Silver Below $14

I UNDERSTAND KURT... but just one thing in the past I have sold metals and made a profit... any profit I make is a good..

 

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Nothing microeconomically wrong with selfishness. Economists call it acting according to one's self-interest. Just don't expect what's good for you personally to be good for the economy writ large. It seldom works like that. The fact that it sometimes works at all is the original source of the economic term "invisible hand". They call economics the dismal science for good reasons.

 

Me too! I bought the heck out of metals in the mid-1990's when they were out of fashion and went short in 2011. I timed it almost perfectly. I was a little off the peak on silver, but I tagged gold right at the top. Got $1890 an ounce, 10 dollars below the very top. Most of my generic silver I got only $40 for. I still kick myself for not pulling the trigger at $46. I still am not buying generic at these levels, just set fillers with prices unrelated to bullion. (Numismatic pieces, but I buy them in all metals, even aluminum, not just precious ones.)

 

Why should stackers care about what is good for the queen bee? Doing what is good for the "economy writ at large" ie consume, borrow (and don't forget to spawn your replacments) is just sacrificing yourself to the beehive.

 

I spawned my replacement. My ex-wife, not s'much. Even looks a lot like me, poor kid.

By the way, many states, at least 19, treat bullion "investing" not as investing at all, but rather "consuming". The federal tax code also doesn't treat bullion as true investment. When that's the case, and it is, it causes some self-reflection on what's going on, or at least should.

 

Just because something WAS a good investment in the past doesn't mean it is a good investment today-- and won't become a good investment again tomorrow.

I quickly regained my losses from the Crash of 2008-09 not by trying to figure out where the bottom of the Dow was, but by playing bonds for rising prices. Obviously today, with rate hikes in the horizon, that would not be a wise move.

I also played gold as a hedge and had the good fortune to get out near the top. Now, with low inflation, a really strong dollar, and a strong chance (I believe) of deflation, I do not see the bottom of PM prices yet. Not that I'm anti-PM -- I just don't see an advantageous entry point yet.

Things move even quicker in the stock market. This quarter's hot sector can be next quarter's cold sector. And an investor must do regular homework on each company he owns.

My point is this: My best investing has come from regular study and the willingness to roll with the flow and punches, so to speak.

 

A wise man with a funny avatar. Metals make no sense in a growing if anemicly so economy with an expected increase in interest rates, unless you believe that too much interest rate increase has already been priced in to gold and silver. But if a rumoured 25 basis points increase can hold metals to these levels and gently falling, what would a percent or two do? Metals could downright collapse.

Seems being the cleanest dirty sock in the hamper is good enough, huh?

 

By any chance do those 19 states have lots-o-taxes, business regulations, marauding cronyists in search of a "deal" and civil "servants" on public pensions?

 

Probably, 'cuz all 50 have those things. Specifically, those 19 levy the sales and use tax on bullion and investable coins, treating them no differently from any consumer purchase. These states are easy to identify - no ANA convention, National Money Show or World's Fair of Money, will ever be held there. California, otherwise a hotbed of über taxes and regulation, is not even among them.

 

I wish I had enough data to stack the dollar and inflation rates into this chart.

 

Of course! When it comes to rising gold prices, nothing beats marketing hype and "pump and dump" article writing, along with the Internet's seemingly infinite capacity to bring together conspiracy theorists and the epically gullible.

What all of those four periods have is expectation of rising inflation, whether real or imaginary. Nothing else truly matters in the end.

 

I just did a little search to find the 19 states. One good site lists 20. I must assume a recent change repealing the bullion sales tax in one.

The "tax bullion as consumption regardless of amount" seem to be:
Alabama
Arkansas
DC
Indiana
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Minnesota
Mississippi
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
North Carolina
Ohio
Oklahoma
Tennessee
Vermont
West Virginia
Wisconsin

My apologies in advance to the one state above that no longer taxes bullion. Maybe it's as simple as 19 states plus DC.
I searched and I see no cultural pattern here. "Red" states and "blue" alike.

 

Isn't buying bullion putting currency into circulation?

 

So is buying a Snickers candy bar. Neither one resembles investing. Anything that deserves the term "investing" connotes putting money to work doing something productive. Pouring more liquid metals into ingots preparing them for rolling, punching, upsetting, and striking barely qualifies, sorry. Not in the same way investing in an enterprise with real returns does.

 

Interesting thought. But is it merely an exchange of a form of worth? When one buys $1,000 worth of stock, he is exchanging cash for stock, which he hopes will go up in value. Hmmmmm. Thinking that one over.

 

What about the guy that dug it up, his suppliers, and their suppliers, and...........

 

You are aware, I take it, that most "new" silver today is recycled from something inartfully called "scrap" than anything mined per se. Maybe also gold, but maybe not. Your grandparents' generation's flatware is being turned into Zombucks at a rate that should pain you greatly. I can think of no factoid that more aptly captures our current banality. When old radiographs are burned and the ash melted down for refining, after digitization, of course, well that creates value. Ditto for silver-bearing liquids from traditional imaging, which still happens more than most people realize.

 

I do realise. I also realize that a lot of silver is a byproduct of other mineral refining. And I also recognize that all those processes, including the guy with a torch melting grandma's silverware, are contributing to an economy. Even a Zombuck is a widget.

 

Citation needed.

 

Warren Buffet would agree with you. But you are ignoring the fact that silver has intrinsic value, even more so as technology progresses. It is the best conductor of all metals and is invaluable in countless electronic devices. It is a physical substance, of which there is a finite amount in the world, so the rest of your sophistry is misleading.

There is a reason why currency was tied to it, and there were certainly a lot less extreme economic waves that occurred when it was so. On top of it, you blame silver hoarders for the great depression!

The talking point you repeat is that one's interest is in conflict with the common interest. Bankers are looking for our best interest, we need to create more debt so they can save the economy from itself!

If there was ANYTHING less productive than a bank, I don't know what is. Not to mention the richest man in the world couldn't come close to the hoards JP Morgan and Goldman have amassed.