I love gold GC00, +0.42%. And silver and platinum. I love them philosophically, and I also just like shiny rocks. But if you think about it, trading metals
Say you are bullish on silver and want to speculate on it, thinking it will appreciate in price. You can buy an ETF, yes, or you can buy silver miners, but the most straightforward way to invest in silver is just to buy coins or bars.
The most popular coins come from the U.S. Mint, but you can get coins from other countries, too. The most popular silver bars for retail investors are the 100-ounce bars, which are typically manufactured by one of a few silver refiners. Asahi is the new standard, after Johnson Matthey sold its gold and silver refining operations to them.
Anyway, you can go to a bullion dealer, tell them you want a 100-ounce bar, and they will charge you the spot price of silver per ounce, times 100 ounces, plus a small markup.
So you buy it, and now you have a shiny rock. It is satisfying to have shiny rocks, especially the 100-ounce silver bars, which make you feel like a baller.
But the shiny rocks don’t do anything. You aren’t going to use them to sew a button, wash your car or paint your ceiling. They just sit there. You hold them for a while, and if the price goes up, you are supposed to sell them.
But most people don’t sell them, and then the price goes back down, and they end up in an estate sale, and the dealer buys them back at a discount. Paraphrasing Warren Buffett, someone watching from Mars would be scratching their heads. There really is nothing more useless in the world than a shiny rock. But we love ’
- Source, Market Watch
