Alpacas in the Wall Street Journal
? With all the turmoil in the stock markets people are looking for alternative locations for their money, and alpacas are making the cut.? The Wall Street Journal recently ran an article relating the investment potential of alpacas to investing in gold.? There are some similarities in respect to investment potential, but there is one significant thing that alpacas can do that gold can’t do.? That is ‘multiply’!
Suppose you have $20,000 to invest.? That will get you apx? 20 gold eagles or two female alpacas (assuming $1,000/oz of gold and $10,000/female).? Suppose you want to hold the investment for 5 years:
| Year | Females | Male Cria | Female Cria | Extra Male | Gold Eagles |
| 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 20 |
| 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 20 |
| 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 20 |
| 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 20 |
| 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 20 |
| 5 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 20 |
So at the end of five years you’ll have 5 females, several crias and some extra males, assuming you’ve held everything.? Ignoring the extra males and even the crias the 5 females could easily be worth $50,000.? This is probably going to be much more valuable than the 20 gold eagles which didn’t do anything during the 5 years but look pretty.? There are also numerous tax advantages to alpaca investment that may not exist for an investment in gold.? John Petersam from Criative Acres has a nice write up on some of these aspects.
Want to diversify your portfolio?? Get a huacaya and a suri!? Actually I’m just kidding, that wouldn’t be the best way to start off.
You should consult your various advisers, tax and investment, research all aspects of any investment, including alpacas and gold.