Queues beget clues. But please, don't mistake this story as a redux of Tuesday's. There's something far more important going on in the line-ups beyond Manhattan.
The value of any commodity as a store of wealth depends completely on its perceived value. Will some impending collapse find it maintaining that value? It depends completely on the public's perception.
The conversion from some speculative investment into an exchange currency depends on someone deciding that it has comparable value to something else in trade.
Not that investing in gold is a bad thing. If you had done it in the past, you would have made out quite well.
Buying in now when it is trading at an all time high in hopes that it will stay there or continue to increase in value probably isn't the wisest choice. But the people trading in gold don't really care. They make money either direction that the prices swing.
Actually, the bet is not whether gold will "stay there or continue to increase in value" but whether the world's fiat currencies will continue to lose value.
That's not a bet, that's a certainty. Whether PMs will retain their value; i.e. their status as currency which is tradable for goods depends on the depth of the fall, and if the fall is long and hard enough, getting enough to eat and clean water to drink will be the line between "wealth" an death.
There is absolutely no difference between fiat currency and any other currency. The only thing that gives any currency value is the perception of value between the parties exchanging it.
The price of precious metals is just as manipulated as any other currency, if not more.
When things are desperate, the value of precious metals evaporates quickly.
" The only thing that gives any currency value is the perception of value between the parties exchanging it"
This is true of ANY medium of exchange, whether you exchange greenbacks or gold for ammo or a goat for corn.
Humans require currency to live any life above the most basic dirt poor survival mode.
A barter economy is incredibly limited both in time and space: you may have an extra goat to swap, but if you need corn and no one close by with corn wants that goat, your goat has no value to you. You might eventually get your corn with a series of swaps, but it becomes more and more difficult
With currency and a more-or-less accepted value of that currency, you can exchange that goat you don't need for currency which is then readily exchangeable for the corn you want. You do not have to wait for someone who wants that particular goat at that particular time and has excess corn.
So interesting, especially given our Book Chat this afternoon.
I wonder if the only metal worth buying is lead?
Steel is useful too.
Very true....
Yikes, but yes!
The value of any commodity as a store of wealth depends completely on its perceived value. Will some impending collapse find it maintaining that value? It depends completely on the public's perception.
The conversion from some speculative investment into an exchange currency depends on someone deciding that it has comparable value to something else in trade.
Not that investing in gold is a bad thing. If you had done it in the past, you would have made out quite well.
Buying in now when it is trading at an all time high in hopes that it will stay there or continue to increase in value probably isn't the wisest choice. But the people trading in gold don't really care. They make money either direction that the prices swing.
Actually, the bet is not whether gold will "stay there or continue to increase in value" but whether the world's fiat currencies will continue to lose value.
That's not a bet, that's a certainty. Whether PMs will retain their value; i.e. their status as currency which is tradable for goods depends on the depth of the fall, and if the fall is long and hard enough, getting enough to eat and clean water to drink will be the line between "wealth" an death.
There is absolutely no difference between fiat currency and any other currency. The only thing that gives any currency value is the perception of value between the parties exchanging it.
The price of precious metals is just as manipulated as any other currency, if not more.
When things are desperate, the value of precious metals evaporates quickly.
" The only thing that gives any currency value is the perception of value between the parties exchanging it"
This is true of ANY medium of exchange, whether you exchange greenbacks or gold for ammo or a goat for corn.
Humans require currency to live any life above the most basic dirt poor survival mode.
A barter economy is incredibly limited both in time and space: you may have an extra goat to swap, but if you need corn and no one close by with corn wants that goat, your goat has no value to you. You might eventually get your corn with a series of swaps, but it becomes more and more difficult
With currency and a more-or-less accepted value of that currency, you can exchange that goat you don't need for currency which is then readily exchangeable for the corn you want. You do not have to wait for someone who wants that particular goat at that particular time and has excess corn.