Buying Gold Eagles

[Perm Port Fan]

Hello, new to this Forum and new to the Permanent Portfolio. I've read the new C Rowland book twice and I'm getting ready to begin.

I'm going to stay with the core approach covered in the book and wanted to see if anyone had tips to offer in buying Gold Eagles for the precious metals portion of the IRA. I'm using Equity Institutional with segregated storage at the Delaware Depository. I have about $170M for the gold allocation.

I'd be interested in whatever seasoned advice is out there regarding my approach to dealers. I've talked to Apmex a few times. The pricing seems good on mixed dates. Are there other less obvious sources doing a better job on price/service?

Does negotiating come into play? I intend to go 'all in' per the book. Could I hold out the size of the purchase as an incentive to get a better spread over spot? Or is this a completely generic purchase and not a comparatively significant amount?

[Bean]

I have about $170M for the gold allocation.

Welcome to the forum!

Are you saying $170 million?  At this level I think you could go straight to COMEX contracts and take delivery.

Then I would probably want multiple geographically (both nationally and internationally) distributed vaults.

[sophie]

Hello, new to this Forum and new to the Permanent Portfolio. I've read the new C Rowland book twice and I'm getting ready to begin.

I'm going to stay with the core approach covered in the book and wanted to see if anyone had tips to offer in buying Gold Eagles for the precious metals portion of the IRA. I'm using Equity Institutional with segregated storage at the Delaware Depository. I have about $170M for the gold allocation.

I'd be interested in whatever seasoned advice is out there regarding my approach to dealers. I've talked to Apmex a few times. The pricing seems good on mixed dates. Are there other less obvious sources doing a better job on price/service?

Does negotiating come into play? I intend to go 'all in' per the book. Could I hold out the size of the purchase as an incentive to get a better spread over spot? Or is this a completely generic purchase and not a comparatively significant amount?

First of all, welcome to the forum and congratulations on your decision.  More than a few would be scared off of Treasuries and gold at this point.

There was a recent thread regarding large-scale gold purchases for new Permanent Portfolio investors.  Quick summary:

- Consider how much you would like to invest in overseas gold storage.  The book has several useful suggestions, and outlines the reasons why this might be a good idea, especially for someone with high net worth.

- Buy 400 oz bars for the gold you will likely not need to sell, both for convenience and to reduce the markup.

- Gold ETFs can be useful to simplify rebalancing, but in the large amounts you're talking about buying you'd pay way too much for fund expenses, and you'd also potentially own way too much of the fund's assets for comfort.

- For the remainder, 1 oz American Eagles are a good choice.  In addition to the usual suspects, try A-Mark Precious Metals - that's where Colorado Gold buys its coins, and presumably you can get a better price with them than you could at a retail broker.

Beyond these hints, there aren't too many of us with investment portfolios large enough to test all this out ourselves.  Do let us know what you find out!

[Perm Port Fan]

I wish!, The amount is in thousands, $150,000 to 200,000.

I'll try A-Mark

[Ad Orientem]

Welcome and congrats on your good fortune. I think you are the first person on this forum who has indicated that the gold portion of your permanent portfolio will exceed convenient storage in two to three safe deposit boxes. That's typically when I suggest looking at a bullion account or IAU if you want keep your ER super low. You might want to just buy 1500 1oz. gold coins and split them up in three bank safe deposit boxes (different banks or branches ), as an SHTF insurance policy. And for the rest look at a bullion account someplace safe and reputable like the Perth Mint. Their unallocated accounts used to be pretty cheap and it's backed by the government. If you get nervous you can always convert an unallocated account to allocated with a phone call.

Or you could just hire me as your portfolio manager. I'm cheaper than most hedge funds. 

[Libertarian666]

You might want to just buy 1500 1oz. gold coins and split them up in three bank safe deposit boxes (different banks or branches ), as an SHTF insurance policy.

I think you have slipped the decimal point; 1500*1400 is about $2 million, not $200K.