30 years ago: The sudden and dramatic drop in the price of silver leads to indefinite postponement of fulfillment of the Great Commission

An incongruous headline? Not necessarily. March 27, 1980 was a notable day in the history of Campus Crusade for Christ. At the main gym of the University of Alberta, this blogger was a volunteer as the Athletes in Action basketball team defeated the Canadian men's national team 81-78 in an exhibition game.

More important: the price of silver, which had reached a record $50.05 U.S. per ounce in January, plunged to $10.50 per ounce--down $5 during the day, causing huge losses for speculators and threatening the collapse of the $2-billion silver empire of brothers Herbert and Bunky Hunt, who were based in Dallas, Texas. They were attempting to corner the world silver market, building up holdings estimated at more than 200 million ounces since the summer of 1979, and driving the price of silver to a record high of $50.05 per ounce in January 1980.

On March 26, a sharp fall in silver futures prices led brokerage houses to make margin calls for more cash from investors to maintain their equity in holdings of commodities bought on credit. The margin call put a severe financial squeeze on the Hunt brothers, and they had been unable to raise the cash. The investment house of Bache Halsey Stuart Shields Inc. began to sell out its holdings of the Hunts’ silver futures and stock positions. On March 27, Bache Halsey Stuart Shields Inc. announced that the brothers had failed to meet $100 million of margin calls on their silver accounts the previous day, which caused panic in the silver market.

Bunky Hunt had been appointed by Campus Crusade for Christ President Bill Bright to head up CCC’s effort to fulfill the Great Commission internationally, and as late as 1979 (in Mr. Bright’s book Believing God for the Impossible, where Nelson Bunker Hunt was described as "one of the world’s most prominent businessmen"), Mr. Bright was still predicting fulfillment of the Great Commission worldwide by 1980. The sudden and dramatic drop in the price of silver may have played a role in the indefinite postponement of that event. Had the Hunt brothers been able to pull off their scheme to corner the world silver market, some of Bunky’s share of the profits would have been given to Campus Crusade for Christ; even a small percentage would have been a considerable amount of money. It can be disputed, of course, whether Campus Crusade's efforts could be regarded as the fulfillment of the Great Commission. In the above-mentioned book, Mr. Bright said that he considered the notorious 1976 "I Found It!" bumper sticker campaign to be the fulfillment of the Great Commission in the United States.

Go here to see an article about Nelson Bunker Hunt that was published in 1980.