Current Silver Spot

[Rick]

Silver spot is frozen for the weekend..at a new record low..

but the "trade war" rhetoric seems ot be heating up..especially on Friday.
is the "risk premium" already included in current spot since the latest announcement was Friday morning.. or might there be a small rise coming Monday?

if so this weekend would be an especially good time to buy..

But I bought even more silver every almost month in past 5 months..
And spot has been dropping.. so technically I have been buying at a loss.
And not really looking to buy if I can help it.. trying to build my savings for a housebuy .. so my savings account right now is not low...

So what to do?

 

[hiwall]

I have my amount of PM's that I am happy with. Now extra money will poured into other tangibles.
But you are correct Blue that anyone who is on the fence about PM's better get it done soon.

 

[Sourdough]

$14.777 (Call is NEUTRAL)
The down trend likely reflects silvers industrial application, looking forward, (recession or depression).

Remember Silver serves TWO masters.......Condensed portable Wealth storage and/or Current industrial needs.
Computer "Hard drive" demand and production is way down. A clear indicator of forward industrial silver demand, and a redundant call for slowing economy.

 

[Rick]

Interetsing...

 

[AdmiralD7S]

Silver spot is frozen for the weekend..at a new record low..

A record for 2019, sure...but it was this same price 4.5 months ago - Christmas eve/day, in fact. "A new record low" without caveats is misleading.

 

[Sourdough]

I bought at $ 2.80 an oz. (early 70's) but that was long ago. Actually less for some.........in 1964-65' my boss paid me in silver dollars. He always said save 10% of them and hide it.

 

[Rick]

A record for 2019, sure...but it was this same price 4.5 months ago - Christmas eve/day, in fact. "A new record low" without caveats is misleading.

You are correct Sir.
It was not my intention to mislead anyone.

I had been tracking it for much of last year and then again starting this Jan and saw come it down down down.
After looking at some more historical data just now, it seems there is zero certainty that we are near a floor.

I will cease buying Silver for the forseeable future.

 

[Sourdough]

I will cease buying Silver for the forseeable future.

What was your motivation for purchasing.....??? Not looking for an answer, only a question to constantly ask yourself.

Will you also stop using a seatbelt, or purchasing vehicle or property insurance.....??? Again.....not looking for an answer, just something to ask yourself. There is nothing wrong with "Risk Mitigation".

 

[Rick]

What was your motivation for purchasing.....??? Not looking for an answer, only a question to constantly ask yourself.

Will you also stop using a seatbelt, or purchasing vehicle or property insurance.....??? Again.....not looking for an answer, just something to ask yourself. There is nothing wrong with "Risk Mitigation".

The money in our accounts is basically just electrons is someone's computer.
No paper backups..
So I am a little uncomfortable having all my savings in electrons.
I do not buy silver as a winning investment strategy.. but I also dont want to lose my shirt and maintain some liquidity.

There is a balance of it all.
Being a prepper cannot get in the way of other things too much.

I bought hundreds of ounces in the past 5 months.. this conversation and some more research has convinced me that maybe for now it will be enough..

 

[Caribou]

I would like more silver and I think that now would be a good time, but, there always seems to be a but, there are other things higher on my priority list.

 

[Tacitus]

I watch gold. It made a bit of a jump today as the markets crashed. Kind of wished I'd bought some over the weekend, but I was busy.

Silver is still at a reasonable price, I think.

I'm stacking cash for the short term right now...every paycheck, a little comes out. If gold stays below 1300, I will consider converting some cash into metal to protect against inflation. If metals go up, I will have the cash saved for other things.

It is never bad to save, no matter what form your savings take...metal, paper, electrons....

 

[AdmiralD7S]

For those interested, silver's at $14.55 and appears to still be dropping. It's approaching the price it was at last fall and, before that, fall of 2016. If you're interested in silver, keep an eye on it.

 

[Tacitus]

Just a clarifying note: There is markup, obviously. Your local shop (or even your online dealer) needs to turn a profit.

So, spot may be $14.50, but you may find:

• 90% US silver circulation coins for $15.20/oz.,
• a silver round (private "coin") for around $15.65/oz., and
• an American Silver Eagle (ASE) 1 0z. coin for around $17.40.

