Alan Hibbard: Silver Just Broke $40, Is Triple Digits Next?
Summary
Silver Market Dynamics: Silver has surged over $40, marking a 33% increase this year, driven by a structural deficit where demand, particularly from industrial uses, exceeds supply.
Historical Context: The current silver market is compared to the 1970s bull market, suggesting potential for significant price increases, possibly reaching triple digits in the next few years.
Investment Strategies: Investors can choose between physical silver and ETFs, with physical silver offering control but higher costs, while ETFs provide liquidity and ease of access.
Market Phases: In a precious metals bull market, gold typically leads, followed by silver, and then mining stocks, with each phase potentially offering larger gains.
Economic Impact: Silver's demand remains strong regardless of economic conditions due to its industrial applications and limited supply, making it a potentially robust investment.
Portfolio Considerations: Investors should tailor their silver and gold allocations based on their risk tolerance, investment goals, and portfolio size, with younger investors potentially taking more risks.
Bitcoin as Digital Gold: Bitcoin is viewed as a digital counterpart to gold, offering a store of value and diversification away from fiat currencies, with a focus on holding private keys for security.
Concentration vs. Diversification: The importance of focusing on a few well-understood investments, such as gold, silver, and Bitcoin, is emphasized over diversifying into less familiar markets.
Transcript
The best analogy here is what happened in the 1970s. So in 1979, silver moved from about $6 to 48 $49. So 8x in about a year. We're going to see something like that. Silver becomes unloved and ignored and forgotten for decades. And then all of the sudden, everyone remembers it and uh it it takes off to the moon. Uh more impressive than gold ever does. If you have any questions about how to navigate the current environment, Wealthon can help connect you with a vetted advisor to get a free portfolio review. Just click the link in the description below or head to wealthon.com/free. There's no obligation and it will just take a few minutes of your time. Again, that's wealthon.com/free. Hello everyone. Welcome to Wealthon. I'm Maggie Lake and today I'm joined by Alan Hibbert, co-host at Golds for a check on everything happening in the precious metals markets. Hi Alan, it's great to see you again. Hey Maggie, thank you so much for having me. And there is a lot going on uh in the metals market and let's start with silver which I think everyone's talking about. It's now rallied over $40. What's behind this? Yeah, very exciting to see silver over 40. Um it's up over 33% this year, which is pretty fantastic. uh I think most of the demand is actually because of the industrial supply demand characteristics. So silver has been in a structural deficit for five years now which basically means that demand for silver exceeds supply. So in order to build our electric vehicles and our solar panels and our consumer electronics, we actually aren't mining enough new silver to do that every year. So we have to use existing stock piles and you know basic supply and demand when when supply exceeds demand price has to go up to compensate. So I think that's the primary driver and it's only starting to be the case that investors are remembering that silver is money as well. So you can hold it as an investment or as a savings vehicle depending on your perspective. So that's starting to come into play and that's also helping to push up the price. Uh but I think it's going to go a lot further in the uh coming years. Yeah, it's it's sort of right at that spot where it's checking a lot of boxes for people and throw the weaker dollar in there. Uh you know, people thinking about a Fed rate cut uh and it seems to be a sweet spot. So, if you think it's going higher, what is your upside target? Well, sometimes we can think about the price of precious metals, whether it's gold or silver. You know, if we measure it in dollars, it it's not just how much people want those particular metals, it's also how much do they not want the dollar. Uh so a lot of times it's really the value of the dollar falling, not so much the value of the metal rising. So if the dollar falls in purchasing power and investors don't want to hold it, there's sort of no upside limit to the price of any asset. Um but I think more realistically, if we think in terms of real real terms here, I think the price of silver easily is going to hit triple digits in the next two to three years. It could be 300, could be 600 an ounce. Um and there's precedent for that. It's it's not unprecedented. It's not coming out of nowhere. I think the bull market we're in is analogous to that of the 1970s. And at that point, we had a 7 and 12x move in a single year. So 7 1/2x in a single year. I think we could get that. Probably not in the current year. Maybe maybe about two years out. Um but if that happens and we're starting at $50 an ounce at that point, going up 8x is 400 an ounce silver. So that's not crazy. That's not unprecedented. That's actually in align with history. Yeah, it sounds I I can see why you want to kind of quantify that because it does sound like an extreme move. It sounds like a meme stock really. And you're talking about something like silver, which as you say, you know, some people are thinking about as a safe haven. But it is important to put into context. Um longtime commodity watcher Rick Rule was talking about silver. got a lot of questions at his annual conference in Florida recently and reminded everyone that when silver takes over leadership in in a precious metals bull market, it can be really really dramatic and parabolic. Yeah, absolutely. So, I think we're going to see that again. And like I said before, the best analogy here is what happened in the 1970s. So in 1979, silver moved from about $6 to 48 $49 depending how you look at it. So 8x in about a year. So I think we're going to see something like that. Um you know, silver becomes or silver Yeah, silver becomes unloved and ignored and forgotten for decades and then all of the sudden everyone remembers it and uh it it takes off to the moon. Uh more impressive than gold ever does. And something like a meme stock or even like Bitcoin, it just goes completely vertical, catches a lot of people off guard and uh you know it's limited in supply. There's only so much of it out there. So when you have an increasing number of people chasing a dwindling pile of an asset, the price goes vertical. Yeah. So if investors want to participate, are we talking about what's the best way to express that or what are the options? Talk. Let's talk about the options and then you can tell me what you prefer. Yeah, there's a lot of options. I think the bread and butter is holding physical. Um, so if