jim4silver
Silver Member
- Apr 15, 2008
- 3,662
- 495
Has anyone noticed that many of the bullish silver pundits talk about how "all the gold ever mined" is sitting around in some warehouse somewhere, and that there is less silver above ground than gold because all the silver has been used up? Thus they say silver is a better choice than gold. They claim that industrial use eats up the silver for good, which is true for the most part. What some of these pundits fail to mention is that industrial uses of silver that result in the metals being lost forever have not been around for too long. Anyone think they were making electronics (cell phones, computers, ipads, etc etc) and such the same way 30 or so years ago? Most of the silver usage before that allowed the silver to be recycled after it was used. The uses today use such small amounts recycling is not economically feasible, but that has not been happening over the past 3000 or more years that silver has been used as "money". Since traditionally 16 ounces of silver have been pulled out of the ground for every 1 ounce of gold, I fail to see where all that silver went. Today, the ratio is about 8 to 10 ounces of silver per gold being mined, but that still leaves a lot of silver floating around.
The statistics I read say basically half of the silver mined each year goes into industrial use. That is half of the roughly 700 to 800 MILLION ounces mined each year. The other half is left for investment, etc. That is still a lot of ounces left over after industry. Compare that to the PGMs where the market actually went into a slight deficit last year (demand exceeds mined supply). Maybe if they knock silver low enough some mining will taper off, but that takes a while to implement and much silver is a byproduct of other mining, so many mines will keep producing silver as long as their other mined resources are making them sufficient profits.
Further, the bullish gold pundits say there is a shortage of gold and that they are having to basically steal from Peter to pay Paul regarding the various central banks who are demanding their gold back. If this is true, then the physical prices would be higher. You cannot just create gold out of thin air like paper, and if there was really scrambling going on to find it, the holders of the metal would be demanding a higher price and we would see shortages of metals and higher prices/premiums in the retail markets to some extent. Most of the bullish gold pundits don't seem to like silver so much and they generally don't mention it, other than to say it should go up with gold, but that gold is the only "real money".
I have heard these things for years and while I still have most of my money in PMs still, each day makes me wonder if some of these bullish pundits are either disinfo agents or controlled opposition that are really on the "other side", or they are simply selling whatever it is they sell every time they write an article or give an interview (such as PMs or PM based investments). Some on this site have stated this for a long time but I really didn't believe it so much until the past couple of months. Many of these pundits are supposed to be either very wealthy or have had extensive market experience over the course of their lives, yet some of the BS that they spew almost makes me laugh at this point. In the end I do believe gold and silver are going much higher, but between then and now many different things can happen, and these bullish pundits don't want to talk about them. Maybe they are afraid they will lose their many bullish fans or maybe they don't want to see the other side of the coin, I don't know?
Some of the pundits keep saying how QE will have to go on for a long time, but I disagree. Yes, QE will be needed to keep things rolling along because we don't have any real economic growth and both gov and private debt is so high it is beyond belief, but that doesn't mean that the Fed cannot stop QE (temporarily) or threaten to. Either event would crush gold and silver in the short term (long term if the QE was never restarted if it were stopped). I could envision a scenario where if gold/silver were to take off, they could threaten to stop QE or to raise interest rates which would stop the run up, which they could do if the dollar was getting pushed down too far. The exception to all of this is when/if the physical and paper markets break apart or the dollar crashes for good. At that point, the only thing to stop gold and silver from rising would be such a high price people decided to cash out. I still don't see the physical and paper markets near breaking apart, although I thought by now it would have happened in part due to some of the BS the bullish pundits have spewed for the past few years.
I can see one day when sentiment is knocked down far enough, the PMs will take off like a rocket for one or more of the reasons the bullish pundits put forth, but that might not be for a year or three. I am still hoping that the big shorts become big longs, even if it is just for another quick run up like in 2010 to 2011.
Just my opinion.
Jim
The statistics I read say basically half of the silver mined each year goes into industrial use. That is half of the roughly 700 to 800 MILLION ounces mined each year. The other half is left for investment, etc. That is still a lot of ounces left over after industry. Compare that to the PGMs where the market actually went into a slight deficit last year (demand exceeds mined supply). Maybe if they knock silver low enough some mining will taper off, but that takes a while to implement and much silver is a byproduct of other mining, so many mines will keep producing silver as long as their other mined resources are making them sufficient profits.
Further, the bullish gold pundits say there is a shortage of gold and that they are having to basically steal from Peter to pay Paul regarding the various central banks who are demanding their gold back. If this is true, then the physical prices would be higher. You cannot just create gold out of thin air like paper, and if there was really scrambling going on to find it, the holders of the metal would be demanding a higher price and we would see shortages of metals and higher prices/premiums in the retail markets to some extent. Most of the bullish gold pundits don't seem to like silver so much and they generally don't mention it, other than to say it should go up with gold, but that gold is the only "real money".
I have heard these things for years and while I still have most of my money in PMs still, each day makes me wonder if some of these bullish pundits are either disinfo agents or controlled opposition that are really on the "other side", or they are simply selling whatever it is they sell every time they write an article or give an interview (such as PMs or PM based investments). Some on this site have stated this for a long time but I really didn't believe it so much until the past couple of months. Many of these pundits are supposed to be either very wealthy or have had extensive market experience over the course of their lives, yet some of the BS that they spew almost makes me laugh at this point. In the end I do believe gold and silver are going much higher, but between then and now many different things can happen, and these bullish pundits don't want to talk about them. Maybe they are afraid they will lose their many bullish fans or maybe they don't want to see the other side of the coin, I don't know?
Some of the pundits keep saying how QE will have to go on for a long time, but I disagree. Yes, QE will be needed to keep things rolling along because we don't have any real economic growth and both gov and private debt is so high it is beyond belief, but that doesn't mean that the Fed cannot stop QE (temporarily) or threaten to. Either event would crush gold and silver in the short term (long term if the QE was never restarted if it were stopped). I could envision a scenario where if gold/silver were to take off, they could threaten to stop QE or to raise interest rates which would stop the run up, which they could do if the dollar was getting pushed down too far. The exception to all of this is when/if the physical and paper markets break apart or the dollar crashes for good. At that point, the only thing to stop gold and silver from rising would be such a high price people decided to cash out. I still don't see the physical and paper markets near breaking apart, although I thought by now it would have happened in part due to some of the BS the bullish pundits have spewed for the past few years.
I can see one day when sentiment is knocked down far enough, the PMs will take off like a rocket for one or more of the reasons the bullish pundits put forth, but that might not be for a year or three. I am still hoping that the big shorts become big longs, even if it is just for another quick run up like in 2010 to 2011.
Just my opinion.
Jim
Amazon Forum Fav 👍
Last edited:
