Why did it do this? “Because we can,” the mint said on its website.

The Royal Canadian Mint displays one of its new 100-kg, pure gold bullion coins.
(Canadian Press/Tom Hanson)

The coin is the size of a “very thick pizza” — 50 centimetres wide and three centimetres thick — and is .99999 pure.

It was originally meant to be a one-off novelty item to help promote the other gold coin the mint unveiled Thursday — a new line of one-ounce Maple Leaf bullion coins that will have a face value of $200.

But after several interested buyers came forward, the mint decided to produce “a very limited quantity” of the $1-million coins on a made-to-order basis for public sale.

Even though the big coin has a face value of $1 million, it won’t sell for that. At current prices, the coin’s 3,215 troy ounces of gold are worth well over $2 million.

A mint spokesperson said the coins will sell for between $2.5 million and $3 million. So far, the mint has received confirmed orders for five coins.

The Royal Canadian Mint faces international competition from a variety of other countries that also make gold coins.

The company said 800 “criminal intruders” were trying to steal ore from the mine when police were called. It says the thieves attacked the police with machetes, rocks and hammers.

African Barrick said the police have increased their presence in the area and are investigating. The company has also started its own review.

“Although full details are yet to be confirmed, African Barrick Gold sincerely regrets any loss of life or injury on or near its mine sites,” the company said in a statement.

“The company will continue to support the government and the community in their efforts to improve law and order and security in the North Mara region.”

The company said the incident had no material impact on operations.

Produced about 213,000 ounces in 2010

The company said 1,753 people worked at the mine at the end of last year including 829 African Barrick employees and 924 contractors.

North Mara produced about 213,000 ounces of gold in 2010.

Bullion reached an all time high of $1,575.79 US an ounce on May 2 after gaining 30 per cent in 2010. June gold was closed Tuesday on the New York Mercantile Exchange at $1,480.00 US, down $10.60.

The mine is situated in the Tarime district of Mara region in northwest Tanzania, approximately 100 kilometres east of Lake Victoria and 20 kilometres south of the Kenyan border.

Barrick Gold, the world’s largest gold miner, holds a roughly 74 per cent stake in African Barrick, which owns the company’s former mines in Tanzania.

Shares in African Barrick, which trade in London, closed down 5.75 per cent at 4.69 pounds Tuesday.

You can buy physical gold in the form of gold bullion bars, contemporary gold coins (gold bullion coins), numismatic gold coins, and of course gold jewelry. For the purpose of this article we’ll assume that most people are interested in buying gold bullion coins and gold bullion bars. The most popular gold bullion coins are the Canadian Maple Leaf gold coins (1/20 oz, 1/10 oz, 1/4 oz, 1/2 oz, and 1 oz), the South African Krugerrand (22 karat gold), and the American Gold Eagle. Many companies manufacture gold bullion bars worldwide, but one of the most respected producers in the business are Credit Suisse, and Johnson Matthey.

Buying Gold from Online Bullion Dealers

The easiest way to buy physical gold is using an online gold bullion dealer. One of the most reputable online gold bullion dealers is Kitco a Canadian company based in Quebec. In the US you can buy gold online from Blanchard and Company. In Canada you can buy gold coins directly from the Royal Canadian Mint. Before purchasing gold online, make sure that you are dealing with established company with excellent reputation that has been in the gold bullion business for some time. Avoid buying from new/unknown companies or auction sites like eBay – it’s gold you are buying after all.

Buying Gold Locally

You can buy gold from local coin shops as well. When buying locally, again make sure that you are buying from a trustworthy company. In Canada you can order gold bullion and gold coins from some of the big banks, but keep in mind that ordering bullion coins may be subject to tax in Canada.

Things to Consider When Buying Physical Gold

If you buy physical gold you will have to store it somewhere. Keeping the gold in your house entails some risks, and if you don’t feel comfortable doing that you might want to consider getting a safety deposit box. Owning physical gold is not for everybody, so think twice before making decision to buy or not to buy. If you decide to buy physical gold consult your financial advisor and accountant and ask them about possible implications of owning physical gold (suitable investment portfolio allocation, tax reporting, etc.).

The rest of us use those prices as reference points to set prices to buy or sell gold in less pure forms and much smaller quantities. When you buy a piece of jewellery at a jeweller, you will typically pay 6 to 10 times the market value of the gold because someone had to make the jewellery and sell it to the store, then the store has costs and everyone needs to make a living.

