What assets would be valuable in a post-apocalyptic scenario?
Gold and silver are for after the crisis, not during.  Gold and silver are far more likely to be able to be exchanged for things you need, since they are rare, easily divided, etc. Getting land away from where the crap is happening is also good, but it's more than that.  Say you have land somewhere.  How will the locals view you if you move there to hunker down only when things go bad?  They won't really trust you, and you'll inherit a new set of problems.  Building relationships in an off-the-beaten-path area requires a time investment. Investing in lifestyle in general is good.  Lifestyle isn't just toys, but it's privacy, peace of mind, relationships with people with whom you can barter skills, as well as the skills you might think you'd need to do more than just get by in whatever scenario you envision. For the immediate crisis, you'd better have the things you'll need for a few months.  Stores probably won't be supplied on any regular basis, and the shelves will be bare.  Trying to use gold or silver during the crisis just makes you a target for theft.  With regard to food, it's best to get acclimated to a diet of what you'd have on hand.  If you get freeze-dried food, eat it now, so that it's not a shock to your system when you have to eat it. (Can you tell I've been thinking about this? :) ) This is going to be a list of some things that will likely be of value immediately after some apocalyptic event.  However, note that I am not answering your question of what you should invest in now to take advantage of such an event.  That is a pretty ridiculous notion.  Preparing oneself for such a possibility is certainly a good idea.  That said, there are some realistic limitations to how you could take advantage of such a situation.  Namely, the very real requirement of physical security.  Unless you have a huge posse -- armed to the teeth -- to defend your cache, someone will come along with a bigger and better armed group to take it.  (Not to mention that I am the type of person that would -- at least -- consider organizing such a group to take you down; if only as a matter of principle.) Guns & ammo (Also, knives; ideally ones that can be used as weapons and for food preparation/hunting.) Alcohol.  Especially liquor.  It's concentrated and easier to store than beer or wine.  Beside for getting inebriated, it is useful as a sedative and antiseptic. Non-perishable foods.  Canned goods are obvious.  Though, grains and cereals can be stored with relative ease under some circumstances.  (Obviously, not so easily done in an urban area.) Methods of starting a fire.  Preferably rugged ones, such as flint and steel.  (Lighters would only be of limited use.  Matches are bulky and require water-tight storage.) Salt and/or salt-licks.  (Possibly, other forms of non-perishable bait.)  As bstpierre puts it, hunting will be about survival not sport. Hand-tools. Textiles, fabrics, thread and needles. Medicines of all sorts, though especially antibiotics, antiseptics and painkillers. Books of a practical nature.  Topics such as: wilderness survival, cooking, carpentry, etc. The list is mostly ordered in terms of value & practicality. Ultimately, I doubt there is much that will provide a practical investment idea for such a scenario.  The physical security issue is a big limiting factor.  In a post-apocalyptic scenario it goes back to who is bigger, stronger and better armed. One thing does come to mind: knowledge.  Prepare yourself with the skills and knowledge you need to survive in such a scenario and you will be invaluable.  Also, as bstpierre notes in the comments, connections will likely also be important.  (Probably local or nearby connections.)  No one person can do it all alone.  It will come down to cooperation. Bullets, canned goods, and farm supplies that don't need gas (e.g. seed, feed, plows). This is a long term investment but can be very useful during tough times. Be prepared not only to take but to give as well. Moreover: I find these type of questions silly, but I'll bite: Guns. Without them, any other conceivable asset would be taken from you. By someone with guns. A book on the power of persuasion. The people will need you to lead them to the glory land like the Deacon* from Waterworld *Dennis Hopper.  Study up. Apocalyptic like MAD MAX, huh? Well, no one so far has mentioned Gasoline, not paper gasoline futures but the real thing in barrels or tankers. Guns, ammo, sure... but if everyone on the ground is shooting each other I'd prefer an ultralight helicopter.  You all have watched MAD MAX, right? On a more serious note, there is a country in the South Pacific that never saw fighting in world war 2 due to its remoteness, but is large and developed enough to be agriculturally pretty much self sufficient, and with a  low population has plenty of space.  Might be good to squirrel away something down there... Barton Biggs's book Wealth, War and Wisdom aims to answer the question of what investments are best-suited to preserving value despite large-scale catastrophes by looking at how various investments and assets performed in countries affected by WWII.  In Japan, stocks and urban land turned out to be good investments; in France, farm land and gold did better. Stocks outperformed bonds in nearly every country.  Phil Greenspun recently wrote a review of the book. Assuming that the financial system broke down, not enough supply of essential commodities or food but there is political and administrative stability and no such chaos that threatens your life by physical attacks.  The best investment would then be some paddy fields, land, some cows, chickens and enough clothing , a safe house to stay and a healthy life style that enables you to work for food and some virtue at heart and management skills to get people work for you on your resources so that they can survive with you (may be you earn some profit -that is up to your moral standards to decide, how much). It all begins to start again; a new Financial System has to be in place….!
