I agree that silver suffers second status in the eyes of the investment community hence the move to it will most likely occur after the move to gold and correspondingly for their shares.

I presume that I differ slightly from your assesment of 'the average investor'. That is definitely not you, probably not me, and the majority of those who read these boards. The average investor in my opinion is the Mom and Pop who have put their money in some institution's fund and therefore are isolated from the decision process of where and when to invest ( some union funds included). They are held hostage to the manager of that fund and unless he uses that fund in the self interest of that institution or himself, he will invest with safety in mind and least work for himself.

Very little research involved in that kind of investing. Hence they are ignorant of ECU type investments unless some famous mining writer recommends the stock and they follow his recommendation. That is often at some late stage.

The only people who know us are the types of institutions that do genuine and thorough reasarch. Mine financiers would have to be the prime example. Second after that are likely brokerages and well connected folks - friends of brokers, insiders and folks with substantial dough.
At present I am mainly in gold stocks (Gold Reserve, Osisko etc.) because I expect them to react first, then I expect to move into silver and catch what is likely to be the tail of silver's rise.
Finally time proven clishe:
Once average Joe awakes it will be time to start getting out.
Heres to patience and profits. Ed G.