by JL Yastine
The Sovereign Investor
Years ago, I remember making my first precious-metal purchase.
Silver was $5 an ounce, and gold was going for $350. I walked into a coin shop and asked the owner if he had any 10-ounce silver bars for sale.
I’ll always be grateful for his response. The owner gave me a little silver seminar — the fabricator’s brand stamp, the weight in troy ounces, the “three nines fine” (the mark showing the metal is 0.999% pure silver). Then he picked up a big hardware-store hammer from behind the counter…
“Hear that?” he said, as he tapped hammer and bar together. A distinctive ping rang out. “That’s the sound of real silver.”