Silver Petition

[Silver Petition]

www.silverpetition.com

We the undersigned petition the EU parliament to remove VAT (Value Added Tax / Sales Tax), throughout the EU, on physical investment silver bullion bars and coins. These 99.9% fine silver bars and coins are bought for the purposes of investment, savings and a hedge against inflation. Removing the VAT on fine silver bullion, (to bring physical investment silver bullion into the same VAT free status as investment gold / savings accounts / ISA's / bonds / stocks and all other monetary investment vehicles), will enable the ordinary people of Europe to once again own real silver as a liquid asset.

Yes the VAT on investment silver is a problem in Europe, and sadly the UK government (and indeed all individual European Country/State governments) is NOT ALLOWED (!!) to introduce new zero tax rates! And this has been the case since power to govern the country began to be handed over to the European empire from the Treaty of Rome and more pertinently from 1973 onwards (the Common Market! ). This is why we cannot petition 10 Downing Street, as they have NO POWER to change the situation, we must therefore petition the EU Parliament itself.

This might not be such a bad thing as it was the EU that removed VAT from investment gold in 1999, and the UK Government was forced to follow suit.

When a substantial number of people have signed we intend to deliver the petition directly to the EU Parliament, hopefully via a willing MEP (Member of European Parliament) VAT on silver is NOT equal across Europe. In Germany & Holland legal tender silver bullion coins such as American Eagles get charged at 6-7% VAT which is less than half the German/Dutch VAT rate of 19%. In the UK we have to pay 17.5% (and soon 20%) on all silver bullion purchases.

Silver is Money, this is shown in a great number of the world's languages, e.g. £1 = 1 pound (weight) sterling (silver), the French word for money is L'argent, directly from the Latin for the element silver, argentum, or Ag in the Periodic table.

In The Bible, the Hebrew word "shaqal" sometimes translated "spend" money, means to weigh, obviously not referring to paper, but a weight of silver or gold.

In the EU you might be taxed THREE times to own silver as an investment;

When you earn your PAPER/DIGITAL currency you have paid INCOME TAX

You then purchase some SILVER MONEY/BULLION with your paper and pay VAT on top

You might then sell some of your SILVER to get currency again and may have to declare a CAPITAL GAIN TAX !!??

This is not a just situation, especially if other investment vehicles, such as "spread betting" on the markets, is encouraged with the current incentive in the UK of NO tax on profits. If silver was re-monetized and freed from the shackles of VAT the ups and downs of a mostly DEBT based BANKING system would surely have FAR LESS influence on peoples economic situations. Silverbob Proverbs Ch11:1 "False balances are an abomination unto the Lord: but a perfect weight pleaseth him."

www.silverpetition.com

[Silver Petition]

Silver at the moment is still very low in comparison to where it should be. Our cousins across the pool are not slow at all on picking up on the truth that silver and gold cannot just disappear, they are very pro active in protecting their wealth.

The reason why the Americans are so quick is that it has not been long since they used precious metal to trade with, it is in their constitution and there is no tax bearing down on investment silver. The UK has not known silver to be used as legal tender for centuries. It is true that here in the UK, silver is taxed but as my good friend silverbob pointed out that; VAT maybe on silver but you don’t have to give details on who you are, where you live, how much you have bought or even a limit on the amount you can buy, but with gold you do.

[Silver Petition]

VAT on Silver in UK

Yes the VAT on investment silver is a problem in Europe, and sadly the UK government is NOT ALLOWED (!!) to extend the zero rates or introduce new zero rates! And this has been the case since power to govern the country began to be handed over to the Roman, sorry European empire from 1973 onwards.

However it is worse than described here because the VAT on silver is NOT equal across Europe nor is it equal within the UK! In Germany legal tender silver bullion coins such as American Eagles get charged at less than half the German VAT rate 7% instead of 19%.

And if you are a member of the VERY EXCLUSIVE LBMA you can enjoy buying and selling silver at 0% (YES ZERO % !!) VAT.

Alas for the rest of us surfs in the UK we have to cough up 17.5% extra on our investment as a thank you to the Nice Government Men for being, well Nice Government Men.

So if you buy an ounce of physical silver today at £11.42 in the form of one of our Silver Roses + our mark up + manufacture + government mark up, means your ounce will cost £16.52 – 44.66% over metal price. (Though buying larger amounts will reduce the mark up and bars are cheaper)

So silver is definitely a longer term investment

[inspector]

The UK has not known silver to be used as legal tender for centuries.

Not true.

[Quiet Guy]

This is not a just situation

Who expects justice from the EU? It seems more likely to me that the EU will impose VAT on investment gold than remove VAT on silver.

