Silver is up over 120% in the past year. Gold has run from $2,000 US an ounce to over $4,500. Platinum has broken out of a 13-year downtrend. The precious metals bull market is well underway, and a lot of Australians are asking the same question for the first time: how do I get involved?

Why Precious Metals Right Now

The short version is this. US debt is sitting at $39 trillion, which is 130% of GDP. It is mathematically unpayable. Inflation is structural and it is getting worse, not better. And interest rates cannot be raised above the real rate of inflation without collapsing the system entirely. If the average Australian mortgage holder had to service a 15% interest rate today, the whole thing falls apart. So rates stay suppressed, inflation keeps running, and the purchasing power of your dollars keeps eroding.

The big money already knows this. Central banks around the world have been dumping US treasuries and replacing them with gold for years. This is not retail sentiment. This is sovereign wealth moving at scale, and it is the single most important signal in the precious metals market right now.

The last time inflation was this persistent was the 1970s. Gold went from $35 an ounce in 1971 to $850 in 1980. That is a 24x return in nine years. Silver went from just over $1 an ounce to $50 in the same period. A 50x return. I am not predicting those exact numbers again. What I am saying is that the macro conditions driving those moves are more present today than they have been at any point since.

The Three-Step Process for Buying Bullion

When someone comes to me looking to buy precious metals for the first time, I walk them through the same three-step process every time. Get these three decisions right and you will set yourself up for the best possible outcome as an investor.

Step 1: Which Metal or Metals Are You Buying?

You have three options: gold, silver, and platinum. Each behaves differently, and understanding that difference matters.

Gold

Gold is the least volatile of the three. It is a slow, steady climb over time. I call it the lowest risk asset in the entire financial universe. It does not move as dramatically as the others, but it does not drop as hard either. If you are older, more conservative, or new to volatility, gold is your anchor.

Silver

Silver is gold on steroids. When the precious metals bull market runs, silver outperforms gold on a percentage basis. When it drops, it drops harder too. The current gold-to-silver ratio is telling you something important: silver is still cheap relative to gold. In 1980, that ratio hit 15, meaning 15 ounces of silver bought one ounce of gold. In 2011, it was 30. If you are buying silver today at a ratio of 60 or above and that ratio compresses back towards historical norms, you are going to make significantly more holding silver than gold. That is not bashing gold. I love gold. But if you put a gun to my head and made me pick one metal, I am picking silver.

Platinum

Platinum is different again. It is not a monetary metal the way gold and silver are. It does not have 5,000 years of history as money and central banks do not stack it. But it is a serious performer, and right now it may be the most interesting of the three from a timing perspective. Gold broke out in 2023. Silver broke out in 2025. Platinum typically follows both with a lag, and it has not broken its all-time highs yet. Platinum was $2,100 to $2,200 an ounce back in 2007 and 2008. It is less than that today. Think about what that means. It is like buying silver before it broke through $50.

My personal portfolio split is 70% silver, 20% platinum, and 10% gold. I am a younger guy and I can stomach the volatility. If you are closer to retirement, you might want to weight more heavily towards gold. But all three have a place, and you can absolutely combine them.

Step 2: Coins or Bars?

This one is straightforward for a first-time investor. Buy bars.

Coins cost more than bars. They have pretty pictures on them. Designers need to be paid. Stamping and artistry cost money. All of that gets passed on to you as the buyer. When you come to sell, I pay you based on the metal value of what you have brought in. I do not care about the picture. I do not pay a premium for it. So if you paid more for a coin on the way in and get the same payout as a bar on the way out, you have made your investment harder for no reason.

Coins do have one advantage: collector value. Certain coins become highly sought after and trade well above the metal price on the secondary market. But you can only capture that premium by selling directly to a collector, not back to a bullion dealer. As a cold hard investor, bars are the answer. Once you have built your stack and want to have some fun with the collector side of things, coins are great. But start with bars.

Step 3: What Size?

Buying the wrong size of bar can bite you when it comes to buying and selling. Buying too large to try and make the purchase price lower, it can bite you when you sell. But buying too small to try and make the seller price high, can also bite you when you sell.

Just before you read this, I would like to clarify that I make the same profit no matter what size you buy. So I'm not financially incentivised to push you in one way over another.

The general rule is that bigger is cheaper per ounce or gram. The same logic as buying a 10kg bag of rice at the supermarket versus a 1kg bag. The per-kilo price is lower when you buy in bulk. The same applies to bullion.

