Why Is Platinum Worth Less Than Gold?

More than not is it looks to much like silver or white gold.If you have an item you have to tell everybody what it is every time you show it to somebody.

I remember when platinum spot was always about 10% higher than gold. I think those days will return.

Pt has lots of industrial uses especially in catalytic applications. Because it is so expensive, there is always much pressure to find or make cheaper substitutes that will do much the same job. There ARE now cheaper substitutes for Pt, when it comes to car exhaust applications.
Perhaps some of those some of those efforts have been rewarded for other applications as well, and the demand for Pt has been lessened.

I know what Tritanium is... It's the stuff Star Trek is made out of

I wouldn't say that platinum is tougher than white gold. Platinum is pretty soft and gummy. White gold is stiff but brittle. Platinum is much denser than gold; the difference is obvious to a blind man. Palladium almost became a hot item in jewellery, but the difficulty in working the metal has eluded many artists.

Platinum on the whole takes more effort and costlier materials to bring it to the shape and polish needed, so the only thing I can think of is that the demand is just very low. In my own shop, I work with gold every single day, whereas platinum jobs only come in once every 3-4 months.

Rarity means nothing without a market to back it up. Look at Newfoundland coin mintages in relation to Canadian coins, and then see how easy it is to call them "sleeper" coins. Yet the lack of interest keeps them relatively cheap because there aren't that many Newfoundland coin collectors.

Platinum derives from "Plat" - Silver and "inum" - which doesn't melt.

The very high melting point and hardness makes it tricky yo work with.

The spike before when it overtook gold was with the introduction of catalytic convertors which use platinum. Our roads are now covered in the stuff to the extent it might be worth recovering it.

I think most people have it backwards. I've been doing this since 65. You are right, historically Platinum is more expensive than Gold.

The difference is that platinum is not seen as an INVESTMENT metal.

Nine years ago the world went stupid crazy melting anything that had a hint of gold or silver in it. My shop had a courier from the refiner that came up twice a week to pick up metal to be melted.

People were trained to think that the "real" price of silver and gold were many multiples of what they had been just two years before. A lot of people became very very wealthy in this time frame. Even ordinary folks found themselves richer by thousands of dollars; in many cases.

Coincidnental with this were the rise of the "Invest in Gold/Silver" Companies.

Together they drove the price of Silver and gold far above where it actually should be.

When the price fell, the smart money got out and collected their profits. A great many people felt like they missed the boat and they want, very badly, to be "here" when it goes up again. They entered the market in great numbers and those same people are responsible for the continued increase in price over where true demand is. It is a fact, if you dig, that there is a large surplus of both Gold and, especially, Silver; right now. I'm an Engineer, and I can tell you that materials suppliers that I deal with are scratching their heads over the prices of Gold, Silver, and Platinum. There are currently wherehoused at least a seven year supply of Silver.

The smart money saw that the small investors were hanging in there and now quietly manipulate the market to make a cozy profit. Why do you think the price, ON A REGULAR BASIS, drops down a dollar or more an once in silver ( for instance) and then goes back up to the same level only to drop again? The big boys KNOW when to sell short and when to go long. It is steady income, and will remain so until enough small investors get out of the market.

At which point Silver and Gold will find their true market value via supply and demand.

Exactly why I will not play that game.