How to make money with gold
The aim of any investment is twofold: to protect and diversify your savings, and to make money. Gold is one of the best assets to own to achieve the first, and if you’d like to read more on this then check out our page on why you should buy gold.
Gold is incredibly valuable and always has been. With confidence in financial institutions shaken since the crash in 2008, gold offers an alternative to stocks and shares, or government bonds. The global pandemic in 2020 and 2021 has resulted in huge amounts of money-printing, and an increase in national debt. Gold has once again been a popular choice of investment to protect money from the inflation that looks likely in the years ahead.
Although long-term protection of your wealth is often the main goal of investors, it is very possible to make money from gold, much the same as if you were trading stocks and shares. Making money from gold is a different proposition however, and more about patience than fast, reactive trading.
Below are some of the top things to consider if you’re also looking to make money from gold.
When should I invest in gold?
Buying gold at the right time will make a big difference to how much money you make when you sell. There are many things to consider if asking yourself when the right time to buy gold might be, but volatility is a key thing to watch out for.
Gold reached an all time high in 2020 when the global pandemic was at its worst. As optimism over a potential end to Covid in 2021 has grown, gold has seen its price pull back from last years high, but remains high. Inflation is forecast to rise far above normal targets, and gold has enjoyed a recovery in these last months of the year as investors seek to hedge their wealth from devaluation, providing a potential opportunity to make money as well.
You can view our live gold price chart or historical charts to see the most up to date price and get a rough idea of the direction gold is heading.
The key principle is that you should invest in gold when the time is right for you. By putting aside your own funds, there will come a time when you find yourself sitting on savings. Money in the bank makes almost no money with the current low interest rates and, if you take inflation into consideration, it could even be losing money.
Gold price forecasts
Predicting the gold price is educated guesswork. It is impossible to know how any asset will perform in the long-term, and if it was possible then there would be no risk and everyone at BullionByPost would be rich. Alas, we are not...
Shorter term forecasts are a little easier but even then, it can be difficult to predict what could happen in the wider world that could drive the price higher or lower. In 2016, for example, the unexpected result of the Brexit referendum vote sent the price climbing as investors reacted to the shock decision and the uncertainty of Britain’s economic future. Any unexpected political announcements can have this effect, but short-term forecasts are more accurate than longer term.
By keeping up to date with gold news and economic trends it is possible to build up an educated picture and outlook of what could happen to the gold price. BullionByPost make this easy for our customers by providing our own gold price forecasts for the coming year. We recommend investors spend some time looking at our wide range of information pages and investment guides, to build a picture of what could happen for the price of gold.
Ultimately, this is the way to make money from gold, buy it at a low price, and sell it at a high price. An old fashioned way of investing perhaps, but in a world of digital transactions and lack of true ownership, we believe it is a welcome one.
Scrap goldScrap gold
Selling your gold coins or bars back to a gold dealer such as BullionByPost is as simple a process as buying them. At BullionByPost we primarily focus on gold coins and bars intended for investment, but gold is used in lots of other ways.
One of the most traditional uses is in jewellery. Old jewellery, that could be damaged or simply out of fashion, is often made of gold, and with just an ounce of gold costing around £1,300 at the time of writing, a little gold can go a long way.