best gold and silver funds

[newyorklady]

any advice?

 

[calmloki]

any advice?

Uhm... Don't buy them? Our one gold fund dropped twice as far as the worst stock we owned. Please note: That's one gold stock and we only own maybe 10 other stocks. I am not in synch with the winds which blow our investments up or down.

 

[newyorklady]

not going to buy right now, waiting to time it. still too high even with the slip.

 

[ziggy29]

I've allocated 4% of my portfolio to Tocqueville Gold (TGLDX) since 2000. I've been pleased with the results so far.

 

[Sparky]

I like American Century Global Gold Fund (just a very small percentage of total port).

 

[JohnEyles]

I believe I've heard that the cheapest and simplest way to just buy
the yellow stuff itself would be the ETF called GLD (technically it's an
"exchange traded NOTE"). It's what I use.

 

[Spanky]

what is your definition of "best"? Are you planning to add them to your portfolio as a protection against inflation as part of your asset allocation? Are you trying to time your purchase and sell it at the peak?

 

[Olav23]

I believe I've heard that the cheapest and simplest way to just buy
the yellow stuff itself would be the ETF called GLD (technically it's an
"exchange traded NOTE"). It's what I use.

And SLV, the same situation as above, but Silver instead of Gold.

Are you sure they are ETNs? I thought they were simply a "trust" that owns a bunch of gold/silver, not a debt instrument. Maybe you are thinking of the commodity ETNs like DJP?

 

[2soon2tell]

Check out UNWPX from US Global Investors. The golds funds offer leverage 2-3 X the price of precious metals. Unfortunately this works on the downside as well as the upside.

2soon2tell

 

[JohnEyles]

Are you sure they are ETNs? I thought they were simply a "trust" that owns a bunch of gold/silver, not a debt instrument. Maybe you are thinking of the commodity ETNs like DJP?

You're right, sorry, I moonlight part-time as a moron.

 

[greg]

I like GDX as a general miner fund:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=gdx&x=28&y=16

The Tocqueville fund mentioned before is a well managed one with an emphasis on smaller miners and explorers.

 

[saluki9]

Check out UNWPX from US Global Investors. The golds funds offer leverage 2-3 X the price of precious metals. Unfortunately this works on the downside as well as the upside.

2soon2tell

Wow, leverage & gold, what a great idea! :

 

[laurence]

Between your Tuesday's drop = recession post and this question about how to buy gold (Gold, GOLD!), I'm thinking you saw a ghost this week, black cat crossed your path, something! I don't even look at gold, I think it's return has been completely flat over the last 30 years (or worse?). You obviously took risks to get where you are so young, are you just feeling cold feet now and want to take your money off the table?

 

[newyorklady]

scared. haven't been hit hard at all. minimally impacted but yeah freaked the hell out when the market dropped until i checked my accounts. you got me pegged. but gold and silver are too high now. wanted to know so i could set an alert if prices get more reasonable.

 

[newyorklady]

not taking money off the table though, not panicking actually bought some stocks yesterday... but have some cash lying around that i want to do something with.

 

[JohnEyles]

but have some cash lying around that i want to do something with.

Have you joined The Brewer's ISM/OSM cult yet ? See the thread here with
ISM in title. Looks like a good inflation hedge, yielding siginificantly better than
TIPS albeit with some minimal risk. Since inflation-hedge is one of the main
reasons to go for some precious metals, no ?

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

I still cant figure out metals but it might pay to own 3-5% of your total in them if they were cheaper.

Only thing about them that makes any sense to me is that people usually run to them when theres a crisis. Other than that they have no recent correlations that stick. The investment tracks TERRIBLY with inflation although for some reason people keep trying to stick that benefit onto it.

Its a hairball investment, IMO. But if you want to play it by buying a small amount when nobody is nervous, and selling right after the run up from the crisis buying by the nervous people who think it'll save them from Mel Gibson in the post cataclysmic world...I guess its okay.

Really, really sorry...big apology to all the goldbugs. I know it makes perfect sense to you guys.

Its not even a stable investment. If you're worried enough to be considering a big investment in metals, buy TIPS instead. At least you'll get a return and an income from them.

 

[newyorklady]

no thanks TIPs and the rest don't appeal to me. pretty low return. with gold or silver there is the mel gibson apolcalypse factor going for it...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Except that I dont think Mel's going to be interested in your gold. Bullets and gasoline, maybe some food.

Dang I cant believe i'm suppressing the Mel Gibson jokes.

 

[haha]

I still cant figure out metals but it might pay to own 3-5% of your total in them if they were cheaper.

Only thing about them that makes any sense to me is that people usually run to them when theres a crisis. Other than that they have no recent correlations that stick. The investment tracks TERRIBLY with inflation although for some reason people keep trying to stick that benefit onto it.

Its a hairball investment, IMO.

For most retirees, any investment with little cash return is made on faith. Gold is maybe an extreme example of this, but it's the same thing. Unless you have quite a bit of money and can live on the 2.5 to 3 % that is available with secure dividends you are basically buying electronic entries and hoping to transfer them in the future to some greater fool.

Gold and gold equities are the same. It so happens that gold and gold equities have performed better than the S&P for quite a few years now, so I don't see that they can be called inferior. Obviously, a degree of timing is necessary. Which I am sure The Fuzzy One will have no problem accomplishing in fine style.

Ha

 

[newyorklady]

doesn't silver have industrial purposes though?

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Ha, you're correct. Since a number of asset allocation schemes have hit the market, many of which propose a 3-5% (or slightly higher) holding in precious metals, correlated with a preponderance of easy ways to buy these beasties, combined with a lot of global turmoil...gold has done well.

Didnt do a dang thing for a couple of decades before that, or really much of anything except for the late 70's inflationary period, which is about where most people realized that the investment had no actual ties to monetary issues anymore.

Dang good for teeth and a fine metal for jewelry, although it still makes me wonder why we currently seek out diamonds with an absence of yellow color, then mount them on a yellow metal that makes the more colorless stone look yellowish

I'd suspect that once everyone of consequence has their allocation, this category will at best languish for another couple of decades. But thats just my fairly uniformed opinion.

BUT COME ON, I GOT OUT JUST AHEAD OF THAT 400 POINT DROP, *AND* I CAN SINK A BASKET ONE HANDED FROM THE HALF COURT LINE!

(Gotta milk this for what its worth)

Anyhow, yes silver has some industrial applications, predominately in old style analog photography which...shoot...is sort of petering out. So does platinum, and so does gold.

Not sure I see a lot of potential growth there that'd drive the price up. And theres no shortage of supply or places and ways to dig up a shitload more of all of them.

 

[d]

in the interests of efficiency, perhaps someone could attach this thread to the old gold thread from last year ... with 199 replies there, can there be much to add? ... other than the much repeated alternative: b33v3r ch33s3.

btw, the yellow safe haven didn't seem to help much this week!