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Is it smart to own gold or silver?

While both gold and silver have attractive features, gold is the best investment for the average investor in precious metals. Gold has a much larger liquid market, driven mainly by investment and demand for jewelry. The price of gold is also less volatile than that of silver. Both silver and gold can function as safe haven assets, but gold tends to have a better track record over longer periods of time.

It is important to be aware of potential Gold IRA scam opportunities, however, as these can be detrimental to your investments. That said, in shorter periods, the specific dynamics of each market end up being more important for their respective returns. Regardless of the asset you buy, remember that neither asset generates cash flow, so the best thing for long-term investors would be to take a buy-and-hold approach with a profitable and growing portfolio of stocks. The point here is that gold isn't always a good investment. The best time to invest in almost any asset is when there is negative sentiment and the asset is cheap, providing substantial upward potential when it returns to favor, as stated above.

The advantage of silver over gold is that you can get all of these same benefits, but at a much lower cost. Your financial insurance is now more affordable. This is why silver is called “the gold of the poor”. Investors can invest in gold through exchange-traded funds (ETFs), buy shares of gold miners and associated companies, and purchase a physical product.

Demand for gold and silver comes from different sources, with gold being primarily an investment asset and silver an industrial asset. Sure, there are times when gold's gains will exceed those of silver, but for the most part, low volatility and slow gold prices translate into lower returns. Gold stocks generally rise and fall with the price of gold, but there are well-managed mining companies that are profitable even when the price of gold falls. Investors treat gold more like a currency than silver, a metal that has many more industrial uses than gold.

And some people still do, but instead of burying gold ingots in their backyard, they buy stocks or mutual funds that invest in gold. If you think about the global obsession with gold, it's easy to get carried away by adventure and mystery, such as searching for gold during the gold rush, pirate ships and treasure maps. While short-term fluctuations in gold prices receive much attention, gold is relatively stable as a long-term investment. You can easily see that, in percentage terms, silver rises much more than gold in bull markets and falls much more than gold in bear markets.

The government is the owner of all gold coins in circulation and ends the minting of any new gold coin. The dollar has not been able to turn into gold since President Richard Nixon ended that practice in 1971. Before that, people bought gold bars as a way to diversify their investment portfolio and give them protection against inflation. In short, this law began to establish the idea that gold or gold coins were no longer needed to serve as money. While gold and silver have similar boom-bust cycles, there are some key differences to consider when deciding whether investing in gold or creating a gold coin stamped with a stamp seems to be the answer, as gold jewelry was already widely accepted and recognized in various corners of the world.

Some of the most popular precious metal ETFs include SPDR Gold Trust (GLD), iShares Gold Trust (IAU), and iShares Silver Trust (SLV).