By Justin Fraughton
With the current state of the world—the fear of a near return of Cold War politics, concerns over the actions of extremist zealots and worries over increasing natural disasters—many people are beginning to worry for the future of both our country and the world, and they’re starting to prepare themselves for the very worst.
If you relate with the stories of fellow preppers and their wants to secure protection for the future, you should begin considering certain types of investments. In particular, one of the most useful investments you can store alongside your preps is precious metals such as coins, jewelry, and silver made of both gold and silver. Not sure how or why these precious metals can benefit you in the event of global or regional catastrophe? Here are five key reasons to consider:
- Money Makes Civilization Go ’Round
First and foremost, you should be certain to stockpile some spare money along with all of your partitioned goods—i.e., to be unbanked. The provided benefit to being prepared in this way is that you will have money on hand without having to worry about whether your bank—or any digital transaction system—has survived whatever doomsday has hit your corner of planet Earth. Furthermore, it’s in your best interest to have money nearby in case it is unsafe for you to leave your home for some time. The best options available for you is to stock up on a variety of cash and precious metal items—precious, and even rugged, coins, bullion bars, and gold jewelry.
You might think that cash is the better option here, as you can store large wads of bills with ease, but that cash might not fair well in the long run—as considered in points (2) and (3).
- Cash Won’t Be Around Forever
Precious metals are at a greater benefit to cash for the wear and tear they are able to withstand over time. Dependent upon the conditions of the doomsday world, the cloth of your cash might not stand up to whatever debris and natural wear it comes into contact with. Even if your gold and silver get a little beaten up, it will still harness its innate value, being useful no matter the conditions.
Cash—as a marketable currency—might not withstand an apocalyptic event either. Similar to the market depressions that hit countries like the United States and Germany in the first half of the 20th century, the value of the dollar might plummet to extreme levels, becoming more or less useless. The likelihood of this happening with either gold or silver is quite low, though, as the intrinsic value of these precious metals is far above that of paper currency.
Even if you’re not convinced and you don’t think precious metals are the primary investment for you, it is still in your best interests to have some as backup.
- Gold and Silver Go a Long Way
Even today, the spot value of both gold and silver is quite substantial. The benefit of having some gold and silver items on hand cannot be overstated. While the value per ounce of these items is noteworthy, there is something to be said about the allure that these items offer. Whether used as a cash transaction or as a form of bartering (4), precious metals in the forms of rings, necklaces, collectors coins, and bracelets can be helpful if you need the aid or goods that someone else has available to offer.
- How to Barter and Influence Others
As stated before, you can’t underestimate the value that gold and silver can provide when attempting to influence the actions and emotions of other people. If you were to find yourself in a bind following the apocalypse, a beautiful, shiny golden ring or an impeccable American Silver Eagle coin can capture the attention of whoever it is you’re trying to convince/influence.
With such precious metal goods in your inventory, you’ll be able to trade with others even if the normal systems of payment and trading happen to be wiped out. In need of someone’s services, such as woodworking or welding? Offer them some gold and silver coins, or a gold pocket watch! Need protection from a group of people who have taken power in your region? Provide them with a gift made from precious metals and increase the likelihood for them to respect both you and your family!
- To Fight Inflation
As stated earlier, the likelihood of the USD being hit by an aggressive amount of inflation is quite high. The last thing you want to do is stockpile a large amount of cash to only have it become nearly useless.
In such an event, gold and silver are one of the best bangs for your buck. Per expectations, it might even be expected that the spot price of precious metals might increase whenever the USD is hit by inflation. While paper currency has become the standard within the past century, the historical value of both silver and gold has stayed true. For such reasons, it is best that you think ahead and make sound investments when prepping.
When prepping for doomsday, you want to make whatever moves you can to protect yourself, whatever the conditions might be—natural or manmade. Your best option is to guarantee that you have a large list of items on demand there for you in the event of the worst. Be sure to take the time and stockpile the basics needed for survival—clothes, shelter, food, and water—while also securing precious metals to keep your finances safe and sound.
About the Author
Justin Fraughton is the Head of Marketing and Content at Provident Metals, a recognized and trustworthy supplier of gold, silver, platinum, palladium and copper bullion coins and bars. Justin is an avid prepper and working on building up his own homestead and enjoys blogging about his experiences.
Nice as for Precious Metals. All information is correct enough but assumes that basic civil LAW exists.
