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To: Dan3 who wrote (75513)	3/2/2008 4:07:37 PM
From: carranza2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116555

You may very well have a point. Seems silver has historically been shorted heavily. See this, in which the black line represents silver short positions and the green represents the price of silver: Read more here: marketoracle.co.uk From a historical standpoint, it appears that short positions have diminished as the price goes up. The latest CoT, 2/29, shows that short positions, though healthy, have gone down from previous levels: news.silverseek.com

To: Dan3 who wrote (75513)	3/2/2008 10:24:11 PM
From: pitbull_1_us	Respond to of 116555

Let me be more specific Dan.Although I don't keep as close an eye on the numbers as I used to and may not recall the catagories and # like I used to.That is silver that is in existence available for investment.The key there is loosely held and available for investment.While experts in the know estimate that there are approx 900 million to 1 billion oz bullion equivalent world inventory amount the vast majority of that is very tightly held and a whole bunch of that is in Chinese bank vaults that will never see the light of day except at much higher prices and maybe not even then for the Chinese held bullion if the Chinese go to a silver based system as some people expect to be their eventual plan.I don't necessarily buy into those theories mainly because I don;t have any idea what the Chinese plan and don't believe anyone else does except maybe them. Above ground inventories of silver are down 95% in the last 60 years(that silver is gone.never to be seen again)due to industrial demand and due to the industrial and fabrication demand being virtually in balance with total production (mining plus recycling), none of the silver currently being produced is, effectively, available for investment demand.Every single speck of silver mined in 2007 was used in fabrication.Therefore that silver no longer exists(except a fraction that can be recycled)and not one single troy oz of it was available for investment purposes.The same will be true for 2008,2009,2010 etc.Of course you have the issue of a slow down causing a drop in fab demand creating a small supply excess but that will be quickly swallowed up and that excess will be fleeting imo never to be seen again. The only real source of silver for new investment demand is silver already held as investment, namely existing world inventories. In other words, since all newly produced silver is already spoken for by industrial and other fabrication demand, the only real silver available for new silver investors is the sale and resale of silver by existing silver investors. And I appreciate your concern for my retirement Dan but don't worry about me.I started buying physical bullion many years ago when Slider jumped ship on the old strictley drilling and oil field services board from black gold to the yellow dog(and silver for me)and it has been mighty good to me..mighty good..But I would echo your sentiments and absolutely not advise anyone to bet their retirement.I did that 8 years ago with nads of steel but I'm not so sure about today.I might be scared to jump in the pit today.But then I might not be..Some people dream of $1500 gold and $50 silver.But that is rediculous right.Kinda like $950 gold and $20 silver was a pipe dream 8 years ago.But I digress.