Matador, I share your sentiments and that it exactly what I'm doing.
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Matador, I share your sentiments and that it exactly what I'm doing.
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The guys and gals who are going to really feel the pinch, are the ones who buy scrap. For those of us like myself who don't buy scrap, we have a little more flexibility. I will be hoarding, in fact, I'm looking to amass about a 1000 lbs for the year. To me, it's a challenge and I cannot wait to see what the end result is going to be.
QUOTE=1956;235273]Well every one has there own opinion on the storing of material, my opinion is I buy it I sell it it has worked for me for quite a few years, thinking or better yet hopeing the market will turn back to the highs of the last couple of years is a gamble that in my opinion is no way to run a business, copper in the scrap metal business is by volume and value the most precious metal we deal with and can like mentioned in a prior post a way to go into bankruptcy, buying this Commodie for a price gambling it will go up in value just does not make sence to me. Being a former yard owner I can tell you you never gamble with the highest price metals by hoarding them recipe for disaster. My advise to you would be if you want to gable , gamble on items that contain copper, perfect example electric motors, an item that if copper goes back up the coper bearing motors would also go up so you are not tiring up lots of capital and the amount of money you are gambling with would be a hole lot less. Just one more point I would like to make copper has a way of disappearing especially if a few people know you are storing it, so proced with caution best of luck.[/QUOTE]
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Thanks for the breakdown Otto. That's the optimism one needs in this time.
UOTE=Otto;235266]I've got some totes that are 10"x12"x15" that hold about a cubic foot. When filled with stripped copper wire they can hold about 65 - 70 lbs. Actually if I were to compact the wire they would weigh a lot more. In fact, a cubic foot of sold copper weighs approximately 560 lbs. http://www.coyotesteel.com/assets/im...rcubicfoot.pdf If you do the math on how much copper you could fit in a small storage locker, you'll see you don't need a lot of space to hoard a very valuable amount of copper.[/QUOTE]
Metal Recycling Entrepreneur
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The defining line between the two camps is whether you bought the scrap or acquired it through labor. If you purchased, my opinion is that one in the hand is worth two in the bush as the saying goes. Take a little loss now and buy at prices in the new market. If you haven't purchased but acquired it through jobs, as a byproduct of your business or other means then perhaps you can hoard until prices go up. However, as other members have said, your stockpile of copper is very tempting to thieves. It would be a shame to wait a few months to see prices start going up but someone came along and stole your stash.
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If anyone has decided to sit on computer scrap that's not a smart move at all. I want to explain why. E scrap trends follow a formula of the average PM content and PM prices at any given time. We as scrappers know that the newer the scrap is the less PMs it will have HOWEVER it may also have resellable parts. This is fine and dandy except both these trends steadily move downwards at a constant pace. Sure DDR2 memory is still doing good but around here that has alot to do with me. I can pay it because I need it. You guys might want to look at ebay sometime, the ddr2 memory has fallen below my buying prices, core 2 procs are dropping and things are shifting towards i series stuff...some of which is falling below 10 per proc.
My point is exactly as 1956 already said. Buy it, sell it. Computers are a super solvent depreciating market. You never hold anything unless you like losing money. Plan for every low grade assay from the big boys to come back with less PMs than last time. Did everyone forget a year or so ago we had 2.00/lb low grade motherboard buyers? Gold wasn't 1500 a year ago. I've taken the time to come up with an estimate of computer scrap depreciation formula on a few different factors, resale components, p3 and older mix and then p4 and newer but not reusable scrap. It basically says that if you sit on your scrap for six months you stand to lose 20% of your sell value if gold is at a similar price both times. I can back that up by checking my invoices. I was sick for a few months last year and had a big garage full of stuff that sat because of it.
I'm also not sure if I would sit on copper pipe, bar stock or stripped wire either. I too remember a long long stretch of low copper prices. I take the opposing view on shred though. I know the low shred price is not sustainable for anyone from down to up stream and I know the melters are still hard at work as ever here in the states...and I agree with oldude that things will take some time to settle out. I however believe we will never have 200/ton shred until the end of the decade. I think we can bounce back to 75-80% or original sometime next year. I'm ok with that...I'm looking for solutions to that problem, baling technology and so on. If your of the select few like patriot who can hold a huge amount of material you stand to make a few bucks trading on physical futures.
