Tuesday 22 November 2011

Decision time: gold fund vs gold etf

A further £3,000 should be transferring into my Hargreaves Lansdown account from another ISA that has been sitting out of sight for a decade. The question is whether I want to build up my gold or diversify.

However I don't understand other investments to any useful degree and so I'll probably use the cash to motivate more understanding of my existing investments - narrow as they may be.

One area I could look at is increasing the cash in the BlackRock Gold and General Fund which has fallen 6% over the last week or so.



The chart only goes up to 19 November but the fund's second biggest holding, silver Miner Fresnillo, and its biggest holding Newcrest Mining (NCM), both fell again on Monday and today (Tuesday) as this google chart shows. The chart also shows that my physical gold ETF (PHAU) hasn't fallen as much - and even less in sterling.


The two charts suggest the fund is behaving more in line with Fresnillo than gold or even gold miners.

So, if markets regain confidence, there is potentially more to gain from the fund than the gold ETF. Another advantage is that it's a fund and the cost of buying is much lower than the £11.95 flat fee for an ETF share purchase. The problem is that I have to make a decision to buy before 8am and that purchase won't be processed until midday - and by then anything could have happened. (Interesting observation from Harvey Organ today about a large amount of physical silver being shifted around - the significance of which I do not know... more general news suggests gold is up a lot since UK markets closed, so may be the chance has gone...)

Below is what has happened to my account since Sunday:


Tuesday 22 November



Monday 21 November
Sunday 20 November