Silk Road forums
Market => Product offers => Topic started by: cache on March 30, 2012, 06:26 am
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I have had an idea on the back burner for a little while and thought it was time to bring to the forums to guage whether or not anybody would be interested in it.
We all know the hassles involved in cashing out bitcoins anonymously so why not cash them out into the original anonymous universal standard, gold?
It would only be able to offer this in the UK, at least for the time being, because it will require a completely fool proof insured shipping method and I only know the Royal Mail services well enough to be certain of them.
Is this something that people would be interested in?
Obviously you would have to pay above the day's fix for the gold to cover shipping and to make it worth my while, but I am only expecting somewhere in the region of 12% over.
I am thinking of offering Sovereigns or partial and full Krugerrands, it depends on what the interest would be like.
This is NOT a sales thread, I want to find out whether or not people would be interested in a service like this before I drop the money on a vendors account.
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Obviously this would be done in full escrow with recorded delivery for both our protection.
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Hi cache,
I think this has been brought up before, with the overall consensus that it was a bad idea for vendors to purchase gold from another vendor in order to cash out, as that would be an excellent way for a LEO to snare vendors.
Buyers, however, I think would be interested if its at a good price! Don't forget to factor in the SR fees. I know that many of us interested in holding gold don't want to buy from regular channels, purely because we'd like to remain as anonymous as possible. Even in the event that a LEO did get around to selling it, there's nothing illegal about buying gold, and nothing illegal about visiting SR to do so.
(NOTE: I am NOT implying that cache is anything but an upstanding member of the SR community!)
I'd certainly be interested in the odd Krugerrand, but I'm not sure if the interest levels would be worth the cost of an account and fees etc.
Just my ฿0.02
- grahamgreene
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I would have thought that a vendor, if so minded, could set up a separate buyer's account for doing this. If he used an anonymous drop (if there is such a thing in the UK) he should be quite safe.
It is the interest levels that would concern me, is it worth the hassle and expense to sell maybe two or three Krugerrands a year?
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A vendor certainly could do that, but if it were a LEO selling the gold then any large/significant purchases (as would be required for most vendors to cash out) would surely be noted, and likely followed up on. I've always had my doubts about anonymous drops, I mean if the seller were a LEA then wouldn't it be terribly easy to keep an eye on the drop site until the buyer arrives to pick up the goods? Or electronically track them in some way? I was never able to wrap my head around that! :-\
I think if you have them available then you'd sell quite a few more than two or three Krugerrands a year, given the large amount of UK users; I'm in Ireland myself, so if you were to stretch this far then I'd be interested in them as gifts, maybe 5 or 6 a year, and perhaps 2 or 3 times that much as a small physical store of wealth for any future events that may require quickly liquidated assets.
If you can scale that up to even 10 or 15 people, I think it'd make it worthwhile. :)
Then if you were to introduce international sales, it could be quite a moneyspinner! :)
- grahamgreene
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Yes, you are right. It would be pretty easy for plod to sit and wait at a particular address, even our police couldn't fuck that up!
Still, vendors cashing out is not the only market for this, as you said. I might have an ask around and see if I can get my hands on a few quids worth of part krugerrands, maybe 1/10s or 1/4s to begin with rather than risking a full one at the outset.
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Anonymous drops are about as anonymous as face to face meets I reckon. :P
But exactly, I reckon there'd be quite a bit of interest from regular Joe's just looking to get some gold.
Don't forget that there are only 16,000 registered forum users, most of whom don't actually start or reply to threads on the forum, even interest-gauge threads, but the amount of users on SR itself is far, far higher! Watch out for scam buyers though and always trust your gut instincts even if they could potentially lose you out a healthy profit margin. Always better to be out a profit margin than be out profit margin + cost of goods.
I'll keep an eye on this thread anyway, post back any updates you have, and I look forward to doing business with you in the future! :)
- grahamgreene
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You are right, it could take off once I actually put something up and $150 is not that much in the greater scheme of things.
I will take some time to work the numbers out and post back here if and when I decide anything.
Thanks for knocking the idea about with me.
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Right, I have done some maths and based on today's fix I would be able to offer 1oz Krugerrands at about £1360 delivered in the UK by Special Delivery and 1/10oz Pandas for £168 delivered by the same method.
Any interest?
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Hi Cache,
It seems you've been able to set things up faster than me! I was only able to find Credit Suisse 1g bars. I understand Vendors concerns but as you say the entire issue could be circumvented by having a separate buyer's account. Doesn't SR's seller's page recommend this anyway?
In any case so what if LE can prove John Smith bought some gold with Bitcoins and uses Tor? There's nothing illegal about that!
V.
Right, I have done some maths and based on today's fix I would be able to offer 1oz Krugerrands at about £1360 delivered in the UK by Special Delivery and 1/10oz Pandas for £168 delivered by the same method.
Any interest?
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Hey cache,
Thanks for getting back about this!