When you are selling a piece of jewellery at the end of its useful life you can expect to get somewhat less than the intrinsic value of the gold, because the quantity is small and the gold is not pure. The question is: how much less and what is fair?

For most jewellery a good dealer will pay about 75% of the intrinsic gold value. You may get a little less if the piece is very low karat like 8 or 9 karat which is less than 1/3 gold, and you may get more if the piece is high karat like 22 karat which is over 90% gold.

Pure gold bars typically attract 90% or even 95% of their intrinsic gold value, because they are pure and there will be no refinery costs.

If you have chunk of silver articles like tea sets, spoons, forks, silver coins, silver ingots, silver wafers and a mix of them to give away in selling you should know an approximate value you can gain based on the spot price. When your deal with reliable silver buyers, they tell you the facts straight; however, it is better you learn how to do it yourself to ensure you know you are getting the right price for your metal. Know the difference between single assay purity and multiple assay purity standards as well.

It is a standard practice to look for brand and fineness marks in silver bars, silver wafers, and silver coins.  If you have procured them form reliable sellers, you can be sure that it represents the quality printed on the bars; however, if there are not reliable brand marks of certificates even refiners require the bars, wafers and ingots to be tested.

In cases of sterling silver dinnerware or gift items you need to look for similar marks and again you cannot be sure that the seller has made the silver exactly like quality marks printed on it.  There are likely to be minor differences in fineness. In several countries, most silver articles do not have any precious metal marks at all.

Silver is tested with nitric acid and it is worth the effort you put in to learn how to test the quality of silver.  You need to be careful when you test your metals with acids because most of them burn the skin.  Ensure you wear gloves and precautionary glasses before you before you open the acid bottle for testing.

When you perform the acid test with silver, the spot you drop the acid shows up color and the purity of silver is decided accordingly:

• Turns in to cream color, then you can be sure the metal is high quality silver.  This is the case with sterling silver.
• If the silver coin turns out to be black then you can be sure that the silver alloy is that which is to make coins.
• If the metal turns green then it means it has high amounts of copper in it.
• When the nitric acid spot shows up a gold color, then it means the metal has lot of brass mixed in it.

Buy early

1. Luxury
One of the 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry is due to the increase in luxury consumers. Antique gold jewelry is a luxury item. Luxury consumers buy luxury items, right?

Sixty percent of the world’s population resides in the countries extending from Afghanistan to the micro-states of Oceania.

That makes more than one billion new Chinese, Middle-Eastern and India luxury consumers who know the value of buying gold in the form of recession proof, portable, miniature work of arts.

Many people from many third world countries know that investing in gold as opposed to fiat currencies offers more security. Experience has taught them the hard way, that fiat money is only as good as the value we place on it.

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Take for example, the emerging Asian-Markets and the impact the unprecedented growth will have on the luxury market and the gold market in the years to come.

2. Marketing Fraud
There are a growing number of commercial jewelry websites selling gold jewelry and diamond alternatives that are fraudulent, using confusing descriptions such as:

perfect man-made diamonds
lab created diamonds
imitation diamonds
man made diamonds
alternative diamonds
synthetic diamonds

Some of the better lab created diamonds are moissanite diamonds. This substance, which didn’t come on the market until 1998, so closely resembles a diamond that even experts have a hard time telling the two stones apart without a special instrument.

Synthetic moissanite diamonds fool electric diamond testers by erroneously indicating “diamond”! Moissanite sells for about one-tenth the price of diamonds.

Diamond imitations have been made for hundreds of years, but nothing as convincing as what you see around today.

A girl’s best friend isn’t the only gemstone to keep you up at night wondering if it’s faithful to its original natural properties over time or a synthetic diamond cooked up in a lab overnight.

Read the story about a visitor to this web-site who is trying to determine if her very large 40 cts of color -change gemstone is indeed an authentic alexandrite gemstone or a crafty siberian imposter.

Another one of the top 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry is because if the diamonds are the original, you’ve acquired an antique diamond in addition with the old gold store of value.

3. Time
But one of the best 10 reasons to invest in gold antique is because it has a strong track record over time, and we’re talking about thousands of years of time which could be the case for heirloom pieces.

