Investing In Precious Metals
Gold isn’t the only popular precious metal. Especially not from a long-term investment point of view. The three other major investment metals are silver, platinum and palladium. Like gold, all three have risen in price over the past several years (one of the reasons is the emergence of wealth and commerce in China and India that has contributed to the higher demand for industrial purposes).
Platinum is currently being used in medical equipment, automotive parts and computers. Palladium is highly conductive and is sometimes used - as an alternative to gold – in electronics. Palladium also has a variety of other applications like photo processing, photo processing,raw material, water purification and the refining/purification of oil & natural gas.
Precious metal prices, especially for Platinum and Palladium (as seen in this graph), are on the rise.
Why Invest Precious Metals?
The Federal Reserve are inflating the money supply rapidly, but at some point the record low interest rates will have to increase to stave off retail inflation. It’s inevitable. The U. S. government has taken dramatic action to combat a very severe recession and the results so far have been mixed, but the effect on the national debt is obvious.
One of the factors that are pushing commodity prices higher is concerns for future inflation — And holding metals is a way of spreading portfolio risk during times when inflation threatens our currency. Buying precious metals like gold, palladium, silver or platinum represents an alternative and safe approach to diversification and a partial hedge against equities.
What’s next
We believe that the demand for metals is on the rise. This doesn’t necessarily translate directly into an immediate price increase since the supply is constantly changing due to sales by large holders and active mining. We recommend that you do your own research before investing and buying precious metals.
