Bitcoin Forum

I see a lot of posts that generate a number of responses in the marketplace offering silver for sale. Its quite amazing that people are wiling to sell things like precious metals for Bitcoins. It makes sense, I just can't believe the world we live in. I have some silver-not a lot, some to "diversify my portfolio". What do you guys think? Would you rather have (if you can figure an equivelant amount) x amount of Silver or x amount of Bitcoins?

I'd rather have silver because the value of Silver remains the same however the value of Bitcoins are changing.

stick to silver and gold.. keep bitcoin a hobby

Not sure I follow. Both silver and BTC are fairly volatile investments in terms of FRNs.

I have both and I like them equally. Forced to choose which to put fiat into right at this time I'd choose BTC, largely because I have more into AG, but also because I have some investments I'd like to capitalize.

I look at it this way.  Silver, Gold, Platinum, copper, cash, physical assets (cars, house), stock, bonds, 401k, etc...

It's all about not having all your eggs in one basket.

I wouldn't trade Silver for BC, but I think having money in different forms is important if one goes away or goes to the tank you still have a form of trade/barter.

--Ted

All I mean is both BTC and Silver are great however BTC are changing all the time, like now you get BTC25 for a block instead of BTC50 and other things too.

Silver always remains the same and has no chance of being shut down or hacked.  :)

Also, Silver is physical; I believe there needs to be a physical form of Bitcoin.

Thanks for sharing everyone. I agree in a diverse portfolio, too. Why is it so important for bitcoins to be physical? I know there are some services that send your coins to "cold storage" and effectively put them on paper. I think as long as you have a good wallet there is no need for BTC to become physical. The only benefit to them becoming physical (I'm assuming in addition to digital) is that it would facilitate face to face transactions. But in a world of smartphones and other capable devices, I don't think its really practical or necessary to have bitcoins be a physical entity.
I also wanted to point out that bitcoins are similar to precious methods when you think about it. I think merely making money and keeping it in the bank is a terrible idea of investing. Our money supply (thanks to the Fed) has the potential to be infinite, leading to deflation, making your hard-earned dollars constantly worth less. Did you know the Fed plan to eliminate the penny nickel and dime? That should say something. Our money isn't even worth the cheap metal alloys its minted on. I like BTC because their supply is finite. I understand that not all BTC in existence have been "mined", and thus there might be temporary lapses in their value. But, once all bitcoins are mined, no more are going to be produced. This is just like precious metals. Supply remains constant, while demand does not-that is the essence of an investment. I just think its really something to be impressed about that people are trading precious metals for Bitcoins. My portfolio will remain diversified-I have bitcoins and I have Silver. Money in the bank-of course some, but I have very little faith in the dollar. My portfolio contains lots of real estate, stock, precious metals and now...Bitcoins.

I completely agree with you, the idea of them being physical is for security and replacing money so people will trust it more (will probably takes years to happen anyway). But yes, money is a scam whereas Bitcoin and Silver are not; however Silver is more safe because it's physical.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=129399.0

Thank you for the link. :)

Funny! Silver is the 2nd most volatile commodity out there, just behind bitcoins.

How so?

It's value in fiat changes a lot.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v718/timonex/ag85-pres.gif

Gold is rather tranquil by comparison.

Yeah but that's the value of money changing not silver.

That is precisely why I worded it the way I did.

That's not the whole story though. Gold value measured in FRNs does not experience such wild % swings, primarily because the gold market is several times larger than the silver market. The bottom line is silver and BTC value measured in FRNs fluctuates a lot. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it can cause one to experience sleepless nights until you have been through a few corrections. 

Oh right yeah fair enough I guess you're right.

Imagine a cryptocurrency backed by Silver and Gold, would be wonderful. :)

Obviously a diversified portfolio with both Silver and Bitcoin would be preferred. But if I was choosing between the two right now, I would have to choose bitcoin. It has a lot more upward potential than silver right now imo. Silver is already relatively highly priced after the run up of the last few years, whereas bitcoin's run up is much closer to the beginning.

what do you want? a super safe store of value with 5000 years of historical precedent or the one lottery ticket to rule them all.

