Silver Investing - Are You A Collector Or Investor

I decided to escape the winter weather of the upper mid-west for a few weeks and head for warmer parts - namely Laughlin and Las Vegas NV plus Palm Springs CA later. While in Laughlin, I attended a local coin dealers show. There weren't a lot of dealers there but the ones that were had impressive inventories of coins with silver far outweighing gold coins.

There were many, many Morgan Silver Dollars, Peace Silver Dollars and Silver American Eagles being bought and sold but what struck me were the majority were slabbed and graded. MS-63s, MS-64s and MS-65s on the 1878-1921 dollars and MS-69s and MS-70s on the Silver Eagles. Of course there were some pretty hefty prices on most of the merchandise and I can't say I got too excited about most of these graded coins.

I'll admit I did enjoy looking at many of them but it just reinforced in my mind that I am a silver bullion coin investor and not a silver coin collector. Not only is it less expensive but the knowledge to wisely invest in silver bullion coins is much less. God bless the gold and silver coin collectors but for me it is quantity over quality. Unless it is a coin I am really interested in such as a Morgan CC Silver Dollar, coins grades of XF or AU will do just fine. So which are you?

At the time of this post (in Laughlin), spot silver is at $33.91 for a gain on the day of $1.25! Very impressive. Let's see where this leg up takes us.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - Silver Sniping On eBay

When I have some spare time, I like to look at the various silver coins that are being auctioned on eBay. While I haven't seen many "deals", every now and then I find something that is of interest enough for me to bid on. That may be Walking Liberty Half Dollars, Silver Philharmonics, Silver Rounds, Morgan Dollars, etc. As long as the current bid isn't too high, the shipping fee is reasonable, the seller has a high positive feedback with a good number of transactions under his/her belt and there are only a few hours to go on the auction, I will probably place a bid.

Nothing is more frustrating than almost having the winning bid when some other bidder "steals" it from you with seconds to go. Then it's too late to place a higher bid before the auction ends. That's where sniping comes in. There is a free service that allows a bidder to automatically place a bid with just seconds to go (sniping) thereby increasing the odds of being the winning bidder. And the bidder doesn't even have to be by his/her computer. Just enter the eBay item number, the maximum bid and when to place the bid (how many seconds before the auction ends). Then go play outside. If interested, go to Goofbay and read up on eBay Sniper. This site offers other useful services that you may find of interest.

If you have come across other useful silver investing tools, please share them on this blog.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - January 2011 Totals For Silver Eagles

When I last checked on Silver American Eagles produced in January, the total was at 4,724,000. This was toward the end of the month and with no updates from the U.S Mint for several days, I thought that may be the final figure. Checking today to see if they repeated their December ploy of reporting a large amount on this first day of February (rather than including them in the previous month), I couldn't believe my eyes. 6,422,000 Silver Eagles for January's total!!!

They also reported 50,000 more on this first day of February. So the year-to-date total stands at 6,472,000. That is a huge, record-setting number. It looks like they are taking the increasing demand for Silver Eagles head-on. That's a good thing. Because if they ever decide to throw in the towel and stop offering these popular silver bullion coins, the premiums will skyrocket for the Silver Eagles already in existance. To prove that silver really is the poor man's gold - in 2010, the U.S. Mint sold nearly 30 times as many ounces of silver as it did ounces of gold.

I have a few short articles you may find of interest by two of my favorite precious metals experts. The first is a King World News Blog entry with information provided by James Turk and can be found at Gold & Silver Have Reached An Important Bottom. The second is also a King World News Blog with information provided by Eric Sprott where he talks about $50 silver and $2150 gold. You can find it here.

Before I close, there is one piece of information I forgot to include in my post on Mercury Dimes. If you decide to invest in 90% silver dimes, keep in mind that it takes approximately 14 dimes to equal one troy ounce of silver. So don't go overboard on what you pay for them if you decide to invest.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - January 2011 A Banner Month For Silver Eagles

The U.S. Mint is working overtime producing Silver American Eagles and the demand is right there too. So far in January 4,588,000 Silver Eagles have been produced - more than any month in its 26 year history. To put that in perspective, 4,588,000 is more Silver Eagles than were produced for the entire year of 1996 (3,466,000), 1997 (3,636,000), 1998 (4,320,000) and so close to 1995's total (4,590,000). And we still have eight working days to go in the month.