For the rest, I have some advice. Do your breakdowns, maximize your scrap, cherry pick what you find...don't get out of your truck for a broom handle...but a microwave you should. Think about part reselling...it's tax season and in certain neighborhoods you will begin to see perfectly good appliances get kicked to the curb simply because they are dirty or "dont work as good" anymore. I'm three feet away from a panasonic microwave with a non working turntable...it it heats just fine...and its an inverter microwave...free for the taking.
Hang in there, things are going to get much better as we shake loose the people who were only in it for easy money.
WI ITAD LLC, IT Liquidation Services, we remarket, buy and sell scrap electronics No customer too large or small!
Couldn't say it better Army , small timers like myself need to turn and burn. We can't sit on material. Adjust, adapt, and overcome. Buy low sell high. Of coarse free is nice!
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I meant to say "It was free for the taking"
Keeper of the Cooler!
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No novel for me.
The quotes speak for me!
Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature's inexorable imperative. - H.G. Wells
A true champion can adapt to anything. - Floyd Mayweather, Jr.
As human beings, we have the blessing and the curse that we're able to adapt to almost anything. No matter how extreme the circumstances you're in, they become normal. - Kevin Powers
As human beings we do change, grow, adapt, perhaps even learn and become wiser. - Wendy Carlos
Or as the great mind above me posted(That would be Junkfreak), Adjust, adapt, and overcome.
Besides, this weeds out all the folks in it for the easy cash, like another said. There is always a silver lining, sometimes you just have to look harder to find it.
Sirscrapalot - Adjust, Adapt, overcome..profit. - Unknown
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In this debate you are quoted because you responded right after my post.Originally Posted by Victor
My business works with farmers on a percentage bases. I have to be honest with them about scrap metal value at any given moment. Farmers want the most for their scrap because it is valuable for repair projects. Therefore the only way to get them to sell their scrap is with a promise it will be prepared and left on the ground for better prices.
These same farmers want their shelter belts cleaned up, providing diversification for this business model.
The basics of this equation are pretty simple. It costs $ 30.00 in diesel fuel, another $ 20.00 on wear and tear on the vehicle, $ 50.00 on equipment costs (skid steer and trailer), plus two days worth of work for 4 tons of metal at $ 80.00 per ton. So $ 320.00 profit with the owner getting $ 107. Therefore net profit equals $ 214 with $ 100 in expenses provides me with $ 114.00 profit for a two days worth of work. Subtract 33% (37.62) for taxes and social security equals $ 76.38. Divided by sixteen hours (most days are 10 hours) equals $ 4.78 per hour. I think my time is worth more than that.
So the choice is to build more trailers, repair the ones used in the operation, service the many vehicles, prepare a shed full of non ferrous, ice fish for walleyes, remodel a home, make things from scrap (gifts from scrap will be updated in the near future), hunt for varmints, clean shelter belts and barns for cash or haul scrap that is stored on many farms that has been there for centuries. It is worth the gamble, but I understand not everyone is in my situation. By the way I can wait for the rest of my life for prices to rebound because I do it for the love of independence, not for financial security. Sorry this has to end quickly, but the dogs have a raccoon treed and I have to take care of business.
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still buying aggressively......If nothing else give me something to do
BUYING ALL COMPUTER SCRAP WORKING OR NOT
CHECK OUT MY BUYERS THREAD http://www.scrapmetalforum.com/scrap...nic-scrap.html
https://getjunk.net/Knox-County-TN-0...Recycling.html
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I'm hoarding.
Money is not the root of all evil, the love of money is.
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I have been sitting on all my copper for a long time and can't part with it for such a low price. I got 19 lbs of carbide from a buddy a year ago or so and I sat on that hoping the price would have gone up. It's was selling at $12.25 and now at $8. Locally i could of sold it for $7 and now its $2.20. I have to sell it, but there is that lingering thought I can store this easily and wait for the prices to return.
I have a lot friends that own businesses that have perished and are scrapping by. They all tell me to sell and not hoard. One buddy took me to his warehouse to show me an example of hoarding. He has a printing business and bought cartridges $20 a piece trying to sell them at $60. The technology changed 6 months later for printers and everyone invested in new printers. He was selling 4 a month and now its like 2 every 6 months. He has 2 pallets of these.
"It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage." Indiana Jones - Raiders of the Lost Ark
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Carbide is my LONG game. I started that after I discovered the high value right here on THIS forum. When I say long game, I plan to sit on the buckets I've got for years, decades if need be because unlike any other metal Tungsten has proven to be a finite resource.
