Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'm getting a bonus and have a fair amount to spend (for me, anyway!) Since April, I've bought about 40 lbs of silver and 10-12 oz of gold. I wished I'd have started years ago, but didn't.

Anyway, I'm in Korea and have $6k to spend and am wondering what would be some recommendations? I'm going to Apmex and pondering the 1 oz Krugs but eyeballing the 90% junk silver as well. What you do in my situation?:confused:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'd be tempted to dollar value split 60/40 silver/gold and buy as much metal as I could and not worry about numismatic values. Rounds, bars, whatever, just so it's as cheap as possible and real PM.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Silver is sweet
But
Gold is King!

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

since you have so much silver, I would buy 3k of gold, and right now its $626, I know it will be 700 or higher this fall

spend 3k on silver or just put it in a roth ira

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I like TomD's advice.........although I'd lean a little towards Gold $-Dollar wise.

Increase the Silver to 50-lbs. or a little over and put the rest in GOLD. :coolbeer:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Are you staying in Korea, or will you be relocating sometime soon?

If you are relocating soon, I think you could consider an Exchange Traded Fund such as:

SLV - the Silver ETF
GLD - the Gold ETF
CEF - Canada Fund (a 50/50 mix of gold and silver)

Then when you relocate - you can sell out of the ETF funds and buy physical pm

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Since you are about 50/50 on your holdings I would buy gold with the 6K and whenever you have extra money I would buy silver. If you plan on leaving Korea anytime soon I would only be buying gold.

65GT350

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'm staying in Korea for a year, possibly 2. The thing is, I have an apartment as part of my job, walk to work, have health insurance, and am paying a LOW tax rate. My salary is pretty decent against the tax bite and living costs back home. At the moment, I have $1.5-$2k to spend a month. What I buy is going to a very good friend who is putting in my rented storage place, hidden in some boxes that I have stored as well in a small town in Ohio. I prefer PM's to stocks at this time.

It's low stress, 6 hours a day and I don't fight traffic. But I want to come back to my nest egg and start an Aquaponics farm, eventually.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

start a roth ira, and a traditional ira, then 1/3 each silver, gold, and oil etfs. put the balance in FRNs stuffed into your mattress.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Since you are in a foreign country make some trips to some antique/junk stores for some early date US coins.....see if you can find some good deals on PM coins......once you educate yourself these sort of expeditions can pay off...

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'm doing that. I recently bought a 1912 1/2 ounce half Indian Head coin that was in perfect condition (brilliant uncirculated condition--no wear whatsoever) for about $350. They charged me for the price of the gold, not the rarity of the coin. I sent it home to my father to have it graded and sold. I care about the gold value, not the "rarity" value of it.

Actually, I plan on writing an article about buying gold here in the near future, after I skulk about the country looking for deals here and start to learn the market much better.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'm amazed ya'll think 40-50lbs of silver is "a lot".......:haha:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

It's about 40-50lbs more then 98.73% of the people have. :smile:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

You can get a big red box of Silver Maples for a bit under $7K. :yippee:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

But still only 560-700 ounces +/- a little.

My personal silver/gold $ ratio is about 2.5/1 silver/gold

I am personally convinced that silver has a much greater future price move built into it but I also value gold's lesser volitility.

Look at the price drops of early summer, working from memory silver dropped from about $15 to $9.7 and gold from $720 to $570. Prolly off some but close. Sliver lost 35% and gold 21%. But now silver is back 26% but gold 10%.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Yep....I'm totally with you on that point, except I'd say it's 99.73 !

But this is a GOLD and SILVER site......I'd think a "LOT" here means if you put it in your pickup, the overload springs were creaking....:haha:

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

It's really only 800 ounces. I'd buy more Silver. Get at least your bodyweight. Then buy more Gold.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I've been on a diet and am losing weight. Do you mean to say that I should sell some of my silver and buy gold, as I lose weight? _really big grin_

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

how about buying $500 face value of junk silver from me?

i'll match apmex prices at $4300 right now.

let me know...i'll even take paypal echeck....you'd of course have to pay for shipping which i think might be a lot since silver is heavy and you live in another country.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I'd like to revisit the statement:

You have some really big ones doing that IMO. Until you get back from overseas, I would prefer that you would go with a top notch fund like Tocqueville Gold, and they will protect your funds 'til you get back. They have done a phenomenol job of growing accounts.

