey, they tried.)

In Brazil, up to 90% of gold mining is illegal.

In Colombia alone, there are over 2,000 illegal gold mining operations.

And they’re all raking in monstrous amounts of money… often with terrible consequences for everyone else.

Again, it’s probably worse than you think.

The Belly of the Beast

Cuba has its cigars. France has its baguettes. Switzerland has its chocolates.

And Colombia has its cocaine.

The country’s cocaine industry — and the chaos it wrought — has been notorious for decades.

Here’s the thing…

It’s actually Colombia’s black market for gold that’s been fueling the latest flames of cartel activity.

In 2015, former President Juan Manuel Santos warned that “criminal mining brings more money to criminal groups, to guerrilla groups, to mafias than drug trafficking.”

Not just by a little bit, either.

At its peak, Colombia’s illegal mining industry was raking in about $2.4 billion a year for criminal cartels — three times more than the cocaine industry.

Underneath all of these black market operations is the one thing the cartels need to grease the wheels: violence.

Which is why only a handful of Americans have dared venture into the belly of the beast…

Inside Illegal Colombian Mines

With the help of an ex-government official, Bob recently did something unheard of only a couple years ago — he saw one with his own eyes.

“It’s still dangerous,” he said, “but not as much as it was in 2020. Back then, you would’ve gotten shot. No question.”

To this day, disagreements are settled not with contracts and lawyers, but the old-fashioned way: with machetes.

And, as you can probably imagine, the mines aren’t exactly up to code.

“It looks like something from a scary movie,” said Bob. “Wires hanging down. Dark. Dingy. You walk in and… I’ll just say this… some of the workers are clearly not adults.  Go in a little further and there’s a big hole next to your foot. The guide told me, ‘Oh yeah, it drops down a couple hundred feet into water. Watch your step.’”

These holes are crucial. They’re where the gold is pulled.

The workers — yes, including those ‘clearly not adults’ — are lowered down head first and pulled up with buckets of sludge.

(And, if you’re wondering about cave-ins, yes they’re a constant problem.)

But that’s not even the worst of it.

Mud, Mercury, and Cyanide

Nearby the mines are, naturally, the illegal gold processing centers.

“OK,” said Bob. “So this is where it gets nutty. You walk in and the smell blows your hair back. I asked the guide, ‘What is that smell?’ It’s all Korean-branded cyanide. Tons of it. And then, you look into the tumblers and they’re full of mercury.”

Those chemicals have to end up somewhere. But they don’t just end up somewhere. They end up everywhere.

It’s hard to imagine, but the surrounding areas were once pristine jungle. Now they’re toxic landfills, scorched by chemicals.

Tragic, but not unexpected: local birth defects are not uncommon.

“Some of these mines and processing centers have been operating for 30 to 35 years,” said Bob. “And they’re disgusting. The guide showed me pictures of before and after. It looks like a documentary from Al Gore. It’s nuts.”

Black Market Gold

If you walk past the kids playing in the mercury mud, and balance on the splintered boards past Cyanide Creek, you might find your way to the illegal storefronts selling the gold.

There, you can buy gold for a bit cheaper than your local gold hawker.

But that’s not where most of the gold ends up. Nor is it where the real money is made.

Alongside cocaine, most of that illegal gold ends up in Europe and the U.S.

That said, these shops do carry a hefty amount of gold. And where there’s a consolidation of product, there’s a consolidation of protection.

“That’s why,” says Bob, “you’ll always see some guys standing around, watching. They look like they’re on a siesta. But don’t be fooled.”

Another tell-tale sign is guard dogs.

“I saw a pit bull get into a fight with a German shepherd. It was the most horrendous thing I’ve seen outside of television.”

All of this sounds pretty bad, right?

So you must be wondering, ‘Why in the heck did Bob go there?’

I was wondering the same thing. Until he told me about the opportunity.

I can’t reveal too much too soon, but…

In short, things are changing in Colombia.

And the opportunities for early investors could be monstrous.

More tomorrow.

[Ed. note: For the record, this isn’t some fluffy, anti-profit ESG play. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance to get into the next gold rush. As we’ve said all along, the REAL opportunities are outside the ESG umbrella. Stay tuned.]