Buying gold & silver

[1nvest]

Another variant to 50/33/17 FT250/Gold/US$ bills is to employ a 2x FT250 holding instead (2MCL ticker), half weighted. 50/50 2x FT250/cash will tend to compare to 100% FT250 when rebalanced yearly (US PV example). Where for 'cash' we use the 50/33/17 instead, then that recursive function converges at close to around 33/44/22 in 2x FT250, Gold, US$ holdings. That will be slightly more volatile, but also likely slightly more rewarding, whilst having two-thirds of assets in-hand (gold/US$). Possibly a good choice under a Labour government and it imposing a wealth tax, where the two thirds of portfolio value in gold and US $ bills might be 'shifted offshore' or otherwise be disowned/hidden. With no regular interest/dividend footprints being produced. Taxation is only reasonable/fair when levelled to fair levels - but where at times can become punitive/confiscation. A hedge against when others might be seeing 12% rewards, but after 12% inflation and 33% taxation are yielding -4% real. Sovereigns and Britannia's are CGT exempt, hard US$ bills are CGT exempt, drop a third of portfolio value into a ISA 2MCL holding, and taxation risk is potentially significantly reduced.

[elephanthunt11]

At home, in capsules which are in a pencil case which is in a safe.

Only buy gold if you can take physical possession of it.

...and don't buy from the Royal Mint and especially BullionByPost.

Buy from Atkinsons, Chards, Sharps Pixley. All highly reputable gold dealers who charge far lower premiums.

[scotview]

How do people here hold gold and silver as investments?

Buy from Atkinsons, Chards, Sharps Pixley. All highly reputable gold dealers who charge far lower premiums.

The above dealers will probably also give you a better resale price.

As an experiment, go onto the Chards website. Get the lowest purchase price for a sovereign. Now go to their selling section and get a sell price for a sovereign. That will show how much you will immediately lose in the spread. That's how much it will need to appreciate just to break even. Next you could maybe add say 10% inflation to the purchase cost and that will let you see how much the sovereign will need to grow to beat this year's inflation.

A very useful tool is the gold price on Bullionbypost. You can even look at the live price. Silver is also covered. See link below:
https://www.bullionbypost.co.uk/gold-pr ... ice-today/

[1nvest]

How do people here hold gold and silver as investments?

Buy from Atkinsons, Chards, Sharps Pixley. All highly reputable gold dealers who charge far lower premiums.

The above dealers will probably also give you a better resale price.

As an experiment, go onto the Chards website. Get the lowest purchase price for a sovereign. Now go to their selling section and get a sell price for a sovereign. That will show how much you will immediately lose in the spread. That's how much it will need to appreciate just to break even. Next you could maybe add say 10% inflation to the purchase cost and that will let you see how much the sovereign will need to grow to beat this year's inflation.

A very useful tool is the gold price on Bullionbypost. You can even look at the live price. Silver is also covered. See link below:
https://www.bullionbypost.co.uk/gold-pr ... ice-today/

I'd just add to do that during market hours, spreads will be widened out of hours.

My FT250 index shares are down around -15% this year so far, so factoring in 10% inflation and they need to gain +30% just to break-even, excluding costs. Gold this year so far is up +9.2%, so even on a average 3% above spot, -2% below spot to buy/sell, gold only has to make +5.3% to break-even with inflation net of costs.

Personally, as I've previously mentioned, I like to get others to pay for the spread, initially buy the ETF (tighter spreads), and when the portfolio is up in real terms, use some of those gains to fund swapping out ETF for physical gold. If 20% gold is your thing, 5% spread, 1% proportioned to the total portfolio and the portfolio is up 5% that year, then swap gold ETF for physical gold, and count it as a +4% portfolio gain year. Another option when you're more known is others might trade with you, be happy to sell at spot to you compared to -2% below spot that they might otherwise have sold at; buy from you at spot rather than paying +3% above spot elsewhere. There are precious metals forums around that facilitate such connections. There is some tendency to see buyers increase after prices have risen and you might be looking to reduce, and similarly sellers seem to increase after prices have fallen and you're looking to add more.

Don't buy via eBay.

In India where banks are less trusted, its quite common for individuals to 'save' using gold. When they want the equivalent of a pay day loan they'll "deposit" gold in return for around 70% of the spot value in cash. Later when the cash + interest (around 8%/year equivalent rate) is paid back - they get their gold back. Lender is happy as their gold potentially earns 8% (less costs of swapping out some of their own physical gold for the clients gold), or if the client defaults they have gold in effect acquired at a 30% below spot price. Borrower is happy that their gold was easily liquidated into currency, and if for just a short while the interest costs are pretty low. As such, Asian/Indian physical gold trades tend to occur with relatively tighter spreads that here in the UK were there's much lower trading activity. It's quite common that lower volume/less-liquid assets tend to have wider spreads.

[1nvest]

Spreads can also be wide on the likes of currencies. For instance for that 33% 2MCL stock, 44% gold, 22% hard US$ currency portfolio I outlined earlier, then for a £1M portfolio value at present prices you're looking at a little over a foot tall stack of $100 bills and 3 stacks of 1 ounce Britannia coins stacked to a similar height. £666K value, 1.5 stone or so in combined weight. However to buy into US$ bills, and sell back again to convert back to £'s, can involve quite wide spreads. All just part of "cost to do business" - where otherwise to save that by not trading, perhaps staying in cash, you'll more likely see far higher "costs".