pdowd,
re: "I think that ammunition will have more barter power than gold any day for goods & services in a true doomsday scenario!"
You have to define "doomsday scenario" a little better. To at least some people's way of thinking a "doomsday scenario" means we're all dead.
To others, it means the Great Depression.
There are as many thoughts on what that means as there are people.
Certainly, ammunition and guns will be good to have in a serious economic decline. If you look beyond that - to where things start to recover - then gold might be the place to be.
During the Great Depression, holders of Homestake Mining made a bundle. Maybe that will happen again.
"It is meaningful to note that in late 1929 the value of Homestake Mining was about $80 per share. Moreover, during the next six years Homestake Mining paid out a total of $128 in cash dividends. In fact the 1935 dividend alone reached $56 per share. That's almost a 70% dividend yield payout (basis 1929) in only one year! Indeed, hard asset investments (gold mining shares) were islands of economic refuge during the grueling years of the Great Depression."
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