In 1987 the issue was to do with Japans expectation of higher interest rates; now both Japan and China have been making use of the dollar peg. Also 1980-2000 commodity bear market, now commodity bull market. -2002 deflation cycle, 2002+ an inflation cycle. Its an entirely different set up.

I've just been reading an article which points out that around 25% of the silver market could be lost if companies that mine silver as a bi-product of copper and zinc, slow down due to world demand. Only something like 30% of silver miners are pure pm miners, or mine zinc as a bi-product of silver. So the result of a global slow down coupled with increased demand of a product that increases in value in an inflation cycle is bullish silver. A slow down as a result of a housing crash is actually bullish for pure silver miners. Deflationary issues that result in more and more cash being created in an inflation cycle can only increase inflated share prices of silver miners.