“Sentimental is now out the door.”
~ Tobina Kahn, President of House of Kahn Estate Jewellers
Written by Bryan Lutz, Editor at Dollarcollapes.com:
Now that times are tough, gold jewellery has become the ATM Americans never thought they had.
Bloomberg reports:
At a Brooklyn Pawnshop, Customers Are Flooding In to Sell Gold
“For some, sky-high values simply mean it’s a good time to cash in; It’s hard to ignore record prices that climbed above $2,400 an ounce last week. For others, it’s a more desperate move to get money for bills and rent. Whatever the need, what’s clear is jewellers and pawn shops are seeing a flood of sellers.”
You’d think that when prices are rising…
When new all-time highs hit, that’s when it’d be the exact time to hold on to gold.
Especially since it doesn’t appear as if the price of gold is going down any time soon.
Sovereign debt continues to increase…
Fiscal deficits have become the norm…
And treasury bond yields continue on their upward trend…
That’s when you’d want to hold on to whatever gold you have because the spot gold price is most likely going to go up.
But now, since inflation continues to rise and interest rates remain high, American’s may have good reason.
The average American needs money to pay their bills. Yet, their credit cards are all topped up.
Michael Maharrey over at Money Metals writes:
Is the American Consumer Tapped Out? Credit Card Borrowing Tanked in March
“According to the latest data released by the Federal Reserve, revolving credit cratered in March. Meanwhile, non-revolving credit continued to grow at a tepid rate, a trend we’ve seen for well over a year.
Both of these data points signal the American consumer may well be tapped out.”
Americans are scrambling to find a new source of income to pay monthly expenses.
And for many, they’re looking for sources of income other than their credit card, which seem to already be overwhelmingly high.
Consumer debt, which includes credit card debt, student loans, and auto loans is now up to $5.06 Trillion.
And if you include mortgages, that number more than triples. Totalling up all household debt in the US of A, it comes to $17.5 Trillion, and rising.
The solution has come to this:
Selling off the golden family heirlooms…
while prioritizing which pieces of jewellery to sell first, and last.
And the pawn shops, they’re are on the front lines.
“At King Gold, the 55-year-old was pawning a bracelet for gas bills. It was her first time using such a service, but she says she’ll do it again if needed.”
So there you have it. It’s gold jewellery. Gold jewellery has now become the ATM Americans never thought they had.