Investing in antique gold is as old as the hills and much older than stocks and shares and fiat currency markets. Gold antique has stood the test of time and this is another one of 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry.

Tips on How To Invest Money In Jewelry.

Another one of the top 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry is that in the past, buying and selling fine antique jewelry was conducted mostly in private and many antique jewelry dealers like it that way.

As the current global melt-down escalates, gold’s holding its own, the performance of gold is unmatched. When you invest in Gold antique jewelry your money is safer than paper dollars.

4. Recession-Proof
Another one of the top 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry is because it’s recession proof. Keeping assets in the bank means one gets a paltry interest rate (if that) which gets eaten up with bank charges and inflation as each year the dollar is worth less than the year before.

Antique gold jewelry does not hit you with bank charges and is not subject to inflation. With inflationary scenarios investors need an asset class with a relatively fixed supply that will at least increase with inflation and is likely to attract speculative demand as a consequence.

Precious metals achieves this with low annual production in relation to total supply, and converts into currency as fiat currencies lose their value.

As for investing in Natural Pearls; – well, don’t hold your breathe. A strand of Natural Pearls are more rare and valuable than any of the other types of pearls put together, even the Tahitian black pearls.

5. Higher Melt-Down Price than New Gold
Another one of 10 reasons to invest in Antique gold jewelry, is due to the fact that Antique gold has a higher melt-down price. Most people don’t consider the melt-down price, (scrap-value) of their Antique gold jewelry. But did you know that high-quality Antique gold jewelry has a higher retail price above the spot gold price than gold bullion?

Look at Platinum, popular in jewelry from the early 20th century. But platinum is very expensive today and New platinum jewelry may be made of metal that’s only – 58.5% platinum!

When you invest in gold and platinum Antique jewelry your risk of being duped is significantly reduced.

6. Transportable
Good things come in small sizes and gold jewelry is one of them. You can wear gold, and you know exactly where your wealth is when you are wearing it yourself.

Gold facts are: Au, or gold, has the periodic number of 79, a boiling point of 2,856°C or 5,173°F, a standard atomic weight of 196.966569 g/mol and is metallic yellow in appearance.

On the other hand, the gold market can be extremely shadowy with unsavory characters lurking in murky places attempting to place risky barriers between owners and their gold.

There are basically 3 ways of buying gold and when you buy physical gold jewelry you get to see, wear and pick your investment yourself.

7. a Historical Value
Even if you buy gold antique jewelry, not intended for your own personal use, they will be appreciated for their historical value, either way, and will be increasing in value.

7. b Heirloom Value
The heirloom factor is another great one of ten reasons to invest in gold. Premier Antique jewelry is the perfect gift between family members and gives great pleasure and sentimental value and shows you care.

8. Fashionable
One of the 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry over other forms of investment, is the simple fact that it can still be put to its original purpose, that being to complement beauty and fashion.

Women like knowing they can put their investment where they can see it. Wearing a dress make out of stocks, bonds and gold certificates, would look more than a bit tacky, right?

9. Time is Right to Invest in Gold!

One of the 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry is because of the price of gold.

The point is, it’s still relatively undervalued, which basically means it’s a good time to be buying gold before it goes over the roof.

So if gold in the future were to reach a $6,255 gold price, (this is not impossible) the inflation between now and then would require gold to reach an even higher price to equal the purchasing power it had in January 1980.

10. The Internet

The internet has changed the rules of conducting jewelry investing and collecting forever and it is this reason which is our final 10 reasons to invest in gold jewelry; investors and collectors can now fairly securely buy jewelry online from retailers they trust, and they need not even leave their homes.

Admittedly, it is not always easy to get into the market for gold coins. After all, gold is expensive, so coins made from gold are going to be pretty pricey. However, there are usually several weights available, so you will be able to find something that will fit your price range. However, when looking for gold coins, it is usually fairly easy to find a dealer. Many coin dealers are attached to the gold coin market and, if they cannot sell them to you directly, they will be able to connect you with someone who can.

There are also several internet merchants who offer gold coins, but it is a good idea to be careful when shopping online. After all, there are a lot of proper merchants out there, but there are also a lot of shady folks looking to make some quick money. So, before purchasing online, do some research and check the vendors out thoroughly. Be especially careful of anyone selling coins for prices that are lower than the market value for gold. This is a case where anything that seems too good to be true absolutely is too good to be true, because nobody is going to sell you anything at a loss – especially not a commodity like gold.

