Wow...Adam, I am impressed with you. Most kids are out there buy toys and blowing their money and you are investing in the stock market...wow! In my humble opinion, the time to sell has passed. If you sell now, you will be throwing money away. Trust me when I tell you, it is now just panic selling. But if you looked at the market today, it bounced back a little today, enough where I gained back $6,000 that I lost. Two weeks ago, I sold my Sprint stock that I bought back in 2011 for $2.64 a share and sold it 2 weeks ago at around $10 a share and now I have about $124,000 in my account. But, because T-Mobile is buying Sprint, I just waited for T-Mobile to drop and I went all in and bought $124,000 in T-Mobile shares. They prediction is that T-Mobile will be the #1 telecom in 5G. So this is why I moved my Sprint share over to T-Mobile (ticker: TMUS) Plus, I just happened to have an extra $100,000 that I will be investing in 5G stocks. But I can't get a hold of this money for another 3 weeks. But I plan to invest that in a few 5G stocks. I made the majority of my money investing in Marijuana Pot stocks. Which are all penny stocks, which are very volatile. investing in Penny stock is a whole different ball game than investing in Blue Chip stocks. But if you are interested, I would be more than happy to tell you how I changed my $34,000 into $400,000 investing in Pot stocks. Just PM me and I will tell you how I did it. Anyways, good luck, and I just want to add that, even though I don't know you, I'm pretty impressed!
Every time PM has gone up, numismatic premiums decline. Tons of coins that used to sell for premiums sell for melt. Happened in 1980 and 2011. That was my point, if it is a choice between 3 better coins or 4 worst ones, if PM spikes the 4 coins will always be worth more.
Absolutely love it that you're investing in a such a young age. I started around age 14, I had to have my mother set up UTMA accounts for me. I would strongly recommend that you do not sell your stocks. I am hoping that you're in something broadly diversified like a s&p 500 index fund, perhaps a low cost mutual fund that owns a mix of US stock index, international stock index, and in gov and corporate bonds. But regardless even if you own individual stocks, as I did when I was young, you have an exceedingly long time before you need to wind down these investments. This Long time horizon allows you to absorb even very long periods of a depressed stock market. Contrary to what many people will tell you, That's exactly what you should be hoping for! If you can accumulate twice as much stock in corporations over the next 10 years, while hypothetically prices are cheap, that will have a dramatic positive effect for you in the very long term. Think of any stock market crashes like a 20% to 30% off sale. I assume you don't have earned income yet, and probably have a taxable brokerage account. A UTMA or UGMA. Keep in mind, any selling of stocks will likely result in capital gains. In short, you'll have to give up a chunk of your profits to the government. (If you do somehow have your own income from working, possibly also set up a retirement account that's tax advantaged. A your age a Roth would be amazing. ) I think you should think of precious metals and/or coins as a hobby and not as a investment. if you insisted on investing some portion of your money in precious metals, say you should not go more than 10%. Personally I probably would only do 5% max. You don't need to sell your stocks to accomplish that 5%. Put any new monies that you would invest in stocks into the PMs until you reach that threshold. That way you can keep hold of the stocks you have now, and not sell them in a down market, and avoid any capital gains. I have a lot more to say on this subject but I'll leave it at that for now. Keep up the good work and continue to invest in stocks for the rest of your life. Don't have a short-term mentality when it comes to investing, think for the long term. Accumulate accumulate accumulate.
But while the premium in % terms DECLINES...it may RISE in absolute terms. The premium for common MS65 Saint-Gaudens in 1999-2000 was 75-100% (maybe more) but gold was $300-$325 during most of that time. The premium in absolute $$$ has generally been higher (though falling of late) the last decade, closer to 20-30% for MS65's). In absolute terms, the $$$ are higher but the % is lower.
Oops. Not before replying, lol. Still there's a lot of good replies here, regardless of the OP ever sees them. Someone will!
I'm glad you and I, others read/absorbed good advice for today. Thanks for your scholarly astute observation. Have a great today! Rich
haaaa, I answered in 2017 and then again on Thursday . Of course I knew! Mods know everything or where to find it.
JP Morgan as an example are you jocking ?? A bad example that this banks that was nearly bankrupted some years ago.
When I was in my 20s I subscribed to Money Magazine for several years. When I was just starting out as an investor I read an article that suggested 10% for precious metals. That was in the 80s, but it was my rule of thumb for many years. Not so much, any more, though. In those days most advisors recommended a certain percentage, based on your age, of your investments should be in bonds. I think many still do for older investors, but not so much for younger investors. I currently don't hold any bonds, but my 401K is spread across three index funds and one of those does have a small amount (4% I think) in bonds.
I partly agree with that, for someone who can afford to join Cramer's site, but those two books give a good fundamental understanding of how to evaluate companies and read the stock market.
Sorry. I didn't answer the second part. Something I learned in the 80s was that there are investment grade and collector grade coins. In those days, the rule, as I was taught, was XF or better was investment grade and VF or lower was collector grade. That doesn't hold true for every coin any more, but if you look at any coin in a price guide you can pick out the change where the coin changes from collector grade to investor grade. Look at a guide for any silver coin, for example, as the grades go higher, so does the price, but on virtually every coin you will find a gap; a spot where the value jumps much higher from one grade to the next. That gap is created because coins at the higher grade increase in value faster than the coins in the lower grade. That's the line between collector grade and investor grade coins and I always recommend buying to the right of that gap if you can afford it. If you're buying precious metals strictly for melt value, then I think you're right; go with the lowest price you can. But I don't personally recommend that. I like the idea that the coin could increase in value because of its numismatic worth AND/OR because the intrinsic value of the metal increases.
I understand the idea of getting more numismatic worth so as to have some collecting pleasure if you are a collector. But one has to be very careful. I have seen way too many people justify purchases as PM investments, then pay high premiums for grade. Which is it? I waste a ton of money buying coins for my hobby, but that is never investment money, that is hobby money. If you are truly buying PM as an investment, stick with low premiums IMHO. I have some coins I find interesting in my PM "pile", but never paid a premium for them. Just my view. I always get nervous people get tricked into sinking too much money into a hobby by saying it's for investment. Look at the PCGS chart for the last 30 years to show how bad US coins have been as an investment, then factor acquisition and selling costs, and it is a disaster.
Yes, this was widely claimed in the 80s -- but a lot of people learned in the late 80s/early 90s that their "investment grade coins" were actually a terrible investment.
Are YOU joking ? JP Morgan was never "nearly bankrupted" during the Credit Crisis. Don't believe the Fake News Media Elite who don't know what they are talking about 90% of the time. And a report from their equity department has nothing to do with the fiscal health of the entire company, regardless.
The chart I admit comes from Doug's posts here, but that just reinforces what I have always seen and thought. I treat every cent spent on my hobby as my wasted money, just like football tickets, etc. If I do not get $500 of enjoyment out of a coin, I do not buy it. Once I am gone if my family wants to keep or sell them I simply do not care, I had hobby money to spend and spent it how I liked.
True...and we can also just enjoy the damn things, right ? That's one reason why I don't want mine in a SDB or squirreled away somewhere where they are inaccessible.