[gasket37]

Who expects justice from the EU? It seems more likely to me that the EU will impose VAT on investment gold than remove VAT on silver.

precisely - governments reducing taxes? very unlikely these days i'd wager.

kudos to the OP for trying though

[Stay Beautiful]

www.silverpetition.com

We the undersigned petition the EU parliament to remove VAT (Value Added Tax / Sales Tax), throughout the EU, on physical investment silver bullion bars and coins. These 99.9% fine silver bars and coins are bought for the purposes of investment, savings and a hedge against inflation. Removing the VAT on fine silver bullion, (to bring physical investment silver bullion into the same VAT free status as investment gold / savings accounts / ISA's / bonds / stocks and all other monetary investment vehicles), will enable the ordinary people of Europe to once again own real silver as a liquid asset.

Yes the VAT on investment silver is a problem in Europe, and sadly the UK government (and indeed all individual European Country/State governments) is NOT ALLOWED (!!) to introduce new zero tax rates! And this has been the case since power to govern the country began to be handed over to the European empire from the Treaty of Rome and more pertinently from 1973 onwards (the Common Market! ). This is why we cannot petition 10 Downing Street, as they have NO POWER to change the situation, we must therefore petition the EU Parliament itself.

This might not be such a bad thing as it was the EU that removed VAT from investment gold in 1999, and the UK Government was forced to follow suit.

When a substantial number of people have signed we intend to deliver the petition directly to the EU Parliament, hopefully via a willing MEP (Member of European Parliament) VAT on silver is NOT equal across Europe. In Germany & Holland legal tender silver bullion coins such as American Eagles get charged at 6-7% VAT which is less than half the German/Dutch VAT rate of 19%. In the UK we have to pay 17.5% (and soon 20%) on all silver bullion purchases.

Silver is Money, this is shown in a great number of the world's languages, e.g. £1 = 1 pound (weight) sterling (silver), the French word for money is L'argent, directly from the Latin for the element silver, argentum, or Ag in the Periodic table.

In The Bible, the Hebrew word "shaqal" sometimes translated "spend" money, means to weigh, obviously not referring to paper, but a weight of silver or gold.

In the EU you might be taxed THREE times to own silver as an investment;

When you earn your PAPER/DIGITAL currency you have paid INCOME TAX

You then purchase some SILVER MONEY/BULLION with your paper and pay VAT on top

You might then sell some of your SILVER to get currency again and may have to declare a CAPITAL GAIN TAX !!??

This is not a just situation, especially if other investment vehicles, such as "spread betting" on the markets, is encouraged with the current incentive in the UK of NO tax on profits. If silver was re-monetized and freed from the shackles of VAT the ups and downs of a mostly DEBT based BANKING system would surely have FAR LESS influence on peoples economic situations. Silverbob Proverbs Ch11:1 "False balances are an abomination unto the Lord: but a perfect weight pleaseth him."

www.silverpetition.com

[Number79]

Not true.

yeah, 1948 doesnt seem that long ago to me either. It doesnt look like he is overly concerned with fact or detail though.

[inspector]

yeah, 1948 doesnt seem that long ago to me either.

Quite, but my first thoughts didn't even venture so far back.

I initially had 1997 in mind.

[Silver Petition]

Hello all, and thanks for your opinions on VAT & Silver. The situation is if we just sit on our fat backsides and do nothing, then nothing will get done. We can all whine & complain about things, but that doesn’t change anything, the only way is to join forces and make something happen. I agree that the EU is bankrupt (tax hungry) and will possibly break up; my feeling is that the wealthier states will align with Russia, and the poorer states will just slide down the pan. But with this turmoil, hard assets will remain the only safe haven, its liquid, portable and fungible. Now back to the VAT thing, we can only try, if it works out great, if the petition fails, well at least we had go, and who knows maybe someone else may pick this up and push it further. The biggest problem I see is that people have become apathetic, and rather sit on their fat backsides and complain rather than put up a good fight, if you really want this, then do something about it.

I am waiting for some more signatures.

[Beginner]

I'll let you put down your address and send it to the EU government. I'm gonna try not to had the fact that I'm stacking to them on a plate.

[Number79]

Response from HMRC

"Thank you for your petition. We have agreed to look into the VAT situation and are even considering a refund of tax paid since it is clearly unjust. Could you please send us details of how many ounces of silver you own along with the prices paid and any receipts that you may have. Since we will assume that you also have gold could you please send the relevant details about that stack to us as well.

Please do not sell any of your stack as now that we know you have one we will be calculating CGT liabilities. If we do not contact you before your door gets kicked in then please feel free to continue stacking."

[Silver Petition]

www.silverpetition.com

Here is a reply to a question I received on one of the forums, right or wrong, its my opinion.