Of course, because gold is a commonly bought and sold commodity, the value of your gold coins can be tracked easily. The price can be found online, in the newspapers, and on the evening news. And, because the prices of gold coins are tied to the price of the gold that it contains, you don’t have to worry about the coin market itself. While collectible coins may have upswings and downswings, gold not only increases in value over time, but it also tends to keep its value very well. Which means that gold coins are a way to stabilize your investments as you place your money into a very tangible resource.

When looking for a solid investment that does not require a great deal of knowledge and research, gold coins are a very good place to start. They are easy to find, their value is easy to determine, and they are steady, reliable investments that will hold their value better than almost anything else. And, let’s face it, gold coins are just plain neat to look at. So, if you are looking for a tangible, sturdy investment that is not only valuable, but attractive as well, gold coins will make you happy every time.

On a year-on-year basis, the average cash cost for gold mines escalated by 13%, from $551/oz in Q1 10. The average gold price in Q1 11 of $1,387/oz ensured gold miners continued to enjoy huge margins between the average cash cost of production and the gold price, with the difference nowhere more notable than in Latin America where it stood at $891/oz.

Notably, since the weak US dollar has contributed to higher cash costs in gold producing countries, in North America the difference between the average cash cost and average gold price in Q1 2011 was $841/oz.

The growing middle class in India and China has been mentioned as one reason why demand for gold has been growing; jewelry is, after all, the biggest use for gold.

Traditionally, weakness in the exchange value of the U.S. dollar has also been bullish for gold prices and the dollar weakened dramatically against a wide basket of currencies throughout 2007, reaching an all-time low against the euro and a 31-year low against the Canadian loonie.

When prices fall dramatically, analysts look for signs that central banks are selling off their gold reserves. Many countries have been doing that. The Bank of Canada, for example, has sold most of its gold reserves and held just $78 million US worth as of September 2007. But recently, the wider demand for gold has offset central bank selling as the weak U.S. currency had investors rushing into gold.

Gold has long been a traditional hedge against inflation and demand for gold tends to pick up when inflation does.

And some price movements may simply be due to speculation from short-term traders who notice big price swings in either direction and want to join what they see as a bandwagon.

Investors are left wondering whether the next climb or plunge is just around the corner, followed by years of stagnant returns.

Should I buy gold and if so, how can I get some?

Financial planners generally advise their clients who want a stake in gold to keep their precious metals holdings to a small part of their overall portfolio – at most five or 10 per cent.

There are many ways to acquire gold. You can buy gold coins, gold wafers or bars, or gold certificates.

• Gold Coins: A number of countries mint gold coins. Britain has been producing sovereigns for centuries. Austria, China, the U.S. and Mexico also produce gold coins. South Africa has produced its Krugerrand coins since 1967. Canada joined the gold rush in 1979 with its Maple Leaf gold coin. At .9999, it’s the purest gold coin in the world. It’s available in six denominations from 1/20th of an ounce up to one ounce. There is a small premium charged on the gold value of the coins. Maple Leaf coins are available from the Royal Canadian Mint, some coin dealers and some banks. Be aware that some Canadian gold coins are aimed at collectors and sell for considerably more than their gold value. So if you just want a coin for the gold content alone, buy Gold Maple Leaf coins. No GST is charged on gold coins if they are refined to a purity of at least 99.50 per cent. But some provinces charge sales tax on gold coin sales.
• Gold wafers and bars: There’s nothing quite like the sensation of tossing around a 400-ounce gold bar. Banks can sell you bars and wafers ranging from 1 ounce to 400 ounces for a small premium over the spot gold price. Most financial institutions will also rent safety deposit boxes to store your golden haul.
• Gold certificates: You can also own gold in certificate form. Most banks can issue paper certificates that are backed by the bank’s assets. There are no fabrication, shipping or insurance costs and no sales tax to pay. They can be sold easily or exchanged for physical bullion. They are made out of paper.

You can also invest in companies that mine gold. There are dozens of gold companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Some of the biggest Canadian companies for example are Barrick Gold, Kinross and Goldcorp. International gold mining giants include Newmont Mining, AngloGold Ashanti and Gold Fields Ltd.

There are dozens of precious metals mutual funds that will give investors a stake in a variety of companies that mine gold and other precious metals.