you're going to take something like gold, you know, starting with physical makes a lot of sense. With silver, I think it also makes a lot of sense. However, for a lot of people, it does become that speculative sort of gambly part of their portfolio. I know we talk about gold and sometimes silver as being a safe haven, but for a lot of investors that's not the case. It is a more speculative portion of their portfolio. So, if you are looking for an 8x move, um you know, you shouldn't use that with your your core holdings. That should be supplemental. Uh and so you can take physical, but there's a cost of doing that. You know, shipping charges, custody charges, um insurance, that kind of thing. And so it might be simpler and cheaper to buy an ETF or any of those um paper products or digital products. Um so that's an option as well. However, there's sort of a trade-off, which is that the primary benefit of holding precious metals typically is that no one's in charge of them except you. So, no one is in charge of gold or in charge of silver. There's no CEO. There's no one setting the interest rate of gold or anything like that. Um, but if you but if you do buy through an ETF, then all of the sudden you have all those centralized parties um from the custodian, you know, who whoever your broker is, uh even your internet service provider. I mean, there's all those layers of of uh centralized companies that could either get in the way or add friction to the process when you're buying or when you're selling. You know, you could have a power outage and not be able to sell right at the peak right when you want to. Um but of course, if you have physical, you can you could go to um a coin shop in person or something to sell. So, there's trade-offs to everything. Um there's no one right answer. You just sort of have to think about what your goals are as an investor and which risks you're willing to take on. I love that because if you are somebody who is thinking of understanding why you have something in your portfolio maybe is is the sort of best um way to think about this best framework because if you are someone who's looking at this as a store of value as a safe haven as a diversification either away from dollar assets or fiat assets or just diversification away from equities you realize you have a lot of US equities in your portfolio and you're you want to get some diversification then it sounds like you're saying physical might be something that you want to talk to your advisor about. But if you are somebody who sees this as one of these, you know, kind of parabolic commodity moves, you want to try to get a little exposure to it, then maybe something that's more liquid that you can act on quickly and have a little bit more sort of flexibility with is is a better way to do this. Yeah, that's exactly right. So, if you are buying it for the long term and you plan on holding it 10, 20, 50 years in some cases, physical makes a lot of sense. Um, but if you are just trying to capitalize on a short quick move in the next six to 12 months, probably an ETF or something digital would be more appropriate for you. So, yeah, it's uh, you know, there's a wide range of choices for different types of investors. We're bringing you top tier research in a free silver investment report. To claim your free silver investing report, simply click on the link in the description below. And if you're looking for a simple, secure way to invest in physical gold and silver, check out Hard Assets Alliance at hardassetsalliance.com. Speaking of silver, Wealthon will be on the ground at the SCP Resource Finance Global Silver Conference this October in Toronto where Eric Sprat will deliver the keynote address. It's going to be a major event for silver investors. So stay tuned for more details in the weeks ahead. Right. And really, really understanding your time frame it sounds like is important. Um, and these are the kinds of questions, by the way, you want to be talking to an adviser about, especially if you have not played in the commodity space before. Um, it's a little bit different. It works a little bit different. There's some considerations. So, make sure you're talking to somebody about that. If you want a free review, go to wealthy.comfree. Um, and, uh, the network of advisors, uh, there'll be somebody there who can perhaps begin to guide you or at least uh, help you think about the questions you want to ask. So, another question that comes up a lot, Alan, is uh mining stocks because a lot of people are more more comfortable with equities. It's just where they've been. What about miners in this? Yeah. So, in a precious metals bull market, I think about it in three phases. First, the price of gold moves, then the price of silver moves, and then the price of the mining stocks move. And each successive move, it obviously takes more time, but then the move is even bigger. So, uh, mining stocks have been kind of crushed lately. Um, everyone's wondering when are they going to move and I think it's the answer is soon right after silver continues moving. So, uh, year to date, silver is a better performer than gold or Bitcoin even. And of course, it's it's blowing away the stock market. Uh, so I expect that to continue for silver. And, you know, any day now, um, I expect the mining stocks to continue. So, that's sort of the last last leg of the bull market. And uh it's it's the most spectacular in price. Yeah. If investors do not have exposure yet, there's always a feeling like, oh, it's too late. Like if we're talking about it, it's already too late. Is that true? I don't think so. Um because, you know, we we ordinarily talk about precious metals and so forth. So, it's not out of the norm for us to do so. uh when you find other YouTubers or media outlets that don't talk about finance and all of the sudden they're saying, "Oh, have you guys seen the price of gold and silver that then it might start being too late." Um but for channels that ordinarily talk about it, it's not surprising. And and if we're just getting going, if we're just getting if if you think it could go triple digits, it sounds like there's there's room to run. These things move quickly though, don't they? So when talk to me a little bit about these commodity rallies, do they have So they're very violent on the upside. Do they have staying power or is this quick? Because I don't know you know when we think about something like oil higher prices you know eventually um you know solve the resolve themselves right you have enough people start to participate in it um and if it becomes too high then demand falls you you it becomes unreachable and so they they tend to sort of have blowout tops and then mean revert pretty quickly. Is that the case in in metals as well or again because of the interesting dynamics of where we are with weakening currencies and some of the other issues might it look different