There were three auctions tonight, all starting within 35 minutes of one another. It could have been hectic, but my wife and I are a good team and we've got this down to an art... so it was okay. We didn't win much - just two items at one auction, three at a second and seven at a third. We bid on a total of 56 lots, so the win percentage really was low.
But we had a lot of fun and spent some money for a change. In particular, we spent it on silver - starting with the lot below. It's sterling silver (92.5 percent silver and 7.5% something-else-usually-copper.) The pieces shown came in at 1,860 grams (almost 60 troy ounces), and another nine pieces described only as "handles" weren't included in the weighing. I have no idea what the handles are or how much they add to the known weight. What I do know is that even with the buyer's premium (the auction house's fee) and excluding the nine handles, I'm paying close to $200 below spot. And that's what matters. I wasn't looking to get nice, collectible silverware (though it IS collectible and nice); I was looking to get silver in small, measurable and potentially tradeable pieces at a great price. Anybody who weighs one of these spoons or forks and knows the spot price of silver will know its worth, so in most TEOTWAWKI situations where we don't die, this stuff will be spendable.
Gold is $1,581/oz today. When it hits $2,000, it will be up 26.5%. Let's see how long that takes. - De 3/11/2013 - ANSWER: 7 Years, 5 Months
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