-- Posted 22 July, 2010 | | Discuss This Article - Comments:

“Few investment opportunities arise in our lifetime like silver. The stage is set for a silver price percentage gain of extraordinary magnitude! Forget the popular refrain of “Got Gold?” and make some additions to your portfolio to take advantage of the coming silver supernova!"

So said Donald J. Poitras in an email he sent me after reading an updated version of a recent article by me about the possible impact the historical gold:silver ratio could have on the price of silver should gold go parabolic to various levels. With Poitras’ permission I present below, in a reformatted and edited version, his views on why he believes there are other sound reasons why silver, in and of its self, can expect to experience a “percentage gain of extraordinary magnitude” in the years to come. As Poitras sees it:
 
These Facts About Silver Say It All
 
a) Diminishing Supply: Increasing Demand
- Only 600 million ounces of silver are mined yearly yet industrial demand, with new uses being implemented every year, is currently over 900 million ounces per year.
- Investment demand for physical silver has exploded with the advent of silver ETFs and the increase in actual ownership of the physical metal by interested parties worldwide. China, for example, is now encouraging its citizens to own silver. Demand is such in the U.S. that he U.S. mint is rationing silver coins.
- Total known world above-ground silver inventories have declined by more than 98% in the past 75 years.
 
b) Massive Short Position Exists
- Silver has a massive short position, probably greater than any commodity in history. If one factors in short positions on COMEX and the leasing of silver by bullion banks, banks and brokers selling silver certificates and other silver instruments with no silver to back them then it is quite possible that hundreds of millions – perhaps even billions – of ounces of silver are sold on paper that do not physically exist.
 
c) Inground Silver Is Limited and Will Become Much More Expensive to Mine
- The average occurrence of silver in igneous rock (igneous rock composes ~92.5% of the earth’s crust) is 0.07 PPM or 0.07grams of silver per metric ton of igneous rock, which means that on average 444.3 metric tons of igneous rock must be mined to obtain 1 troy oz of silver (1 metric ton/.07gram Ag)*(31.1gram/1troy oz)!
- Because of the geological phenomenon of epithermal deposition, very little silver remains underground.
- Only the recycling of silver-containing products, the mining of scarce surface silver veins and the silver by-product of base metal mining can provide fairly cheap silver.
- Silver is not found in placer deposits like gold but in veins and these silver veins are formed as epithermal depositions or condensation near the earth’s surface (like whipped cream on the surface of coffee). Simply put, the richest silver deposits are nearest the surface of the earth, and the deeper mines go, the less silver they tend to produce. Economically, the deeper the mine, the more expensive the silver is to obtain.
 
The Result: The Price of Silver Can Only Increase – Dramatically!
- As current silver is depleted from the abovementioned epithermal deposits and mined deeper at much lower grades (approaching 0.07 grams per metric ton), the costs of mining silver must skyrocket and consequently the price of silver must explode.
 
The stage is set for a silver price percentage gain of extraordinary magnitude! It is time to embrace the new refrain “Got silver?”

Lorimer Wilson is the Editor of both www.FinancialArticleSummariesToday.com (a sight/site for sore eyes and inquisitive minds) and www.munKNEE.com (a site consisting of edited excerpts of the internet’s most informative articles on money matters).  He can be reached at editor@munknee.com