I love gold coin collecting. I focus on Western Europe 1800-1930.

I think they will end up a good investment, but can be sure they’ll never really lose much value.

When you buy the etf you pay an annual fee to the sponsor of 0.4%. 20 years compounded that’s 8.3%! But banks will often give customers free safe deposit boxes.

I recently got a coin that fled the nazis from Norway to the USA and was returned when Norway paid back to the US its war loans. Despite the fun background, they aren’t rare and weren’t much more than spot price.

https://www.hhhistory.com/2019/01/the-rescue-of-norways-gold-wwii-story.html

I also now have all four designs of Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands 10 Gulden coin.

Gold coins were not circulated much because of their high value. The most
common size is nicknamed the Napoleon, is a bit bigger than a dime, but has about $380 in value. The smallest common American (the $5 half eagle) and British (sovereign) are a little bigger with about $470 of gold. So they’d be used for a real estate purchase, horse and carriage, high end furniture, a legal bill, or rent. But they mostly sat in bank vaults backing checks.

For this reason, a dime or penny in mint condition from say 1870 is very rare, but the vast majority of gold coins are near mint or mint, and the extra cost for a mint condition is negligible. Like $5 on a $450 coin.

[quote=svelte]I was up in norcal a couple years ago waiting in a bank lobby for a bank rep to grant us access to my recently deceased dads safe deposit box. Dad had left me the key to it, but hadn’t told me what was in it.

A friend from my childhood happened in the bank and we chatted for a while – I hadn’t seen him in going on 35 years.

He asked why I was in town and I told him. He asked what was in the safe deposit box and I said I honestly had no idea.

He smiled as he walked away and said “hope you find a gold bar!!”

That has stuck with me. I’m going to buy a gold bar for each of my kids and leave them in my safe deposit box. They may be tiny gold bars, but gold bars nonetheless. And I’m not going to tell them they are there. It will be my little post-passing surprise for them.[/quote]

Just an fyi banks are doing away with safe deposit boxes. Too much unproductive relatively non revenue generating space. Its not easy to get one and lots of people are being told we are getting rid of them so empty yours out

It’s very unlikely 1 ounce or below gold bullion or gold coin purchased from reputable dealers is going to be fake, so it really doesn’t matter what coin or reputable brand bar you buy. Just stick with the more common ones and buy from a reputable dealer(s)

For svelte , it might be more interesting mix it up and get variety.

American Eagles are good, but my preference would be gold coins that are 99.99% pure. American Eagles 91.67% pure, or 22k. On the other hand American Buffalo and Canadian Maple Leafs, Aussie Kangaroo,
mexican Libertad, Austrian Philharmonic, South African Krugerrand are 99.9% pure, or 24k. Also, the markup for American Eagle and Buffalos above spot is usually much more than other coins. Imho, you really can’t go wrong with any of them since gold is gold and the gold content is the same, so it boils down to price and what you like. My favorite are probably the Aussie Kangaroo and Canadian Maple because of the shiny finish

Some ideas:

Valcamni Suisse bar (serial number reddacted)
[img_assist|nid=27562|title=vs|desc=|link=node|align=left| width=250]

Perth Mint Oriana
[img_assist|nid=27563|title=oriana|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

Australian Kangaroo
[img_assist|nid=27564|title=k1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250] [img_assist|nid=27565|title=k2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

Canadian Maple Leaf
[img_assist|nid=27566|title=maple1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250] [img_assist|nid=27567|title=maple2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

American Buffalo
[img_assist|nid=27568|title=b1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]
[img_assist|nid=27569|title=b2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

American Eagle
[img_assist|nid=27573|title=e1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]
[img_assist|nid=27574|title=e2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

British Britannia
[img_assist|nid=27571|title=br1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]
[img_assist|nid=27572|title=br2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

Mexican Libertad
[img_assist|nid=27575|title=m1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]
[img_assist|nid=27576|title=m2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

Austrian Philharmonic
[img_assist|nid=27577|title=ph1|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]
[img_assist|nid=27578|title=ph2|desc=|link=node|align=left|width=250]

I think if you want to “invest”, maybe it’s easier to just get a tracking ETF like GLD or any of their 2x 3x variants. But I like to collect bling bling and don’t plan to sell. (Ok, maybe sell a few duplicate ones to cover the cost of the ones that I keep… Kinda like what my sibling does with wine… Buy 4 special reservice wine, sell 3 to pay for the 1 she drinks, lol)

[quote=sdrealtor]I do the same with wine sometime. The problem is the most flippable wines are hard to obtain and involved years long waiting lists. Screaming Eagle is probably over 20 years if ever[/quote]

I know nothing about wine. It all tastes the same to me.

I don’t think gold is a great investment. but it’s probably a good way to transfer and launder money under the table since if you purchase above $1500 per transaction, there really isn’t a record of it if you pay cash or with crypto. Not that I would know anything a out money laundering in practice
..