ASE's have the most markup in the US, but they have good recognition and sellability (if that's a word) among the pure silver coins, so although you spend more to get them, you don't lose as much when you sell them.

The 90% are cheaper to buy, but you don't get as good a return when it comes time to sell (assuming market conditions are the same as they are now when you decide to "sell"...if you are buying for prepping reasons, market conditions will be very different, but recognizability and confidence will still be important, and 90% US silver circulation coins and ASE's have both, which is nice, because you may not be selling them...you may be using them as currency, but at a value greater than their face value).

I'm still partial to the British Sovereign or the American Gold Eagle as a store of wealth, even though I freely admit that silver is more depressed than gold right now, which arguably makes silver a better buy at the moment...who knows?

They have been making Sovereigns for hundreds of years. Here is an image of some of them:

I think any is better than none. If you can only buy silver, start with that. That's what I did.

 

[Tacitus]

...So, spot may be $14.50, but you may find:

• 90% US silver circulation coins for $15.20/oz. ...

And, to clarify that: The price I quoted for the US silver circulation coins (also called "90%" or "Constitutional silver" or "junk silver")...that price was for an ounce of silver. I quoted it that way to keep the prices consistent with the other price quotes, and to make it direclty comparable to spot (to show the markup).

However, US circulation silver is not usually priced that way. It is usually priced by $1 face value increments. Since $1 face value or "FV" (e.g., 4 quarters, or 10 dimes) of the old US silver coins is about .715 oz. of silver (with other metals added on top of that...the other 10%), the price of $1 FV will be about 71.5% of the price I quoted above...about $10.85 / $1 FV. Most silver coins and bars are sold by weight, but US circulation silver is usually sold in face value increments.

Also note: In the world of precious metals, when someone says "ounce" they mean a "troy ounce" which is different from the avoirdupois/Imperial ounce that we use in every day life. Most know this, but if they try to weigh things, the math won't come out right if they are using a "normal" scale.

 

[Tacitus]

Oof. I was going to make a purchase this week...should have gone Wednesday, but decided to wait until payday today...but the gold price jumped up $25 in 2 days.

Hopefully it will fall back down when stocks rebound after the Mexican tariff scare blows over.

I guess I can't get too upset...the cash I've saved for the purchase is still in my pocket.

 

[Rick]

I just ordered some more silver.. couldn't help myself even though I had decided to stop..

 

[angie_nrs]

Has anyone else noticed that PM's are running low on stock? I just went to APMEX just to see what prices were on the stuff I bought last year. Almost all the 1 oz. silver rounds I'm looking at are not in current stock. I haven't looked in a while so maybe this isn't new?

 

[AdmiralD7S]

Panic buying isn't limited to guns and toilet paper. A month ago, you could still get most anything you wanted. Demand has become so high that even when the spot price was down to $12/oz last week, everything you could find was still $16-$18/oz, and there wasn't all that much left, either.

 

[Tacitus]

No supply locally by me. I've never seen that. The main supplier here started taking orders, but when they had to push delivery out to 10 weeks, they stopped taking orders, and they stopped publishing their prices. They weren't shut down by coronavirus. They were shut down by a lack of anything to sell. Gold is unavailable at the retail level.

 

[Tacitus]

Link: Goldman Sachs says it is time to buy gold — the ‘currency of last resort’

I think QE Infinity triggered this, but too bad it's not as available as it once was.

 

[Supervisor42]

As an investor I can only offer 4 things:
1: Think about how you will sell them during hard times. Nobody does.
2: Don't confuse collectable coins with metals.
3: When there are no collectors buying, coins become metals.
4: Aside from an increase in price to keep up with inflation, they generate no income.
Be careful!
Wanna buy some Bitcoins?

They are less than $4 each:

Guaranteed to not lose value! :lil guy:

 

[Rick]

Has anyone else noticed that PM's are running low on stock? I just went to APMEX just to see what prices were on the stuff I bought last year. Almost all the 1 oz. silver rounds I'm looking at are not in current stock. I haven't looked in a while so maybe this isn't new?