this time? Yeah, it's a great question and I think a lot of investors are used to stocks which have an interesting dynamic. You know, as a risk asset, they tend to see their highest growth early on and then they level off. So, if you think of a company that's a startup, there's a lot of room to um have a lot of gains quickly and then as you become a larger company, it sort of levels off. You can keep growing, you just can't grow as quickly. And so you get the biggest move early and then it levels off. What's interesting about precious metals is it goes the other way. You get small moves early on and then you get the big move at the end. And that creates an interesting psychology for a lot of people because when they see a move like silver has had 33% year-to date, they they think to themselves, oh, I missed the big move of 33%. Now what's coming are those smaller moves. now I'm only going to get 20% or 10% or 7%. That's what they think. But in precious metals, it goes the opposite way. So after that 33% move, you have confirmation we're in a bull market. Then you're going to get a 100% move in a year or 700% move in a year like we saw in the 1970s. So it's absolutely not too late. We're forming that base that is like absolutely obviously confirming we are in a bull market and the biggest move is going to come at the end. I do not think this time is different. I think this time is the same. It's just that precious metals are fundamentally different from stocks. Great, great way to look at it. So, do you have to believe the global economy is on solid footing to get behind silver uh because of the industrial exposure? Because, you know, there have been and they've been wrong, but there have been people looking for a recession. I think we're going on four years now. um it hasn't really materialized because of all the fiscal stimulus we've had, but there are still people who believe that we are we do have rougher times coming. Um and even if it's not a outright recession, we're sort of maybe in for subpar growth, at least in the United States. Uh does that how does that sort of macroeconomic fundamental story fit into the silver picture? Yeah, another great question and I kind of love the answer here that I'm about to give. Um because it doesn't matter. it really doesn't matter which is sort of a be beautiful thing about silver whether we're in an expansion or a recession because of the way everything is lining up right now it's going to be good for silver either way so let me explain if we are in an expansion and the economy is doing great there are so many products that use silver from electric vehicles solar panels consumer electronics you name it silver is probably the most useful metal on the periodic table so if we're in in an expansion demand for silver is going going to continue. However, if we're in a recession, something very interesting is going to happen. Two things. First, we get closer to war, which is obviously not a good thing. Um, but the war industry, the military-industrial complex uses a lot of silver as well. All the military equipment, uh, a lot of bombs use silver. A lot of all those technologies use silver, drones, and so forth. So, even if we're in a recession, there's there's a demand for silver. And what's interesting is most of the silver that's mined does not come from dedicated silver mines. Most of the silver that's mined, about twothirds of it, comes as a byproduct from other mines like copper mines, zinc mines, even gold mines. So if we do go into a recession, there's going to be less demand for copper. You know, you can think pipes, um, zinc, gold, all that stuff. All these other base metals are not going to be mined as much because we're in a recession. and that means we won't get as much silver as a byproduct. So, it's absolutely fascinating in my opinion that if we're in a recession or an expansion, it doesn't really matter. There's tremendous demand for silver either way and the supply just simply isn't going to come online. So, it's super bullish for silver. So, either the demand's there or the supply tightens and you are. So, either way, you've got support for the price. So, do you favor silver over gold at this point or should investors have exposure to both? How do you think about how these fit into your portfolio? And we'll talk about shorter term, maybe through the end of the year into next year since we're looking at what could be this parabolic rally. Yeah, another great question and the answer depends a lot on what your goals are as an investor and also the size of your portfolio. Believe it or not, that's a that's a really important point. So, if you're super young and you don't have a lot of in your net worth, it makes a lot of sense to pick one investment that you think is the best, put all your eggs in one basket and just go for it because if it doesn't work out, it's not that big a deal. You're young, you you're not losing that much in that context and you have a lot of years to make up for it. But if you're a retiree or something like that, you probably want to be a lot safer. you probably should lean more towards gold um and lean away from silver or at least make your silver position a lot smaller. Maybe it's just two to five% whereas gold is 10 or 20%. Something like that. So, it really depends on what your goals are. Um if you're super risk averse, you might as even as a young person, you might consider going heavy into gold and sort of foregoing the silver because silver is more volatile. It is a bit riskier. Um, but as we've said that if you're comfortable with that risk, you're probably going to get a higher reward, although it's not a guarantee. So, um, I personally have started with an allocation to gold. That was my bread and butter. And now I'm accumulating silver. I've also accumulated a lot of Bitcoin. And that basically comprises my entire portfolio. And I don't hold any paper products. Um, no stocks, no bonds, no real estate. and I think of all the US dollars in my portfolio as pieces of garbage that I can't wait to get rid of and convert into something real. So, there's a lot of ways to think about it. Um, you got to you got to go back to what are your goals as an investor and then choose the pieces accordingly. Yeah. Which would is is the way you should always be viewing how you approach this all. What are what do you need it for? What's your time frame? So, you mentioned Bitcoin. How does Bitcoin fit in with silver and gold as you're thinking about how you're setting up your portfolio? because we've seen a big r if you go back, we've seen a big rally in Bitcoin as well. It's it's so we're hovering around this point now for a little while, but it was a big move up from that last bottom we saw. Yeah, exactly. So, I guess there's many many things I could say about Bitcoin, but the first is probably to clarify that Bitcoin does not trade like a risk asset. I don't