I've been thinking about adding a small gold allocation to my portfolio, maybe 2-5% as a hedge. I use Robinhood and Fidelity for everything else and the experience is pretty seamless.
But when I started looking into physical gold (bars, coins), feels unclear where to buy and the websites seem very old fashioned. Also, lots of different prices depending on payment method, mint, brand, etc.. all for the same weight.
I also couldn't tell which sites were legit vs. sketchy or unfair. Then ,when I checked out local dealer and pawnshops, prices were just astronomical.
I ended up just buying GLD and moving on. But I still feel like I missed out on having something physical and will likely do so later this year.
Curious if others have gone through this. A few questions:
Did you end up buying physical gold, or did you stick with ETFs?
If you bought physical, how did you find a dealer you trusted?
How did you figure out which product to buy and what to pay?
Hope to get my hands on some bars soon!!