Gyroscopic Investing

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A bit of real asset tilting to nickels and silver seems called for.  Load up on a bag of junk silver for double duty SHTF protection.  And start hoarding all nickels you come across.

[quote=MachineGhost]And start hoarding all nickels you come across[/quote]

Not so fast.  US Nickels are only 25% nickel and 75% copper.

And don't think you will get a better deal with Canadian nickels.  Although they used to be 100% nickel, after 1981 the Canadians switched to the 25% nickel/75% copper composition.  And what has to have nickel conspiracy theorists fuming, Canadian "nickels" switched in 2000 to 95% steel, 3% copper, and have 2% nickel in the form of plating.

sounds heavy for any bug out bag

Point is that that 25% nickle content is going to be "reformulated" during the next inflationary episode at the end of this decade.  So if you don't hoard now, you'll lose out.  Current value is .04 but it was above .05 back when gold was peaking.

[quote=MachineGhost]Point is that that 25% nickle content is going to be "reformulated" during the next inflationary episode at the end of this decade.  So if you don't hoard now, you'll lose out.  Current value is .04 but it was above .05 back when gold was peaking.[/quote]

I know, but a nickel really isn't all nickel (especially lately in Canada).  And I agree that the US will likely reformulate the nickel during the next bout of relatively high inflation.

Fun nickel tricks: Nickel is magnetic.  But due to the debasement with copper, US Nickels will not stick to a magnet.  The pure nickel versions of Canada will.  And the nickel-plated steel ones will as well, I suppose.

If one were so inclined, perhaps there are nickel arbitrage possibilities, trading inferior U.S. nickels for superior full-nickel Canadian versions.

Full disclosure: I do save nickels (and pre-1983 pennies) from my change.  I use re-purposed nut jars from Costco for storage.  And I do note that nut jar and nut job are separated by only two letters.

There's also a worlwide nickle shortage, but I don't think its gonna show up in prices until the commodities funk is over.