Thats closely true fact as I have seen my parents doing that all the time. They always try to buy gold whenever the prices for them are dipping a little.
Well they are now old and they have seen the gold pricing at half of what it is today! So they believe in its continuous growth and who would agree upon that.
I have also read one article where it does mention that the Gold rate always increase by around 7-9% each year and its so true this year as well since the gold prices has soared up a lot.
May be they have seen the real profits (and stable) thats why they invest in it.
I mean I do see this, and there has been growth in gold over the years. But none of this growth is even close to comparable to the stock market (in the United States) over that same time period. If you are to compare the growth of Gold from the 1980's to the growth of the stock market, you're going to see that you could have made a SHIT TON more if you were invested in the stock market through that period.
The market increases at that same rate by the way, averaged overtime of course.
I'm not one who would invest in precious metals, but I have noticed that a good amount of the older generations are pretty keen in investing in these metals. They see it as a way to bet against the market, and a security that will always be safe -- even in the times of a market downturn/country failure as a whole.
I personally wouldn't even want to buy these metals in those events, as I don't see the reason to. I'd rather invest in securities that go up when the market shits itself (Payroll lending companies and so on and so forth)
Does anyone here know the reason behind people loving precious metals?
I think that most people buy precious metals as a long term store of value.
And obviously, there is some point to it. Both silver and gold has been used as currency and have proven to be good store of values throughout history, while fiat currencies have depreciated. Your observation of older generations more likely to invest in these assets could well be because they've actually seen these precious metals be used as currency and they see it as "money" itself.
Also, with gold and silver there is pretty much no counterparty risk which is something that you don't get with company investments. But then again, I think that bitcoin would be a much better investment to make right now.
Obviously being a permabull in anything isn't a good idea, nor is it in precious metals. I think that putting all your wealth in precious metals is pretty much a stupid thing to do, but right now, prices seem to be bottoming out for silver and gold and they may be worth a buy.
i just see a problem with the reasonsing, as people are using it as a 'if the world goes to shit' currency. When the only currency that's going to mean anything during a 'if the world goes to shit' is going to be food, water, other supplies, and defenses.
Maybe investing in Gold / Silver is not too risky, as older people are more easily stressed and panicky, so they are looking for a safer alternative/investment solution, which means far from the risk of loss.
i mean, there are so many other safer investments, Investing in gold/silver is like investing against the stock market.