LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 6, 2005--London, New York and Zurich's professional gold bullion markets trade the most competitively priced gold in the world. The markets usually deal complete 12.4 kg bullion bars at about $170,000 each, but the smallest deals accepted are usually over $500,000.
Conversely retail gold bullion is sold at a high premium because the gold is supplied as smaller bars which have to be specially 'fabricated'. Professionals do not like buying these back; especially when they have been stored privately. But professional vault storage deals start at $1,000 per month.
The result is that even without a price move retail bullion sells back for a 3-4% loss. This stops real gold penetrating into retail portfolios.
The popular alternative, bank supplied retail gold, is 'unallocated'. Unallocated customers are unsecured creditors who do not own real physical gold (although few of them realise it). They pay a bit less, but are exposed to the systemic risks most sought to avoid through buying gold.
BullionVault eliminates these difficulties. Full size bars are stored in professional (Brinks) bullion vaults in London, New York and Zurich. Customers gain private physical ownership of these bars' pure gold content. They choose their preferred jurisdiction and trade on-line on a public order board, 24 hours a day. Insurance is included.
Paul Tustain (Director) says -
"3 years ago it took weeks to set up facilities to vault private gold. It was expensive too.
Coin and small bar spreads have been 3-4% for years. Private vault custody and insurance started at $1,000 a month. We've got spreads down to 0.2%-1.5% and private professional grade vaulting down to $4.
We think modern monetary expansion results in bubbles, as savings fight their way into overvalued capital assets. Current financial products look inflated, and susceptible to a prolonged dis-investment of retirement savings. We take a 5-15 year view that gold will be hard to beat in protecting and probably growing private purchasing power during that time.
Our BullionVault.com service uses modern technologies to empower ordinary savers, who might otherwise again see the gold lifeboat reserved exclusively for the very rich."
BullionVault.com is being promoted with a free gram of Swiss vaulted gold bullion to each new registrant.
About Galmarley
Galmarley (www.galmarley.com) runs one of the world's most visited websites on gold's history and modern relevance.
More information: http://www.galmarley.com
About BullionVault
BullionVault (www.bullionvault.com) grew from research gathered from Galmarley visitors. It runs the BullionVault.com web-based service which went live in May 2005. Interesting technical issues include :
- elimination of city dealers in favour of robot traders, to provide 24/7 dealing
- retail customers can act as liquidity providers, by quoting 2-way prices in open competition with BullionVault itself
- extensive use of open source components in the system development
More information: http://www.bullionvault.com
Contact:
BullionVault
Paul Tustain
press_@_BullionVault.com
+44 (0)208 6000 130
