You may have seen my numerous post about gold, and gold ownership in general. Call me a “goldbug” if you will but I am one who believes that everyone should own some gold. I’ve researched various method of investing in gold and I’m sure you won’t be surprised when you hear me say that so far in my book BullionVault provides the best service for investing in gold. Before finding out about BullionVault I seriously thought about just buying gold bullion and storing it in a safe somewhere in my house. No doubt having some gold in your pockets for those “hard times” is still a good idea, but if you intend to be a serious investor in precious metals you’ll soon realize that doing it this way is not so wise. Then I thought about just buying gold backed e-currencies and just “hoarding them”, but e-currencies have a series of disadvantages when it comes to purely investing in precious metals. Sure, they’re great if you intend to use the gold & silver as money, but there are serious cost overheads to consider especially since you’ll have to pay hefty “in/out exchange” fees. I then thought about using GoldMoney but their above spot rates are a bit too high for me. BullionVault allows me to buy directly from other members of the gold market and therefore get the best price.
OK, let me cut to the chase and tell you why BullionVault is peerless:
*An inaccessible market becomes accessible*
Gold's spot market is reserved for professionals. Settlement requires the seller to make delivery in 400 oz bars ($250,000 each) which have never left a recognised bullion vault. It is hard to find any professional dealer who will deal under $1,000,000 a time. Also you must have access to a vault, and generally they do not open bullion storage facilities for private individuals. This is why the private individual has to buy coins and small bars for private custody. Here the costs are approximately 6%, insurance is difficult and expensive, finding buyers who trust you is always difficult, and shipping overseas in time of crisis is impossible. These are reasons why the retail gold market has stayed small. BullionVault acts as a bridge into the professional marketplace - allowing private buyers to benefit from spot market pricing, professional domestic and offshore storage, and dealing in their own currency. Typical overall dealing costs are down from 6% to about 0.9% (a little more for sub $30,000 and a lot less for more than $30,000).
*Safety*
A string of innovations has made BullionVault exceptionally secure. Not only is the gold's purity guaranteed, but it is stored in some of the world's most secure vaults - with insurance included - as your direct personal property. There are burglar alarms on user's accounts, a published Daily Audit, and a guarantee that your money can only be returned to you.
*Accessibility*
You can buy and sell 24 hours a day. You have immediate access to your money which can be wired back to the original funding bank account on the day you choose to sell. There is a normal banking fee for a same day or international wire (usually about $20) or you can choose a three day transfer which is free.
*Choice of Vaults*
Very many users say how much they appreciate a geographical choice of vaults, and the ability to switch storage location quickly – by selling in one location and buying immediately in another. This sort of ability to quickly move physical wealth across borders by instantly settled trading, rather than by shipping, is very highly valued.
*Trust Deeds and Law*
Most gold ownership mechanisms are based on trust deeds, which vest ownership of the gold in the trust, and make the investor a beneficiary under the trust. Trust deeds tend to be long and complicated documents and they are prone to legal challenge. BullionVault does not use a trust deed. The client enjoys direct personal ownership of gold, which is an exceptionally reliable ownership right.
*Storage Charges*
Subject to the minimum of $4 per month BullionVault storage charges are 0.12% per annum, which is almost the wholesale rate [0.1%]. This compares with costs of 1.5% for gold stored in the Allocated Accounts of bullion banks.
*Audit Trail*
BullionVault believes that there are huge cost advantages to retail customers in using a collective mechanism for owning gold. But collective ownership creates the risk of an undetected record keeping failure. BullionVault's web publication of its DAILY AUDIT gives transparency to the records of the system while still retaining anonymity and allowing customers reliably to prove their individual ownership of gold in the pool. Every business day the sum of the vault and bank balances is proved to equate exactly to the thousands of users - not one of which is overdrawn. Then the proof is openly published on the site. The DAILY AUDIT sets a new standard in record-keeping accuracy, and BullionVault both invented the technique and is the only gold storage business in the world to use it.
*Right of sale on main markets*
Under BullionVault Terms and Conditions users have a right of sale on the local bullion market. You can only do this on deliverable quantities (usually large bars), which may be above your planned personal investment. However the effect is that even if it is too large for you it makes your gold attractive to other users who have sufficient gold. Should any price differential arise other users can be expected to bid for your smaller amount very nearly to the main market sale price. The result is an almost direct link from your smaller holding to the main bullion market - and the link is maintained by natural market forces. You have a right of withdrawal too (albeit admittedly expensive on small withdrawals because coin supply is not our primary business).
*Security*
BullionVault has assumed that against the odds your internet access WILL be compromised, and we have implemented substantial further safeguards to guard against such an eventuality so as to still keep your gold and your money safe… We only allow money which might be raised on your BullionVault account (i.e. by selling your gold at the market price) to be returned to the bank which originally funded your BullionVault account - i.e. yours. It would be inconvenient for you, but not catastrophic - and because the criminal would not profit there is little incentive to go to the effort and risk the consequences of detection. All mechanisms for authorizing a transfer of money depend on the presentation by the payee, and to the paying agent, of some data which is supposed to be difficult to duplicate [signature, PIN, password, digital key]. Yet nowadays that data is routinely entered into computers, which are re-programmable machines designed to save, process and distribute accurate copies of data! That's why BullionVault has been designed with this failsafe mechanism to ensure it returns your money to you. *BullionVault's failsafe access provides you with considerably greater security than is possible from your bank. Your bank probably has to effect payment on your behalf to hundreds of different places in the banking system. It cannot switch them off and still be useful to you. We on the other hand can switch them all off, and we are much more secure for you because of it.*
*Unallocated accounts*
BullionVault is sometimes compared to unallocated accounts. Unlike BullionVault unallocated gold accounts are not based on gold ownership but on gold credit. They provide the investor with no meaningful protection from default. This critical fact is too frequently hidden from investors when they buy gold.
*Summary*
Here is a summary the key advantages of buying gold through BullionVault.
1. Deal costs are down from 6% for small bar gold to about 0.9%. On bigger volumes as low as 0.1%. 2. Warranted large bars are high integrity gold. There is less doubt about the quality of the gold you own. 3. You can deal in any size you want. 4. Insurance and storage is 0.12% per annum - less than a tenth of typical Allocated bullion storage at a bank. 5. You get a choice of international storage locations, and can switch between them. 6. You can deal directly in Euros and Sterling - as well as US Dollars 7. Dealing is available all day and every day. 8. Your money can be returned to you in 24 hours. 9. There is no nonsense - you own your gold outright. It is your legal property. 10. We also greatly reduced the time and complexity of dealing. With reasonable efficiency at their banks most of our users are able to buy gold on the day they first make contact with BullionVault.
*BullionVault has made a big impact on the way people are buying gold. There are already 25,000 users, $100 million in client holdings, and 1,297kg of gold added already in 2007. It is now easily the biggest provider of privately owned bullion in the UK, and one of the biggest in the world. *You can learn how to use BullionVault by opening an account. And because we give you a FREE gram of gold bullion, you can practice trading on the system.
You can open your account and get your gram of gold here:
If you haven’t got the slightest clue as to why you’d want to invest in gold in the first place then you need to read this report (thanks goes out to David MacGregor for compiling it):
Free Gold Report – In Gold We Trust