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 Replies: 29 / Views: 3,149 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1590 Posts |
I just had an interesting conversation with my local bullion guy. He is far and away the largest Bullion buyer in this area.
I just asked him how long he thinks people will be bringing in Silver to scrap. He told me he is of the opinion that only 10 percent of all the silver hoards in the area had been brought in.
Well, I'm an Engineer. I deal with numbers, not hopes and dreams.
So I asked him how many customers a day, selling scrap silver coins, he has been averaging since this all began in 2008. He told me he did not have to average, he knows exactly; since he has to keep the records by law. He looked it up and said "As of today; 8,417."
"And how many other buyers are there in town? 6". So asked if they could account for another 1000 to 1500 sales of scrap. And he thought it was easily that number.
I then reminded him that the population of the town was 50k and if there were 12k households in town, then he and the other dealers had depleted roughly 90 percent of all the possible family silver hoards in town. Assuming that every family has some small amount of silver set aside.
But not to worry there was still the county to consider. Another 20k in population. With perhaps 300 to 400 households. Of course people in the western end of the county would go to Columbus ( the nearest big city)
So best case scenario, there were still 2500 possible customers in the county that have not sold to him.
Which means this time next year they could have worked their way through the entire county.
Your results in your county may vary, but I would be willing to bet there is lots less silver out there waiting to be scrapped than most people think.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1391 Posts |
You are assuming the people bring in all their silver at once.
But generally I would agree with you.
That being said. I know a lot of people who are not selling at all. They are in for the long haul, like +20 years or more.
Plus a lot of people have huge stashes, in excess of several thousand oz.
Edited by allranger
08/26/2011 6:21 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
I've heard that 95% of the silver ever mined is in the landfills. So, I'm thinking one day we might see attempts to mine the landfills. yuk  I remember when I was helping run a shooting range we had a guy that wanted to mine the back stops on the range (for lead of course). We said no.  Edited by GoThunder
08/26/2011 7:53 pm
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1502 Posts |
Hahaha, a different game altogether than picking up golf balls at a driving range.
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Valued Member
Canada
235 Posts |
Mining landfills....er, don't give them any ideas.
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Valued Member
United States
52 Posts |
Why? Landfills are full of metals, probably much more profitable to mine the landfills than it is to mine the current deposits. Copper, steel (not iron, steel), aluminum and then the PM's.
I've been forcasting the mining of landfills for a long time, but for now there is enough extra scrap floating around that it's not necessary.
I've basically decided that I'm done scrapping copper. I give away a little silver now and then to friends (largely in jewelry lessons).
Short of that, my scrapping of any PM's is over. I will be exchanging with the refinery for new materials only. I lose 10% of the value + processing fees, and it's only necessary with unknown alloys...otherwise I can melt engelhards & coin silver at appropriate amounts to make my own sterling. I've got rolling mill capacities.
I can tell you the advice I was given from someone who went through a economic fallout. Buy wedding bands...just simple 14k wedding bands. Then if you need to convert those to cash, nobody sees you tossing around gold coins or ingots...because in the way we are going, confidentiality about your stash is going to become quite important.
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Valued Member
United States
52 Posts |
As for the original topic...my father in law wanted me to hook him up with my refinery so he could sell a partial silver flatware set and some old jewelry. I told him if he needed money, he could give them to me and I'll give him money on loan with the silver as collateral. People need to hold on to their silver at this point.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
667 Posts |
Nice thoughts but there are some key things that are unknown. The first is are they turning in all of their silver? The second many people actually have silver? Third most people that I know don't even think about the silver they own to even consider selling it.
I doubt many if even near to most people have turned in any PM's to a great extent. Simply because most people don't even think it the arena of PM's.
In addition you can't account for the number of people that don't trade/sell locally or out of town.
Thus I am not sure you can work these numbers out/
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1150 Posts |
My coin dealer, before his death a few weeks back, would send most of his stuff out of town. Most of his silver was sold before he even bought it from a customer. Anyway, most people I know are also holding for the long term. I've also noticed that the amount of gold and silver being sold on my local craigslist has gone done substantially from a year or more ago and the premiums on even 'junk' silver have gone way up on ebay. These factors are probably a combination of people holding hoards, depleted supplies of physical silver and increasing demand. Any way we look at it there probably is not as much physical silver out there as some may think. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
3692 Posts |
It is my opinion that people hold onto their silver longer because it's not worth much. The average person can't do much with less than $20 today. For me, I wouldn't sell between 1-5 ozt because it just doesn't bring in the kind of money I'm looking for, so I sit on it. And I'm assuming that most stuff for scrapping is "junky" and old or broken.
