[guitarman001]

Hmmm, physical sounds great but I'd be gutted if mine got stolen... or if I got a con-job and it turned out to be worthless. What about bullionvault, is that not recommended by you guys? I see goldline (recommended in first post) do an online gold savings account similar to bullionvault...... (?)

Bullionvault certainly make it sound very attractive and they bang on about security a lot (they have more gold than a lot of the main banks they claim?). Is one going to go far wrong by buying through that platform?

This post has been edited by guitarman001: 26 July 2011 - 10:15 PM

[Old Nis]

Physical is the only way to start.

I can't remember who said it, but the best advice I ever saw on a gold-following forum was "Everyone should have an ounce of gold". Now look in your pockets for four 10p coins. That's almost exactly the same size as four sovereigns (but nowhere near the same weight!) which is just a fraction under 1 troy ounce of gold. You can't tell me that you wouldn't be able to find a hiding place for that. If those four coins were gold, you would have a guaranteed preservation of £1020 (at today's date 3/Aug/2011) of your wealth. That buying power will, for all practical intents and purposes, remain the same for the next thousand years, which I think is an adequately long time to be concerned about. The likelihood of losing it is infinitely lower than the guaranteed debasement of the rest of your money.

If you want to take the small but significant risk that institutionally-held gold might be confiscated by the government in a crisis (and we may look for our moral compass to Gordon Brown's example with the British pension funds and the sale of OUR gold - excuse me while I wash my mouth out with soap) then I reckon these companies are as safe as they can possibly be;

GoldSavers (Baird, London), Goldmoney (London, Zurich or Hong Kong), Bullionvault (New York, London or Zurich), and for truly-allocated amounts The Guernsey Mint. The first three act like bank accounts, GoldSavers is the easiest to get small quantities out, and the GuernseyMint act as a safe-deposit box for PMs only, that is, your stash is actually labelled and separated from other owners, so you can actually turn up with five days' notice and look at your individual lump of metal. Goldmoney and Bullionvault are the traditional ones for traders, but I'm going to open a GoldSavers account soon and will report back. Silver stored in Guernsey has no VAT liability at the time of writing, ditto Palladium.

[Old Nis]

Storage Discussions:
http://www.housepric...showtopic=93366
http://www.housepric...showtopic=85460
http://www.housepric...showtopic=97049

Confiscation Discussions:
http://www.housepric...showtopic=92200
http://bastardoldhol...to-pay-for.html

To be honest, you have three choices.

(1) Keep it in fiat and let the government/banks steal it gradually (or not so gradually) over time by way of inflation.
(2) Keep it in some form of secure storage and hope the contents of your safety deposit box is not stolen by the people in the threads referenced above. (Although the Austrians are probably much more reliable custodians http://www.dassafe.com )
(3) Hide it yourself in a way that is very unlikely to be found by any criminal, bearing in mind that the average criminal is only interested in stealing, quickly, something he can shift at a fast profit. If the police (the last people I would ask for advice, btw) consider that a firearms cabinet bolted to the wall is adequate storage for a shotgun, then it is likely to resist any form of attack long enough to cause an opportunistic thief to give up. Put a small fire safe inside that, and you've pretty much got it covered. Use some imagination to conceal the same, and I would have no issues with leaving a few gold coins in a property.

Take your pick, and remember that concealment from view can be as good as a huge safe left on show.

[up2late]

http://www.silverexchange.co.uk/ gives me a 404

Anyone know if it is temporary or permanent?

[Old Nis]

He was a great guy but got out some time ago. It's permanent. I bought a shed load from him, then he went "off-air" for a while, came back with one last batch which, stupidly, I didn't take off him immediately, someone else bought it and then when I asked him if he had any more, well...

That was it. I think some of the Channel Islands suppliers may have future issues as well, due to our government reducing the VAT-free limit. They said it was to stop the trade in DVDs but the limit was too conveniently=placed at just less than the price of a silver half-ounce coin. £15 is still going to let a lot of DVDs come through at the budget end of the market.

You can still buy from Guernsey via Bruce a The Guernsey Mint, but if you bring a Mercedes-load back at once, you're still going to have to pay VAT if it's silver. Gold is different, of course.