Which is Better: Digital Gold or Physical Gold?

"The desire of gold is not for gold, " Emerson says eloquently. "It's for the sake of liberty and benefit."

It certainly is! Investing in gold provides you with both of these features, which assist in guaranteeing your present and future and the futures of your loved ones.

Did you know you can buy gold from as low was Rs 10 on the Wizely app?


However, there was a period when buying this valuable metal in its basic form was the only way to get it. As a result, the investor became subject to theft and storage concerns, which curtailed their gold purchasing.

Thankfully, this is no longer the case! Gold investments are now available in various media, the most popular digital gold.

Start saving in digital gold with as low as Rs 10 and earn up to Rs 25 lakhs on the Wizely app.


Make sure you read the following comparison carefully before making a significant gold investment.

Infographic by Wizely

Also read: What is Digital Gold? Why Should You Invest in it?

Investment Cost

With respect to the investment cost, you pay to buy the metal when you invest in digital gold through numerous online portals. You don't have to pay any making fees. On the other hand, making charges is a sunk expense that you may avoid by investing in gold digitally. As a result, the total cost of your investment is reduced.

But when purchasing actual gold, there is no way to avoid incurring expenses. Even when buying gold coins, bullets, or biscuits, the producer adds a minimal production charge, typically 8% to 16%. The charges for investing in gold through sophisticated jewellery pieces often start at 8% and can go considerably higher depending on the effort involved. All of this adds to the total cost of your investment.

With Wizely, you can exchange your digital gold for physical gold at anytime and any place.

Liquidity

As for liquidity, in India, digital gold is widely available with excellent liquidity. You can continue buying and selling it on whatever digital marketplace you like to trade in real-time.

Whereas since physical gold is a physical entity, disposing of it off usually takes some time. Here you cannot recover your money plus the appreciation bonus in real-time.

Also read: 5 Reasons to Invest in Digital Gold

Quantity

And there's always the point of quantity. You can't afford to buy 10 grams of gold since you don't have enough money. But, you can buy digital gold for as little as Re. 1 on some portals. After all, why shouldn't you be given a chance to make even a small profit by investing in digital gold?

And typically, the lowest quantity of physical gold you can purchase is a gold coin worth 1 gram. Also, you will struggle to find jewellery items below 1 gram.  

Conclusion

Both digital and physical gold have advantages and disadvantages. If you only want to buy gold for financial purposes, you can buy digital gold instead of physical gold. Digital gold, on the other hand, is unregulated and has a time limit on how long it can be kept in digital form.

In certain instances, other digital investments, such as sovereign gold bonds and gold ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds), may be preferable (mutual funds). On the other hand, physical gold is suitable for the personal use of investors but not for investment.

(Check out 'Learn & Grow with Wizely' to read and learn more all about investment instruments.)

Samiksha Jaiswal

Samiksha Jaiswal