[size=small]In essence, you are buying either collectibles or bullion when you buy gold. Gold, contrary to much belief, remains a speculative commodity and so a questionable "investment," depending on your perspective. Here's what I mean.
You are a consumer when buying processed gold, bottom line - nothing glamorous about that. You are betting that it will either hold or go up in value as bullion, beyond the cost you paid to obtain it.
The other side is that it may have additonal collector value on top of the value it retains as bullion. Collector interest is an artificial function and is based on people's whims and their ability to pay for the things they fancy. You're hoping they will continue to do so in the collector market.
In either case, that's speculative.
Gold as bullion has held high lately, almost obscenely so, which is worrisome in any commodity market. Once a commodity goes high, there is little for it to do but go down. There HAS, in fact, been a dip in spot price over the last year or so. Will it go "bottom drawer" quickly, leaving you with a large loss? Not likely, but I wouldn't expect any drastic increases in value in the near term either. The time to buy gold was several years ago, when it was a fraction of todays price. None of this is good if you fancy yourself a bullion investor.
I'd leave the pure bullion investing to others and suggest you purchase a mix of both bullion coin AND collector grade coin, leaning heavily on collector coin, if you can. Bullion prices may rise or fall, tying the bullion investor to them. But, bullion coin is still that, coin, and so has additional esoteric value to it. Interest in true collector grade coin is likely to remain high in the foreseeable future, too.
At todays prices, a $1000 wont get much - but it's a start.[/size]