But there is a catch. The biggest size is not always the best buy, because above a certain point you start giving up money on the sell side. Here at Liberty Bullion, the largest sizes I will pay 100% of spot price for are 1oz gold bars, 1kg silver bars, and 1oz platinum bars. Go bigger than that and I will still buy your bullion, but you will get slightly under spot.

To put a real number on it: a 1kg gold bar is worth around $200,000 at current prices. I will pay you 97% of spot for it, which is still a strong price. But that 3% gap is $6,000 you are leaving on the table for no reason. Buy the 1oz gold bar instead, pay the same rate in, and get 100% back out.

The sweet spots are 1oz gold, 1kg silver, and 1oz platinum. Stick to those and you are minimising transaction costs and maximising your outcome on both sides of the trade.

Why I Do Not Suggest ETFs

The most common question I get from first-time buyers is: why not just buy an ETF? It is easier, you do not have to worry about shipping or storage, and you can buy it through your existing brokerage account.

Here is my problem with that.

The custodians of precious metals ETFs are investment banks. JP Morgan. Goldman Sachs. These are the same institutions that have required government bailouts every time the global economy has taken a serious hit. Now think about why you are buying gold and silver in the first place. You are buying them because you think the financial system is under stress. You are buying them as protection against exactly the kind of crisis that has historically brought these banks to their knees. So why would you take counterparty risk with the very institutions that cannot survive the scenario you are protecting against?

There is also a metric worth understanding. Estimates suggest there are around 300 paper contracts outstanding for every single physical ounce of gold held at the exchange. For silver, it is even higher. Think about that. It is musical chairs with 300 people and one chair. I will sell you the chair. But not everyone is going to get one.

On top of the counterparty risk, ETFs charge ongoing management fees. When you buy physical bullion from us, you pay a transaction cost on the way in and that is it. No annual fees. No percentage taken from your account every year. No ongoing charges of any kind. Your bullion is yours. You take it home. The fees stop there.

The Macro Case in Full

I want to make sure you understand the bigger picture before you walk out the door, because the why matters as much as the how.

The US Debt is unpayable

The US is carrying $39 trillion in federal debt. That is 130% of GDP. Australia is at roughly 90% of GDP in national debt, and that is before you count state debt. Victoria alone carries five or six times the state debt per person of California. Then there is corporate debt, consumer debt, mortgage debt. Debt on debt on debt at every level of the system.

Why inflation matters

Here is the trap this creates. To fight inflation, you raise interest rates. But raising rates above the real rate of inflation would make debt servicing impossible at every level. Government, corporate, and consumer. The system cannot handle it. So rates stay suppressed. Inflation keeps running. And the purchasing power of your savings keeps falling.

Sitting in a bank account paying below the real rate of inflation is not saving. It is a guaranteed slow loss. The government will tell you inflation is running at about 3 to 5%. Ask yourself honestly: is that what you are experiencing when you pay your bills? My estimate is closer to 10%.

Gold and silver exist precisely for this environment. Every time inflation has run seriously hot throughout history, they have responded. The 1970s are the clearest example. The macro conditions today are more extreme than they were then.

“In reality there is no such thing as an inflation of prices, relatively to gold. There is such a thing as a depreciated paper currency.” - Lysander Spooner

Where to Store Your Bullion

Once you have bought your bullion, you need to think about where to store it. The answer depends on how much you have.

My rule is this: keep it at home up to what I call your comfort limit. How do you define your comfort limit? If you get a knock at the door at 1am and your first instinct is to reach for your gun rather than answer it, you have got too much bullion at home. At that point, it is time to think about vaulting.

Private vaults are the right answer here, not bank safety deposit boxes. I would never recommend leaving your bullion at a bank. Read the fine print around what a bank can do with the contents of your safety deposit box during periods of financial distress. It is not comfortable reading. In Queensland, we recommend the Reserve Vault. In Melbourne, the Melbourne Vault. The fine print between a private vault and a bank safety deposit box is very different, and it matters a great deal.

"Gold is the money of kings; silver is the money of gentlemen; barter is the money of peasants; but debt is the money of slaves" - Norm Franz

If you are an Australian who has been watching the precious metals market and wondering where to start, the path forward is straightforward. Pick your metals, buy bars, get the right size, take physical possession, and store it sensibly. The three-step process is not complicated. Getting started is the hard part.

Our team at Liberty Bullion is here to help with any of it. Come into the store, give us a call, or jump on the website. We are happy to walk you through it in person.

What a time to be alive.