Buying gold Vs staying with CHF

Looks like central banks have been big XAU buyers for the last quarter. (what do they know?)
XAG is also looking interesting.

I heard coin/bar purchases in CH ramped up a lot since the war started. So much that counters had limited stock. Not sure if it’s still the case now. Anybody knows?

My wife is a goldsmith, and she said there is was a shortage in production (refinery) due do covid & due to supply chain issues.
The problems should now be solved.

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What about ZGLD? It has a TER if 0.4% but I prefer to keep my gold in CHF…

What do you mean “in CHF”? In a Swiss bank / fund? Because otherwise the trading currency doesn’t matter at all.

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I was referring to Gold ETFs hedged to CHF, as I saw the fact sheet (attached) of ZGLD offering funds hedged, but as you said the trading currency is USD so the hedging for long term would not make much sense here…
The only thing that I am not able to see in the documentation of the funds is if the custody cost is covered in the TER?

  • UBS CH0106027193 in USD - TER 0.23%
  • ZGLD - TER 0.40%

Yes, the custody cost for the physical gold is (possibly the main) part of the TER.

Edit: To clarify, I’m referring to the costs for safe keeping the physical gold. If you’re referring to custody of the ETF, see @rolandinho’s comment.

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ZGLD is in CHF from ZKB, no? And trades in CHF? There was nothing attached, are you sure there are hedged versions, because the sense of that is limited IMO.

What do you mean by custody cost?
At what broker/bank are you going to keep your ZGLD ETF? If your bank (eg Swissquote (0.1% p.a.), Migrosbank (0.23% p.a.), and many others) charges you a certain % p.a. custody fees (Verwahrung) for stocks in depot, then no, these custody fees are not in the TER.
ZKB may have the “special rule”, that ZKB ETF’s are free of custody fees in a depot at ZKB, check their fee brochure.

There are indeed some CHF Hedged Gold ETFs from e.g. UBS and iShares… But I have absolutely no idea what the point of that is.

What does that currency exchange rate of some random currency to CHF have to do with your Gold investment?

E.g. on the iShares one that “random currency” is USD, but why? Why not EUR or CAD or CNY???

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The main ZGLD ETF is not hedged but both ZKB and UBS offer Gold ETF classes with currency hedging against USD as USD is the main trading currency for physical gold. I also don’t think it makes sense to currency hedge a physical asset, though, unless you want to simultaneously bet against USD.

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Totally agree, the plan that I had in mind is to hold gold and with this part of the portfolio bet as well against USD… But I am not sure yet if I want to pay the cost of the hedging (that I don´t know it yet).

ZGLD - gold stored in ZKB - TER 0.4
AUUSI - gold stored in UBS - TER 0.23
GLDM - gold stored in ICBC Standard Bank Plc - TER 0.18

In case I buy it in USD, probably I will go with the one of UBS, as the 3 have enough liquidity and I prefer to have the gold in Switzerland

Basically gold (in this case) is the hedge. You don’t need to pay an extra cost if you want to bet (say) that the USD will lose value against the CHF: if it happens, it will be reflected in the price of gold quoted in USD compared to the price of gold quoted in CHF. Plus, your bet is asymmetric: the CHF might lose value against the USD as well.

As gold makes new ATH and is in the news cycle more, I wonder if this will trigger a FOMO reaction and make gold the next investing fad?

Gold is still going gangbusters even though Fed cuts have stalled out.

https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/gold-rises-all-time-high-sino-us-tariff-war-2025-02-05/

After a long and boring wait, it finally looks like the gold miners are starting to move.

Gold moved because of Tarrifs drama and geopolitical issues

Big money only trusts gold when it comes to safe assets
For speculation there are more things :wink:

Adding 10% gold to my VIAC 3a and 5% commodities to 5% IBIT last March, improved the performance to 18,2% compared to 5% IBIT only account: 3,6%.

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Same Here…
15% Gold (10% ZGLD + 5% CSIF Gold) (Max)
5% IBIT (Max)
Since June last year (coming from 100% default strategy)

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Fiscally speaking it’s not so smart to have non yielding asset on a 3A :thinking:

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I have no yielding assets (except CHF).

it’s a matter of choice…
For the amount that I put in 3a… I prefer an allocation that seems to me the most performant (I can be wrong in my allocation) with low or no yielding rather than a less performant allocation with high yielding included …
In the end… what matters is the performance/gains at the time of withdrawal…

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