Anyone else notice that gold is at an all time high?
Anyone else made a bit nervous by that?
Tag Archives: silver
Article – What Venezuelan savers can teach everyone else
The old standard for guarding against hyperinflation has always been gold and, to a lesser degree, silver. But, as seen in many wartime economies, certain goods hold their value across board… most notably cigarettes, booze, and …ahem…’personal services’. There’s a handful of occupations that are, basically, recession- and depression-proof: food, medical, weapons, entertainment, and sex. Doesn’t matter if it’s a war or a depression – everyone wants to eat, everyone wants to live, everyone wants to protect themselves, everyone wants to forget, and everyone wants to get some action.
Of course it’s kinda hard to transport some of those goods in a convenient manner which is why we have a medium of exchange – gold.
About this point in the conversation the shortsighted jump in and say that if you can’t eat it or shoot it, it’s worthless. After all, they argue, if you were dropped in the middle of the Andes with a suitcase full of gold you’d starve/freeze/etc.
This is, of course, quite true. But it fails to take into account that economic disasters rarely happen overnight. They are usually a gradual-but-increasingly-steep slope. The gold gets you the things you need to survive that drop into the Andes. Somewhere between “normal” and “Mad Max” is where the gold come into play. When the local backpacking supply shop won’t accept currency, the gas stations won’t take plastic, and the gun stores won’t take a check….that’s where the metals come in handy.
But…thats my opinion. I hedge my bets….metals, ammo, fuel, food, etc.
Whats up with silver
I’ve been noticing that silver has been in the (mostly) below $15 range for the last couple weeks. At one point it very briefly dipped below $14, which was pretty surprising. Problem is, you head down to your local metals dealer to by some you wind up at dang near $20/oz. because of the premiums. Whats up with that?
As I understand it, delivery times on physical silver (and, really, why would you own anything else) are pushed out pretty far. Want a ‘monster box’ (500 ct.) of Silver Eagles? Pay now and we’ll call you in a few weeks when it arrives. And that’s not just Eagles…pretty much all the nationally minted stuff is backed out, too. The generics aren’t much better. Sunshine makes the plancehttes for the US mint, so getting Sunshines is also an exercise in patience. So while the generics have a lower premium than the nationally minted stuff, you’re still looking at waits for anything in quantity.
It seems that the only thing that isn’t on backorder is ‘junk silver’…the pre-’65 coins. Which makes sense since there is no manufacturing bottleneck on those…they’re already made. I want to say the junk stuff was going for around 14-15x face value the other day…which means ten dollars worth of dimes, or ten dollars worth of quarters, will set you back $140-150.
I rather like Canadian Maples and Sunshine rounds for their anti-counterfeiting measures. The Maples are hard to get right now but I can usuualy find some Sunshine Buffaloes in the ‘generic bin’.
I’m not sure where the price of silver is going but I would say its almost certainly going to go up. The days of $6 silver are, I think, gone for a long time. I’d say $15 is about the new normal for this sort of thing. Of course that can change depending on how the markets go…when the markets get wonky people run for something that holds value a little better. And, of course, us ‘anti-government, survivalist’ types always feel a little better with our holdings diversified into tangibles….ammo, guns, fuel, silver, gold, cash, etc.
If you think you want some silver and don’t mind the wait (which really isn’t even a choice at the moment) go rattle the cage of the Metals Pimp.
Silver stuff
Silver is still below $16 and to me that is still a bargain. Even if silver drops to its old price of less than $10 an ounce I will continue to buy all the way down. Why? Because I know that it will go up again.
Speaking of silver, the Metals Pimp dropped by the other day and handed me one of these:
Said one of you crazy guys bought some from him and told him to pass a Maple off to me. So, to that kind soul, I say ‘Thank you’! When we come crawling out of the fallout shelters to face the new, currency-less world of the post-apocalypse I’ll have a head start on every one else as I use this to purchase pre-holocaust Twinkies and post-holocaust pole dances.
SIlver
Silver actually dipped below $16.00 the other day for a brief time. At the moment it’s around $16.30. To me, its time to buy. Is the price going to go even lower? Maybe..thats why I wouldnt spend all my money on it right now. And while I can’t be sure it will be going down further, I am confident that, eventually, it will be a good deal higher than what it is now.
When silver is limp, call the Pimp!
(Which reminds me, I need to redo my post about the Metals Pimp) Yay for cached versions!
The Metals Pimp
Every time I post about gold-n-silver someone usually comments about “where can I go to get a fair price and ……”. So, I’m making this post and will wind up just putting a link to it in any post I make about gold/silver since folks always seem to want to know a good source.
So… my buddy runs Montana Rarities. He buys and sells gold and silver, as well as, sometimes, doing trades for them as well. (As in, you trade ‘x’ amounts of one metal for ‘y’ amount of the other.) He’s very knowledgable, a straight-shooter, and is far more easygoing and fair than a lot of people I’ve seen in this business.
When he started this business and was looking for ideas, I suggested a subscription plan where a person could set up a repeating transaction once a month and acquire gold or silver. He drafts your bank account for, say, $200 every 15th of the month (you pick the amount and the day) and on the 15th of every month he sends you $200 worth of gold or silver (whichever you specified) at whatever the rate was on that day. Basically, set it and forget it. Here’s a link to the page describing how it works. If you want to sock away some metal without the hassle of following prices, and dealing with shipping and credit card numbers every month, it’s the way to go…a fire-n-forget way of accumulating your stash of metals.
Is he a good value? Well, certainly he’s the best deal in town here. Is he the best on the itnernet? Beats me. I suppose if you order 5000 ounces at a time from APMEX you might get a better deal, but if youre going to be doing a bit less volume than that I’d stack him against anyone. In fact, I usually give him a huge ration of crap about how his premium percentages are smaller than pretty much everyone’s.
Now, sure, I’m biased. I’ve known him for years, and watched him start this business from the ground up….back when a $300 sale was reason to celebrate. Nowadays a $5,000 sale barely raises his heartbeat. Why? Mostly because a lot of those $300 sales turned out to be guys ‘testing the waters’ to see if he was a good guy to do business with. Once they did a few ‘nickle-n-dime’ sales with him and realized how great he was to deal with, the real money started changing hands. Can;t buy that kinda customer loyalty, ya gotta earn it.
Anyway, before you go plunk down your slowly dissolving greenbacks at one of the big-name guys’ websites, check him out and see if you cant get a better value from him. Even if the prices ‘tween the two are virtually the same, you’ll probably get much better customer service from him.
