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How to Invest in Gold Online

How to Invest in Gold Online

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There are three major ways of buying gold. The traditional method involves buying gold in physical form, such as ornaments, coins, or bars. Secondly, you can invest in gold-backed financial instruments like ETFs or Sovereign Gold Bonds. And lastly, one can buy digital gold. As an asset class, gold is known for its stable price movement and generally, witnesses increased demand when the economy is struggling or in a volatile nature in stock markets. While physical gold has several challenges regarding storage and safety, digital gold removes these hassles. Hence, it makes life easier for those investors who may not want to hold the physical asset but still want to invest in gold.

Digital gold has made buying gold online easy and accessible, without anyone bothering about its purity, storage, or safety. In this growing digital economy, several fintech platforms offer easy access to gold investments with convenience. 

Ways To Invest in Gold Online

Investment in gold has moved beyond traditional methods, and many online options provide convenience and flexibility by eliminating the hassles of physical storage and safety. 

Here are the key ways on how to invest in gold online: 

  • Gold ETF: In this investment, although you are investing in gold, you will not have any physical gold. The gold will be held in Demat form and gives returns based on the market price of gold.
  • Gold Funds: This covers the investment of those companies that operate gold mining. In this manner, one can benefit from the performance and growth of the industry.
  • Sovereign Gold Bonds (SGBs): The government issues these bonds, which allow you to invest in gold with the added advantage of accumulation of annual interest. It has other advantages too, like being secure, yielding a return on investment linked to the price of gold, and also being redeemable in cash.
  • Digital Gold: A number of platforms have now made it possible to buy tiny quantities of gold online. The storage is secure, and there are no purity or safety headaches. Investing in digital gold is probably the best way to invest in gold nowadays.

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Table of Content

  1. Ways To Invest in Gold Online
  2. What is Digital Gold?
  3. How can I Buy Gold Digitally?
  4. Key Features of Digital Gold
  5. How to Sell and Redeem Digital Gold

What is Digital Gold?

Digital gold allows you to accumulate pure gold in small amounts anytime and anywhere, even with minimal investment. It lets you purchase gold without concerns about purity, safety, or storage. Every gram of digital gold bought is backed by actual 24-karat physical gold. This gold is stored in an allocated vault by the vendor, who acts as its custodian. When a portion is sold, the corresponding amount is deducted from storage. 

Since gold purchases are based largely on trust, it's important to ensure you're buying from authorized agencies. In India, only three companies are permitted to issue digital gold: the state-owned MMTC, in partnership with PAMP from Switzerland, a global leader in bullion branding; Augmont Gold; and Digital Gold India Pvt. Ltd., which operates under the SafeGold brand. This gold sold by the companies is 24.99% pure and is also guaranteed by the issuer in terms of its purity and weight. Knowing what is digital gold is crucial if someone is looking for an investment opportunity.

How can I Buy Gold Digitally?

Physical gold has become very rare with ever-growing global demand, shrinking economies, and expansive monetary policies. However, digital gold provides an equally easy avenue for investors to start investing with as little as ₹100. Thus, one can keep building up the quantity of gold little by little with less inconvenience of saving a large sum and caring about its security. This means that with each purchase, one accumulates virtual gold, which is held in a vault until one decides to convert it into physical gold or sell it. 

There are several ways to buy gold digitally in India, including Gold ETFs, Sovereign Gold Bonds (SGBs), and Digital Gold. Many brokers sell digital gold in partnership with MMTC-PAMP, a joint venture between India’s public sector unit MMTC and Switzerland-based PAMP-SA, a global leader in precious metals.

The seller, while selling the digital gold, delivers it at the prevailing market price and makes storage arrangements in some virtual vault in the customer's name. You can invest at any time, from anywhere, and your gold remains safe in custody until you decide to redeem it or sell it. It would be as easy to buy gold online as buying physical gold without having to bother about storing or securing it. 

Key Features of Digital Gold

Below are the key features of digital gold. 

