Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Don't Lose Your Grip Now

The title of this piece refers to maintaining a long term stance regarding the life-changing potential, and immense eventual profitabitability, of precious metals. Eventual, you ask? Heck, I can make some good bucks now. I bought silver eagles at $30, and now they're selling for $45! I'll take a quick fifty percent profit anytime. I can just buy more on the next dip and repeat the process, over and over again. What... do I look stupid, or something?

Well Bucko, if that's your game plan... then my answer is "Yes." Does that stigmata on your forehead spell idiot? I know, I know... it looks like toidi when you gaze in the mirror, but believe me, if you sell your silver at this point, you'll be calling yourself much worse than idiot in a few months, as silver scales unimaginable heights as it's true scarcity is revealed by a massed market of desperate participants scrambling to convert increasingly worthless slips of colorized paper fiat for real money.

Name calling? How about imbecile, moron, or even ignoramus? I'm sorry if I'm offending any Nadlerphiles, but when you miss the boat, you don't just get soaked... eventually you drown. Alright, let me come down off my platform, put away the bullhorn. I've said my piece. But I am here today to admonish you. If, for all the right reasons, you initially began to protect against accelerating dollar depreciation, preserving your purchasing power, literally saving your money in the form of real money - silver and gold - then don't change your position now, merely because temptation is enticing you.

If you are a hardcore, hard money, metals advocates, you might be interested in browsing the following site. Realcent.org is an internet forum of individuals with like interests in promoting the preservation of valuable numismatic coins, salvage of still-present pre-1971 silver coinage from circulation, sorting of pre-1983 copper cents in the same fashion, and even reclaiming base metal - to hold for their intrinsic worth, greater than their face value in the form of coins - until melt laws are modified.

Long-time readers and posters on that site are pretty much of like mind. What they share in common is a spirit of rugged individualism, perhaps characterized by a Libertarian bent in some instances, of self-reliance in preparation for the day when the dollar, once the almighty reserve currency of the world, is no more than a memory, a once-proud standard-bearer of fiscal invincibility become no more than another failed Third World fiat currency.

Readers of this piece, and members of that site, ought to have in common the shared knowledge that holding silver and gold, historically, have acted as "safe havens" to usher them through trying times of economic instability. Those of us who have had the foresight and means to begin accumulation of a small cache of life preserving real money over the years, whether we began at a precious metals "bottom" or more recently, have - by now - had the opportunity to amass a small hoard.

Whether you have been investing in pre-1965 junk silver, or buying gold in any form - in the shape of pre-1933 American coinage - or as bullion rounds produced by the United States Mint or other global entities, silver and gold have acted as an insurance policy to protect you from the storm of dollar depreciation that is ongoing and intensifying. Such an umbrella, however, has not merely kept you dry, I am confident a warm glow has exuded from your heart as you consider that these precious metals have far exceeded inflation in this past decade.

So, if I could pose a question, why would you consider jettisoning your life raft, merely because the illusion of an alluring tropical atoll is in sight? That, my friend, is merely a mirage. Just because you can score a quick profit in dollars from the metals you were wise enough to acquire in the past weeks, months, even years... does not mean you should do so. What if, rather than a subsequent dip providing you an opportunity to replace the coins you had sold, the market instead never looks back?

Selling even a portion of your real money savings fund could expose you to the dread eventuality of being unable to restore it to its previous size, due to the inability to source reasonably priced alternatives. You could be sidelined in dollars that are being rapidly eviscerated. "Oh, the humanity." You have heard, over the years, pundits describing silver nuts and gold bugs as "strong hands" in chronicaling the movement of commodities from timid parties to those who are bold. The years have proven the bold to be sage.

Many is the time I've read threads on realcent that lamented "Darn, I should have bought more at $_____" (fill in the blank) as the price of silver, or gold, at times lunges upward in surprizing surges. Don't let this remorse metamorph into "Oh, I wish I hadn't sold silver at $50, or gold at $1700." The price of these oh so precious metals, denominated in increasingly worthless dollars, has no limit. Ultimately, prices - years from now- will be many multiples of their present troy ounce cost.

And so, I urge you, now is not the time to gamble with your hard-won worth. Despite the resolution of the debt ceiling, hyperinflation is baked into the cake. We're each going to have to choke on a huge serving of that distasteful concoction, so even though you might feel queasy, fight off that nausea and maintain your rationale for holding safe haven metals in the first place. Remember, the fiat currency of ANY nation-state is not really a viable alternative.

In closing, an apt description of someone displaying a confident manner might be one who offers a winning smile and a firm handshake upon introduction. I could go further and describe said handshake as powerful, though not bone-crushing, leaving a lasting impression of strength. In other words... strong hands. Remember the advice of test-takers, "don't change your answer, you're first impulse was likely correct." Please eschew attempting to trade for quick profits. Hang on tightly to your silver and gold. Don't let weakness of character make you lose your grip now.


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