Silverbugs-Group for Silver Lovers on Facebook

There is an up and coming group on Facebook called Silverbugs.  This group is primarily for interaction between people who love, buy, sell, trade and invest in silver.  People interested in any of theses things may be invited to join.  IMO it is not for the profiteering from fellow members or the advertisement of the newest get rich by making me rich scheme. 

I am not the group leader, so as I said this is only my opinion; however, if this group get floooded with join my new NUMI, snowballing, pyramid or other silver business and make millions posts, I am out.  I have nothing against people in the silver NUMI business, I just do not want the group to be a place to advertise your business.  I am not trying to be a  hard ass, and if you announce that your program is looking for people once, I think that would be fine, but as of now it is fairly balanced.  It really depends on who members invite to join.  If a member constantly invites off-topic members to join, I think they should be banned.  They can always form their own group and keep me out. 

I do not advocate censorship, I just think the group should stay on topic without preying on the other members. I am not saying not to sale or trade between members or announce an ebay item that other members might be iterested in, just stop the internet marketing, pyramid, snowballing whatever you want to call them plans. 

I put this on my blog because I hope that my fellow silverbugs and other friends on FB look at what I post occasionally.  Yes, I have some ads on the page, but I am not pressuring anyone to click.  It helps me if you do but I don't care if you don't.  I just like to keep informed and when I see something that interests me, I share.  I will end my announcement/invitation/rant now.  Carry on, and I cannot stress it enough, NOW is the time to buy physical silver.

The Glitter of Precious-Metals ETFs - Kiplinger.com

By Laura Cohn, Associate Editor, Kiplinger's Personal Finance


Published February 4, 2010

In this article Ms. Cohn identifies five exchange-traded funds that give investors a stake in gold, silver, platinum and palladium. Unfortunately she leaves out my favorite, SIVR, an ETF that tracks the spot price of silver. When silver went below $16.00 and ounce I started buying shares in SIVR, paying as low as 15.35/share. You can buy it through your online broker just like stocks, I paid $4.50 per trade, no other fees. I prefer to hold physical silver which I also bought today, but the ETF shares I bought with OPM (other people’s money). Yes, I bought on margin. I believe this is a temporary dip and when the price increases I will sell. I never hold paper silver very long, and frankly I have never had to. Anyway this is not my article so read on.

"For decades, gold bugs have argued the bullish case for their favorite metal. In recent years, they’ve actually been right. The price of gold has climbed steadily for the past nine years, from $277 an ounce in 2001 to a record high (not adjusted for inflation) of $1,213 in December 2009 as investors piled into the yellow metal because of its reputation as a safe haven and as a hedge against a falling dollar. Gold closed at $1,115 on February 2.

The rising price and the rise of exchange-traded funds have attracted investors in droves. Thanks to ETFs, investors can buy gold without having to open their own Fort Knox. Last year, investors around the world bought 51.2 million ounces of gold, and 35% of that amount came through ETFs. In the case of silver, the figure is even more astounding. Investors snatched up 172 million ounces of silver last year, and 87% of it was via ETFs. Silver closed February 2 at $17 an ounce, well below the record of $50, set in 1980, but far above the $5 level of recent years.

The best way to get a piece silver, buy the iShares Silver Trust (SLV), which charges 0.50% per year. Both GLD and SLV provide a stake in the metals, which are housed in vaults located in London. That way you don’t need to buy bars and worry about where to store them safely."
To read the entire article go here.

Could Explain Why Silver Prices are Dropping

We all know that their is an inverse relationship between the strength of the US dollar and Silver and Gold Prices.


From Barchart.com
Morning Call
Todays Market Focus
February 4, 2010

"The dollar index this morning is stronger and trading at a 6-1/2 month high with the dollar/yen -0.21 yen and the euro/dollar -0.50 cents. The dollar yesterday shook off early weakness as it rallied after mid-morning and closed higher. Bullish factors included (1) strong US economic data that shows improved economic conditions after the Jan ADP employment change showed the fewest amount of jobs lost in 2 years and the Jan ISM non-manufacturing index expanded at its fastest pace in 1-1/2 years, which boosted the dollar on speculation that the dollar's interest rate differentials may strengthen if the Fed hikes interest rates sooner-than-expected." Read the entire article here.

Precious Metals Investing for the Common Man

From the Silver Stock Report


By Matthew Vickers, May 3, 2009

I am going to interrupt my series of posts on the different ways to invest in silver to invite you to read an essay written by a man who started investing in silver as a teen. He came into a small amount of money in which to invest. The only reason he gives for choosing silver is that gold was too expensive and he did not fully understand the stock market. He does not mention it, but I doubt that inflation, dollar devaluation, or any of the other reasons we choose silver over paper played a role. Remember he was a teen.

One sentence sticks in my mind, and I wish I had known this when I was a teen because a lot of pocket change in circulation was still 90% silver. He states “Right now, even a kid with a weekly allowance can invest in silver.” Read the article here.

There Are Many Ways to Invest in Silver

This post is for people who want to invest in silver but do not know how, or they know of some systems but are new to others.  Most everyone knows that you can just buy physical silver.  You can buy old coins.  Silver coins: quarters. dimes, halves, silver dollars minted before 1965 contain 90% silver. Kennedy halves minted between 1965 and 1970 are 40% silver, and the Ike silver dollars are 40% silver.  There are a few years during WWII that nickels contained 35% silver.  It is easy to calculate the silver value or melt value, but what is easier is to go to a website called Coinflation.com and use their handy calculator.  Just make sure that the silver spot value is correct.  Usually it is but sometimes on weekends and holidays it is not updated.

You can also buy silver currency from other countries.  Be careful because the actual content is not always marked. There is a good book (I do not have it in front of me) that you can look up uncommon foreign coins.  Common foreign coins that are 1 oz of .999 silver (just like the US silver eagle) are Canadian Maple Leaves, Australian Kookaburras, and Chinese Pandas.  Beware that there are a lot of fake Pandas on the market. 

Another way of collecting pure (.999 silver) is to buy rounds and bars from private mints.  There are quite a few mints out there, and you will pay spot price plus a premium.  The premium can vary between mints or dealers, and often the more you buy the lower the premium per ounce.  You can check the spot price at the top right hand corner of this site.

Like I said above you can buy from dealers, but unless you are a dealer you will pay tax on your purchase.  You can also get deals on Ebay.com. Be very careful with Ebay, read the listing carefully and if you decide it is legit and if you want to try to win it, decide on a top price before you bid and do not go above it.  The excitement of winning an auction can suck you in and cause you to bid over what you planned.

There are several other ways to invest in silver and I will get to the one by one, posted seperately.

Phoenix Investment Conference and Silver Summit

Come one, come all! The important thing is that you come! I’m talking about the Phoenix Investment Conference and Silver Summit on February 4 and 5, 2010. That’s a few days from now and I hope it’s not too late to invite you to this event. A friend of mine and author of  SilverStockReport.com, Jason Hommel will be speaking on the 4th just in case you wanted to hear him talk about our favorite topic – Silver and Gold.   It should be a very eventful 4+ hours. So again, I strongly encourage you to at least check it out. It’s always a good experience to attend these kinds of shows. It helps give us a chance to check out different perspectives and maybe learn a few things. The summit webpage can be viewed here.