About $48.70 per ounce on January 21, 1980. It reached the British equivalent of $49.45 in the London fix price.
Either way, on this date silver was at its highest value of all time. Within thirteen years, the value of silver plummeted to $3.5475 an ounce at the close of February 1993. That is almost a 93% drop in value!
The interesting thing about the silver is that it is an extremely volatile commodity. If you look at the rise and fall of silver between 1980 and recent statistics (which conclude around 2007) the volatility is quite apparent. Of course, when you observe that solid investors will buy silver when it begins to move, it’s not much of stretch to reach the conclusion that the shift will be fast.
For example, the Hunt brothers tried to corner the silver market quickly but because of the high prices everyone was cashing in on their silver stores. As more and more people sold their stashes of silver the price dropped to $35.00 an ounce within a month and stayed there through March. It dropped again, to less than $20.00 an ounce after that. By July of the next year, the price dropped below than $9.00!
This happened again in 1997 when Warren Buffet tried to capitalize on the $4.40 per ounce silver market. He bought 100 million ounces of silver, which quickly shot the price up to $7.31 an ounce in 1998. The price dropped back again and in November of 2001 the price of silver was around $4.00. Fortunately, Buffet is a smart investor (and has enough money that he can take risks) and after waiting it out, he has been able to take advantage of better silver prices.
Either way, on this date silver was at its highest value of all time. Within thirteen years, the value of silver plummeted to $3.5475 an ounce at the close of February 1993. That is almost a 93% drop in value!
The interesting thing about the silver is that it is an extremely volatile commodity. If you look at the rise and fall of silver between 1980 and recent statistics (which conclude around 2007) the volatility is quite apparent. Of course, when you observe that solid investors will buy silver when it begins to move, it’s not much of stretch to reach the conclusion that the shift will be fast.
For example, the Hunt brothers tried to corner the silver market quickly but because of the high prices everyone was cashing in on their silver stores. As more and more people sold their stashes of silver the price dropped to $35.00 an ounce within a month and stayed there through March. It dropped again, to less than $20.00 an ounce after that. By July of the next year, the price dropped below than $9.00!
This happened again in 1997 when Warren Buffet tried to capitalize on the $4.40 per ounce silver market. He bought 100 million ounces of silver, which quickly shot the price up to $7.31 an ounce in 1998. The price dropped back again and in November of 2001 the price of silver was around $4.00. Fortunately, Buffet is a smart investor (and has enough money that he can take risks) and after waiting it out, he has been able to take advantage of better silver prices.