believe fundamentally that it is a risk asset and it also on a technical sense doesn't trade that way either. So, we talked about stocks going up and curling over and precious metals um forming a rounded bottom and then moving up vertically. Bitcoin moves like precious metals. It forms a rounded bottom and then moves up vertically. And it repeats that pattern over and over and over like a fractal. You just have to zoom out if you want to see it. If you get caught up in the day-to-day or the weekly price action, you're not going to see that pattern. But when you zoom out and look monthly or yearly, you will. And it's formed that pattern like eight or nine times. Um, so first of all, I think of Bitcoin fundamentally and technically as something like gold and silver. So that's how I think about it in my portfolio. And then personally, as a relatively young person, I'm willing to take the bet that I think Bitcoin is digital gold and the world will begin to adopt it in that same way. And if I'm wrong, okay, I have a lot of years to make up for my mistake, but if I'm right, it's, you know, life-changing wealth. So, I think about Bitcoin as digital gold and I'm only putting into it what I'm willing to lose. Yes. Very smart. So, are are you um and and it's just Bitcoin? You're not dabbling in other digital currencies for that reason. That's exactly right. So, it operates as a store of value, a diversification away from fiat for for you. Exactly. So, Bitcoin is decentralized. There's no CEO of Bitcoin. There's no company headquarters. there's no, you know, strategic vision or anything like that. Um, and that's true of gold and silver, right? So, they're all decentralized, whereas all these other cryptocurrencies, they have a CEO, they have a headquarters, they have a strategic vision, they have a roadmap, and they can make mistakes. I mean, they could do great things and build awesome, useful products, but they can make mistakes. Um, and I've been burned on them in the past. I've held, you know, a dozen or so other coins years ago. And then I realized, oh, all these other altcoins are more like stocks. Um, whereas Bitcoin is like a commodity. Uh, and so, so my whole portfolio is actually decentralized. Three decentralized assets and borderless. I remember that really interesting framework from the last time we talked. Um, and so again, the same question we talked about with the others. Uh, in terms of do you hold Bitcoin directly in your own wallet? Do you are you comfortable with a Bitcoin ETF or and again is it just depend on what your what your time frame is and your risk tolerance for how you choose to express that trade. Yeah, there's a learning curve here that's so important for people. So if you are interested in buying Bitcoin, I would encourage you at the very least to figure out what it means to hold your own private keys. You're going to have to do some research there. So, if you buy on Coinbase or Robin Hood or wherever you buy it, you have to at least understand and go through the motions of holding your own private keys, you you you have to figure that out. And if you want, do it with $10 worth of Bitcoin, some really small amount, because you're going to make mistakes. Um, so you have to be able you have to know how to do that in case there comes a time where you need to do it quickly. Uh, so learn it sooner. And then the choice of do you hold it in a a hot wallet or a cold wallet. Again, that's going to depend on what your goals are investing. If you're just trying to capture a quick price movement and buy and sell quickly, it makes sense to keep it in a hot wallet or keep it on an exchange. But if you're going to hold it for 10 or 20 or 30 years like me, you move it into cold storage and then you don't touch it. So, um, so that is what I do with 90% of my Bitcoin. I move it into cold storage and I do not plan to sell even at the next peak. So I'm holding it for the long term. Uh so let's finish up back on metals. Um and I you made an really interesting point before that if you are you know understanding what your needs are and why you're thinking about the metal space and then maybe keep it simple and just concentrate on a couple. So if you're a preservation maybe maybe don't worry about silver. Maybe just concentrate on gold. we be because of the big moves we've seen, we hear people asking questions and things popping up in chats about palladium, about platinum, about all of these other uh metals as well. And again, knowing the commodity space and the fact that it's not always straightforward, uranium for different reasons, like once people get their peak their head in, they're like, "Oh, wait, maybe there's a rally around the corner and all of this stuff." Um, are do you think about diversifying outside? because we know there probably ETFs that have exposure across a bunch of metals or do you like staying more concentrated so you can pay attention to that market? Yeah, I like staying more concentrated. Um, and it's sort of like, you know, I've been thinking lately about this concept of an amateur investor. And I thought, you know what, if if you think about what an amateur is, it means you do it for love. Like it comes from the Latin word amo, amas, amar to love. Like you do it for love, you don't do it for money. And so if you're an amateur investor, that's almost an oxymoron because you're not investing for love. Like you're investing to make money or at least preserve what you have, hopefully grow it. And so it's it's almost an oxymoron. Like you can't be an amateur investor. Like you have to be a professional. And so getting back to your question of do I stay concentrated or I do I diversify? If I'm going to be a professional at, you know, investing, there's only a small number of things that I can know really well. And I think I know gold, silver, and Bitcoin really well. I don't really know the the platinum or the palladium or the even the copper market or many many many other markets. Most markets I don't know well enough to be a professional specifically at them. So I just stay out of them. Um so I you know I can't really give anybody financial advice but if I can give you you know psychological advice it would be you've got to know what you are an expert at. And if you're not an expert at a particular asset, you probably shouldn't you probably shouldn't go near it, you know, because like an amateur investor is not that doesn't make sense. That's an oxymoron. Yeah, great great point. And don't go near it unless you're getting the help of someone who does who has been in it for a long time and understands it why which is why it's important. Um Allan, so great to catch up with you. Really fun milestone and it's going to be wild to see what the future holds. So really appreciate your thoughts today. Yeah, thanks so much for having me, Maggie. [Music]
Alan Hibbard: Silver Just Broke $40, Is Triple Digits Next?