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It's a gamble and each and everyone of us must choose a path. I'm leaning on the side of history and copper prospectus, better days are yet to come. I'm hoarding like a big dog.
Metal Recycling Entrepreneur
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For reuse components, there is no option to sit on them. As Army said, you will soon find them worth nothing as the technology generation switches (DDR2 to DDR3 and C2D/C2Q to i-3/5/7). Scrap is not a pretty game either to sit on. A good friend of mine trades futures commodities, the charts can be categorized as three decades down, one decade up. We unfortunately may be seeing the ending of this "up" decade and prices may not be what they used to be for a while. The dollar is strengthening, the euro is weakening and China is stockpiled on US raw materials (copper, gold, iron) with no real growth. China has been building and building but there is a bubble happening. They have huge ghost cities. Literally empty skyscrapers and business districts.As SirS said before, adapt or perish. It might be tough to get material for a bit because the vendors you normally get your scrap from are still in price shock but eventually they are going to want to start selling again. It is time to get creative, open up new revenue streams and keep pounding the pavement for new clients. Good luck to everyone, we are all surely feeling it.
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When it comes to Carbide a lot of weight can fit in a coffee can so it doesn't take up much space at all. Not sure I've seen it go for much more then $12 bucks though.
As much as I hate to remind people, we never really know what tomorrow brings and any one of us could be 6 ft under by weeks end. When looking over my inventory I try to keep that in mind and how would it impact my family when it comes to trying to convert inventory into cash. I feel like once the initial impact has passed they could deal but would still be a chore. I think of Mick and the 1000 pounds of copper he was sitting on, waiting for a better price, when he passed.
Recyclable Material Merchant Wholesaler
Certified Zip-Tie Mechanic
"Give them enough so they can do something with it, but not too much that they won't do nothing."
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I don't stock pile anything for long but look at it all on average. E-scrap has been moving along just fine for me. Prices may be lower but I gotta keep moving it out. I like to keep a steady stream of cash coming in
so I'll work to save in other areas and I constantly adapt to take advantage of any angle where I can maximize that cashflow. Metals,copper. brass etc all helps but I do a little less of that so I can sit on it for a longer period of time
but when I get a good load I don't hesitate to pull the trigger. " Money makes the world go round"
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So far I do not buy anything, everything we touch is from a waste stream from other companies and all of our scrap is processed. We sell when a particular scrap type has accumulated to a preset weight. I do play the numbers, with my yards and try to have at least three types of scrap to sell. I want my buyers to have something worth buying and me a choice of buyers with prices I can live with. My business plan has always been pretty simple: 1. create goods and service that has value. 2. must be good for me/the customer/the employees. 3. generating as many multiple revenue streams as possible. 4. All cost must be minimized, requiring a continues effort to lower operating cost. 5. review all aspects of the business personally, always seeking the most efficient/cost affected methods. 6. errors will be made, learn from the mistakes, failure to act is very expensive.
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Well said and with that, I hope we can take something from all this discussion. Thank you all.
QUOTE=bigburtchino;235619]So far I do not buy anything, everything we touch is from a waste stream from other companies and all of our scrap is processed. We sell when a particular scrap type has accumulated to a preset weight. I do play the numbers, with my yards and try to have at least three types of scrap to sell. I want my buyers to have something worth buying and me a choice of buyers with prices I can live with. My business plan has always been pretty simple: 1. create goods and service that has value. 2. must be good for me/the customer/the employees. 3. generating as many multiple revenue streams as possible. 4. All cost must be minimized, requiring a continues effort to lower operating cost. 5. review all aspects of the business personally, always seeking the most efficient/cost affected methods. 6. errors will be made, learn from the mistakes, failure to act is very expensive.[/QUOTE]
Metal Recycling Entrepreneur
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Thats all well , but for many of us we need the income. I'll save what I can, but I need a part time job to protect my hoard or steel to go up
As to us to " work together " it's a reality , look the companies with - roll off trucks - large machinery - Even carting companies - will see a wind fall as many scrappers stop Dumpster Diving and curb hunting they will now have more . the scrap yards will re-adapt and receive more from them and have less paper work from hundreds of 1000 pound street scrappers day in day out . We are the ones who are at a loss . I have studied graphs of metals and year pricing , wile trends can change it's also very likely ups and downs last years . Regardless
I will find and I will sell , I know what to do.
Last night a dumpster netted 200# of steel took 10 min to put in truck - so it's all good.
Last edited by Copper Head; 02-13-2015 at 08:00 AM.
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