[Falconoffury]

There are a lot of metals on the periodic table, but so many are overlooked in investing. Lead looks to be a metal with extreme price manipulation. Just look at this.

http://www.metalprices.com/

Here is the wiki on lead.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead

If you look at the applications section, you'll see that it has many uses. If you go further down, you'll see that over half the lead that we use comes from recycling! The price of lead is incredibly low for a metal that is mostly recycled. Lead is not as useful as copper or silver, but it may be time to add some lead to your precious metal portfolio.

[EnergyUnlimited]

The problem with lead is that is is rather considered "dangerous waste", and not an useful metal (at least in public perception).
Many legislative efforts are made to eradicate any lead use and even if those are rather doomed to failure (you will always find it irreplaceable in few applications), it is unlikely that with similar PR the future of lead market if particularly bright.
Neverless, we will always need more bullets...

[smallpoxgirl]

Lead is extraordinarily useful for one application that is bound to boom for the rest of industrial human existance - bullets. I was talking to the guy at the reloading supply store a couple of weeks ago, and that application has apparently already driven the price up dramatically. The US doesn't produce very much lead domestically, in part because of the pollution it causes. The Iraq war is eating up any surplus domestic production, so bullet makers are having to buy it on the international (euro denominated) market. He was saying that lead prices and consequently bullet prices, have almost doubled in the last year or two.

If I had excess money, I would put it in lead way before I would put it in gold. You can't eat either of them, but gold is too expensive to shoot at people. The only way you're going to loose money in the lead market is if people suddenly decide to shoot eachother less.

[pitzel]

Toyota Prii use lead? Thats news to me, because as far as I understand, they use Ni-MH batteries which contain no lead whatsoever. And with 42V systems and intelligent control, the days of the lead battery in cars may very well be numbered -- the old lead batteries perform well because of the raw amounts of current they can provide, but 42V will enable better starters and lower line losses.

Also CRT production is in a downtrend (thankfully!), and CRTs are a major user of lead. And of course, leaded fuels are slowly being phased out worldwide, leading to a reduction in the amount of lead that cannot be recycled. Lead solders have also been mostly replaced in most of the developed world as well.

Essentially, its not a metal that has a huge number of industrial applications. Its cost will essentially track the cost of energy inputs needed to extract it. Since almost every form of energy has doubled or tripled in the past few years, its no surprise that the bullet manufacturers are paying slightly more for supply.

[frankthetank]

I'll take lead acid over NIMH. I don't care about the weight. THose AA NImh might as well be given away. They hold a charge for about a day before there dead!

[whereagles]

Lead is twice as dense as iron. Good for lowering the centre of gravity of ships, I guess.

Oh wait, you can also use it to build nuclear bunkers and radiation coffers.

[rogerhb]

The bottom fell out of the balloon market.

[MrBill]

I do not know if lead is undervalued, but if you let it float it would soon be underwater.

[rogerhb]

Somebody valued the lead from our parish church roof.