Buying physical overseas and transporting back is a security, and a cost problem. These costs will detract from your final value to realize your goals.

Buying physical here, and allowing others to handle, introduces a variable that may cost you big time, no matter how well you know the person.

JMHO

Fund Name Symbol Closing Net Change YTD % Ret

Tocqueville Fund TOCQX $24.36 0.27 4.91%

Small Cap Value Fund TSCVX $16.64 0.24 -2.23%

International Value Fund TIVFX $16.26 0.20 6.21%

Gold Fund TGLDX $50.34 0.60 23.38%

Alexis Fund TOCAX $13.41 0.12 -0.87%

Genesis Fund TGENX $11.17 0.15 4.59%

http://www.tocquevillefunds.com/

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Gold Maples.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Here is the chart through the bull period.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Would you be willing to give any clues as to the area in which you went searching for coins? I'll give you the only place I have found--Insadong (art district) in Seoul. There was a street vendor selling coins. I don't know if he had any gold or silver (I suspect he did) because I brain farted on the Han Gul word for gold and couldn't communicate too well. He did have some neat north korean fiat coins and paper that I almost bought for novelty sake but I couldn't force myself to part with the FRNs for money even more worthless. I don't live in Seoul so I haven't had the chance to revisit Insadong to search.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I went to a 2 story building in Namdaemoon that has many different jewlers there. I found them (gold coins) in a display and snatched them up as soon as I found them.

I was at Insa-dong as well and most gold is either the clunky chains, knick-knacks such as golf balls, gold turtles, (etc...) and the 37.5g gold dongs. And the prices they charge depends on how stupid the vendors think you are!

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I asked my GF for the proper phrasing to ask for U.S. Au coins in Han Gul.

"Meagle Geum Wa Isseyo"

Meagle (the States)--Pronounced like "Smeagle" in Lord of the Rings without the S

Geum (Gold)--sounds more like "Koom" to me

Wa (Chinese for money)

Isseyo (Is there?)--I'm sure you already know that one

Literally---"States Gold money is there?"

You ever notice that when you translate Han Gul literally into English you sound like Yoda?

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

>I am personally convinced that silver has a much greater future price
>move built into it but I also value gold's lesser volitility.

I agree with that also, but the choice has to depend somewhat on why you are buying the metal. I am more bullish on silver, but if you need to relocate quickly the gold is going in the backpack, not the 100 ouncers

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I got to thinking. My only concern with buying stuff here are the possibilities of forgeries. I'm sure you know from experience how well the Koreans are at copying stuff. I have a "Breitling" Watch that would take somebody from the Breitling factory to know that it is a knockoff. I also have several "Armani" suits that I paid $180.00 each.

That being said, I have never known a Korean to purposely mislead someone about an item being genuine when it is not. They may try to overcharge you but they usually won't flat lie to you.

Your take on this?

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

I only buy gold from jewelery shops in large buildings full of jewelers. I don't buy from the first place I go to, either. I let them know I have money, am serious and not afraid to walk next door if I don't like the deals. Like I said earlier in this thread, I'm moving from Wonju to very close to Seoul and will spend a lot of time in the next year skulking around (Seoul) and am considering writing an article on my experiences in the near future.

I've been to a couple shops where they speak perfect and talked to them at length and was told the things to "look" for. But the main things are the gold "heft," are they giving me a price off the top of their heads--or do they get out the calculator and weigh and figure it out by the gram--(believe me I know the day's price). You can tell an established shop and a shop that's a fly by night operation.

In spite of this, it's still possible to get burned.........but like I said, I'm pretty careful.

Re: Got $6k to Spend! Silver or Gold?
 

Considering the way gold and silver are behaving right now and considering you already have a respectable stash of bullion what I would do with the $6,000 is trade the silver and gold etf's against eachother. I'd watch the silver to gold ratio closely, when silver approached 50 ounces to one ounce of gold I would sell silver and buy gold. When gold approached 1 ounce to 60 ounces of silver I would sell gold and buy silver. As silver and gold dance around eachother you could make quite a bit of money and then at any time you please cash out and buy silver and/or gold bullion, much more than the initial $6,000 would have bought you even if the price per ounce is higher at the time of your bullion purchase.

Before SLV I wouldn't have done this, but these two etf's are a match made in heaven for some quick cash.