Umm...I want some of each actually.

ready for risk ? test bitcoin. either way silver is always best

Don't kid yourself. Silver is stable ATM, but it's a firecracker. I last played the GSR, swapping AG for AU at nearly $48/Ozt. It then fell to $29/Ozt and has worked it's way back up to $33. If you want stable and reliable then buy gold, both silver and bitcoins are volatile.

Certainly not. The spending power of the dollar did not go down by 80% from 2008 to 2010, and then up by 30% from 2010 to present (in any sense other than the dollar price of silver.) These changes are almost entirely due to changes in the value of silver.

A set number of dollars could not buy five times more labor, or butter, or gasoline, or real estate in 2008 than it would in early 2010.

Exactly.  The decline in purcashing power of the dollar is pushing the longer multi-year trend however anyone saying silver is "stable" just uneducated.   The daily and weekly moves aren't suddenly caused by a major change in purcashing power of the dollar.

I mean if it was then one would expect McDonald's combo meal to be $4 this week, $5 last week, and $2.25 at the start of the year.  Sometimes during the day the price of a meal will jump $0.50 while you are standing in line.

Yeah, a combination of a small silver market and lots of manipulation is a recipe for wild swings. This need not be a bad thing if you have the anti-acids handy and can keep emotion in check. On the contrary silver investing can be tremendously profitable.

Both are fairly liquid assets.  But the volatility of bitcoin could be potentially more damaging then the trend silver has shown since '09. 

A careful mixture of both seems to be the more conservative approach.

Lots of stuff I've read lately says silver is due for a crash.

Yeah. Either silver will go up or it'll go down...or maybe it'll stay the same. Meh.

I recommend buying when it goes on sale and swapping for gold when it gets too long in the tooth.

Well how come silver is fluctuating so much?

I'm just going to repeat what other people have been saying.
The most reliable portfolio of investments is the one that is the most diversified.

No truer words have been said.  If you are looking to diversify your BTC holdings, FastCash4Bitcoins https://fastcash4bitcoins.com offers brilliant uncirculated Canadian Maple Leaf 1 oz coins.  Available as single coin (in premium airtite capsule) or as a 25 coin mint tube.  Need a lot of silver.  We can do custom orders of 200 oz or more just drop of a PM.  Personally I like 10 oz silver stacker bars.  Nothing like opening up a good quality safe and seeing your wealth "stacked up".

I diversify between metals from coinabul, perfect money and bitcoin. Silver and gold makes me sleep at night...

To be fair I think you people think the "value" of Silver is fluctuating a lot because they "value" of currency is, that's what the charts are based on anyway. I quote from a documentary I saw "One silver coin gets you two goats a thousand years ago, one silver coin gets you two goats today." The value of silver doesn't change, the value of money does (for obvious reason).

That theory accounts for the longer term upward trend in silver. It does not account for the tremendous day to day volatility that silver displays. As was mentioned earlier in this thread, the silver market is tiny and it's manipulated by some large players, resulting in wild swings.

just my 2 cents but bitcoin seems to have a large market for growth as a payment medium alone

Indeed and with kewl projects like coinbase just getting revved up, the greedy SOBs @ paypal had better watch their backs.

The dollar value of silver swung up by a factor of 4 between December 2008 and December 2010.

The dollar value of goat meat did not quadruple during that time. The price of silver changed.

Fair enough.

I think you have to consider the long-term merits of stable and sound money, e.g. gold and silver. I was sitting close to (if not in) the front row at Charles Vollum's sound-money lecture at September's London Bitcoin conference, and he raised a very interesting point:

In 1900, a year's tuition at Yale cost about a kilogram of gold.
Today, a year's tuition at Yale costs... about a kilogram of gold.

Yes, the price of a Yale degree has fluctuated somewhat around that, e.g. a 1980 trough due to a high gold price and a 2000 peak due to a lower gold price, but has clearly tended around the 1kg mark. The dollar price has simply gone up and up (inflation/dollar debasement).

Vollum made the point that hard-money investors should try hard to detach themselves from assigning value too centrally in fiat terms. Psychologically, this is trickier than it might seem, given how everything around us, generally including wages, is priced in fiat.

Silver. would rather have a physical currency. Plus when the zombie apocalypse happens try trading bitcoins.