Summary
Transcript
The best analogy here is what happened in the 1970s. So in 1979, silver moved from about $6 to 48 $49. So 8x in about a year. We're going to see something like that. Silver becomes unloved and ignored and forgotten for decades. And then all of the sudden, everyone remembers it and uh it it takes off to the moon. Uh more impressive than gold ever does. If you have any questions about how to navigate the current environment, Wealthon can help connect you with a vetted advisor to get a free portfolio review. Just click the link in the description below or head to wealthon.com/free. There's no obligation and it will just take a few minutes of your time. Again, that's wealthon.com/free. Hello everyone. Welcome to Wealthon. I'm Maggie Lake and today I'm joined by Alan Hibbert, co-host at Golds for a check on everything happening in the precious metals markets. Hi Alan, it's great to see you again. Hey Maggie, thank you so much for having me. And there is a lot going on uh in the metals market and let's start with silver which I think everyone's talking about. It's now rallied over $40. What's behind this? Yeah, very exciting to see silver over 40. Um it's up over 33% this year, which is pretty fantastic. uh I think most of the demand is actually because of the industrial supply demand characteristics. So silver has been in a structural deficit for five years now which basically means that demand for silver exceeds supply. So in order to build our electric vehicles and our solar panels and our consumer electronics, we actually aren't mining enough new silver to do that every year. So we have to use existing stock piles and you know basic supply and demand when when supply exceeds demand price has to go up to compensate. So I think that's the primary driver and it's only starting to be the case that investors are remembering that silver is money as well. So you can hold it as an investment or as a savings vehicle depending on your perspective. So that's starting to come into play and that's also helping to push up the price. Uh but I think it's going to go a lot further in the uh coming years. Yeah, it's it's sort of right at that spot where it's checking a lot of boxes for people and throw the weaker dollar in there. Uh you know, people thinking about a Fed rate cut uh and it seems to be a sweet spot. So, if you think it's going higher, what is your upside target? Well, sometimes we can think about the price of precious metals, whether it's gold or silver. You know, if we measure it in dollars, it it's not just how much people want those particular metals, it's also how much do they not want the dollar. Uh so a lot of times it's really the value of the dollar falling, not so much the value of the metal rising. So if the dollar falls in purchasing power and investors don't want to hold it, there's sort of no upside limit to the price of any asset. Um but I think more realistically, if we think in terms of real real terms here, I think the price of silver easily is going to hit triple digits in the next two to three years. It could be 300, could be 600 an ounce. Um and there's precedent for that. It's it's not unprecedented. It's not coming out of nowhere. I think the bull market we're in is analogous to that of the 1970s. And at that point, we had a 7 and 12x move in a single year. So 7 1/2x in a single year. I think we could get that. Probably not in the current year. Maybe maybe about two years out. Um but if that happens and we're starting at $50 an ounce at that point, going up 8x is 400 an ounce silver. So that's not crazy. That's not unprecedented. That's actually in align with history. Yeah, it sounds I I can see why you want to kind of quantify that because it does sound like an extreme move. It sounds like a meme stock really. And you're talking about something like silver, which as you say, you know, some people are thinking about as a safe haven. But it is important to put into context. Um longtime commodity watcher Rick Rule was talking about silver. got a lot of questions at his annual conference in Florida recently and reminded everyone that when silver takes over leadership in in a precious metals bull market, it can be really really dramatic and parabolic. Yeah, absolutely. So, I think we're going to see that again. And like I said before, the best analogy here is what happened in the 1970s. So in 1979, silver moved from about $6 to 48 $49 depending how you look at it. So 8x in about a year. So I think we're going to see something like that. Um you know, silver becomes or silver Yeah, silver becomes unloved and ignored and forgotten for decades and then all of the sudden everyone remembers it and uh it it takes off to the moon. Uh more impressive than gold ever does. And something like a meme stock or even like Bitcoin, it just goes completely vertical, catches a lot of people off guard and uh you know it's limited in supply. There's only so much of it out there. So when you have an increasing number of people chasing a dwindling pile of an asset, the price goes vertical. Yeah. So if investors want to participate, are we talking about what's the best way to express that or what are the options? Talk. Let's talk about the options and then you can tell me what you prefer. Yeah, there's a lot of options. I think the bread and butter is holding physical. Um, so if you're going to take something like gold, you know, starting with physical makes a lot of sense. With silver, I think it also makes a lot of sense. However, for a lot of people, it does become that speculative sort of gambly part of their portfolio. I know we talk about gold and sometimes silver as being a safe haven, but for a lot of investors that's not the case. It is a more speculative portion of their portfolio. So, if you are looking for an 8x move, um you know, you shouldn't use that with your your core holdings. That should be supplemental. Uh and so you can take physical, but there's a cost of doing that. You know, shipping charges, custody charges, um insurance, that kind of thing. And so it might be simpler and cheaper to buy an ETF or any of those um paper products or digital products. Um so that's an option as well. However, there's sort of a trade-off, which is that the primary benefit of holding precious metals typically is that no one's in charge of them except you. So, no one is in charge of gold or in charge of silver. There's no CEO. There's no one setting the interest rate of gold or anything like that. Um, but if you but