By: Derek Lim
After reading Brendan's post on Stagflation, it rekindled my interest in Gold again. I'm looking for a investment that have very low co-relation to stocks and Gold/Silver is one of my consideration. Since Brendan is more bullish on Silver, I decided to read up more if Silver is indeed a better choice.
Silver or Gold? This topic has been widely discussed and there are both Gold and Silver supporters but I guess Gold has the majority since more people own Gold than Silver. Here are a few interesting facts that I discovered.
Silver tarnish. It seems pretty dumb since most people already know this but not many knows that it is because of this unique property that creates additional industrial demand. Silver is used to make photographs. Of course with the increasing popularity of Digital cameras, the demand in this particular area has diminished.
Silver is a better conductor than Gold. This explains why the Electronic sector is a major consumer of Silver, very much more than Gold. Some Silver supporters believed that the Silver consumed by the Electronic sector will be too uneconomically to recover hence the increasing demand for Silver.
Silver is rarer than Gold. Silver supporters like to emphasis on this. Because of its rarity, the increasing industrial demand for Silver and dwindling Silver inventories, sooner or later the the price of Silver will go up. However, please take note that this applies to the refined form of Silver - above ground, such as in bars & coins.
With all that said, I still do not believe that Silver is a better bet than Gold. Silver supporters have been preaching for years about the lack of supply of Silver which will one day drive Silver prices to new heights but the question is when? Chances are it will not happen in my lifetime and even if it does, the industry will seek other alternatives.
The debate between Gold and Silver will go on and on. Hence it is important to know what exactly you are looking for before you invest in it. I am looking at a safe alternative to stocks in a recession and Gold is historically proven to be the more resilient of the two.
http://bullythebear.blogspot.com/2007/10/who-chooseth-me-shall-get-as-much-as-he.html
I think you’ll be interested in this article posted in my blog regarding silver. Have a look :)
Both gold or silver had gone up very high and very fast since Dec 07. I still think gold is still cheap.