If you think "Cash For Gold" places make a neighborhood look bad, let's hope there are never businesses based around this.

A new study found Americans may be pooping up to $4 billion worth of gold a year.

A professor at Arizona State University did a study on feces from 94 different wastewater treatment plants across the country, and found small quantities of 50 different precious metals. The metals include: gold, silver, and platinum.

When you multiply that across the entire population, we could be pooping out several billion dollars worth of precious metals every year.

Now the U.S. Geological Survey is leading a study to see if it'll be possible to extract those metals, which would be good for the environment in two ways:  It would reduce the need for mining and make our poop safer as a fertilizer.

More importantly, why is there gold in our poop?  No one's 100 percent sure. The best theory is that tiny amounts get into our system through things like hair products, detergents, and cosmetics. Then our digestive system concentrates them together.

Sadly, one individual person is only producing a very small amount. We beg you, please do not start prospecting in your toilet hoping to strike it rich.