At this time, spot silver is at $28.68, down 69 cents in the last 30 days and up $10.81 (60.49%) over the last year. Despite being down recently, you will find the premiums for popular silver bullion coins and bars to be strong because the physical silver market is tight. Be a smart shopper and compare prices of at least a few dealers to get the most for your money.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - Buddy, Can You Spare A (Silver) Dime?

If you have read my article on Mercury Dimes, you know this is one of my favorite 90% silver coins. Officially known as the Winged Liberty Head dime, this U. S. silver coin was minted from 1916 through 1945 by the Denver, Philadelphia and San Francisco mints.

The Mercury Dime contains .0715 troy ounces of silver. With spot silver at $29.71 at the time of this post, the silver in that lowly dime is worth $2.12. In 1980 with silver at around $50 per ounce, a 90% silver dime was worth $3.57. No wonder some gas station operators were selling a gallon of gas for a silver dime. Could those days be in our future?

With silver again knocking at the $30 door plus the high premiums being charged for popular silver bullion coins, don't overlook investing in some of these affordable silver coins. They could come in handy for you someday. Before I leave the Mercury Dime discussion, let me say that some of these dimes are worth a lot more than others due to their scarcity. By far, the most valuable Mercury dime is the 1916D. So if you inherited some old coins, look for this dime and you could be several hundred dollars richer.

So far in January, 2011 the U.S. Mint reports producing 3,357,000 Silver American Eagles. The 1,696,000 Silver Eagles they reported on January 3rd certainly weren't produced in January but rather December. If this was done to keep the Silver Eagles totals down for 2010, it couldn't have been more obvious.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - Year End Totals For Silver Eagles

To say that 2010 was a good year for silver would be an understatement. Unofficially, silver rose $14.04 for the year. An 83.22% gain. I hope you benefited from that gain. Silver is not so cheap but still affordable, still the "poor man's gold". Spot silver at this writing is at $30.74. James Turk was correct in his prediction of $30 silver before year-end.

After a record month for Silver Eagles in November (4,260,000), the U. S. Mint took a bit of a breather. It is possible the number could be "tweaked" this next week but the number of Silver Eagles produced in December stands at 1,772,000. For all of 2010 34,662,500 ounces of silver were converted into beautiful Silver American Eagles. A total of 1,220,500 ounces of gold were used to produce one-ounce, half-ounce, quarter-ounce and tenth-ounce Gold Eagles. Predictions for continued strength in both metals in 2011 remains strong.

Thanks for reading.

Silver Investing - Buying Silver From A Private Party

An ad appeared in our local paper offering some silver coins for sale. The list included 20 Silver Dollars, 10 Silver Eagles, five Walking Liberty Half Dollars and six silver one-ounce rounds. Asking price was $1100.00. If you want to follow up on deals like this, here is how to do it.

Basically, you need to find out how many troy ounces of silver that amount represents and multiply ounces times the spot price of silver. The difference between that figure and the asking price is the premium over the spot price you will be paying. Let me go through the process using the silver from the ad described above. The silver content of most silver coins can be found at Silver Coins.

20 (circulated) Silver Dollars at .7650 silver content per coin = 15.3 troy ounces of silver. 10 Silver Eagles = 10 ounces of silver. Six silver rounds = six ounces of silver. Lastly, five Walking Liberty Half Dollars at .3575 silver content per coin = approx. 1.79 ounces of silver. Total ounces of silver for these 41 coins is 33.09.

Now multiply 33.09 times the current spot price of silver. For your protection, you MUST know the latest spot price of silver. One source is at Silver Investing Guide. Since the current price is about $29 per ounce, the result will be $959.61. The difference between $959.61 and the asking price of $1100.00 is $140.39. By dividing 140.39 by 33.09, the result is approx. 4.24 which is the percent premium over spot you would be paying. This is a low premium. If the coins are in decent condition and you are confident that silver will be going higher (much higher according to some experts), this may be a deal you would like to take advantage of.