personally I started with silver, then converted all my silver maples to gold bullions and never look back.

that was when I am almost half way through my monster box (250oz).

No doubt the premiums for silver is HUGE, even in Singapore where I bought most of my metals from.
For silver maples alone, the premium is 14.37%... that means I need to sit and wait till my maples appreciate above 14% to breakeven.
In Malaysia silver premiums are even higher (over 20%) which makes it "worthless" to invest in physical silver.

In contrast, 1oz gold maple's premium is only 3.8%. 
XtraLeoGecko, the reason why silver's premium is on the high side is because local market do not have much demand and not many dealers bringing them in at large quantities. If you look at APMEX their silver prices are much more reasonable and their 100oz silver bars have similar premiums as 1oz gold bullion. I will only re-consider holding physical silver if the premiums drop to the same level as gold.

XtraLeoGecko, do take some time to think hard on this:

1. What is your exit strategy? Even if you have a large stack of silver bullion who will you sell them to? It is just like stacking palladium or platinum, yes you can easily find 1-ouncers but who will take them off your hands when you want to sell them? Don't forget transportation is a major problem if you have large quantities of silver.

2. Precious metals in physical form, will incur higher premiums when you buy in small denominations. Personally I think for silver 100oz should be the "right" balance on premiums vs price. 10oz silver bars definitely has very high premiums (12.3% in Singapore).

I personally know some metal dealers in Singapore... take Perth Mint as an example. Master dealers order their stuff from Perth Mint at spot + small premium... say 1 ton of silver. Smaller dealers get their stock from this Master dealer at a mark-up (the Master dealer still needs to eat right?). Small dealers then sell to other smaller dealers, or sell direct to consumers with even higher markups. Due to floating spot price the premiums tend to be quite high as the dealers need to hedge for any price fluctuations. In the end consumers like you and me end up paying 15-25% premium above spot.

If you look at large dealers like APMEX, they have the capacity and customer base to move their stock very quickly thus they can pass the savings to consumers. It is not about whether you stay next to the Mint or not... even if you stay next to US Mint you can't just walk in and get your silver eagles over the counter.

Yea, 5g gold is also in my wish list. Hehe. But as for now, I will only allocate <200/month for PM investment. Maybe I'll stop buying silver for 2 months and buy the 5g gold instead. I'm ok with the premiums as I expect to keep it for long for 10-20 years. My only concern is who to sell to? But think positively, u won't know what ppl's perception on silver after 10-20 years. The gold silver ratio is 1:60 now and if it is 1:20 (don't ask me why 20, just simply pick a number  ) ppl might hoard silver like gold too. If it really happens, it'll be easier to sell silver then.

I might want to stop paper gold and go for physical gold instead. The spreads are too wide for me. I will buy more to lower down my average cost and sell all either at break even price or small profit. Gonna buy 5g or 10g gold... 

maybe some of us might wanna buy 100oz from US dealer and sell it at lower premium over spot price. that might trigger a huge competitive price to local dealer and everyone starts selling closer to spot to be able to survive. or maybe we get 10 ppl to buy 10/oz each from international dealer. but do we trust each other?

Do u mean the 1st method - import the silver and sell like any other local dealer or 2nd method - we share the 100oz and split the cost evenly? 

There's no way I'm gonna sell u evenly with 1st method. Cos I gotta spend my time and pay my money first together the stocks. I have to earn smth. Just like any local dealers aka vampires.. Hehhe

Want to become kaki or not? We share the 100oz la. With XtraLeoGecko.

I tot u did quite a lot to prevent milk spot. Seems like it's unpreventable..

i buy every month and i've bought this month's silver already. in fact, i bought on monday when the price was at 21.xx/oz. now, it's 20.xx/oz. can save about 0.90 per oz if i buy today instead. but nvm la.... it's still cheaper than what i paid for in august...