if you do buy through an ETF, then all of the sudden you have all those centralized parties um from the custodian, you know, who whoever your broker is, uh even your internet service provider. I mean, there's all those layers of of uh centralized companies that could either get in the way or add friction to the process when you're buying or when you're selling. You know, you could have a power outage and not be able to sell right at the peak right when you want to. Um but of course, if you have physical, you can you could go to um a coin shop in person or something to sell. So, there's trade-offs to everything. Um there's no one right answer. You just sort of have to think about what your goals are as an investor and which risks you're willing to take on. I love that because if you are somebody who is thinking of understanding why you have something in your portfolio maybe is is the sort of best um way to think about this best framework because if you are someone who's looking at this as a store of value as a safe haven as a diversification either away from dollar assets or fiat assets or just diversification away from equities you realize you have a lot of US equities in your portfolio and you're you want to get some diversification then it sounds like you're saying physical might be something that you want to talk to your advisor about. But if you are somebody who sees this as one of these, you know, kind of parabolic commodity moves, you want to try to get a little exposure to it, then maybe something that's more liquid that you can act on quickly and have a little bit more sort of flexibility with is is a better way to do this. Yeah, that's exactly right. So, if you are buying it for the long term and you plan on holding it 10, 20, 50 years in some cases, physical makes a lot of sense. Um, but if you are just trying to capitalize on a short quick move in the next six to 12 months, probably an ETF or something digital would be more appropriate for you. So, yeah, it's uh, you know, there's a wide range of choices for different types of investors. We're bringing you top tier research in a free silver investment report. To claim your free silver investing report, simply click on the link in the description below. And if you're looking for a simple, secure way to invest in physical gold and silver, check out Hard Assets Alliance at hardassetsalliance.com. Speaking of silver, Wealthon will be on the ground at the SCP Resource Finance Global Silver Conference this October in Toronto where Eric Sprat will deliver the keynote address. It's going to be a major event for silver investors. So stay tuned for more details in the weeks ahead. Right. And really, really understanding your time frame it sounds like is important. Um, and these are the kinds of questions, by the way, you want to be talking to an adviser about, especially if you have not played in the commodity space before. Um, it's a little bit different. It works a little bit different. There's some considerations. So, make sure you're talking to somebody about that. If you want a free review, go to wealthy.comfree. Um, and, uh, the network of advisors, uh, there'll be somebody there who can perhaps begin to guide you or at least uh, help you think about the questions you want to ask. So, another question that comes up a lot, Alan, is uh mining stocks because a lot of people are more more comfortable with equities. It's just where they've been. What about miners in this? Yeah. So, in a precious metals bull market, I think about it in three phases. First, the price of gold moves, then the price of silver moves, and then the price of the mining stocks move. And each successive move, it obviously takes more time, but then the move is even bigger. So, uh, mining stocks have been kind of crushed lately. Um, everyone's wondering when are they going to move and I think it's the answer is soon right after silver continues moving. So, uh, year to date, silver is a better performer than gold or Bitcoin even. And of course, it's it's blowing away the stock market. Uh, so I expect that to continue for silver. And, you know, any day now, um, I expect the mining stocks to continue. So, that's sort of the last last leg of the bull market. And uh it's it's the most spectacular in price. Yeah. If investors do not have exposure yet, there's always a feeling like, oh, it's too late. Like if we're talking about it, it's already too late. Is that true? I don't think so. Um because, you know, we we ordinarily talk about precious metals and so forth. So, it's not out of the norm for us to do so. uh when you find other YouTubers or media outlets that don't talk about finance and all of the sudden they're saying, "Oh, have you guys seen the price of gold and silver that then it might start being too late." Um but for channels that ordinarily talk about it, it's not surprising. And and if we're just getting going, if we're just getting if if you think it could go triple digits, it sounds like there's there's room to run. These things move quickly though, don't they? So when talk to me a little bit about these commodity rallies, do they have So they're very violent on the upside. Do they have staying power or is this quick? Because I don't know you know when we think about something like oil higher prices you know eventually um you know solve the resolve themselves right you have enough people start to participate in it um and if it becomes too high then demand falls you you it becomes unreachable and so they they tend to sort of have blowout tops and then mean revert pretty quickly. Is that the case in in metals as well or again because of the interesting dynamics of where we are with weakening currencies and some of the other issues might it look different this time? Yeah, it's a great question and I think a lot of investors are used to stocks which have an interesting dynamic. You know, as a risk asset, they tend to see their highest growth early on and then they level off. So, if you think of a company that's a startup, there's a lot of room to um have a lot of gains quickly and then as you become a larger company, it sort of levels off. You can keep growing, you just can't grow as quickly. And so you get the biggest move early and then it levels off. What's interesting about precious metals is it goes the other way. You get small moves early on and then you get the big move at the end. And that creates an interesting psychology for a lot of people because when they see a move like silver has