That’s why you want to own mining stocks. You can get dividends now, and will be leveraged when TSHTF.
Don’t go crazy on them, no more than 3% of your portfolio in any one stock or 10 to 15 % in the sector depending on your risk tolerance. The sector ETF is GDX, which pays about a 1.24% dividend, and it’s currently a falling knife, so this not for the faint of heart. Use stop losses or options so you don’t get sliced up too badly.
Investing is about patience and judgment, because the market will always be one step ahead of you.
Not investment advice, but the stop-loss order often goes under everyone's radar screen. You can't use them with Mutual Funds, they are not available with that instrument.
With ETF's trading "Intra-Day" if the SDHTF and the markets have a huge correction in one day ( a la Sept 08') and you hit you exit number, you are in Schaffer City....
If you wish to invest in gold stocks, that’s fine. Although I own PMs and have invested in and traded PM stocks in the past, I do not like them now. That doesn’t mean I may return to them in future...but I think investing in them is kind of wrong now. That’s just my opinion.
But GDX is IMHO absolute poison. GDX is a Goldman Sachs fund and they use it to short mining stocks by shorting the whole sector. It is poorly diversified, about 12% ABX and about 12% GG, the rest little snippets of about 1% or less of many other companies. I heartily unrecommend it.