Gold

[DisplayNameChanged]

hollogramme

I was looking at BullionVault this morning and found this FAQ - Governance:-

"As a British business BullionVault is subject to British law. The situation for British users of BullionVault is typically eccentric.

Current legislation requires that where gold is physically delivered to British citizens in a sum exceeding £5,000 in one transaction (or aggregating £10,000 in a full year) then a report must be filed with HM Revenue and Custom's 'Gold Team'.

But the Gold Team no longer exists, so although the legislation remains there is no practical way of obeying it. In any event BullionVault does not routinely make physical delivery into the hands of its users (although users are entitled).

The nature of BullionVault's business and the fact that BullionVault retains all records of transactions has been notified to HMRC in writing and acknowledged by them. For the time being no-one at HMRC is seeking or receiving any reports of BullionVault trading or holdings."

[john mitchell]

My recollection is that single purchases under £5000 need not be reported. Annual purchases over £10000 from the same dealer have to be reported.

Im new to this but I know for a fact that this is not true at all as I've had it explained to me in some depth. There is no reporting done because there is no-one to report it to! If you buy more than 5k worth in a year you need to provide the dealer with some ID only because you may turn out to be a crook and if the police / customs have to start an investigation they wilol go to the dealer and ask for details of the transaction. When you submit yo0ur ID its still totally confidential and no-one needs to know about it. It's only if you turn out to be a crim then the dealers have to cover themselves by being able to identify you to the authorities so they don't get done for being part of a scam. The dealers simply wouldn't be able to make any money if they had to disclose their customer's names and their purchases because half of their punters are desperate to be discrete.

So essentially if you want to be anonymous its still fine to provide ID but just don't commit any fraud 'cos then the dealer will have to reveal you.

[john mitchell]

;

Edited August 18, 2007 by john mitchell

[john mitchell]

Anyone able to say what's best (coins, lumps, brick-type things etc ) - has to be physical gold though, not interested in funny-money paper investments.

If you don't want to store at places you have access to, use services of BullionVault or Goldmoney.

I'm pretty new to all this myself and admit I'm shit-scared of being burnt and rely on the advice of my knowledgeable friends, but from what they've told me Bullionvault potentially comes under the category of 'funny money paper investments' as you so succinctly put it. Two of my mates (who I trust implicitly as they're at the top of their respective fields and are a lot older and wiser than me) did some sums one day and decided there was something highly suspect about the Bullionvault set up 'cos if they truly offered what they say they offer at the rates they advertise then they wouldn't make any money. They told me not to trust any large lumps with them as they've only been around for a couple of years and are totally unregulated.

I don't know anything about goldmoney yet 'cos I havent got that far so I can't comment on them, but I will ask my friends to get their calculators and detective hats out for them aswell and post any findings of interest.

Does anyone have an opinion on Baird's allocated accounts 'cos although their name comes up all the time in respect to physical theres not much about their accounts so opinions please? Their website says they've been around since the sixties which reassures me a little in advance and my friends say they are reputable so Ive asked to be sent a brochure and will report any info.

Another point of interest, I recently I went to a small local jewellers who happens to stock a few coins aswell to buy a sov for my niece's b'day and had a chat with the bloke in there. The name Bullionvault came up in conversation and he showed me a ciopy of moneyweek where the founder of Bullionvault wrote an article where he said something about the value of your gold being instantly reducued as soon as you take physical posession of it yourself due to the risk that you might have tampered with it or something like that. The jeweller told me this is nonesense and that he is pissed 'cos some of his more wealthy elderly customers read money week and came in the next day with the article worried that the coins they had stored up over the years would be unsaleable cos they had held onto them for a while. It all sounds a bit odd to me and I didn't have time to read the article in depth whilst in the shop but he was certainly pissed off and called the MD of bullionvault a 'slimy little c**t' and he's normally quite mild mannered. I don't know what to read into this but I thought I should add it as an aside, and it's interesting that moneyweek decided to print such a thing if it is in fact untrue. Comments on this?

