Gold Bullion Purchaser

Misled by Goldline? Refunds are available. May 22, 2012 Deadline for Claims

Posted by admin on Apr 29th, 2012 in Gold Purchasing | 2 comments

A judgment and injunction handed down by the Los Angeles Superior Court back in February required Goldline International, Inc. , one of the nation’s preeminent coin and precious metals dealers, to offer refunds to customers who were the victims of predatory, unethical up-sells to over-priced gold numismatic coins rather than the bullion they originally called to purchase. Many of these customers paid more than 55% over the market value(someone had to pay for all those TV commercials and their celebrity endorsers) of these coins. The judgment required Goldline to set up a fund of $4,500,000 to compensate former customers who returned the coins they bought, a process overseen by a court-appointed monitor. As of late April, $4,250,000 have been refunded for the coins that were returned.

Former employees came forward stating Goldline trained them to dissuade would-be customers from buying bullion and push them to the overpriced coins through misleading high-pressure fear tactics, including the claim that the U.S. government could seize gold bullion, but not numismatic coins.

This claim is disallowed for future transactions by Goldline, but their statements about this do have a basis in fact.

Guard Against the Purchase of Fake Gold and Silver Bullion Coins

Posted by Max on Mar 27th, 2012 in Gold Purchasing | 0 comments

A South African company, Fisch Instruments, manufactures a line of simple devices that detect fake gold and silver coins. They call these devices Fisch® Fake Coin Identification Gauges, and they can save the gold investor quite a bundle by identifying even the well-crafted forgery presented for sale by a counterfeiter or scammer.

Note: Be sure to check out various other scams at our Gold Scam File.

How It Works

First, you select the gauge that is designed for the particular coin you are testing. The Fisch gauges(testers) are specific to either 1 particular coin, or in a couple of cases a set of coins that happen to be designed with nearly identical specifications. A gold or silver coin either passes all four checks of weight, diameter, thickness and shape or it is rejected as demonstrated by the following video:

Fake coins made containing brass, lead, steel or copper with the correct weight would not have sufficient density to pass through the gauge’s slot. The coin would either be too thick or too wide. A fake with correct dimensions would not have sufficient weight to tilt the gauge. Metals with density similar to gold are also problematic. Platinum is priced at a level similar to gold, so there would be no money to be made in producing such a coin.

Tungsten is similar to gold in density, 19.25 gms/cm3 versus gold’s 19.3 gms/cm3, but it is a hard, brittle metal not easily shaped into a form that would constitute a fake that would pass muster. Fisch states that they have not come across a tungsten fake coin as yet, although there have been cases of tungsten rods being placed in larger gold bullion bars. Those bars were slightly off weigh. Osmium and iridium have densities higher than gold, and theoretically could be combined with a lower density metal to create a fake, but once again they are too expensive to make such counterfeits financially worthwhile.

Gold Coins and Bars for Which Fisch Testers are Available

• Austrian 100 Corona
• Mexican 50 Pesos
• Mexican 20 Pesos
• Mexican 1 ounce Onza
• Credit Suisse 1 ounce Gold Bar
• South African Krugerrand/American Eagle/Britannia/Angel (1 ounce)
• 1/2 ounce SA Krugerrand/American Eagle/Britannia/Angel
• 1/4 ounce SA Krugerrand/American Eagle/Britannia/Angel
• 1/10 ounce SA Krugerrand/American Eagle/Britannia/Angel
• British Sovereign / South African 2 Rand
• U.S. $20 (1850 – 1933)
• U.S. $10 (1838 – 1933)
• U.S. 1 oz. Arts Medallion
• U.S. 1/2 oz. Arts Medallion
• 1 oz. Canadian Maple Leaf
• 1/2 oz. Canadian Maple Leaf
• 1/4 oz. Canadian Maple Leaf
• 1/10 oz. Canadian Maple Leaf
• 1 oz. American Buffalo
• 1 oz. Austrian Vienna Philharmonic
•  1 oz. Australian Nugget/Kangaroo

These are grouped into “Wallets” containing several testers in one set. The purchase of more than one wallet at a time saves the purchaser money compared to buying individuals wallets separately. A tester for the U.S. Silver Dollar (1840-1935), and for the Isle of Man 1 oz. Platinum coin are also available.

Fisch’s web site can be found at http://www.fisch.co.za/home.htm .

Queen of Sheba’s Gold Mines Found?

Posted by admin on Mar 6th, 2012 in Historical | 0 comments

Have the legendary mines of the Queen of Sheba been at long-last found? An archaeologist and former curator for the British museum, Louise Schofield, headed a team excavating a site on the Gheralta plateau in northern Ethiopia which discovered artifacts and stone carvings  lead her to believe it has.

Here is the evidence as described in an article from the Guardian UK (url below):

An initial clue lay in a 20ft stone stele (or slab) carved with a sun and crescent moon, the “calling card of the land of Sheba”, Schofield said. “I crawled beneath the stone – wary of a 9ft cobra I was warned lives here – and came face to face with an inscription in Sabaean, the language that the Queen of Sheba would have spoken.”

