Buying Gold - A good investment in uncertain times ??

FaTB

Does anybody have any knowledge of buying gold.

I have read It can be a good investment in uncertain times.

Would appreciate any views, whether they be positive or negative.

MattyNeth

not sure, but to try to avoid inheritance tax my old man wants to buy some gold bars

Anyone know how?

Tim_L

You'd have to buy quite a lot of gold bars to avoid inheritance tax to any significant degree, and then you have to store them somewhere secure. It would be fraudulent not to declare any gifts of bars, or to omit them from an IHT return, with the risk of prosecution falling on the executor of the estate. It is absolutely not worth risking, and there are much better legal ways of mitigating inheritance tax, particularly by making maximum use of the gift allowances. Unless the estate is significantly above the threshold it's probably simpler in many cases just to pay the tax anyway.

As to whether gold is a good investment, then this is a question for your own judgement, and it's impossible for anyone to give advice without a crystal ball or time machine. Times are uncertain, but this will already be priced into the value of gold. It's quite a long way down my own list of things I might look at.

Stonk

It isn't that great an investment, although I have a few bullion coins (which are currently worth more than I paid, yippee, because gold is at a high right now).

For "regular" people: the bid/offer spread is high compared to other investments. You cannot derive income from gold you own (like you get dividend from equities), only capital gain, so you don't get the compounding effect of income reinvestment.

It's great stuff though. Four-nines (99.99% pure) bullion is astonishingly heavy and beautifully coloured and you'll want to keep handling it.

Unlike crap 9ct jewellery (which isn't even considered gold other than in the UK) and gold-plated junk. I saw them selling a watch on price-drop TV t'other day, and they were really pushing the fact it was "18ct GOLD-plated!!!". "To 3 microns!!!". Like, yeah, that must have cost all of 10p. I had to laugh.

cheerfulcat

FaTB wrote:

Does anybody have any knowledge of buying gold.

I have read It can be a good investment in uncertain times.

Would appreciate any views, whether they be positive or negative.

Physical gold is not so much a good investment ; rather, it is a preserver of wealth in uncertain times. It generally costs money to hold in any quantity( insurance or storage fees ),and it earns no interest, but it is a universal currency. And it's awfully pretty :-)

Have a look here for a bit more about investing in gold -

http://taxfreegold.co.uk/investmentadvice.html