Buy Platinum instead of Gold

Daily Wealth—Weekly: You’re Nuts if You Own Gold Instead of This

I don't know why anyone would trade gold when they could trade platinum right now.

Platinum does everything gold does. It's a store of value, it works as money, it's easy to hide, it's durable, it looks beautiful as jewelry and I could go on. From a trading standpoint, it also has some huge advantages to gold.

First, platinum's major demand comes from industrial users, especially the auto industry. You might think that's a bad thing, but I see it as an advantage. Think what happens to gold once it's mined: It sits in vaults, in safety deposit boxes or in people's jewelry boxes. It never disappears. When sentiment changes or the price gets high enough, this "scrap" gold floods the market and suppresses prices.

But with 80% of platinum demand from industry, each year automakers sweep that platinum off the market and bury it inside catalytic converters. It can't come back as supply. And economically sensitive assets are rallying hard.

Second, platinum is 15 times rarer than gold. And 80% of its supply comes from South Africa. There is a much greater supply risk. Gold is produced all over the world.

Finally, the gold-platinum ratio is at a 12-year low after platinum's crash in 2008, but as I write this, platinum has broken out and is now moving up against gold as well as the dollar.

In April, platinum hit its highest high in more than six months. The platinum exchange-traded fund (PTM) is one of the five best-performing ETFs of the 88 I've followed over the last three months.

Don't get me wrong; I still own plenty of gold as a "crisis hedge." But if you're shooting for really big gains in the precious metals market, look into platinum—you would be nuts to ignore it.

[link to www.theepochtimes.com]