Better Buy Gold

Aegis

pop_gun wrote: »

70% is a worse case scenario. Give me the best case scenario from any point in the last 20 years.

Best case scenario for the FTSE 100 in the last 20 years is buying exactly 20 years ago. The time in the market would have led to returns of 347%, or 7.8% annual compounded return.

As such, just buying the FTSE at a random point in the last 20 years and holding until now would have resulted in a range of 70% to 347% gross return.

Let me know if more figures are needed.

Aegis

Aegis wrote: »

Best case scenario for the FTSE 100 in the last 20 years is buying exactly 20 years ago. The time in the market would have led to returns of 347%, or 7.8% annual compounded return.

As such, just buying the FTSE at a random point in the last 20 years and holding until now would have resulted in a range of 70% to 347% gross return.

Let me know if more figures are needed.

Sorry, busy day - just realised that of course you wouldn't have a 70% return by buying in the last few days. The range band is any time buying between 1995 and 2000, of course. More recent figures are somewhat hampered by the shorter holding period.

Pretty obvious, I know, but I felt it warranted clarification!

pop_gun

Gadfium wrote: »

Q.E.D.


Again you have demonstrated the limit of your knowledge.
16% growth in 12 months, 0.24% annual charge
http://www.hl.co.uk/funds/fund-discounts,-prices--and--factsheets/search-results/v/vanguard-lifestrategy-80-equity-accumulation

Why the need to misrepresent my question?

It's clear I was referring to the original brokerage fee of $6,000.

PenguinJim

On an investment of $2,500,000 showing 16% growth in 12 months, I don't think a $6,000 brokerage fee is unreasonable.

And to answer your earlier question: yes, 16% growth in 12 months does cover the annual fee of 0.24% for those 12 months.

But I'm sorry for my earlier post - I thought your title and OP were advising people to buy gold as an investment. This is the "Savings & Investments" sub-forum, and I was also thrown when you compared gold to a savings account. If you are just buying gold with a particular purpose in mind - in your case, to line your pockets (I prefer velour myself) - then of course. Your suggestion and thread of "buy gold if you want gold" does make more sense on those terms. As an additional suggestion, I expect the best way to have a solid gold toilet is to buy a toilet made out of solid gold.

Of course, I feel like a bit of an idiot now. If you had been describing gold as an investment (as opposed to a commodity or consumable), surely the word "spread" would have come up in at least one of your posts.

Gadfium

pop_gun wrote: »

Why the need to misrepresent my question?

It's clear I was referring to the original brokerage fee of $6,000.

I'm not sure you fully understand the point. If the author had invested in a passive such as that one that I illustrated then he would have had a return (over the last 12 months) of 16% against a management fee of 0.24%. He even says that moving his IRA (individual retirement account) to Vanguard reduced his costs from $6K per annum to $300.

Ultimately, the article is about the importance of diversification, and the dangers of putting your money into a single asset. Why? Because a crash in the price of a single asset can lose you a lot of money, or in the case of a bankruptcy such as GTAT, lose you the initial investment. It doesn't matter what that asset class is, be it equities, BTL or gold...holding a single asset is not a good idea. So the article that you used actually warns of the danger of taking the action that you are banging on about.

Of course, a bright guy like you will have spotted that.....

Anyhoo, at this point all you are doing is flailing about, throwing lots of different arguments to try and support your point (also known as a gish-gallop ). At times like this I am reminded of a Churchill quotation "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject". I'll leave you to it...enjoy your shiny coin.

pop_gun

Gadfium wrote: »

I'm not sure you fully understand the point. If the author had invested in a passive such as that one that I illustrated then he would have had a return (over the last 12 months) of 16% against a management fee of 0.24%. He even says that moving his IRA (individual retirement account) to Vanguard reduced his costs from $6K per annum to $300.

