User Panel
Posted: 4/6/2006 4:38:00 PM EDT
I was curious as to the pricing trends of ammo and, being unable to find any resources available online, decided to cobble together some data and generate some charts.
Hat tip to Brillo who was able to provide the historical data from archives of the incomparable Ammo Price List. Pricing is based on average of all vendor's net price on ammunition in-stock. Gaps in the sequence indicate all vendors listed being out of stock. First chart is price of 1000rds in USD$: Given that the USD$ is a fiat currency and extremely susceptible to inflation, I thought it may be telling to view the ammo pricing in terms of something real. This chart shows the pricing of 1000rds as valued in Gold Ounces: The above is not intended to be any sort of accurate financial analysis but best I could do with resources available. Hopefully it provides a little perspective. If anyone has more historical pricing data (either on the above ammo or others) you're hereby encouraged to contribute. Cheers, Paje
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It's good to see this keep going, I understand and appreciate the work required to keep up a great chart like this. It's also good that to know I bought 10,000 rounds between Jan and Mar 2006! I can thank the Arfcom ammo forum for that. I saw the trend and heard everyone agree. Unfortunately for all of us, we were right.
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Awsome. Only problem is that it reminds me of how stupid I was for not buying XM193 by the truckload back when it was readily available and affordable.
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or USD$ went down... it's all in one's own perspective I suppose. I look at USD$ a bit like flushing the toilet. Does the water go down or do the sides rise? Thanks for all the kind words... I wasn't sure there would be much (any) interest. There isn't much of a time-line available to analyze. ETA (delete old chart data) |
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When are the Democrats going to step in and investigate these outrageous prices? We need some sort of controls on ammo prices now!
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Not to get too far off on a tangent here but ~ Again, this is relative to what Gold is compared. In USD$ it is up recently in nominal terms (Of, relating to, or being the rate of interest or return without adjustment for compounding or inflation.). In inflation-adjusted terms, the current gold prices in USD$ aren't as impressive when considering the high of $850 in 1980 adjusts to around $2,200 today. This chart shows the relative purchasing power of Gold and several fiat currencies: When compared to the GYX (industrial metals index), Gold has just hit its lowest level in more than 5 years: So, if we priced ammo vs. other metals (or oil!), the trend would be down even more significantly than Gold. Money being a medium of exchange that retains/stores value over time, I thought that the valuation of ammo vs Gold would give some perspective. In USD$ terms, I can only see the price of ammo increasing (big time). The 'pain factor' of this is directly related to one's dependence on USD$. I think we can score another one for the Founding Fathers (see Article 1, Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution). Regards, Paje |
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btt for edit of graphs ~> corrected 3 data point errors (had 2005 instead of 2006 on three dates which created 3 "flyers", lol).
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Look at the 1st chart with regard to DEVELOPMENT for the other half of the story... It's not the FED or Gold that is the 'culprit', it's the 'needs' of an average household. Compare 1920s life with 2006 life: 1920s: Cars are somewhat new & still a bit of a luxury item. TV not invented. Computers not invented. Electricity, telephones, etc are far from the universal items we have today... 2006: Most families have a minimum of 2 cars - it's impossible to make a decent living without at least one in most of the country, excluding absurdly large cities (NY, LA, Chicago, etc). Most families have multiple TV sets, VCRs, DVD players, computers, etc... Almost everyone has phones, full utility service... Basically, life got easier, but it got more expensive. Salaries went up as workers demand more pay to buy all this 'more stuff' that they 'need'... And you get harmless inflation over time - a natural effect of economic development. As for 55gr M193 spec ammunition, I'm suprised the price didn't go up earlier. All this talk about military purchases & such ignores the fact that THE MILITARY HAS HAD NO USE FOR M193 SINCE THE 80s. It's ammunition designed for a weapon no longer in service (the M16A1), and for a barrel twist that is EXTREMELY rare in the civillian market (1:12). Why would there be continued easy availability of M16A1 ammunition in the mass-quantities associated with a military standard cartridge, if there is no longer a mass demand for 'M193' spec ammo? What you are seeing is the 'running out' of M193 spec, similar to SA or any of the other supplies of surplus 55gr. The difference is that instead of 'going away' it is merely moving from military leftovers to pure-civillian production. Think about it: The military hasn't used M193 for years. |
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I think this data confirms many opinions in the Survival Forum and on survivalblog.com... that the "aught" years are going to be a wild ride.