Hi Nick. I suspect that they do not levy the tax because "they need every penny" since central banks can create limitless money (and without any cost). VAT on silver is so small that this not even a pocket money for them. The purpose of VAT is not economical but political - to discourage investors and keep them out from the physical silver market. Only then can they rigg the silver market. The best way to fight the system in my opinion is to encourage people to "get physical". Maybe you can add this component to your silverpetition in some form. Great work with the petition - I signed up.

Hi Mr ******, its my opinion that everything is manipulated to some degree, a good example is Al jazera and Fox news, both have their own target audience and produce news for their audience, so is this an opinion, propaganda, or is this manipulation? And that depends from which standpoint you analyse it. There are a lot of opinions on silver manipulation, and once again it depends from which standpoint, is it manipulation, or is it just a trade by big powerful banks who trade a small market. I think that when the demand becomes too big to short they will switch sides; however it’s my opinion that they could be selling silver paper and converting into physical metal, so is this manipulation or just a trade from their point of view? And lets face it, the business of banking is a business, and there to make a profit. As for the VAT issue, in my view this is wrong, Canada, Australia and USA do not charge sales tax on silver bullion, and allow their citizens the freedom to own silver bullion unhindered, but in the EU the removal of VAT on gold should also be passed onto silver as it is a monetary asset, and the EU should consider their citizens where inflation is concerned, (for what is a productive nation when their citizens are broke). Its also immoral to levy a tax on a asset that throughout the history of over 5000 years has been considered and used as money, especially amongst the poor, and under our historical rights of our forefathers before us, placing sales tax on silver money in my opinion is un-lawful, thus denying the poorest of our society to have exposure to precious metals.

I don’t think it’s a conspiracy on behalf of the EU to keep silver investment demand down, and I think it’s more of a case that some bureaucrats somewhere has decided to classify silver to be only an industrial metal, and ignored the fact of its monetary aspect. If there was a conspiracy out there, im sure that the big banks would have lobbied their local governments to force VAT on Canada, Australia and the USA.

I have had long talks with friends of mine regarding the flight from fiat to precious metals, and the ramifications to any local currency, in my view the precious metals market is to small to make any impact, and being in a global system its far easier to exchange fiat for fiat, than fiat to metals.

As for governmental confiscation of metals from their citizens, I don’t think this will happen, in fact I think this is already happening right now as we speak, but this is being done through private companies like cash for gold, or got gold get cash etc, where vast quantities of metal is being soaked up by way of scrap, and if there was a confiscation by stealth, it would easy to just buy in the open market with QE money, its also worth noting that very little silver scrap is coming out of the public hands, as the public doesn’t have much to sell away, that went during the last bull market in silver (late 1970’s). However if the government did impose such a law, it would have to be by contract, or contractual payment, similar to how a parking ticket works, where the public wilfully gives up their metal believing it’s the law, it is also noting that during the great gold theft/confiscation in America, the law was directed at everyone, but only legally applied to government agents & employees, and gold held in America by foreign entities was untouchable as the law didn’t apply to them as foreign nationals, maybe this explains how the elite kept their gold holding in America.

It is also worth noting that some 30% of the global silver supply comes from scrap, mainly from film, “example” X Ray’s disposed by hospitals as they digitise their records, this cannot last for long and I estimate some 12-15 years supply from my contacts in the silver recycling business, after that we would be increasingly reliant on mining supply, and as you know it can take 8-10 years to get a mine into production, so we are very reliant on the exploration companies to keep finding new silver deposits. Should the silver supply become tight, we could see governments considering silver as a strategic metal, maybe even nationalising the mines or restricting export quotas, but I think we are many year’s way from that. So back to confiscation, would the government really take the time to take silver from the public? Even if silver was at USD1000 ounce, the work and effort involved in trying to collect that metal from the public would be huge, we should also consider that if silver was at $1000 oz you may be paying $80 for a regular Americano at Starbucks, its all relative in inflationomics.

The last point you made was that to beat the system is to encourage people to get physical on silver, the EU has the third largest population after China and India with 830 million as of 2009, opening up the market to 830 million would make a huge difference to the silver price, it would also make precious metals accessible to the less well off.

Any way, thank you for signing the Silver Petition, who knows, we might make a difference one day.

[Stay Beautiful]

www.silverpetition.com

Here is a reply to a question I received on one of the forums, right or wrong, its my opinion.

Hi Nick. I suspect that they do not levy the tax because "they need every penny" since central banks can create limitless money (and without any cost). VAT on silver is so small that this not even a pocket money for them. The purpose of VAT is not economical but political - to discourage investors and keep them out from the physical silver market. Only then can they rigg the silver market. The best way to fight the system in my opinion is to encourage people to "get physical". Maybe you can add this component to your silverpetition in some form. Great work with the petition - I signed up.

