When I started stacking I found this forum and got superheated like everyone else as silver was heading up and up. Now reflecting on the "good old exciting days" I seriously question my lemming instincts. Just to remind some of you and ruin your weekend, I have included the silver chart in US dollars. Best to keep this chart hidden from the wife at all times.
That's ok, so do many from the 2000 dot.com era. I have two long term friends who were trading like made back then (yes im old enough to remember those times). One took it with a grain of salt, played the game and went to cash when things started to go wrong. One just believed in the 'story'. Both started off with several thousand dollars in the game, both were up to $100k by the time the story was in its peak. One walked away with a decent profit, the other didn't. At least with PM you have a real asset on your hands and wont end up with the total wipe out that many faced during the dot.com boom. (However for many you will face real losses, at least for those buying in the parabolic phase)
In short: those that bite through it, have a fair chance to end up on the positive side, and those that let themselves suck into the greed and concern game, end as ducks served on plates, seven times in a row. During that parabolic trend, concerns were absent, yet apparently clearly present, since a massive profitgrab was just around the corner. Things are not different now. We have $50-$19 that fleed to accounts of King Cashers, waiting for those that stayed on the boat, to concern, stop sailing upto even abandon ship, with as goal to replace them on the boat, and sail further, leaving the swimming losers behind. When everybody raises a sun flower bees flag, it doesn't need guts to decide to buy. The absence of the flags, needs guts. Don't be a victim of the bull that has a bear suit in his backpack. Don't be a victim of the bear that has a bull suit in his backpack. This was Radio Pirocco, we get back to you over 3 mins.
I don't remember those days as good old days. I rather worried about all those other stackers, listening to the money for nothing club, accepting less and less silver for their money. Rich on paper, poor on asset.
If silver ever approached the "good old days" prices of $30 or $40 I would consider selling at or below spot to cash out (assuming the cash could be used for something useful).
Yes I remember - I really thought we had finally embarked on the space shot. Never sold an oz, just added at A$50 + premium. Used to look at vast baronial estates on realestate.com. A modest house would just cost a sliver of silver. Now I look at the cheap cramped hovels.
That is 2011 influencing your investment strategy. That is learning from a past mistake. It isn't uncommon and you would not be alone, it's this very reason that breaking $50 is now a near impossible task. Never ever dismiss the lasting damage of a parabolic rise and fall.
Yet, if one looks at the Zimbabwe and Belarus cases, one sees a butterfly, with the rest following every landing. Those that jumped off during those intermediary landings, just gave away their ticket to a next safe landing. A world version wont be different, albeit maybe the time intervals may be bigger. To illustrate it with a margin value based example: imagine tomorrow some governments decide to swiftly perform the Cyprus decision. All of sudden, a huge risk would seemingly pop out of nothing, thus relatively decreasing other risks (alike silvers). It's for a reason that the Federal Reserve explicitly doesn't warn customers of failing banks ahead of their declaration of bankruptcy. They are smarter than that. Yet, despite a seemingly total absence in media, apparently some were aware on forehand, as illustrated by huge market positions taken in advance, or (case Cyprus), 'silent bankruns' going on. It just proves once again that general awareness of situation, and insider information, provide an advantage, no matter earnt by effort or by legal privileges. To say, that 'now' can quickly change. Very quickly. It's not like a highway at cruise control, where one can perfectly calculate time of destination. It's harder, and everything is relative, including lasting damage.
When the price breaks $50 (a purely meaningless psychological number), I will probably start selling at slightly below spot, just to sell it fast and beat out the competition. At that price, I will have more than doubled my money and will not stress when the price begins to fall, and everyone else is desperate to offload their holdings in a falling market. Greed kills profits. If it appears that the price is going to the moon, because there is actual fear that the economy is truly crashing, then I will not accept any fiat for my silver. I will trade it for actual physical things and hard assets which will be found at bargain-basement prices. Desperate men do desperate things, and those who are not desperate (because they prepared), are the ones who emerge from crises in much better financial shape.
Same here, I'm more sad to have learned the prices before that. I wish I was buying at 8 an ounce haha
I love that chart it is one of the reasons that at some auctions I can get hall marked silver at half spot value! this is because the confidence has been knocked out of the market. however if silver breaks 30 again then I will be lucky to get it at spot in which case I will sell and retire debt so I can focus on my coin collecting
Keep in mind that if the gold/silver boom to come occurs in the same manner as the 70's, gold will outperform silver for many years and the lions share of the silver spike will occur over the space of about 6 months to a year. Trying to gauge the top of the parabolic blowoff will be impossible......I think you would be lucky if you got the peak price minus 20%.
I'd be more concerned at the current gold price which still looks to be highly inflated on the long-range charts.
In 2012 looking at the graph. it appeared that silver was once again about to top $40oz. I think just as many believed that silver was making a second run. Small Stackers didn't have the $$$ to buy too much in the short time span but some of the big buyers must have taken a hit. Those that forget the history of silver may well pay the price again when the bull starts to run. It sure was fun every night on the pirate ship with so many stackers on dog watch. Regards Errol 43
That chart sends iced water coursing through my veins, however Casey Daily Dispatch had an interesting take on that view - emailed out just today ... Time to Admit that Gold Peaked in 2011? Jeff Clark, Senior Precious Metals Analyst " ..... As you probably know, the government has made numerous changes to the way it calculates inflationthe Consumer Price Index (CPI)since 1980. So, even the BLS number we've given grossly underestimates the real difference between the 2011 and 1980 peaks. For a more apples-to-apples comparison, we should adjust for inflation using the government's 1980 formula. And for that, who better to ask than John Williams of Shadow Government Statistics (AKA Shadow Stats), the world's leading expert on phony US government statistics? I asked John to apply the CPI formula from January 1980 to the $1,921 gold price in 2011, to give us a more accurate inflation-adjusted picture. Here's what his data show. Using the 1980 formula, the monthly average price of gold for January 1980 would be the equivalent of $8,598.80 today. The actual peak$850 on January 21, 1980isn't shown in the chart, but it would equate to a whopping $10,823.70 today. The Shadow Stats chart paints a completely different picture than the first chart. The current CPI formula grossly dilutes just how much inflation has occurred over the past 34 years. It's so misleading that investment decisions based on itlike whether to buy or sell goldcould wreak havoc on a portfolio. This could easily be the end of the discussion, but there are many more reasons to believe that the gold price has not peaked for the current bull cycle Percentage Rise Has Been Much Smaller Inflation-adjusted numbers are not the only measure that matters. The percentage climb during the 1970s bull market was dramatically greater than what we experienced from 2001 to 2011. Here's a comparison of the percentage gain during both periods. From the 1970 low to the January 1980 peak, gold rose 2,346%. It climbed only 535% from the 2001 low to the September 2011 highnowhere near mimicking that prior bull market. Silver Scantly Participated in the 2011 Run-Up After 31 years of trading, silver has yet to even reach its nominal price from 1980. It surged to $48.70 in 2011but it hit $50 in January 1980. On an inflation-adjusted basis, using the same data from John Williams, silver would need to hit $568 to match its 1980 equivalent. The fact that silver has lagged this muchwhen its greater volatility would normally move its price by a greater percentage than goldfurther shows that 2011 was not the equivalent of 1980." More to read at: http://www.caseyresearch.com/articles/time-to-admit-that-gold-peaked-in-2011