Investing

Ben, from my personal experience I would suggest breaking it up into smaller denominations. You may also want to consider buying a mix of new silver/gold and collectible coins. Based on the world economy and it's volatility is my reasoning for smaller denominations, you may have to use it as a means of purchasing items.

A pile of fractions will make you feel better as long as you dont think about the extra premiums you paid on them , but as others have said they maybe easier to sell later on, but personally If I were you I would buy at some point at least one 1 ounce of gold , nothing like holding a full one ounce of gold in your hand.

Are you saying 500 hundred pounds of silver or 500 pounds in British currency(865 in US dollar)?

I'd probably buy a couple 5oz and one 10 oz silver bars and then a few each of ASE, Maples, Britannias, and Libertads. (Or Kookabura, Panda, etc. Whatever you prefer)

£4-500 sterling. There wouldnt be any 'using as currency', I'm pretty confident in sotciety.

Smaller units might be easier to offload in drips and draps, but it could be useful to offload in 1 batch.

I suppose the ideal would be buying the metal at melt and selling it at melt when I need the dough (im looking at a time frame of 2-3 years). I dont know if perhaps theres a place you can buy a bar of a specific value?

Also, whats the best way of acquiring?

It's a hard question to answer as we don't know what your intentions are. If you are looking for profit then you are better off roll trading to keep your cash working for you. If you have a large bank account and are after purely investment then spread over different metals. The lower fractions (in gold) are easy to move on but you do pay a premium on them and get a lot less for your money.

But ... why? Sorry Ben, but it seems to me to be a very American thing to invest in pms. Thing is ... how many gazillion tons of silver must there be world wide? Even gold. If a crash came and people really started liquidating the market would be flooded in hours IMHO. Plus, if it got really bad .. who wants gold when food and water are short?

it just seems like you'd be better buying Premium Bonds. Still a gamble. But you get your money (minus inflation) back with the possibility of a prize! Government Stocks? Guaranteed interest for the duration at a known rate and again, money back at maturation. And if it got so bad the Government was in trouble .. again money is probably the least of the problems.

If you want then top grade coins are just as good a risk. Sorry .. investment! Because nobody knows what the prices of metals will be at in 2-3 years. It's all a gamble. Better IMHO to invest in something you have knowledge about (such as top end ancient coins?) than (what I'm afraid I have to say is, in 'investment' terms a very small amount) in something unknown.

Of course, if you're really keen: http://www.coinsofbritain.com/pages....asp?ID=4570 Just an idea.

Tom.
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I hadnt even considered premium bonds, they make a good investment, will definitely go for that.

Interesting idea with investing in coinage. I already have quite a bit of money tied up there and I've had issues trying to offload, but I may look into some higher calibre stuff, dont have any ancient gold.