Hello ladies and gentlemen. I wanted to take a moment to talk about collecting precious metals, more specifically;
PHYSICAL Silver & Gold
Hmm.. many of you may be thinking why I empathized physical over say, paper Silver & Gold. You may say why would I want to hold my Silver and Gold physically? Then I have to worry about storing it, keeping secure and even transporting. Or why would I want any precious metals at all?
Well, there benefits and aspects to holding physical gold and silver that you may not have thought of:
1) Paper to Physical Metal Ratio:
In 2016 the amount of Gold Paper trading came in at $9.8 Trillion! The total amount of actual Physical Gold investments was only $42 billion.
This leaves the paper to physical ratio at 233-1
In 2016 the amount of Silver Paper trading came in at $2.27 Trillion! The total amount of actual Physical Silver investments was only $4.4 Billion.
This leaves the paper to physical ratio for silver in 2016 at 517-1
"The gold and silver prices are being capped because paper contracts can be added as more funds move in" In other words... There is more paper trading of silver and gold taking place than silver and gold in existence. The price of Gold and Silver are being depressed and leveraged by paper trading.(2)
2) Physical Gold/ Silver is a hard asset
The nice part about having physical Gold and Silver is that your asset is secure and readily available. From just another typical day... all the way to doomsday, having it in your hand is having it in your hand. You are safe from cyber hacking, a problem you may see with cryptocurrency, although you must also secure your physical metals to prevent from theft.
I recommend purchasing a safe of some sort that you can secure your valuables in to prevent from theft. Obviously depending on the size of your precious metals would determine the size and strength of your safe.
3) Danger of fiat currency
A fiat currency is one that is backed on faith rather than tangible resources, and right now all of the world’s currencies are fiat currencies. As history has shown us, this type of currency system is doomed to fail. By holding onto tangible investments like gold and silver, investors can protect their portfolios against the eventual crash of the world’s economic systems and currencies (1)
I hope you consider looking into Physical Gold and Silver, even if you decide against adding it to your portfolio. I'm curious to get all your thoughts on precious metals in general. I just recently decided to invest into physical gold and silver in addition to my cryptocurrency portfolio. I think its nice to have on hand, and I decided to get my nephew started on his Silver stash :P
Cheers!
Sources:
(1): https://www.americanbullion.com/10-reasons-to-buy-gold-silver/
(2) https://www.moneymetals.com/news/2017/05/16/paper-vs-physical-silver-market-001075