Anyhoo, at this point all you are doing is flailing about, throwing lots of different arguments to try and support your point (also known as a gish-gallop ). At times like this I am reminded of a Churchill quotation "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject". I'll leave you to it...enjoy your shiny coin.

PenguinJim understood my point and even offered an investment amount of $2.5m. But he's as dishonest as you are, because he also ignores the fact the author said he was losing money on his retirement fund despite regular contributions to it. So for PJ to say it's fair shows he doesn't care about the investor and has taken the dubious step of aligning himself with the broker.
Which begs the question what affinity does he have with the brokerage trade?

You do like all these silly little terms. Confirmation bias and now gish-gallop. What's next? Codswallop. Possibly to describe your posts to date?
My very first post asked a simple question; is anyone else investing in physical gold?

You, PenguinJim, Gadgetmind, JimJames, Nocto or any of the others needn't have responded. But you did.
It was you and these other posters who turned this into a gold v money\stocks and shares thread. Any arguments I have made have been to points raised by the aforementioned stock market gurus.
Churchill's quote (which seems to have appeared long before he's alleged to have uttered it) is inappropriate. Not least of all because one doesn't need to change one's mind if he is right.

Nocto

Post 16:

pop_gun wrote: »

It seems everyone on this board is promoting stocks and shares and talking about portfolios.
I forget whether it's the DOW Jones or the FTSE that hasn't recovered it's 1999 highs. Which means long term investors have lost money. There's also brokerage fees and premiums associated with owning stocks and shares. So please spare me the spiel about investing in companies which are more often than not, a hair's breadth from insolvency.

I don't buy gold for it's monetary value (despite what I wrote in my original post about it's current price) but as a hedge against inflation and the likelihood of a new Bretton woods system.

Come on!

That was always going to kick off a lively discussion on a ‘Savings & Investments’ forum..!:D

Gadfium

pop_gun wrote: »

PenguinJim understood my point and even offered an investment amount of $2.5m. But he's as dishonest as you are, because he also ignores the fact the author said he was losing money on his retirement fund despite regular contributions to it.

Oh dear...you really have missed the point of the article, haven't you?

pop_gun wrote: »

So for PJ to say it's fair shows he doesn't care about the investor and has taken the dubious step of aligning himself with the broker.
Which begs the question what affinity does he have with the brokerage trade?

You really do see conspiracy everywhere, don't you?

pop_gun wrote: »

My very first post asked a simple question; is anyone else investing in physical gold?

You, PenguinJim, Gadgetmind, JimJames, Nocto or any of the others needn't have responded. But you did.

Asked and answered.

Not much point in asking a question on a public forum if you don't want to get answers. Even less point in asking if you don't like the answers that you get.

I hope that you and your single gold coin have fun together.
Over and out.

brasso

pop_gun wrote: »

I brought a gold one ounce sovereign at the beginning of last month and the value of it has increased by over £100.
That's better than any savings account I could lay my hands on.

And equally, when it drops by the same amount, as it will do at some point, that will be worse than any savings account. So I'm not sure what point you're making, apart from making a rather bland observation that commodities can show short term changes in value.

pop_gun wrote: »

Anyone else investing in physical gold?

I'm not sure I'd call it "investing" as there is no income, dividend or guarantee of profit, but I do own half a kilo of physical gold which I bought nearly 2 years ago, and which is currently worth 25% less than what I paid for it .

I bought it for diversification, and have no intention of selling it in the forseeable future. Nor do I plan to buy any more.

In the last year or so I've drifted back to LTBH funds -- mainly low-cost trackers and ETFs. I've had my fingers burnt too much recently by over-volatile single stocks and commodities.

EdGasket

jimjames wrote: »

A few examples from my portfolio, an Asian trust has gone from £1.50 to £10 in the last 15 years, much the same timescale as the FTSE100 peak you're quoting.

and I had an Asian Trust that went from 50p to nothing over a few years!
(Edinburgh New Tiger Trust - went down to 13p then converted to split capital, then bust)

At least gold will never be worthless.