had 33% year-to date, they they think to themselves, oh, I missed the big move of 33%. Now what's coming are those smaller moves. now I'm only going to get 20% or 10% or 7%. That's what they think. But in precious metals, it goes the opposite way. So after that 33% move, you have confirmation we're in a bull market. Then you're going to get a 100% move in a year or 700% move in a year like we saw in the 1970s. So it's absolutely not too late. We're forming that base that is like absolutely obviously confirming we are in a bull market and the biggest move is going to come at the end. I do not think this time is different. I think this time is the same. It's just that precious metals are fundamentally different from stocks. Great, great way to look at it. So, do you have to believe the global economy is on solid footing to get behind silver uh because of the industrial exposure? Because, you know, there have been and they've been wrong, but there have been people looking for a recession. I think we're going on four years now. um it hasn't really materialized because of all the fiscal stimulus we've had, but there are still people who believe that we are we do have rougher times coming. Um and even if it's not a outright recession, we're sort of maybe in for subpar growth, at least in the United States. Uh does that how does that sort of macroeconomic fundamental story fit into the silver picture? Yeah, another great question and I kind of love the answer here that I'm about to give. Um because it doesn't matter. it really doesn't matter which is sort of a be beautiful thing about silver whether we're in an expansion or a recession because of the way everything is lining up right now it's going to be good for silver either way so let me explain if we are in an expansion and the economy is doing great there are so many products that use silver from electric vehicles solar panels consumer electronics you name it silver is probably the most useful metal on the periodic table so if we're in in an expansion demand for silver is going going to continue. However, if we're in a recession, something very interesting is going to happen. Two things. First, we get closer to war, which is obviously not a good thing. Um, but the war industry, the military-industrial complex uses a lot of silver as well. All the military equipment, uh, a lot of bombs use silver. A lot of all those technologies use silver, drones, and so forth. So, even if we're in a recession, there's there's a demand for silver. And what's interesting is most of the silver that's mined does not come from dedicated silver mines. Most of the silver that's mined, about twothirds of it, comes as a byproduct from other mines like copper mines, zinc mines, even gold mines. So if we do go into a recession, there's going to be less demand for copper. You know, you can think pipes, um, zinc, gold, all that stuff. All these other base metals are not going to be mined as much because we're in a recession. and that means we won't get as much silver as a byproduct. So, it's absolutely fascinating in my opinion that if we're in a recession or an expansion, it doesn't really matter. There's tremendous demand for silver either way and the supply just simply isn't going to come online. So, it's super bullish for silver. So, either the demand's there or the supply tightens and you are. So, either way, you've got support for the price. So, do you favor silver over gold at this point or should investors have exposure to both? How do you think about how these fit into your portfolio? And we'll talk about shorter term, maybe through the end of the year into next year since we're looking at what could be this parabolic rally. Yeah, another great question and the answer depends a lot on what your goals are as an investor and also the size of your portfolio. Believe it or not, that's a that's a really important point. So, if you're super young and you don't have a lot of in your net worth, it makes a lot of sense to pick one investment that you think is the best, put all your eggs in one basket and just go for it because if it doesn't work out, it's not that big a deal. You're young, you you're not losing that much in that context and you have a lot of years to make up for it. But if you're a retiree or something like that, you probably want to be a lot safer. you probably should lean more towards gold um and lean away from silver or at least make your silver position a lot smaller. Maybe it's just two to five% whereas gold is 10 or 20%. Something like that. So, it really depends on what your goals are. Um if you're super risk averse, you might as even as a young person, you might consider going heavy into gold and sort of foregoing the silver because silver is more volatile. It is a bit riskier. Um, but as we've said that if you're comfortable with that risk, you're probably going to get a higher reward, although it's not a guarantee. So, um, I personally have started with an allocation to gold. That was my bread and butter. And now I'm accumulating silver. I've also accumulated a lot of Bitcoin. And that basically comprises my entire portfolio. And I don't hold any paper products. Um, no stocks, no bonds, no real estate. and I think of all the US dollars in my portfolio as pieces of garbage that I can't wait to get rid of and convert into something real. So, there's a lot of ways to think about it. Um, you got to you got to go back to what are your goals as an investor and then choose the pieces accordingly. Yeah. Which would is is the way you should always be viewing how you approach this all. What are what do you need it for? What's your time frame? So, you mentioned Bitcoin. How does Bitcoin fit in with silver and gold as you're thinking about how you're setting up your portfolio? because we've seen a big r if you go back, we've seen a big rally in Bitcoin as well. It's it's so we're hovering around this point now for a little while, but it was a big move up from that last bottom we saw. Yeah, exactly. So, I guess there's many many things I could say about Bitcoin, but the first is probably to clarify that Bitcoin does not trade like a risk asset. I don't believe fundamentally that it is a risk asset and it also on a technical sense doesn't trade that way either. So, we talked about stocks going up and curling over and precious metals um forming a rounded bottom and then moving up vertically. Bitcoin moves like precious metals. It forms a rounded bottom and then moves up vertically. And it repeats