Unfortunately the price is a little too high for me personally; I can currently buy 1 Oz Krugerrands via mail order for roughly £278 cheaper utilising a fake ID and a virtual office service - although that doesn't afford the same level of anonymity, paying someone else to pick it up still works out cheaper. :-X
I understand that SR fees and postage / packaging / potential scams / profit margin have to be taken into account on your part, but perhaps those costs combined may drive the product price up a tad too high to make it viable. :-\
I'd gladly pay an extra £50 - £75 over the price I can get it for in order to support SR and a SR vendor and be that bit more anonymous but I'm afraid that I, personally, couldn't justify £270+. :(
If you can do better on prices whilst still protecting your profit margin, do let me know.
Sorry man, and best of luck.
- grahamgreene
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Hi Graham,
It sounds like a great setup you have but do you mind if I ask how you convert your Bitcoins into cash in the first place to buy the gold? I think the advantage of the service cache is toying with offering is that you wouldn't have to cash out your Bitcoins and then use those funds to buy the gold - the advantage being you wouldn't be as liable to the volatility of the BTC and of course it would be more anonymous.
I suppose it depends on the amounts you're talking about - an extra 15 - 20% for instance might be beneficial if you could guarantee there'd be no way to prove you bought precious metals using dirty money.
V.
Hey cache,
Thanks for getting back about this!
Unfortunately the price is a little too high for me personally; I can currently buy 1 Oz Krugerrands via mail order for roughly £278 cheaper utilising a fake ID and a virtual office service - although that doesn't afford the same level of anonymity, paying someone else to pick it up still works out cheaper. :-X
I understand that SR fees and postage / packaging / potential scams / profit margin have to be taken into account on your part, but perhaps those costs combined may drive the product price up a tad too high to make it viable. :-\
I'd gladly pay an extra £50 - £75 over the price I can get it for in order to support SR and a SR vendor and be that bit more anonymous but I'm afraid that I, personally, couldn't justify £270+. :(
If you can do better on prices whilst still protecting your profit margin, do let me know.
Sorry man, and best of luck.
- grahamgreene
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That is the problem, when you are paying 10%+ fees it gets expensive.
For example, if we take the Krugerrand that you can get for £1082, add on 10% fees and it is already £1190 before you factor in hedging or making a profit.
However my offer negates the need to cash out, rent a virtual office with fake ID (not everybody has this) and pay somebody to collect I think that it is worthwhile.
Time will tell.
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.... In any case so what if LE can prove John Smith bought some gold with Bitcoins and uses Tor? There's nothing illegal about that!
V.
Hi vlad1m1r,
The privacy concerns remain, I think, even with seperate buyer and seller accounts. What's the likelihood of Mr. Financial Trader from down the street buying gold via the Silk Road rather than a reputable registered gold trading firm if he's not trying to hide the extent of his income? :P
I agree that there's nothing illegal about buying gold with Bitcoins, nor (currently) with doing so through the Silk Road via Tor, it's just the reason behind buying so much of it were it to be noticed that might get the boys in blue wondering where all this money is coming from in the first place. That brings the taxman into it too, which I'm sure most of us who are relatively large vendors of various products could do without. :P Of course with Bitcoin and the proper mixing that problem is largely eliminated, but still, a small dose of healthy paranoia never does any harm. ;)
- grahamgreene
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Apologies, I posted before reading the 2 new replies!
@v1ad1m1r:
I'd usually convert my currency into coins via Western Union, and have all the associated fees and currency exchange rates factored into my product prices. I'm not a vendor here on SR, I'm a middleman of sorts, so I just take a percentage of the products which are delivered directly to my customers, so I can't speak about this with regards to cashing out from a vendor's perspective. I'd be buying them mostly as gifts for family and high-value customers. Its surprising what a difference a gift as opposed to a simple discount makes to your relationship with a customer! :)
This will certainly suit some people, no doubt about that, but for me personally the difference in price is just a little too high.
@cache:
I think the fees for higher value items are lower than 10%, somewhere around 3% (check the forums for the actual figure, I'm lazy! :P) Your offer would definitely appeal to some though, and it certainly negates the need for the extra hoops of ID and virtual office services etc. The convenience factor alone of buying straight from SR with the BTC in their accounts certainly could, at the right price, provide enough incentive for vendors to make a number of small purchases throughout the year.
- grahamgreene
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Yes, I need to check the new rates as this was mainly top-of-the-head type thinking.
I am hoping that it will appeal to those looking to just get a few coins here and there to build up a nest egg rather than dealers looking to cash out £10k/week.
I do believe this is a viable process, and it is potentially a simple way of getting a little stash for a rainy day without the Inland Revenue knowing about it.
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The new fee structure is nice and complicated isn't it?
From what I think I have understood it is tiered in a similar way to our income tax, so you pay 10% on the first $50 and then progressively smaller percentages until you are paying 1.5% on any amount over $1000.
Based on that 1oz Krugerrands would be in the region of £1250 approximately.
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That is how I had it worked out too, I came to the same amount for $100.
You are right about hedging, I cannot make my mind up. The way things are at the moment with the rates I do not think it is worth it, but a sharp drop could wipe out my profit very easily. It would be interesting to know how many vendors actually use hedging.