It's in favor right now, man.

Silver will never be an interesting buy and hold. The most valuable thing in the world is the ownership of the organized labor of the world's most intelligent people. The second most valuable is to own privileged access to markets and resources (and laws which protect these). If you can own a part of that, you get rich, reliably. Silver is just a lump of a static substance that cannot produce wealth. It will never be a long term buy and hold.

Are we maybe not talking about the same time frames? From 2005 to 2012, surely buy/hold on Gold was +EV?

Anything that can fluctuate 300% over a decade will beat the S&P 500 over periods < 15 years. That's not proof it's a good buy and hold. Most of the time it will lag, and long term it will ultra lag (to the point of being a horrible, horrible investment), but the possibility is there. The only question left is, are these fluctuations predictable? I do not believe they are*. The silver proponents in this thread certainly had no clue that they were making a bad buy over the past 3+ years, and they're the ones arguing for the metal.

*Especially when you consider that the S&P500 destroys gold even if bought at the highs.

I suppose. But why trade anything at all reliant on areas like commodities, energy, etc...? Somewhere some people are beating those sectors. I'm not claiming I could or should be, I just know that if all I did was invest in intelligent people and brain power while I was working at Nortel, reinvesting my pay the way so many people did around me did then, I would have had my ass handed to me.

Innovation and technology is great until it's not. Look at long term charts for Nokia and Alcatel for example (companies I also worked with who employed some of the world's most intelligent people), once power houses that had so many of the qualities you mentioned. They are now dead money in buy/hold. Siemans had been one of the most prolific places for IP across a ton of sectors. I think from 2000 to now, you're still down on your shares.

I don't disagree with all that you're saying, and obviously investing in the leaders and best minds in innovation is a great thing. But I think it's a bit simple to say "invest in companies, not in things". Lots of companies in the business of building all manners of great devices have lost people money.

Now with a $14-handle! Only down 70% for the 'getting rich off silver' bros!!

I forgot this thread existed. Fun times.

This thread will never not be hilarious.

This is the greatest thread in the history of 2+2. It should be required reading to understand the psychology of bubbles.

Yep, this will never stop being great.
Best enjoyed from start to end with a glass of scotch and Schubert's Unfinished Symphony in the background.

Entertaining!

i've been waiting weeks for this thread to be bumped!

great buying op right guys?!?!?

Guys, I am new to lolling at silver speculators, but this seems like a great time to get in the game. Is it better to lol at physical silver hoarders, or should I lol at companies that mine silver speculators, or is there some kind of ETF for loling at people who don't understand how dividends work? I would also like to gain some exposure to lolgoldbugs.

Thanks in advance,

--Trolly

Trolly, you need to physically lol. There are lots of people out there with paper lols and even electronic lols, but what's going to happen to them when the wave finally breaks? There's going to be the mother of all lolsqueezes, and they're going to be out in the cold.

Trolly, I hate to tell you but you're too late. Your orders will never get executed due to private lol pools and algo lol trading.

What's even more pernicious is the spoofing of lols by dastardly hedge funds.

But there is still value in loling at people trying to time the Fed rate cycle for silver buying.

That's right everybody - NOBODY spotted the Internet Bubble [Cramer made 30% in 2000 shorting tech from the peak, Julian Robertson's stocks went up Billions and NOBODY spotted the housing bubble. Not anyone!

Of course, he could spot the bubble in the USD....meanwhile the Dollar Index has gone from 75 to 98.

Also he got Nixon's timing wrong. So much love for this post.

Only if they're also hoarding 1,200 cans of Stagg Country Style Chili Beans!

Some gems:

mrapex - Valhalla1 at $47 Metsman at $49 emet --Shorted at 48 looking to add at break of 45.5

wickedgood trader ricky1231, days after the top Shortly thereafter came the 10% drop.

Then the margin requirements raised.

May 3 FieryJustice One of my easiest 35% gains ever, less than a week.

May 5, Bloomberg 'The biggest slump for silver since 1983 may not be over as the Comex exchange in New York makes it 84 percent more expensive for speculators to trade the metal, triggering an exit by investors.'


tl/dr; Just a few posts from the first 9 pages!

SO. MUCH. GOLD. IN. THIS. POST.

How did I miss it?

I can't believe we just didn't hold our SLV shorts. My last short call itt was 32.60-$33. That 28% drop/gain for me over the past 12 months would help the old portfolio.

Great pulls naj and you didn't even get to the superstar of this thread Mrmusicrecorder. I always assumed the musicman and silverman2 were the same guy since silverman showed up shortly after music disappeared.

Yep, one of my biggest mistakes was not letting my for teh lulz OTM SLV leap puts run through the year. They would've gone up by six fold by the end of it

Instead I was just happy to take a two bagger like an amateur.

The simple fact that this thread was bumped and all the bears are patting themselves on the back makes me feel like we're near the bottom and silver is probably a good buy at this price. $14-15 or whatever it's at right now.

Of course it makes you think that. If it wouldn't, we'd be at the bottom.

Not bears but people who recognized a tinfoil hat bout of mania which couldn't be sustained. This thread shows the psychology of bubbles in real time and it is worth reading seriously. It's worth it for the lols too

So, wait, only silver bulls can pat themselves on the back, not the posters who actually....made money? NotSureIfSrs.jpg.

I'm neither a bull nor bear on PMs near-term. Everything has its bargain price, and if silver drops down to its extraction cost I'd be somewhat more likely to buy, although I'd buy platinum again first at rock-bottom levels.

The issue is that btw Silver/gold and, say, Google or Gilead or SBUX, I find the former to be dramatically worse investments.
All investments must be compared to each other to find which are superior in a number of categories: risk, carry cost, yield, insurance, taxability, liquidity, coupon, inherent gamma/vega, odds of return and size of risk/return ratio, BK risk.

So, a 'risky' stock may also contain the components of: yield, liquidity, 4-1 odds of going up and if it goes up, likely 4-1 unit of return up versus down, no need for insurance.

Or only 33% to go up but likely to have 10x return if that happens [say a drug approval].

Laughing at silver bugs does not make one a bear. Doing it at $40-49.85 was merely common sense AND a money-making opportunity for several of us here.

In closing, OMG TEH BERNAKE PRINTING TEH MOBNIEZ FIAT CURRENCY WORLDWIDE MELTDOWN.

[Has anyone ever explained why I would trade food for your silver if our economic system melted down? I've never seen it. You eat your silver, I'll eat my wheat]