Rmpl |
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Not so sure about that.... I believe USAF for one has some A1's still. I know my AF Resv friend who just got back from a tour in Baghdad said they had lots of 20rnd straight mags with metal followers. I never asked him about the ammo. But yes, M193 is on its way our with US Mil.... though it may still be used in other mil's - notably any that use US hand-me-down's |
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Yep, thanks! |
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I was reading through this and was wondering when somebody was going to say this, exactly right! |
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Inflation is neither natural nor harmless. "Central bankers and politicians don’t want a gold-backed currency system, because it denies them the power to create money out of thin air. Governments by their very nature want to expand, whether to finance military intervention abroad or a welfare state at home. Expansion costs money, and politicians don’t want spending limited to the amounts they can tax or borrow. This is precisely why central banks now manage all of the world’s major currencies. Since your dollars have no intrinsic value, they are subject to currency market fluctuations and ruinous government policies, especially Fed inflationary policies. Every time new dollars are printed and the money supply increases, your income and savings are worth less. Even as you save for retirement, the Fed is working against you. Inflation is nothing more than government counterfeiting by the Fed printing presses." -- Dr. Ron Paul "If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them, will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." -- Thomas Jefferson "This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists' tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard." -- Alan Greenspan, Ph.D. |
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Get or direct me to the data, and I'll do so. There's just *not much* data avialable, at least which I could find. Perhaps some of the arfcom ammo vendors have archived data they could share? I only chose the three makes charted due to their inclusion since the inception of Brillo's price data. At any rate, these charts estimate a general trend over a short time-frame, which the three profiled share in varying degree. I'd suspect Wolf's pricing would follow the market trend. Thanks again to all who've chimed in with the good words. |
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btt ~> charts updated + addition of base metal live charts and technicals.
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Great information and interesting charts, thanks.
Bottom line don't make cash a big part of your assets, better something that historically has grown in value, such as index fund mutual funds. Gold has only held steady...though it's much better than acutal dollars. |
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"SELL! SELL! SELL!"
buy low sell high or just hoarde it for the zombie apocalypse |
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Wow, what a lot of effort put into this. Great information.
Thanks Paje! |
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botm + added energy price data charts (gasoline & electricity).
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Great stuff (as usual) and very thought-provoking.
Sure looks like gas & ammo are tracking, maybe the next time around plug that into a graph (ammo normalized to gas prices - we all buy gas, not all of us can afford gold) sorta off-topic - wonder if overseas ammo prices are experiencing the same trends or if this is strictly a US thing? Again, thank you (things like this put the bigger picture in perspective) |
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XM-193 appears to have a support line around $190 and a resistance line just below $300
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botm
ETA ~> Will archive 'quote of the weeks' w/monthly btt.
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You can try and say its modern lifestyles or whatever but the fact of the matter is your money is nothing more than 1 and 0's on a computer and printed pieces of paper, that are borrowed into existance. Its the worst kind of slavery, the type where the slave does not know he/she is a slave.
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You mean a Monetary System based on the value of shiny rocks is a flawed idea? |
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No I mean a monetary system that is based on debt, is a flawed idea. Every federal reserve note is borrowed into existance, you can not borrow yourself out of debt, hence the 7+ tillion dollar national debt. Yet every dollar you borrow from a bank or the government borrows on our behalf from the federal reserve is expected to be paid back plus interest. It is a system designed to keep the country and most specifically the government in perpetual debt to those who create and lend the money... the federal reserve. Which is a corporation made up of banks. |
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I know what you meant. That was my way of throwing out the idea that shiny rocks have no actual value to people who's minds have evolved above valuing useless objects. |
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I am not argueing for or against a shiney rock based system. It would be great if the power to create money was returned to the people (thru their elected reps) and a set 3 or 3 1/2 % inflation rate of the pool of money was adhered to, but even then it leaves much power in the hands of few and I suspect that in several generations the situation would erode back into the monopolistic corruption that we currently have. Those shiney rocks.... you cant just make them outta thin air. I know what you are saying... as one poster exemplified it "the price of gold has gone up" |
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I agree that rare metals have value because of the lack of their availability, but I argue that although rare, they have no actual valuable use. "The price of gold has gone up" or it's value has stayed the same and inflation has risen. |
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botm
I had to adjust the upper limit on the USD$ again. Nearing the $300 mark. Gold valuations are relatively flat.
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There are still a few original M16s in the USAF, though almost all have been upgraded with new uppers and disconnectors to A2 spec. most units now "train" with a computerized simulator (FATS) rather than live ammo, and the SFS and CES have enough A2s for range practice. A2s are stocked for deployment, but upgrades are going slowly. There are even a few people still wearing steel pots instead of kevlar or carbon fiber. |
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Your argument is flawed. Gold, silver and PGMs, not to mention copper, are VERY useful in industry. Silver and PGMs tend to get used up in industrial processes. There is a finite and shrinking supply. As they are generally produced as byproducts of base metals, that makes them even harder to lay hands on easily. As demand increases, the cost of recovery rises dramatically, as does the market price for reuse. When we have to start mining for silver, rather than it being a byproduct of zinc, cadmium or other mining, it will be far more expensive. The main reason all the commodities--including oil, iron and processable sugar--have risen so much and so monolithically in the last couple of years is that 2 billion Chinese and Indians are entering the 21st century. They all want cars and computers. That means iron, copper, gold, catalytic metals and oil are in short supply for the market, and will remain that way. |
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Also note that because the military is not allowed to surplus out complete ammo anymore all you can get are the components as surplus.
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Let me just say this. The .223 and 7.62x39 prices are being pushed up by the dealers.
Note that the ammo manufactured years ago is going up. Can't blame the rise in metals on that. Also, note that PISTOL ammo has really not risen at all. So what does that tell you? Just refuse to pay the high prices for the rifle ammo and the market will force the prices down. Remember the internet bubble in the market and the tulip craze? This is THE SAME THING. I have enough ammo for a while and I AN NOT BUYING the hype. You shouldn't either. The argument that metal prices are up does not fly. First, it is not true across the board. And the evidence is to the contrary as I just portrayed. LOOK IT UP. |
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