Image courtesy of www.preciousmetalsirax.com
When you hear the words “precious metal”, what are the first words that you think of? Most people think gold, silver and platinum as they are talked about more frequently, but there are many more!
What makes metals precious?
Metals are deemed precious based on a couple of different things.
- Rarity
- Market Value (Demand)
Rarity
Rarer metals tend to fetch higher values than metals that are more commonplace such as copper and aluminum. This is nothing new to anyone, but what is interesting is that improvements in the mining industry and refining process allow more sources of ore to be found and made available for use.
This happened to aluminum in 1886 when the Hall-Heroult process was invented. At the time, aluminum was a highly valuable metal, but the invention of the Hall-Heroult process allowed more aluminum to be produced more efficiently. Thus, the high market value for aluminum crashed for good.
Believe it or not, the value of aluminum once surpassed that of silver! Tradition has it, that Napoleon III gave his most noble and important guests aluminum cutlery, at the Exposition Universelle of 1855, while the less important guests received mere silver cutlery [source].
Another aspect of precious metals worth mentioning is their luster and beauty.
Market Value
The demand for precious metals is driven by their practical uses and their role as investments.
Historically, precious metals were used as currency, but as technology progresses we have found new uses for metals which affects their value. For instance, gold is highly sought after in today’s industry.
Today, gold can be found in a variety of electronics including cell phones and audio equipment. It’s unique properties make it one of the most sought after industrial metals of our time. It conducts electricity superbly and doesn’t deteriorate. This is one reason why NASA uses large amounts of gold in the electrical work of their space crafts.
Since the demand and economic value of precious metals is ever changing, precious metals can make wonderful investments. Take the price of gold for instance. It has quadrupled in value since 12 years ago! Because of rising gold prices, more and more people are buying and selling gold.
List Of Precious Metals
Gold, silver, platinum and palladium all have an ISO 4217 currency code. The following list of precious metals is filtered most valuable to least valuable.
- Platinum
- Rhodium
- Gold
- Iridium
- Osmium
- Palladium
- Rhenium
- Ruthenium
- Germanium
- Beryllium
- Silver
- Gallium
- Indium
- Tellurium
- Mercury
- Bismuth
Toronto Gold is a gold buyer in Toronto, Ontario. The above image is not our own.