[PatientObserver]

Interesting points made. My understanding is that BullionVault are able to offer such good deals because they deal in good delivery bars - cutting out the cost of the middle-man and the risk of tampering.

www.bullionvault.com/help/index.html?content=/help/FAQs/FAQs_whyBV.html#Big gold bars in the professional bullion market

Any gold handled by third parties runs the risk of being tampered with (medieval England springs to mind). The onus is then on the buyer to ensure quality.

I am also finding this process scary as I take the first steps away from the usual cash-equity-property portfolio I've held for the past 10 years.

[Guest Bart of Darkness]

hollogramme

I was looking at BullionVault this morning and found this FAQ - Governance:-

"As a British business BullionVault is subject to British law. The situation for British users of BullionVault is typically eccentric.

Current legislation requires that where gold is physically delivered to British citizens in a sum exceeding £5,000 in one transaction (or aggregating £10,000 in a full year) then a report must be filed with HM Revenue and Custom's 'Gold Team'.

But the Gold Team no longer exists, so although the legislation remains there is no practical way of obeying it. In any event BullionVault does not routinely make physical delivery into the hands of its users (although users are entitled).

The nature of BullionVault's business and the fact that BullionVault retains all records of transactions has been notified to HMRC in writing and acknowledged by them. For the time being no-one at HMRC is seeking or receiving any reports of BullionVault trading or holdings."

Good find ds_t.

[DisplayNameChanged]

Another point of interest, I recently I went to a small local jewellers who happens to stock a few coins aswell to buy a sov for my niece's b'day and had a chat with the bloke in there. The name Bullionvault came up in conversation and he showed me a ciopy of moneyweek where the founder of Bullionvault wrote an article where he said something about the value of your gold being instantly reducued as soon as you take physical posession of it yourself due to the risk that you might have tampered with it or something like that. The jeweller told me this is nonesense and that he is pissed 'cos some of his more wealthy elderly customers read money week and came in the next day with the article worried that the coins they had stored up over the years would be unsaleable cos they had held onto them for a while. It all sounds a bit odd to me and I didn't have time to read the article in depth whilst in the shop but he was certainly pissed off and called the MD of bullionvault a 'slimy little c**t' and he's normally quite mild mannered. I don't know what to read into this but I thought I should add it as an aside, and it's interesting that moneyweek decided to print such a thing if it is in fact untrue. Comments on this?

I was looking BullionVault this morning, and like you wanted to know if everything was legal and above board:

The quote about gold losing its values : I think they were talking about "Good delivery gold bars" - apparently these bars are all individually numbered and their exact weight and purity is know and it is these bars that are tracked from the day of manufacture and only stored in accredited vaults. If these bars are ever taken out of the system then they can no longer be called "Good delivery bars" and so in theory lose some of their value.

but of course they are going to talk up thier own business, just like your shop keeper would.

Your other point about not charging enough to make money and thus a scam. Well Gold Bullion Securities , is a public limited company listed on the London exchange FTSE symbol GBS, their only assest is $2 billion in gold in a vault - their only income is a 0.4% charge on the value of the gold and the spread of the shares is small 5 cents in $65 ie approx 0.1%. BullionVault seem to be doing nothing more than having a vault of gold and a web page and software so that the allocation of the gold can be traded between account holders. For purchases in the £1000s then BullionVault is 0.8% (buy & sell) plus 0.12% per holding charge (minimum $4 per month = $48 per year), so if people are holding $4800 worth of gold the minimum charge 1% per year to hold the gold plus 0.8% to buy it. So BullionVault would seem to be making more than GBS from that point of view? Plus BullionVault is doing everything to encourage trading between account holders, their commision is then almost free money on top of that.

If you really want to find out I think you can order their accounts from company house for £1 - company number 4943684.

Between BullionVault and Goldmoney - just the fact that BV is a proper UK limited company, and Goldmoney is based in Jersey gave me a preference for BV.

GBS web site: http://www.lyxorgbs.com/sites/uk/shares/

BullionVault charges from their help pages www.bullionvault.com/help

Oh MOTD is on can't write any more

[jonesinamillion]

Five years on and very interesting reading (the very first thread on this forum)...

[Errol]

Pity the guys who bought at $740 an ounce last year!

Some great comments on this thread. lol.

Yes, I really pity people buying gold at $740 an ounce. lol - I'd kill for that price now.