Regarding gold being nearly useless I was just comparing it to silver. A far larger percentage of annual silver production is used in industry compared to gold and most of the gold is recycled whereas most of the silver is not economically recoverable.
To quote Warren Buffet regarding gold: "It gets dug out of the ground in Africa, or someplace. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head."
The US has recently announced the will be starting to accumulate strategic reserves of rare earths, we may not be too far off from the day when both governments and industry start to accumulate strategic reserves. Silver is the first metal to have its own dedicated user group to "to represent the interests of companies that make, sell and distribute products and services in which silver is an essential component."
I am not arguing that gold is overvalued, just that silver is fundamentally undervalued.