Otherwise someone will kill you for your Gold.
Agreed. The reality is, a precious-metal based economy is awkward even with rule of law in place. Silver and copper in wire form, do have potential use in disinfecting directly or in colloidal solutions and can be traded in that form. Gold… not so much direct survival use.
The tech exists to print gold into sealed plastic bills, but few buy into that because of the difficulty in verification and ease of loss. Similarly, spoofed gold has been found even from bank-certified coins and bars.
Most people don’t know the karat system for gold alloys. Most people don’t know today’s spot price for gold off the top of their heads. Nor the fair percentage of spot price they can expect from a dealer – and its in U.S. dollars anyway.
Gold is for the really wealthy (legal and not so legal), and for nation states, to settle balance of account differences. However, the initial transactions were based in fiat or discrete commodities. Gold transacting is something that should be regularly practiced before SHTF if one is serious about this.
Joe Nobody prepper should maybe have a little fungable gold, to stave off selling stuff with real sentimental value like wedding rings. However, jumping big into gold for prepping without active skills or knowledge in transacting with gold is just building a stockpile waiting to be fleeced or pillaged by someone else.
I would not know a real gold or silver coin from a fake one.
Same goes for jewelry.
I will stick to things I know the value of, and has value to me.
A Soviet Union refugee’s story
My favorite story about escaping the former Soviet Union was from a guy who devised a unique way to fool the border guards into believing (after a thorough search) that he was carrying almost no money (which the guards would have confiscated on the spot — just like TSA) and little else of value except for all the clothes he could carry. After passing through their TSA-like scrutiny, he traveled on into the West.
All his clothes were carried on wire clothes hangars, almost like ones we’re all familiar with — with one tiny exception. He had used a service that made his wire clothes hangars out of platinum, which once in the west he was able to convert back into spendable money.
–Lewis
The demand for Gold is mostly intrinsic, but Silver has many uses and utility. Making Antibacterial Silver colloid will be highly sought in the medical industry in SHTF. Go sell a few ounces to a dentist or doctor. Solar Panels an electrical components will continue to expand and so will the need for silver to produce these electrical devices. I say skip the junk silver and old US pre-1964 coins as 1932 – 1964 Silver Quarter is 90% silver; Quarters after 1964 are copper nickel clad, there is no silver. only the 1/2 dollars or “50 cent” pieces from 1965-1970 are 40% silver.
But the problem is how do you make Silver colloid with the 10% contamination from other metals from junk silver? Answer, You can’t, so US coins ad jewelry is virtually worthless and useless junk. So Preppers, Stick to .999 Pure Silver Bullion Bars or 1 Oz Silver Rounds, which will barter great or trade in SHTF. Skip all the junk. Why do you think its called Junk? Duh!!
This article makes some good points but is short on detail. See this article for the details https://www.theorganicprepper.com/precious-metals-a-preppers-guide-to-gold-and-silver/
I don’t like the idea of using jewelry for a store of gold. For one thing it will be difficult determining the exact amount of gold in a SHTF situation. Jewelry has to be weighted and calculation made on the karat (fineness) of the gold. Wearing gold, other than wedding rings, makes you stand out in the crowd, makes you a target. I personally prefer to be the “gray man”. https://www.theorganicprepper.com/selco-explains-how-and-why-to-be-the-gray-man/. I don’t wear any jewelry.
I prefer US silver coins. With these you can easily and precisely have an amount of silver to trade that is less than a full ounce. I’d much prefer to barter a silver dime for a hand full of fresh vegies that to waste a one ounce Silver Eagle on the same purchase.
Details matter.
Absolutely details matter. Those were great articles, btw, thanks for writing them 411 and Selco.
Even if you’re not doing the gold thing, points from those articles and others are a handy thing to have in the BOB manual.
Which should be in printed hardcopy, not flash drive or your phone.
I also appreciate collecting US pre-1965 silver coins as a way of showing my daughter the difference between our current fiat currency and something of real, tangible value.
We can count out different denominations of silver coin and convert them to current USD value, back and forth, and discuss what can be purchased with them. It’s a great way to help with not only math but also with teaching her the value of something.
She receives no standard allowance but can do extra chores to earn money, and sometimes she asks for silver coins instead of cash. She’s also saved half of every dollar she’s ever made, again because she understands value.