  • Allow you to invest with as little as ₹1, with no making charges and varying maximum limits per distributor.
  • Offered in 24-karat purity (99.5% by SafeGold, 99.9% by MMTC-PAMP).
  • Gold is stored securely by the vendor (free for 2 years with SafeGold, 5 years with MMTC-PAMP).
  • Prices are determined in real-time, with no depreciation deductions.
  • Redeem as physical gold or sell it at the current market price.
  • Convert digital gold into jewelry via approved jewelers.
  • Vault-stored gold is insured.
  • No DEMAT account is needed for buying or selling.
  • Flexible, allowing gradual investments with small amounts at any time.

One major advantage of digital gold is flexibility. You can grow your gold investment gradually with small, anytime purchases, without the need to monitor daily price trends or make a large lump sum investment. This option, once limited to large investors, is now accessible to small retail buyers as well.

How to Sell and Redeem Digital Gold

A key advantage you enjoy when you invest in digital gold online is the easy redemption process. You can follow the steps to sell or redeem your digital gold at any time. 

Sell:

  • Login to the digital gold account and select the amount of gold that is to be sold.
  • Once the bank account details are provided, sales proceeds will be credited into the account at the current market price. 

Redemption: 

  • Digital Gold can be redeemed for physical gold with authorized sellers.
  • After getting to know the valuation of the gold in your account, you will get an option to convert your gold coins into bars or jewelry.
  • The actual supply of gold is by the dealer, wherein the equivalent amount would get deducted from your digital gold account balance.

Conclusion
Investment in gold today is not restricted to traditional modes of physical buying. Alternatives like gold ETFs, sovereign gold bonds, and digital gold have become handy digital options that make all these easy, accessible, and secure. Digital gold investment allows the investor to invest as little as one gram. Hence, it saves him or her from the troubles of storing physical gold and ensuring its purity. Nowadays, you can use an online share market app to invest in digital gold along with gold ETFs. Digital gold is suitable, whether one aims to hold on to it for long-term capital appreciation or seeks a hassle-free, convenient form of investment.

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FAQs on How to Invest in Gold Online

Mostly, to invest in digital gold online, there is not much documentation required by most platforms. Typically, you would need a PAN card for tax-related purposes, an Aadhaar card for identity checks, and a bank account for transactions. In addition to these, a few platforms may have mobile number verification as well, although a DEMAT account is not at all required for investment in the case of digital gold.

Gold being one of the favourable investment options acts as a hedge against inflation and economic slowdown. It is considered one of the safe harbors in times of turbulence. More importantly, gold retains value intrinsically over time, thus allowing long-term security. Digital gold assures ease of access, liquidity, and flexibility without having to bother with its safekeeping or making a large upfront investment.

Yes, buying gold online is safe if it is through reputable and approved sites. The best way to invest in gold is through major players like MMTC-PAMP, SafeGold, and Augmont make sure your digital gold is backed by physical gold that is safely stored in secure, insured vaults. Always check the credentials of the platform to ensure that the investment is safe.

Investing in digital gold can turn out to be a fine investment for people who wish to gather the yellow metal in small installments. It also happens to be very convenient to buy and sell at any time without any glitches relating to storage or safety. However, it is important to assess your investment goals by comparing returns against other similar investments in gold ETFs or Sovereign Gold Bonds.

FDs and digital gold are both regarded as safe investments. Digital gold is one way of capital appreciation and acts like an inflation-hedging tool during turbulent times. In the case of FDs, guaranteed returns are provided over a fixed period. If you need more liquidity with growth opportunities, then digital gold could be better. Conversely, FDs are suitable for those risk-averse investors who seek steady returns.

Yes, it is legal to buy digital gold in India. The well-known vendors offering digital gold include MMTC-PAMP, SafeGold, and Augmont. They are regulated and abide by the government’s regulations. However, since digital gold does not come under the purview of either SEBI or RBI at this juncture, one needs to exercise caution to ensure that it is bought from trusted and authorized platforms.