can I take out an isa in gold market?

[mrsshackleton]

The title says it all really, I have my isa allowance to use up this year and am keen on investing in commodities (already have a ftse tracker isa). Any advice on which low-cost ISA to invest in or if this is an utterly stupid idea very welcome. BTW we have no mortgage and are self employed so we need to invest for pensions.

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Not really my area, but you can get exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that invest in gold, and these can be held in an ISA (probably a self-select one like the Share Centre).

Or there are gold funds like BlackRock's Gold & General that invest in miners and so forth - these are just like any other unit trust/Oeic so are very easy to buy in an ISA.

As to whether this is an utterly stupid idea, like anything else it's a matter of sentiment and timing. Gold has gone up severalfold (if that's a word) in the last decade or so and is widely considered to be a one-way bet. I remember when they closed the gold and commodities fund sector because no-one was interested in the funds (this would have been late 90s).

I don't believe any investment is a one-way bet and to my mind the time to get out of an asset class is when this kind of view takes hold. Gold and commodities are not exempt from market cycles; they just have very long market cycles. But I've been saying this for a few years now and at the moment I'm still wrong. One day I will be right, but by then I'll probably have missed out on the chance to double my money.

It's a very unpopular view, but based on the idea of 'buy low' (which you certainly wouldn't be doing with gold), I'd be having a little punt on Japan right now.

(Disclaimers of all sorts - I'm not an IFA, my advice is likely to be rubbish and so on)

Oops, sorry, meant to put in this link to a thing about gold ETFs.

the other thing about gold etfs is to watch what assets they hold. so there's one that holds PHYSICAL GOLD (TICKER IS PHAU I THINK) and some that hold stocks or futures, which can be a different relation to the gold price.

buying gold miners is another way to profit because then you get a dividend - gold only costs money to store, and is really a hedge against other things.

(sorry about the caps, stupid keyboard).

silver is an alternative of course, or platinum but i would need to go and look those up.

I would be super careful with gold as it has been very hot for a few years now and has been making new highs due to all the problems in the middle east and inflation expectations.

I would consider other metals as greygirl said. silver was really on the move, platinum and palladium are others, but you are getting into different set of supply/demand scenarios and should appreciate this.

I would not be considering buying gold miners (this is my opinion of course) as apart from the global gold price, which could well have been hedged by their companies' trading departments and therefore they would not be benefiting from price rises, you are buying into their specific management strategy, which will make much more impact on share price than gold price alone.

mrsshackleton here is a link for a guy who runs his own chat blog concerning stocks and shares. He posts regularly on a stocks\share site called www.iii.co.uk (interactive invester)

His alias name is Hub. He has given a list of AIM commodity ISA'able shares.

Here....

hope this helps