Why Buy Copper?

Every few weeks I get an email quoting the spot price of copper and mentioning the 'high price' of the copper bars sold on the Buy Copper website.  

Some people ask for an explanation of the price and some people are rude.  The rude emails are deleted straight away, and I rarely have time now to reply to the people who'd like to know.  

The reason is, tax and labour.  

When you buy copper or silver or titanium, palladium, gallium etc you have to pay tax.  VAT is 20%.  Polishing is labour +VAT, stamping is stamping +VAT 

Paypal takes 3%  and there are other expenses that push the price higher.  

The spot price is a mythical number constantly quoted.  I believe you can buy metals at the spot price from the London Metals Exchange but it would have to be about 20 tonnes! Which you'd have to move with a lorry and the pay 20% VAT. What form it would look like I don't know because nobody does it.  

Remember the price of gold was at an all time low in about 2002?  How many people considered Gold as a good investment back then?  How many uses has gold got?  Not many.  What about Copper?

So as the Euro slides into oblivion much like the Russian Ruble did in the 90s, the currency you think in may actaully be worthless.  

Certainly £75 billion of new Quantatative Easing money from the Bank of England last week hasn't done your savings or weekly wage any good. 

Metals are money, they have value because they are expensive to mine.  Paper money is a promise.  The Bank of England has devalued it's promise of worth.

£75billion pounds is about 10% of GDP in Britain and they'll use that up in under 2 years, which probably means the price of everything in paper Pounds will go up by about 10% before the next round of devaluing.  

http://buycopper.co.uk/

Copper coins

Piedfort coins

Hello ladies and gents,

Yesterday I had a chat with the pressings chap about making coins in pure copper and he said I should make a model and he'll get a price on making coins.  

pure copper coin model

Coins are made in a coin press (suprise, suprise) and they exert up to 400 tonnes of pressure. 

So I'd like to make a run of copper coins but I'd have to make a run of a lot of coins to keep the price reasonable. 

As you can see from the pictures I had a little play around with one design in Solid Works (a CAD modelling programme). I thought it would be good to have a coin that is fun to own, maybe drill a hole so it can be a keyring or something, and most coins out there are very intricate and ornate so it would be nice to see something a bit different.  
I also think it's wise to differentiate this coin from actual currency because the government may get a little annoyed with coins that are actually worth something as they print our currencies into oblivion.   
The weight I'm thinking of for a coin would be 50grammes.  The reason being is, there is a type of coin called Piedfort which means something like heavy weight.


*I read yesterday that a 2pence coin made before 1992 was actually worth 3pence because it was actually made of 97% copper.  


Gallium
You may notice that I've finally got around to selling Gallium http://buycopper.co.uk/one%20kilo%20rare%20earth%20Gallium.html
Using plastic syringes I was able to dispense exact amounts of melted gallium in a mould placed on a digital weighing scales.  The lower weight pieces are more like splats as I can't find very small silicon moulds.  
Gallium acts quite like water. When its solid it expands by 3%
As it solidifies it looks quite frost like as it crystalises.
It also melts quite like water. In that, it doesn't go soft and viscous like chocolate but it's either solid or liquid.  It has quite a high surface tension as well.  
It really is very interesting, and when it's all used up in electronics, mankind will have to mine the rubbish dumps to try and get it back again.  


That's it for now.  The 1 kilo copper bars should be ready next week and I'll put a deal up for people who want to buy ten bars at a time.  


http://buycopper.co.uk/

Rare Earth buyer supplier

After some feedback about the metal Gallium it seems people are interested but not sure where you would be able to sell the metal once you own it. 

So I phoned around a couple of metal specialists and I’ve found a foundry near Liverpool UK that deals in rare earths and specialist metals. 

They’ll be able to buy and supply Rare Earth and just plain rare metals.  Of course, they’ll be talking minimum orders of several kilo’s upwards, so I’ll look into a section of the shop where I can buy the small quantities of unusual metals people may hold as an investment. It'll probably as a 2% less than scrap price much like how silver is bought back by bullion traders.

I also found out Gallium isn’t part of the Rare Earth group of metals.  Gallium is plain and simply rare, as in, there is hardly any of the metal on the face of the planet or universe. 

The boss of the foundry told me more about what he’s noticed in the Rare Earth metal market.  He says, these metals have shot up in price and are now difficult to get hold of because of China’s restriction on export supply.  So I’ve heard it now, straight from the horses mouth. 

A little reminder.  Russia restricted the export of Palladium in 2000 and the price increased ten fold! 