that pattern over and over and over like a fractal. You just have to zoom out if you want to see it. If you get caught up in the day-to-day or the weekly price action, you're not going to see that pattern. But when you zoom out and look monthly or yearly, you will. And it's formed that pattern like eight or nine times. Um, so first of all, I think of Bitcoin fundamentally and technically as something like gold and silver. So that's how I think about it in my portfolio. And then personally, as a relatively young person, I'm willing to take the bet that I think Bitcoin is digital gold and the world will begin to adopt it in that same way. And if I'm wrong, okay, I have a lot of years to make up for my mistake, but if I'm right, it's, you know, life-changing wealth. So, I think about Bitcoin as digital gold and I'm only putting into it what I'm willing to lose. Yes. Very smart. So, are are you um and and it's just Bitcoin? You're not dabbling in other digital currencies for that reason. That's exactly right. So, it operates as a store of value, a diversification away from fiat for for you. Exactly. So, Bitcoin is decentralized. There's no CEO of Bitcoin. There's no company headquarters. there's no, you know, strategic vision or anything like that. Um, and that's true of gold and silver, right? So, they're all decentralized, whereas all these other cryptocurrencies, they have a CEO, they have a headquarters, they have a strategic vision, they have a roadmap, and they can make mistakes. I mean, they could do great things and build awesome, useful products, but they can make mistakes. Um, and I've been burned on them in the past. I've held, you know, a dozen or so other coins years ago. And then I realized, oh, all these other altcoins are more like stocks. Um, whereas Bitcoin is like a commodity. Uh, and so, so my whole portfolio is actually decentralized. Three decentralized assets and borderless. I remember that really interesting framework from the last time we talked. Um, and so again, the same question we talked about with the others. Uh, in terms of do you hold Bitcoin directly in your own wallet? Do you are you comfortable with a Bitcoin ETF or and again is it just depend on what your what your time frame is and your risk tolerance for how you choose to express that trade. Yeah, there's a learning curve here that's so important for people. So if you are interested in buying Bitcoin, I would encourage you at the very least to figure out what it means to hold your own private keys. You're going to have to do some research there. So, if you buy on Coinbase or Robin Hood or wherever you buy it, you have to at least understand and go through the motions of holding your own private keys, you you you have to figure that out. And if you want, do it with $10 worth of Bitcoin, some really small amount, because you're going to make mistakes. Um, so you have to be able you have to know how to do that in case there comes a time where you need to do it quickly. Uh, so learn it sooner. And then the choice of do you hold it in a a hot wallet or a cold wallet. Again, that's going to depend on what your goals are investing. If you're just trying to capture a quick price movement and buy and sell quickly, it makes sense to keep it in a hot wallet or keep it on an exchange. But if you're going to hold it for 10 or 20 or 30 years like me, you move it into cold storage and then you don't touch it. So, um, so that is what I do with 90% of my Bitcoin. I move it into cold storage and I do not plan to sell even at the next peak. So I'm holding it for the long term. Uh so let's finish up back on metals. Um and I you made an really interesting point before that if you are you know understanding what your needs are and why you're thinking about the metal space and then maybe keep it simple and just concentrate on a couple. So if you're a preservation maybe maybe don't worry about silver. Maybe just concentrate on gold. we be because of the big moves we've seen, we hear people asking questions and things popping up in chats about palladium, about platinum, about all of these other uh metals as well. And again, knowing the commodity space and the fact that it's not always straightforward, uranium for different reasons, like once people get their peak their head in, they're like, "Oh, wait, maybe there's a rally around the corner and all of this stuff." Um, are do you think about diversifying outside? because we know there probably ETFs that have exposure across a bunch of metals or do you like staying more concentrated so you can pay attention to that market? Yeah, I like staying more concentrated. Um, and it's sort of like, you know, I've been thinking lately about this concept of an amateur investor. And I thought, you know what, if if you think about what an amateur is, it means you do it for love. Like it comes from the Latin word amo, amas, amar to love. Like you do it for love, you don't do it for money. And so if you're an amateur investor, that's almost an oxymoron because you're not investing for love. Like you're investing to make money or at least preserve what you have, hopefully grow it. And so it's it's almost an oxymoron. Like you can't be an amateur investor. Like you have to be a professional. And so getting back to your question of do I stay concentrated or I do I diversify? If I'm going to be a professional at, you know, investing, there's only a small number of things that I can know really well. And I think I know gold, silver, and Bitcoin really well. I don't really know the the platinum or the palladium or the even the copper market or many many many other markets. Most markets I don't know well enough to be a professional specifically at them. So I just stay out of them. Um so I you know I can't really give anybody financial advice but if I can give you you know psychological advice it would be you've got to know what you are an expert at. And if you're not an expert at a particular asset, you probably shouldn't you probably shouldn't go near it, you know, because like an amateur investor is not that doesn't make sense. That's an oxymoron. Yeah, great great point. And don't go near it unless you're getting the help of someone who does who has been in it for a long time and understands it why which is why it's important. Um Allan, so great to catch up with you. Really fun milestone and it's going to be wild to see what the future holds. So really appreciate your thoughts today. Yeah, thanks so much for having me, Maggie. [Music]