Out of interest - do you hold Gold?

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  • bowlhead99
    bowlhead99 Posts: 12,295 Forumite
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    levdon01 wrote: »
    Just for your interest my current Gold holdings are a little high at around 30% of my portfolio. I am looking to sell some Gold to re-balance the portfolio which I shall do in the next few months.
    I have an ounce of physical gold, sentimental reasons. There is a bit in a couple of my watches. And from an investment perspective I have exposure to some via an actively managed multi-asset investment trust whose holdings I don't control, and further through a PPSG ETP. I haven't checked recently, but expect gold is likely to be under 3% of my portfolio.

    I wouldn't advocate having as much in gold as I have in equities and as much in cash as in those two combined, as you recommended in a recent thread. But then, I am looking to grow my wealth over the long term, as I'm only 40ish and hope to need to amass enough to live on for another five decades. But I wonder if you are only here in the guise of 'research' to promote your book or blog.
  • reeac
    reeac Posts: 1,430 Forumite
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    In around 20 years of DIY investing I've never held any gold.
  • Apodemus
    Apodemus Posts: 3,384 Forumite
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    I would reply "no" as I have never bought gold (apart from the OH's wedding ring!). I do however have something like 20 old sovereigns that were my grandfather's (all dated before the First World War) which I guess must be worth something. The fact that at least three generations have never spent them, either says something about their usefulness or the stability of the UK banking system!
  • lpgm
    lpgm Posts: 355 Forumite
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    None. Not even personal ornaments.
  • AnotherJoe
    AnotherJoe Posts: 19,622 Forumite
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    To repeat another poster you think 30% " a little high" ?? I would consider that preparing for the apocalypse. It's not an investment. It is a hedge against crises.

    I've never held gold except very recently indirectly via a fund that has perhaps 1% of my investments that itself I think has 10% gold. So that's zero point 1 % at most. (This is a fund I bought for short term defensive purposes I wouldn't normally buy such a fund)
  • ChesterDog
    ChesterDog Posts: 1,112 Forumite
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    Another no here.

    I invest for the long term. When the assets I hold go through a period of falls in value, gold might well go up in value, but I won't be needing to sell those assets during those periods, so if I held gold I would be in the position of watching it rise only to see it fall again later.

    If the whole thing collapses and all I would have would be some gold, I don't see it as actually having much utility anyway. It would only be useful if I held a huge proportion of my worth in it, in lots of small-demonination forms. And that would bring massive risks of its own.
    I am one of the Dogs of the Index.
  • Malthusian
    Malthusian Posts: 10,931 Forumite
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    I hate gold as an investment so much that when my fiancee and I buy wedding bands I'm going to short the equivalent amount of gold to ensure our net exposure remains nil.

    :D
  • Biggles
    Biggles Posts: 8,209 Forumite
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    I am surprised that, 'as an economist', you even consider it to be an investment at all.
  • bowlhead99
    bowlhead99 Posts: 12,295 Forumite
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    Biggles wrote: »
    I am surprised that, 'as an economist', you even consider it to be an investment at all.
    Hey, if Linkedin is to be believed, he has a 2:2 in economics & maths so we could be looking at the next [insert celebrity economist] here :D
  • JohnRo
    JohnRo Posts: 2,887 Forumite
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    edited 13 September 2017 at 12:33PM
    Never held lumps of the shiny stuff in my hands but I have owned in the past via a very small exposure to Julius Baer physical gold.

    Also had exposure indirectly via Blackrock, firstly with Gold & General a long time ago, which did very well for me when sold, although that was far more about luck than judgement.

    I now hold a very small stake in BRWM which itself has some limited exposure to gold miners. BRWM allocation is currently 1.98% of income portfolio around 0.5% of total investments, so that's about 0.1% gold mining exposure overall. Or in other words not really very much at all.

    I have no intention to 'invest' in lumps of the shiny stuff now or in the future.
    'We don't need to be smarter than the rest; we need to be more disciplined than the rest.' - WB
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