Gold/Silver Investing Question

[squid8286]

Other than the vast difference in price between an ounce of gold and silver, is one or the other considered better to invest in? Obviously with gold being much higher, you would have a lot less material laying around if you invested in gold. I know that gold is used as a conductor in the electrical industry, and silver is used in film processing. I guess with the advent of digital photography, this will be less and less common. What are some of the less obvious pros/cons of each?

[borderguy]

Silver is your better investment.
It may double or go even higher.
Less outlay, higher profit potential.

[DigitalNY]

When the SHTF you can bet that the value of silver and gold will rise ten-fold or greater. Personally I put up silver and gold.

I keep silver because it's more manageable. If I have to barter with someone for say a vehicle alternator. I'd much rather be able to shell out a 1 ounce .999 silver round that I paid $11 for and which could very well be worth the equivalent of $60-$100 Post-SHTF than have to shell out a .10 ounce gold US mint coin that I paid $62 for that could be bartered for the equivalent of $500 in goods. The person your trading with may not have quantities of silver to use as change if your using gold.*

I keep gold because it's a greater value :: ounce ratio. It's easier to keep large quantities of value in gold and because it's smaller it's easier to conceal. My rule of thumb is to keep 2x my gold value in silver. This is because of the fact that if I'm trading I'm likely to receive gold and I want to have silver to give as change.

*These figures are of course right off the top of my head and there's no way to tell what silver & gold would be worth Post-SHTF in a scenario that leaves us with no government backed currency worth diddly. You can bet your petunias that it'd rise and my guess would be at least 4-5 fold and possibly greater than ten-fold.

DigitalNY

[Jules343]

I have some silver that I was thinking about selling. Prices are pretty good right now are they expected to go even higher? I know that it's impossible to predict the market, but anybody care to enlighten me with any tips?

[keiser]

I personally think you are looking at this gold/silver issue wrong. When you buy gold with paper money printed by the private corp called the "federal reserve", you should not expect that you will make any money on that gold. Gold today buys the same basic product it did in Roman days, so if you had bought gold 2000 years ago, you would be able to buy no more today then you did then. You do not make money on gold. True, you may be able to get more pieces of paper from the federal reserve corp for that gold down the road, but that is not because you made money. The truth is that the paper is worth less due to the current monetary policies of running the printing presses day and night. When I buy gold, I don't assume I will be any better off in 10 years of when the SHTF happens than I am today. However, I can be assured that the paper money being printed by the fed is going to buy less and less every day. Investing in it is a sure loss.

Another thing to consider is that people may not take gold or silver for their goods. I have had this happen several times. People who believe in the fed's paper do not believe in gold or silver. As such, they see no value in it. The majority of the people fall in this bucket else our whole economy would have already collapsed. Money is whatever the majority believe it to be. Right now, they believe that piece of paper has value and they do not in general believe in the value of gold or silver. Anyone who believes having gold or silver in a SHTF situation is going to save the day may be sadly mistaken given how stupid the generally dumb public is on money matters.

[buckshot007]

I have more moneys worth of Gold than Silver so I will be getting more Silver 1 oz rounds as soon as I can afford it.

I think it is worth hoarding both if possible and will eventually aim to have a ratio of 20 oz silver to 1 oz Gold.

In my Bug out bag I have a plastic green top tube of 20x 1oz Silver eagles and 1x 1oz Gold Eagle.

This should be a good emergency source of funds for purchase of necessary items or for bribing officials.

[Jules343]

I understand what many of you are saying about the worth of gold and silver, but I didn't purchase the silver so it's free money. I could use the cash today for things that need to be paid for, i.e. bills/books for school.

Anyway how much is silver expected to get up to?

[J-Man]

Well, look at it this way. Silver has more than doubled in price in the last five years, and this bull market is FAR from over. The long term fundamentals are in place for silver to go MUCH higher. I personally see a minimum of $50/oz and $150/oz is not out of the question. Even some of the worlds most savy investors are buying silver. Warren Buffet owns at least 129 MILLION ounces of silver. Bill Gates and George Soros have significant positions in silver too. What do these billionaires know that we don't? Well, they aren't selling yet....

[Treborer]

Laying up treasure takes capitol out of the economy, investment grows an economy.

Greed and Avarice have a price too.

No jobs=more Goblins....

More Goblins=more weapons/dogs/alarms so I guess it all works out.

Rode this horse in the late 1970's-early 80's, it was good.

Buy low , sell high. Silver bought at 3.50 sold at 29.00, Gold bought at 32.00 sold at 399.00, if i'd waited one more day it would have been 800.00, after that controls came down hard.

Most of the 1980's and 1990's it was steady state, Savings bonds paid better...
:p

Buy LOW-Sell HIGH
:uhoh: :beer:

Any and all gain went to Doctors for family, so WTF?

If the Family had just come over the border they'd have gotten the same treatment-free.

Best laid plans often go astray.

LIVE were the nieghbors like you, and the air is good, and there is water.

Be Blessed, hard to squeeze water from sand, and favor from aliens.

:bigangel:

[brownknees]

Silver!
Here's why.
Gold is taxable as bullion, silver is not.
One photo plant I worked in had the owner retaining all the reclaimed silver as his "retirement account", we were pulling about 45Lbs a month out of the chemistry, so he had quite a lot after 20 years.
A salesman convinced him to trade it for gold, because of the volume of space tied up in securing several cubic feet of silver.
He did.
Then he got an assessment of his bullion storage which he had to pay!
Boy was he mad!

[squid8286]

Thanks for the info.