Hello, I met up with my father last weekend at a family gathering. He mentioned something about taking all our savings and turning it into gold/silver and said that the American dollar is going to be worthless. While my father is a very smart man, we don't always have time to get down to the nitty gritty. Is this true? Being honest, I have never looked into gold or silver, funny though, we have oodles of penny banks! Thanks!
He's got the right idea. Most of it anyway. Personally I wouldn't turn all my savings into gold or silver. At most I would convert 50% of it to precious metals. We still need some cash in hand.
Gold is an ideal foundation for a diversified financial portfolio because the price of gold often appreciates in response to factors that reduce the value of mere paper assets.
It is a good idea This is because in the longer run the value of gold will increase and you can sell it at a much better price.
Don't you think 50% is quite high? I am investing around 20% to 25% of my savings in bullion. Anything more than that, I consider risky.
I currently hold maybe 5% of my total assets in precious metals - mostly silver becasue it makes for a better fractional money. Important to distinguish between money and currency. Gold and silver are considered money, and paper 'stuff' is currency (as I guess too are Bit Coins). Money has finite limits as to how much is available (can only mine it so fast and now at substantial cost due to the lower grade ores needed to obtain the 'money'). Printing presses are limited only by the availability of paper and ink. That in itself turned out to be a problem in German Wiemar republic. Is the accumulation of PM's a rational approach to protecting your wealth? I guess if you don't have much else to do with your currency. I think of it this way. When I was working at a 'convenience store' such as it was back in the 1960's, I could take three Ag dimes and a nickel and buy a gallon of gasoline back then. I can pretty much do that today, although I have to convert the Ag dimes to currency first, then I can buy the gas. I dare say 95+% of today's convenience store clerks haven't the foggiest idea of the difference between pre-65 coins and today's modern coins.
When people say "20% of wealth in silver or gold" does this mean any type of silver and gold like a generic bar or does it have to be currency like a silver eagle or gold eagle. ??
Your choice. As to silver, I focus on older coins that 'may' have some numismatic value, although in the EOTWAWKI, the rarity probably won't matter much. To me, it's maybe a little easier to pay a slight premium for US govt. coins over that for 1 0z silver planchets. The silver bars may necessitate the cost of an assay. And I can buy silver coins on the open market in $50-100 increments easier than finding bars or planchets. As to gold, I don't buy too many of those, but when I do . . . I buy recognized coins, e.g. Krugerands, Canadian Maple Leafs?, American gold eagles or the older US gold coins.
Assay is the material analysis to verify the purity of the precious metal. Usually there is a cost, and it is often? usually born by the seller. EOTWAWKI = end-of--the-world-as-we-know-it planchets are the silver rounds stamped out by (usually) some non-governmental organization that imprint some type of historical or geographical or event AND stated purity on what is usually a 1 ounce coin.