Silver rounds/coins trade for waaay over spot now...
With the low spot price i was tempted to buy some but I am unwilling to pay 5-7 or even 9 dollar over spot

 

[SheepDog]

I buy "junk" silver and gold at spot price. There is no real market for it otherwise.
I am not talking about old silver coins. I am talking junk as in worn out chains, old rings, silver contact tips (electrical), and gold terminals.
I have to smelt it and purify it myself but that is cost free, or virtually, and then grade it. I can easily get .999 fine and with some extra work I can get .9999 fine gold. Gold chains and rings are typically 50% gold or slightly under that. Not having to pay the sale fee is worth the work.

 

[Tacitus]

I buy "junk" silver and gold at spot price. ...
I have to smelt it and purify it myself....

That is an inexpensive way to get into the market, and I applaud your effort. You have the entry side nailed down.

I worry more about the exit side, as Supervisor 42 posted. That is, in hard times, I want to maximize my opportunity to move the metal even if I have to sell at a time not of my choosing, potentially to a buyer not of my preferred choice (e.g., local coin stores are closed), .

Which is someone more likely to take:

1. a homemade silver bar "minted" in someone's garage by someone who is of unknown reliability, even if the bar is purported to be certified by a company which may be unknown to the buyer,
   or
2. a bank roll of pre-65 US silver quarters minted at the United States Mint and publicly known and accepted for over a century by people all over the country, which is guaranteed by the Mint to have a certain amount of silver in them (or even modern bullion coins made by that same mint)?

I would wager that it would be easier to sell (or trade) the quarters or bullion coins (even if they aren't as pure as private bars). When I buy, my strategy is to pay a little extra on the entry side to make sure that my exit side (my sell or trade) will be accepted by the most people possible, not just people who trust me.

Each stratagy has its advantages and disadvantages. Mine is more expensive on the front end, but it requires less work, and (I think) it will be more accepted by the public in a crisis on the backend.

 

[Bacpacker]

I don't do anything other than pre 65 coins. At least folks will recognize them for what they are. Bars could be any purity and no real way for most to determine what they are.

 

[Supervisor42]

That is an inexpensive way to get into the market, and I applaud your effort. You have the entry side nailed down.

I worry more about the exit side, as Supervisor 42 posted. That is, in hard times, I want to maximize my opportunity to move the metal even if I have to sell at a time not of my choosing, potentially to a buyer not of my preferred choice (e.g., local coin stores are closed), .

Which is someone more likely to take:

1. a homemade silver bar "minted" in someone's garage by someone who is of unknown reliability, even if the bar is purported to be certified by a company which may be unknown to the buyer,
   or
2. a bank roll of pre-65 US silver quarters minted at the United States Mint and publicly known and accepted for over a century by people all over the country, which is guaranteed by the Mint to have a certain amount of silver in them (or even modern bullion coins made by that same mint)?

I would wager that it would be easier to sell (or trade) the quarters or bullion coins (even if they aren't as pure as private bars). When I buy, my strategy is to pay a little extra on the entry side to make sure that my exit side (my sell or trade) will be accepted by the most people possible, not just people who trust me.

Each stratagy has its advantages and disadvantages. Mine is more expensive on the front end, but it requires less work, and (I think) it will be more accepted by the public in a crisis on the backend.

I'd trade for those quarters in a heartbeat.
Ingots, no.
One of these, would probably be worth $20:

 

[hiwall]

I have a little junk silver but very little. Mostly I have silver eagles. Honestly I never expect to use it.

 

[SheepDog]

The problem with coins is that there are a lot of people who will say, "that's just a quarter." and walk away.
Now I agree that home minted strips and bars are not ideal for trade, I don't plan on using it for anything except after society returns.
Having ten pounds of gold is $700,000 in today's money. That means I can start out my new life ready to buy property or start a business.
It has less value when food and water are what people need. Remember the depression? Even courts traded in potatoes and chickens because they needed to eat too.

 

[Tacitus]

Diversity is also good. For me:

• pre-65 US silver circulated coins (the ones without the copper showing on the rim...people will know them when they become important)
• 1 ounce American Silver Eagles
• British Sovereigns (made for hundreds of years...recognized around the world)
• 1 ounce American Gold Eagles / South African Krugerrands (same specfications, both recognized around the world)

You never know what type of reliable & trusted metal a buyer may want.

And, you never know what you might want to purchase with it, so having a variety of sizes/denominations is helpful.

 

[SheepDog]

I believe you underestimate the amount of stupid in the world.