id5

I have just dug out some dat I have on the value of gold and silver from 1900 and I now think that the dataset from the article from Gold Eagle that Wren pointed to in his post is wrong. Here is the price of gold and silver in GBP from 1900. 1 GBP worth of gold has the same buying power as 1 GBP woth of silver and the value lines don't cross so why do the purchasing power of the metals cross in the Gold Eagle article?

An interesting dataset where its graphical form shows the separation between gold and silver coinciding with the Industrial Revolution in the 1800's and the leap in the value of gold during the Great Depression. The last few entries shows that silver and gold flipped as the world tried to get out of the Great Depression by suppressing the value of gold. Does this chart show that the root of the present monetary problems can be traced back to the Industrial Revolution?

From the photo it looks like it is a bar from the end of a melt run where the melt has become too cool to pour without layering, its fine and purchasing dealers will happily accept it although private purchasers may not as it does not look perfect. The bullion coin market is having the same problem with private purchasers refusing to accept bullion coins that have been scratched or bent because they do not look like the photo or look used I am always happy to purchase damaged, scratched, bent or used looking coin or bar, at a discount of course as they are obviously second hand

A few of the lower value, poor quality ones get scrapped, the remaining hardly increase because they are already way above the value of the gold content.

Bleach also has an effect on silver but not as strong as egg, it turns it more a light grey, the commercial product Patinol will turn it completely black. If you want to clean silver use citric acid, slow but gets there in the end, or best of all any of the commercial products named Safety Pickle.

It is the 1998 and I read somewhere that the production run of copper coins accounted for about 55% of the mintage fof 2p coins during hat year.

Chard will sell you some in the UK or you can deal with the German Mint direct on this site but as GF said numismatic coins are not for the investment collector. If you are collecting for investment then the only things you need to consider is the tax you may have to pay on sale such as CGT, the spread and what is easiest to sell, answer those and you will know what coins to buy.

Germany mainly produce silver 10 Euro coins about 200,000 of them each year plus about 1 Million of commemoratives, but I think that the author has in mind Austrian Philharmonics, I still haven't seen any mintage figures for 2008 but I think it was very high! The Austrian Mint also produce Euro and commemorative specials.

It's not just CPU's but motherboards, memory, plug in cards, mobile phones, in fact anything with digital processing in it. Bare boards, those that are stripped of steel and plastic have a gold content often higher than that of gold bearing mineral ore itself. Older digital equipment has a greater level of gold in it than modern equipment.

Putting an issue limit on Proofs I can understand but to put a limit on bullion coins was very daft marketing, especially when they are selling like bacon butties in a builder's site!

Yes

If you are buying for investment then buy the cheapest, if you are buying for a collection then buy whatever you like the look of or need to fill your gaps. There is also reasoning behind buying any coin that has a small production run or ones with popular markings like the Aussie Lunar Dragon and Horse but to gain the most value with most of them you may have to keep them for decades before the market conditions are right.

The 2002 Year of the Horse Lunar is also very popular in Western countries and carries a high premimum

Often short term investment is generates a small profit where each trade returns < 5%. If short term trades are taxed you could kill the opportunities. Better to offer tax incentives/rebates for long term investment.

Montana State Legislature considers return to gold, silver dollars "It further mandates that the state must accept payments in gold or silver for various fees and purchases" Where one goes others will follow.

Happens in GBP as well, you must have missed the graph I put up in Jan

HMRC treat silver as a commodity and bullion whereas gold is just treated as bullion

Officially No - silver in coin or bar form is classed as bullion so you can only claim VAT back on purchases up to 125g in weight, see Link or 2.75 toz which equals 85g or 10 Tolas which equals 116.6g Unoffically, yes but you have to get the shop to issue you a VAT 407 or VAT Retail Export Scheme sales invoice and then when you go to the reclaim counter just go through the process because the people that staff them just stamp the form and give you the money. If you are unlucky and they say no you just don't get the VAT back. If you have a UK passport you may find it difficult to get VAT refund unless you can show them the return part of your ticket back to your 'home' country.

I don't think that 300K for that house is over optimistic. If the current average wage is 24k then the average house should be 3.5 x 24 = 84K, but as of the end of Feb it was 156K. House prices then have to drop another 47% to get back to the norm, so 53% of 600K is 318K. It's either that or wages go up. Forget the monied up middle managers nearly ready to retire. A friend of mine has a similar house, Z4 & 2007 Landrover for the wife, etc. His pensions with three different firms have basically collapsed, his debt is getting to the point of breaking, he can't sell his current house, he's f&^ked and so are too many more

Bet you told him at sometime that you were heavily into gold, he's noticed just how much your investment has gone up and thought 'He can afford it'! P.S. They always say that you should give a % of your investment to charity, house owners could become a new charity

Just about to sign a new rental deal for a better quality, larger house +15% sq ft increase, off a private drive, country views, etc. At current house prices it is effectively moving 200K GBP upwards in price to a house that I could not afford the mortgage on. 8% overall increase in rental price from our last centre of village rental but the Landlord has dropped 13.3% from the price that he was previously getting. The agent informed me of another very large property in the nearest town which has just had a decreased of 30% to get someone in to rent it. Look out below

Their service is good although they are not the quickest to deliver but they are one of the most respected long term dealers out there.

The Royal Mint marketing working overtime again, from public calls of your coins are so expensive!

Rather than use a floating exchange rate for the Euro rule, HMRC set their own value so businesses do not have to be aware of the GBPEUR exchange rate. The US limit is set at USD10,000.

The face value of a sovereign is £1 but it is its market value that is used to calculate tax.