I’ll see if I can buy metals like Indium, Tantalum and Hafnium from the foundry because that would save on import duty and shipping and of course bring you the customer the cheapest possible price. 

Copper Bars

The 1kilo copper bars are selling well and I'll have to get some more manufactured soon.  I'll look into production of 2 kilo and 1/2kilo bars as well.  

http://buycopper.co.uk/

1 Kilo of Gallium for sale very soon

I took the plunge.
I've found a supplier in China that is willing to sell me some Gallium.  Luckily I've traded with China before which helps and luckily I'm British and we haven't annoyed the Chinese within the last 100 years so they're still willing to trade with us for now.  If I was Japanese it wouldn't have happened.
I was told however to be careful what I say in our trading.  I'll leave it at that.

The Gallium is >99.99% pure so perfect as an investment metal.  You can see the certificate of authenticity below

What I will probably do is list it for sale as a 1 kilo bottle, but also list smaller amounts for sale.  If somebody wants to buy a smaller amount I'll split this bottle and turn it into ingots of some kind.  If anyone would like 1kilo or more of Gallium please contact me and I'll order some in.
As Gallium melts at 29*C the problem is handling.  It's a bit like chocolate. If you hold it in your hand it will melt. Containers need to be able to cope with melted Gallium turning solid and putting strain on the container.
I've read a good way of storing it is to keep it in those zip lock plastic bags and if it melts simply put it in the freezer so it can easily be removed from the bag.
There is plenty of documentation of Gallium on google and youtube if you need more information.
I read that this metal is going to be extinct within 10 years and the figures kind of support this.  It is an unbelievably rare metal. I read it was extracted from the soot in factory chimneys. You can pretty much only get it from China these days and it is heavily used in electronics.
If you ask me, I'd gamble that this is the most undervalued metal.
As for pricing.  I haven't worked it out yet.  I have to buy the Gallium in Dollars, so the bank gives a crummy exchange rate, Then charges £25 for the transaction, then the Chinese bank charges $30 for turning Dollars into Yuan, shipping is expensive, then when it gets to Blighty, there's import duty and VAT of 20% to pay.
Believe me though.  This is one metal you'll be glad paying for.  : )

If anyone is interested in buying another rare earth metal Indium (used in TFT screens) please email me at info@titanclassics.com
and keep checking on the site http://buycopper.co.uk/ for updates.

Copper bars update.
I'm pestering the pressings workshop to hurry up with the 40 1 kilo copper bars.  They were supposed to be ready yesterday but they've gone quiet.

Gallium and Indium bullion

If things go well I'll be buying 1 kilo of Gallium and will split it to sell as an investment metal.

Its not a process of taking a hammer and chisel to the metal.  You just heat it to about 30*C and it melts.  Very strange indeed. In 99.99% pure form it is very silvery. 

I think as an investment Gallium is excellent.  Everyone knows about the rapid rise in Gold and Silver, but Palladium shot up in price too but nobody really noticed it. I remember in 2009 its price rise was way ahead of Gold and Silver.  Maybe it was in 2010 as well, I haven't checked.

The palladium price in 2000 shot up ten fold because Russia blocked its export for political reasons. Ford used Palladium in catalytic converters so had to buy it whatever the cost.  

I believe Palladium is 15 times more rare than gold, so these rare earth's are very sensitive to supply shortages.

The world only produces about 30 tonnes of Gallium per year.  Bear in mind China alone produces 300 tonnes of Gold per year and you realise just how rare Gallium is. 

Gallium is used in integrated circuits and LED's.  You have probably noticed LEDs seem to be on everything within the last 20 years.  There are new super bright low power LED's taking over the high energy halogen spot lights now. How long before governments demand LEDs instead of halogen lights you may ask?

From my reading I understand Gallium to be quite safe to handle.  Not quite the same with another metal I'm interested in selling, INDIUM. The youtube video below should explain the uses of this rare earth.  

I can get hold of Indium but I'm concerned about selling it. It seems just touching it is toxic. It can be stored in an appropriate container with a Hazmat warning on it, but it kind of takes the fun out of owning the metal.  

On the positive side of owning Indium, 20 years ago nobody knew we'd all have TFT monitors and screens using Indium.  The supply must be coming under strain.

And finally:

Did anyone read The Telegraph a few weeks ago where a company called Zest that was losing money, changed it's name to Rare Earth Metals on the AIM and immediately went up in value 300%  

They hadn't even got any supply chain or any metal in stock.  

These metals are really difficult to get hold of.  You need to to import them from China, build relationships and if they don't like you, they'll ban the sale to you, just like they've done to the Japanese.

Food for thought.