Gold

[longdogs]

Why is it that Gold is considered to be one of the best investments but if you try to sell some it's worth F.A?

Say you bought a ring for £1.000 and immediately tried to sell it in the jewellers next door, you would probably be lucky to get forty quid for it.

 

[jeds]

That's because you are paying for a ring - not the gold. If you want to buy gold, buy gold bars.

 

[ladylola]

If you do buy gold make sure you are actually buying the metal and keep it yourself , don't get into the whole paper gold market.
On a related note jewerly can be of more use than bullion in certain circumstances.
interesting read here if you have the time to read the lot
http://ferfal.blogspot.co.uk/2008/10/thoughts-on-urban-survival-2005.html

the bit about the gold

Someone hit me in the head please because I messed up about the gold issue.
Everyone wants to buy gold! “I buy gold. Pay cash” signs are everywhere, even on TV! I can’t believe I’m that silly! I just didn’t relate it to what I read here because they deal with junk gold, like jewelry, either stolen or sold because they needed the money, not the gold coins that you guys talk about. No one pays for the true value of the stuff, so big WARNING! Sign on people that are buying gold coins. Since it is impossible to determine the true mineral percentage of gold, small shops and dealers will pay for it as regular jewelry gold. What I would do if I were you: Besides gold coins, buy a lot of small gold rings and other jewelry. They should be less expensive than gold coins, and if the SHTF bad, you’ll not be loosing money, selling premium quality gold coins for the price of junk gold. If I could travel back in time, I’d buy a small bag worth of gold rings.
Small time thieves will snatch gold chains right out of your neck and sell them at these small dealers found everywhere. This is VERY common at train stations, subways and other crowded areas.

So, my advice, if you are preparing for a small economical crisis, gold coins make sense. You will keep the value of the stuff and be able to sell it for its actual cost to gold dealers or maybe other survivalists that know the true value of the item. In my case, gold coins would have been an excellent investment, saving me from loosing money when the local economy crashed. Even though things are bad, I can go to a bank down town and get paid for what a gold coin is truly worth, same goes for pure silver. But where I live, in my local are small time dealers will only pay you the value of junk gold, no matter what kind of gold you have. So, I’d have to say that if TSHTF bad, gold jewelry is a better trade item than gold coins. Forgive me for not talking about this before, but I didn’t realize this until today, when I visited my local market warehouse and saw a “Buy Gold” sign.

 

[longdogs]

Thanks. i'm not interested in buying gold - got no money for a start but it just winds me up when I see the price of jewellery and how little it is actually worth.

 

[JohnD]

I did once hear a jeweller justifying the buy and sell prices of jwellery by comparing the price of a car with the price of a ton of scrap metal.

I am amused to see that gold 1oz coins that were a thosand pounds a few months ago are now selling for £835

Gold is a panic buy, not an investment.

 

[noseall]

it just winds me up when I see the price of jewellery and how little it is actually worth.

The last time I looked jewelry was a luxury item and not a compulsory purchase.
I look at jewelry and choose not to buy it, at least not for myself. Can not stand the stuff.

 

[jockscott]

In buying jewellery, your also paying for the manufacturing cost of producing the item. As John D says, there's a big difference between a car and a ton of scrap iron. If you were going to buy gold then bullion would be the way to go. Remember, if the price of gold drops, you'll only lose money if you decide to sell it at the lower price (much like Gordon Brown did with the UK gold reserves) Same with shares on the stock market. On the news they tell us "it was a bad day for shareholders when millions were wiped off the value of shares" Yep, only the investors who sold their shares, actually lost out.

 

[ladylola]

Gold is a panic buy, not an investment.

There's a rumour that the Chinese are looking at it as an investment and may be about to back their currency with gold rather than the debt that western fiat currencies do. Could have interesting consequences and seriously challenge the dollar as the de facto world currency, and there's very little the US could do about it.
http://www.arabianmoney.net/gold-si...nning-to-move-to-a-gold-backed-yuan-currency/

 

[JohnD]

and is there a supporting rumour that the nominally communist but really military state will become reliable and trustworthy, and stop being corrupt?

When the Chinese banks collapse it will be far worse than the US/world banking crash was.

 

[enyam]

Gold is a panic buy, not an investment.

So Gordon Brown was right to sell it off cheap after all.

 

[JohnD]

if you say so.

It must be hard to forecast panics.

How much did you buy at the time?

 

[securespark]

Gold is a panic buy, not an investment.

Good album, though.

 

[Sombrero]

What about Royal Mail shares? anyone buy them?

 

[jockscott]

What about Royal Mail shares? anyone buy them?

Probably every employee of Royal Mail.

 

[ladylola]

and is there a supporting rumour that the nominally communist but really military state will become reliable and trustworthy, and stop being corrupt?
.

what , you mean they'll become as reliable, trustworthy, and honest as American and Western governments?