There really isn't a craze/mania yet, although it's slowly becoming common knowledge that silver is easy to find in personal hoards and is playing the same sport as gold. But once that mania kicks in I'll be damned if I'm left holding the bag. It's only a matter of time.
Edited by Libertad
08/27/2011 12:17 pm
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Valued Member
United States
315 Posts |
There is a lot of silver that will never be sold due to its value far, far exceeding the spot price. I am not selling my Great Grandmothers silver set. I don't care if the price of silver is $100+ an ozt. It is a very, very, heavy box full of very nice silverware and silver service. Not to mention the antique value. I am not selling my Grandmothers silver platter, candle stick holders, salt and pepper shakers, napkin rings, or tea service set. My Great Grandfather was born in 1881, my Great-Great Grandfather had a Morgan silver dollar from each mint from 1881 for him. I have those Morgans, all though they are a common date, they are priceless to me. I have gold wedding bands and engagement rings from my Great-Great Grandparents, Great Grandparents, and part of Grandparents. There are some silver coins that the numismatic value far exceeds crazy number spot prices. There are a lot of collections that will never be sold until the owner dies. I am sure their are many people who are the same as I am. Also, why do people want to exchange a valuable piece of gold, silver, platinum, etc for a piece of paper that continues to depreciate almost daily? I know I can't send in some 10 ozt silver bars for my mortgage payment, nor would I want to. Until there is a fundamental change in the current world economic policies and situation, I see no reason not to continue to acquire PM. If the Fed raised interest rates 1/4% on Monday. Commodities would plummet. But, they are not going to do it. Banks and Oil own politicians. We may vote for them, but the banks and oil companies own them. You and I don't. Rant Over |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
3670 Posts |
"I am not selling my Great Grandmothers silver set. I don't care if the price of silver is $100+ an ozt. It is a very, very, heavy box full of very nice silverware and silver service. Not to mention the antique value.
I am not selling my Grandmothers silver platter, candle stick holders, salt and pepper shakers, napkin rings, or tea service set."
It is probably a good thing it has much sentimantal value as I saw one of those quiz question on Pawnstars, answer A,B, or C, and the question was what item sits the longest in the shop before it sells, and the answer was silverware sets....
If your point of the post was to point out a silver shortage, I think industrial silver use will bring the overall numbers so low, that eventually the stash items in our collections value will eventually shoot through the roof. I could be way off, but the landfill hunt for all the lost silver is not an if, but when situation IMO....
Edited by Silverhawk74
08/27/2011 1:58 pm
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Valued Member
United States
315 Posts |
I think there is a lot out there. I think a lot of it will not be sold, due to some of the things I mentioned above.
I don't think miners go looking for silver. I think it is a byproduct of copper, gold, etc....mining. All PMs continue to rise and I see mines being reopened now. Silver demand outstrips supply now. But, there are large known reserves that were uneconomical to be mined, until now.
If silver becomes so high in price that it is no longer industrially affordable, something else will, most likely, be developed, I suspect. Also, if is becomes industrial unaffordable, the items will be unaffordable and no longer produced. A viable replacement could also cause a rapid drop.
But, if little changes,(huge reserves brought back on line, replacements, etc)then silver should continue to rise. Just my humble opinion and guesses
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Pillar of the Community
United States
3670 Posts |
"I don't think miners go looking for silver. I think it is a byproduct of copper, gold, etc....mining. All PMs continue to rise and I see mines being reopened now. Silver demand outstrips supply now. But, there are large known reserves that were uneconomical to be mined, until now."
Agreed for that an the sentimental family history factor you pointed out....
"If silver becomes so high in price that it is no longer industrially affordable, something else will, most likely, be developed, I suspect"
I agree with this as well. Very feasible to think they will look, developing something that is equal to silver for all its positive factors. But developing it (the cost), and it actually turning out ot be equal to silver, well that may be the tough part....
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Valued Member
United States
315 Posts |
 All though manipulating the price of silver is going on now, in my opinion, one day it will have to stop. I believe it is being held artificially low for several reasons. 1) short covering 2) buying time to develop something else 3) gold (all though far more in abundance) is the darling I continue to buy silver. I sell a little bit, very little. Stuff that I have upgraded, junk, etc..I buy quality to upgrade my collections. I buy on dips. I buy value. There is a lot of fear in the market and I think fear will drive the silver market to unimaginable levels. JMHO |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1502 Posts |
Not a chemist/engineer by any means, but still think it may not be as easy as finding/developing a substitute for silver. There are multiple reasons why we have copper wires and not something else. Even if copper's price goes through the roof, my bet is the wires will still be copper.
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Replies: 29 / Views: 3,149 |
Posted 08/26/2011 6:32 pm
