Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Silver and Gold I have none!

I was with some friends the other night and one couple who’d been in Amsterdam a few years ago were telling me about a bank there. Apparently this bank has a good deal of gold bullion stored in its basement, and they have an excellent approach to preventing the gold being stolen. When the alarm goes off to tell them that someone is trying to filch the gold, floodgates from the canal near which the bank is built open up and….flood the basement. Any thief is promptly drowned (unless he’s a good swimmer) and the gold, which is known to float too well at the best of times, stays exactly where it was. A little hard on the thieves maybe, but then did I hear anyone say theft was something they approved of?

I was reminded about this story when I came across a firm, Monex Deposit Company, advertising silver as an investment. I hadn’t realised silver came in ingots as well as coins – but then silver hasn’t been something I’m known for giving much thought to. I didn’t realise that there is more demand for silver now than ever; in fact, the demand is outstripping the supply….which means, of course, that anyone investing in silver will do very well. Silver, like gold, doesn’t lose its value. Maybe I should store a few bars here at home. The only problem is, living on a hill, I don’t have a canal running alongside the house…

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