"The raw question is as follows:  ""You will be recommending a purposed portfolio to an investment committee (my class). The committee runs a foundation that has an asset base of $4,000,000. The foundations' dual mandates are to (a) preserve capital and (b) to fund $200,000 worth of scholarships. The foundation has a third objective, which is to grow its asset base over time.""   The rest of the assignment lays out the format and headings for the sections of the presentation.  Thanks, by the way - it's an 8 week accelerated course and I've been out sick for two weeks. I've been trying to teach myself this stuff, including the excel calculations for the past few weeks." I'd have anything you would need for maybe 3-6 months stored up: food, fuel, toiletries, other incidentals.  What might replace the currency after the Euro collapses will be the least of your concerns when it does collapse. "... until they collapse too!!!  This is ""Luft Gesheft"": German/Yiddish for ""making money out of thin air"".  Money should be made by making things and building things - adding value to something.   Apple Computers is one example - they make real money." Taking into account your POV I would recommend mostly goods that will be harder to obtain, precious metals (not only gold) and forex (although the forex aproach depends on some other country not having troubles with it's own economy which in a world as interconnected as ours by internet and all the new technologies doesn't seem likely)  i highly recommend silver which is cheaper than gold and is stable enough in the long term Investing for your future through stocks isn’t for the faint of heart. While there are stocks that can withstand our volatile market, there are few that can guarantee their business will still be a business 20 or 30 years from now. [Compound Stock Earnings](http://www.compoundstockearnings.com) Report Benigans would always be with us, but they no longer exist. Cash can be a lifesaver after a natural disaster. I was in central Mississippi in 2005 after Katrina. There were a few things selling for cash only (generators for one). The banks opened pretty quick (1 day) where I was; south of me it took much longer (days or weeks). "First of all, metals are commodities. So if you're phrasing that as metals and/or commodities, then that's poorly worded. If you're phrasing that as ""metal commodity reports"" then say as such.   Second, and more importantly: what commodities? Power is very different than coffee. Different places specialize in different things, all banks are good in some and weak in others. There's no generic ""commodity"" market but rather a huge range of specifically different products traded in the future.You learn more than a small fraction of this universe so pick one or two specific products from the macro buckets (i.e. energy, grains, metals) and focus on those." Vehicles (plural, because I'd be filling multiple roles, and also because I'd really prefer to have spare parts). Self-sufficient farm with machine shop, heavy-duty fabric production/sewing capacity. Hunting/camping gear. That kind of thing.  I have about $600 in student loan debt remaining, which should be gone in the next year. No car loan (own my truck outright), don't own a house, carry 0 balance on my credit card. I suspect I'm a bit older than you (28) and I'm finding increasingly that I'm feeling financially strained by both current needs and projected needs. Moreso future than current, as a matter of fact, though I am unemployed right now. No matter how I look at it, barring some exceptional luck, there's no good way to obtain what I feel is needed to ensure that I can retire in safety. The current system basically forces you to take on nigh-crippling debt and hope like hell you can remain employed almost constantly through the most productive years of your life so that you may retire with some degree of security.  