Owning precious metals such as gold and silver is extremely wise for people in every country of the world, but especially for Americans right now as the U.S. Dollar finds its ultimate value – zero.

But how should you own gold and silver?

Taking physical delivery of gold and silver has risks. So do you put it in a safe deposit box? Not in this country. Switzerland, fine, but not everyone is in a position to do that.

One precious metals dealer lives in Colorado and states simply

“I can’t keep it at home because people know what I do for a living; let’s just say that I live in the Rocky Mountains where there’s a whole lotta rocks.”

Good advice, if you live in the Rockies. What about the rest of us?

You can buy gold and silver certificates from a variety of institutions, but some investors have flown to those companies in foreign locales and asked to see the metal. “What metal?” they’re told “you bought a certificate, not metal”. So it’s imperative that you know what you are buying. And I recommend that you check it out thoroughly.

Even the GLD ETF has a lot of holes in the prospectus. GLD and other ETF’s might be a way of handling short term profits, but it is certainly not disaster insurance if that’s what you’re looking for.

Certain online purveyors of gold and silver offer you the opportunity to not take delivery of your purchases. Certainly that is safer than keeping it under your mattress, eliminates transportation costs and makes it more convenient to sell. But there again I highly recommend you go through the cycle of buying, selling, and asking for your profits to be returned to you a time or two before you ever even begin to feel comfortable.

Goldmoney.com is another venue, located in the Channel Islands of Britain where you can own gold and pay very small storage expense. I think an awful lot of people would vouch for James Turk and his firm as to being reputable and reliable. Nonetheless, perform your own due diligence and don’t rely on them exclusively.

Whether or not you take physical delivery of your gold and silver is entirely up to you. I just want you to know the risks and rewards both ways and to make an informed decision with a very important part of your portfolio.

Interestingly enough, few newsletters cover this topic that I have seen. One excellent exception is the coverage done a couple of months ago in Big Gold from Casey Research.

They have a risk free trial subscription that you can take advantage of and have access to the archives which includes this great info on gold storage and transportation.