On a mound nearby she found parts of columns and finely carved stone channels from a buried temple that appears to be dedicated to the moon god, the main deity of Sheba, an 8th century BC civilisation that lasted 1,000 years. It revealed a victory in a battle nearby, where Schofield excavated ancient bones.

According to the Bible (Kings 1:10), the Queen of Sheba, having heard of King Solomon’s wisdom and the greatness of his kingdom, wished to see for herself if these stories were true. She came to Jerusalem with a train of camels bearing spices, precious stones, and 120 talents of gold. The weight of a talent is not known for certain, but approximations based on several archaeological finds estimate 120 talents to be about 4 metric tonnes of gold.

The mine shaft is located 4 feet beneath the surface, hidden by a 20-foot stone slab, surrounded by rocky hillsides and sparse vegetation, it is easy to see  how the mine has escaped detection for many centuries. The ruins of a nearby temple bear the sun and moon symbols associated with Sheba, and an inscription over the mine shaft written in  Sabaean, the language associated with Sheba warns of the presence a 9-foot cobra.

Full exploration and excavation of the mine and surrounding sites have yet to occur; exploring old mines is a dangerous and time-consuming activity, so it may be a while before the knowledge gained will help solve the mysteries surrounding the Sabaean civilization and how the Queen of Sheba came into such large quantities of gold. Assays of samples taken from within the mine will likely be used to try and determine the richness of the mine’s ore, both as a way of confirming the mine as a major source of Sabaean gold and for evaluating the possibility of substantial ore remaining in the mine that can be accessed using modern mining methods.

 

Related articles

• Archaeologists strike gold in quest to find Queen of Sheba’s wealth (guardian.co.uk)

2011 Gold Demand Moves Ahead

Posted by Max on Feb 16th, 2012 in Market Outlook | 1 comment

Worldwide demand for gold continued its upward trend, with total demand reaching a record according to this recent World Gold Council press release:

Global demand for gold in 2011 rose to 4,067.1 tonnes (t) worth an estimated US$205.5 billion – the first time that global demand has exceeded US$200billion and the highest tonnage level since 1997, according to the World Gold Council’s Gold Demand Trends.

Major increases in demand were seen in China, India and Europe. India has been the leader in gold demand in recent years, but Marcus Grubb, a Managing Director of  Investment at the World Gold Council sees China overtaking India in 2012:

… It is likely that China will emerge as the largest gold market in the world for the first time in 2012. What is certain is that the long-term fundamentals for gold remain strong, with a diverse and growing demand base, coupled with constrained supply side activity.

(more…)

Top 10 Gold Producing Countries 2011

Posted by admin on Feb 9th, 2012 in GoldFacts | 0 comments

Annual World Gold Production 2011 Chart

The chart at left depicts the annual world-wide gold production, including rows for the top 10 gold producing countries for 2011. Data was provided by the U.S. Geological Survey. Amounts are shown in metric tons, where 1 metric ton = 1000Kg = 32,150.7 troy ounces. The 1 ounce gold bullion is the standard weight used for most of the gold bullion rate quotes you see, but the chart uses metric tons due to the large numbers involved otherwise.  The global gold supply increased as a result of 2011 mining operations by a total of slightly less than 2700 metric tonnes, split among the largest 14 gold producers plus an entry for the rest of the world’s production as shown in the chart .

The corresponding data and graph for 2010 can be found at Top 15 Gold Producing Countries 2010.

As it did in 2010, China led with 355 metric tons, followed by Australia at 270, the United States at 237, Russia at 200, South Africa at 190, Peru at 150, Canada at 110, Indonesia 100, Ghana 100, and Uzbekistan with 90 tons.

Designer Gold Bullion : The Jean-Paul Gautier 1 oz. Bullion Bar

Posted by Max on Jan 26th, 2012 in Gold Purchasing | 0 comments

French designer Jean-Paul Gautier, in a collaboration with Dillon Gage Metals of Dallas, Texas, has created a 1 oz. gold bullion bar featuring a heart engraved with Gautier’s trademark sailor stripes wrapped with a banner emblazoned with  the designer’s name and augmented with  a sun ray pattern as a background. The bar is selling for a 10% premium over the current price of gold, with a production run of 5,000 units.

Just the thing for those patrons of haute couture who harbor a secret desire to own gold, but couldn’t countenance an association with the gun-toting, bunker-building, rugged survivalist crowd. Due to the novelty, the question for those buying the item is: do I put the bar on display for the delight of visiting fashionistas or hide it away in my vault or safe-deposit box. If fashion sense and haute couture are far down on your list of priorities, it may still be a worthwhile purchase. The Gautier gold bar would make a nice Valentine’s Day gift or novelty item, and were it to become collectors item, having paid the premium wouldn’t have been a bad idea.

Mr. Gautier’s fashion designs and runway showmanship have been variously described as decadent, shocking, unconventional, controversial and gender-bending, earning both acclaim and derision, depending on who is offering their judgment.

Now for the video, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal:

Anyone interested in the purchase of one or more of these bullion bars can get more information and details the  Dillion-Gage webpage at http://www.dillongage.com/PR-JPGBulllion/Default.aspx .

Two other posts chronicling the unusual and extraordinary in the gold purchasing world can be found at World’s Biggest Gold Coin and World’s Biggest Gold Bullion Bar.