75K would make me feel a lot closer, but it only really deals with the immediate concerns and gives me room to hope to rectify the future ones in the next decade. If it were a completely foolproof 75K with no chance of vanishing, it'd go a lot further -- but still wouldn't alleviate my worries entirely. I think what the person meant to say is that Gold is not a one stop solution. There's nothing wrong with having Gold in an otherwise diversified portfolio but you need to be aware about the potential downsides: The problem with gold is that its value nowadays depends mainly on investor confidence, or the lack of it (actual demand for gold cannot explain the rise in value gold had after the crisis). If people are afraid the world and currencies with it will go to hell, the gold price will go up. Why? Because if currencies seize to exist, Gold will still be accepted. It can replace currencies. What many people tend to forget: let's consider the extreme example and currencies really cease to exist and all hell breaks lose. What good are gold bars at the bank, or even at home, for that matter? You'll be better off with gold coins to use in barter and to pay off marauders. But that's not about investing anymore, that's survivalism. "Buying gold, silver, palladium, copper and platinum. The first two I am thinking about new currencies. The last three for the perpetual need for the metals in industry. I also have invested in Numismatic coins. They are small portable and easy to hide around the house. I only collect silver coins, so even if the world really blows up and numismatics goes out the window, I can depend on them forming a barter system through the content value of the silver. The problem with collectable items is that they are easy to see. For example, a nice painting just shouts out ""steal me!"". I don't buy large gold coins. As long as the coin is below 1/4 Oz gold I collect it. If the dollar does finaly collapse, to be honest it will be so bad that I think weapons will be order of the day. Do I think it will collapse...nah never." Yes, because you cannot have an exponential growth rate that is faster than the rate at which the economy grows on the long term. 100% growth is much more than the few percent at which the economy grows, so your share in the World economy would approximately double every year. Today the value of all the assets in the World economy is about $200 trillion. If you start with an investment of just $1000 and this doubles every year, then you'll own all the World's assets in 37.5 years, assuming this doesn't grow. You can, of course, take into account that it does grow, this will yield a slightly larger time before you own the entire World. "In addition to the ""The Time Machine""-type society you're talking about where the working class basically end up devolving into hunting game for elites, i'd worry that the enhancement for the skilled-labor jobs you describe would include some dog collars. If I'm an enhanced engineer I'll start my own company, not make money for someone else. If I'm a super soldier I'd hit up academi (blackwater), not get treated like shit in the army. If these technologies can enhance intelligence, it can probably also steer traits like loyalty, ambition, etc to ensure that the person acts more like an appliance rather than a genius." I'm not sure I'd say the assets they had were worthless. One of the big controversies was whether it was a solvency crisis (bad assets) or a liquidity crisis (fine assets, but if everyone sells illiquid assets there's a fire sale problem).   The US and Buffett bet it was a liquidity crisis, and they were proven right. But how valuable is it in the Star Trek world? How much gold is available and how much do they need?Are there alternatives? Will they ever find another element that replaces it? These all affect the actual value...  Nothing has value without demand, so how can anything be intrinsically valuable? Different risks require different hedges.  You won't find a single hedge that will protect you against any risk.  The best way to think about this is who would benefit if those events occurred?  Those are the people you want to invest in.  So if a war broke out, who would benefit?  Defense contractors.  Security companies.  You get the idea. You also need to think about if you really need to hedge against those things now or not.  For example, I wouldn't bother to hedge against global warming or peak oil.  It's not like one morning you're going to wake up, turn on CNNfn and see that the stock market is down 500 points because global warming or peak oil just hit.  These are things that happen gradually and you can react to them gradually as they happen.