Hi Mr ******, its my opinion that everything is manipulated to some degree, a good example is Al jazera and Fox news, both have their own target audience and produce news for their audience, so is this an opinion, propaganda, or is this manipulation? And that depends from which standpoint you analyse it. There are a lot of opinions on silver manipulation, and once again it depends from which standpoint, is it manipulation, or is it just a trade by big powerful banks who trade a small market. I think that when the demand becomes too big to short they will switch sides; however it’s my opinion that they could be selling silver paper and converting into physical metal, so is this manipulation or just a trade from their point of view? And lets face it, the business of banking is a business, and there to make a profit. As for the VAT issue, in my view this is wrong, Canada, Australia and USA do not charge sales tax on silver bullion, and allow their citizens the freedom to own silver bullion unhindered, but in the EU the removal of VAT on gold should also be passed onto silver as it is a monetary asset, and the EU should consider their citizens where inflation is concerned, (for what is a productive nation when their citizens are broke). Its also immoral to levy a tax on a asset that throughout the history of over 5000 years has been considered and used as money, especially amongst the poor, and under our historical rights of our forefathers before us, placing sales tax on silver money in my opinion is un-lawful, thus denying the poorest of our society to have exposure to precious metals.

I don’t think it’s a conspiracy on behalf of the EU to keep silver investment demand down, and I think it’s more of a case that some bureaucrats somewhere has decided to classify silver to be only an industrial metal, and ignored the fact of its monetary aspect. If there was a conspiracy out there, im sure that the big banks would have lobbied their local governments to force VAT on Canada, Australia and the USA.

I have had long talks with friends of mine regarding the flight from fiat to precious metals, and the ramifications to any local currency, in my view the precious metals market is to small to make any impact, and being in a global system its far easier to exchange fiat for fiat, than fiat to metals.

As for governmental confiscation of metals from their citizens, I don’t think this will happen, in fact I think this is already happening right now as we speak, but this is being done through private companies like cash for gold, or got gold get cash etc, where vast quantities of metal is being soaked up by way of scrap, and if there was a confiscation by stealth, it would easy to just buy in the open market with QE money, its also worth noting that very little silver scrap is coming out of the public hands, as the public doesn’t have much to sell away, that went during the last bull market in silver (late 1970’s). However if the government did impose such a law, it would have to be by contract, or contractual payment, similar to how a parking ticket works, where the public wilfully gives up their metal believing it’s the law, it is also noting that during the great gold theft/confiscation in America, the law was directed at everyone, but only legally applied to government agents & employees, and gold held in America by foreign entities was untouchable as the law didn’t apply to them as foreign nationals, maybe this explains how the elite kept their gold holding in America.

It is also worth noting that some 30% of the global silver supply comes from scrap, mainly from film, “example” X Ray’s disposed by hospitals as they digitise their records, this cannot last for long and I estimate some 12-15 years supply from my contacts in the silver recycling business, after that we would be increasingly reliant on mining supply, and as you know it can take 8-10 years to get a mine into production, so we are very reliant on the exploration companies to keep finding new silver deposits. Should the silver supply become tight, we could see governments considering silver as a strategic metal, maybe even nationalising the mines or restricting export quotas, but I think we are many year’s way from that. So back to confiscation, would the government really take the time to take silver from the public? Even if silver was at USD1000 ounce, the work and effort involved in trying to collect that metal from the public would be huge, we should also consider that if silver was at $1000 oz you may be paying $80 for a regular Americano at Starbucks, its all relative in inflationomics.

The last point you made was that to beat the system is to encourage people to get physical on silver, the EU has the third largest population after China and India with 830 million as of 2009, opening up the market to 830 million would make a huge difference to the silver price, it would also make precious metals accessible to the less well off.

Any way, thank you for signing the Silver Petition, who knows, we might make a difference one day.

I think there is as much chance of getting a HPC'er to sign your petition as there is of house prices crashing in the next 12 months.

[Silver Petition]

Hi, i guess maybe your right, maybe we all have different views and opinions, maybe house prices will keep moving up, but thanks for your honest opinion, much appreciated.

[Number79]

Hi, i guess maybe your right, maybe we all have different views and opinions, maybe house prices will keep moving up, but thanks for your honest opinion, much appreciated.

It really is a dead horse mate, VAT is on silver for a reason and you arent going to change that anymore than you are going to change the system or end inflation.

Put your energy into working it all out and then sharing the answers if you ever do.

[john mitchell]

Or buy a market bar (1000 oz) from bairds or any other market member, have it stored, and avoid the VAT totally. You can even make an appointment to stroke it lovingly at their vault...