Goldbugs undeterred by price volatility

By Sophia Grene
“Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owner a counterfeit pile of paper.”
Although Ayn Rand's views may be an extreme version, there are enough goldbugs of varying degrees of intensity to have pushed both the price of gold and the tide of money flowing into gold investment products to notable highs.
“The most direct gold you can buy is coins or bars,” says Daniel Sacks, who manages Investec Asset Management's Global Gold and Precious Metals fund. “Coin purchases are picking up a lot.”
Buying gold coins may be the most satisfying for investors anticipating the end of the world as we know it, since they are tangible and portable, but it is an expensive business.
First, there is a premium over the price of the gold, currently around 15 per cent, according to Mr Sacks, and then there is the cost of insurance and storage of the gold, unless you simply bury it in the woods behind your cabin.
For investors who want to buy gold but not have to deal with the practicalities of storage, asset managers have been very happy to provide options. The most straightforward, and in recent months extremely successful (in terms of asset gathering) is the exchange traded fund.
The first gold ETF was launched in Australia in 2002, according to Hector McNeill of ETF Securities. Gold Bullion Securities, a joint venture with the World Gold Council, was backed by physical gold, bars of bullion sitting in a vault.
Graham Tuckwell, who set it up, subsequently moved base to the UK, where he set up ETF Securities and a European sister for GBS.
However, because the fund allows for physical delivery of the gold if the investor is so inclined, it was not eligible for a number of tax and regulatory benefits in various European jurisdictions. In addition to this, ETF Securities saw only one third of the revenue from the fund, because it was a joint venture.
“So we created our own fund, ETFS Physical Gold,” says Mr McNeill. “It's almost identical but has some slight differences.” Those differences are largely in its treatment by regulatory authorities, although its annual management charge at 0.39 per cent is one basis point lower.
Other asset managers around the world have been quick to spot an opportunity for asset gathering. In the US the SPDR Gold Shares ETF, launched in 2004, has been one of the fastest growing ETFs in a highly competitive field. In the Middle East, Dubai Gold Securities launched a sharia compliant vehicle, also backed by gold bullion.
Swiss asset manager Julius Baer has a nice gimmick to attract the more paranoid investors in its year-old gold ETF. “There is a webcam in the store. When you buy the ETF, you get an access code, so you can log on and see your gold,” says Stefan Angele, head of investment management at Julius Baer.
“People are very worried about the fiscal situation. They want to go back to the gold standard because they don't trust central banks,” he suggests, referring to Switzerland's recent decision to intervene in the market in an attempt to weaken the franc.
It is not obvious, however, that investors are thinking that clearly. “It's about emotion,” says Mr Angele. Mr McNeill is more blunt: “People who trade gold are the most paranoiac on the planet.”
The emotion and the investment strategy can combine in odd ways, though. While the bulk of the money in gold ETFs seems to be going into physically backed funds, a number of investors prefer the futures based fund from ETF Securities, or the exchange traded note launched last month by Lyxor.
“We have around $130m in ETFS Gold, compared with $7bn in the three physical funds,” says Mr McNeill.
These vehicles invest in derivatives, supported by collateral invested in short-term fixed income instruments. They may offer exposure to the gold price, but they are also deeply involved in the financial system goldbugs are mostly attempting to avoid, as well as having extra charges to manage the collateral. The Lyxor ETN, for example, currently costs over 100 basis points, due to the high cost of collateral management.
“There are some investors who just like to track an index. I don't know why,” says Mr McNeill. Other motivations are even more obscure, he says.
“We once had a guy turn up asking for a prospectus. He said he liked the ETFS Gold because it was under $10 a share and he liked stocks that were under $10.”
Investors less in thrall to the glister of gold may still be keen to invest, seeing it as a useful source of diversification, a hedge against inflation or simply a rising asset class. For them, a futures-based ETF might make sense. If they are prepared to put up with even more volatility than the gold price itself, they can allocate money to gold equity funds.
Mr Sacks describes his fund as offering “gearing on the price of gold”, which should lead to it outperforming in the good times and underperforming in the bad. Judging by last year's performance, investors need to be prepared for a rocky ride. After losing more than 50 per cent in the first three quarters of the year, it bounced by 38 per cent in the final three months and is continuing to do well.
Another gold fund manager, Graham Birch of BlackRock, has taken a sabbatical after a rocky year in 2008 when the fund fell 17.4 per cent.
The fund remains popular, with Evy Hambro keeping Mr Birch's seat warm for the rest of the year. Whatever their motivation for investing, it seems gold hunters will continue to ignore the volatility of gold, providing opportunities for asset managers, whether it be physically backed gold ETFs or complex derivative structures taking advantage of gold volatility.

警惕金价波动
作者：英国《金融时报》索菲亚•格利(Sophia Grene)
“当毁灭者出现在人们当中时，他们首先会摧毁金钱，因为金钱是人们的护身符和道德存在的基础。毁灭者夺走黄金，留给主人一堆废纸。”
艾茵•兰德(Ayn Rand)的观点可能比较极端。可现在黄金投资者虽然热情程度各有不同，但合在一起，足以将金价和黄金投资产品的资金流量推向了引人瞩目的高点。
天达资产管理公司(Investec Asset Management)环球黄金和贵金属基金(Global Gold and Precious Metals fund)的经理人石令豪(Daniel Sacks)表示：“你最直接能买到的黄金就是金币或金条。金币销售额正在大幅上升。”
在一些投资者的心中，世界的末日即将来临，购买金币或许最让他们满意，因为金币是有形的、可携带的。不过，这种投资的成本很高。
石令豪指出，首先，目前的黄金价格大约存在15%的溢价。其次，你要支付储藏和保险费用，除非你只是把它埋在树林里小屋后面。
对于那些想购买黄金但不愿应付储藏事宜的投资者来说，资产管理公司非常乐意提供投资选择。最直截了当， 而且在近几个月来成功吸纳了大量资产的产品，就是交易所交易基金(ETF)。
ETF证券公司(ETF Securities)的赫克托•麦克尼尔(Hector McNeill)表示，首只黄金ETF于2002在澳大利亚推出。黄金证券(Gold Bullion Securities, GBS)是由ETF证券公司(ETF Securities)和世界黄金协会(World Gold Council)合资建立，这家企业是以实物黄金（金库内的金条）为基础的。
这家合资企业的创办人格雷厄姆•塔克威尔(Graham Tuckwell)随后将总部搬到了英国，并在那里建立了ETF证券公司和GBS的欧洲姊妹公司。
但是，如果投资者强烈要求， 这只基金允许用黄金实物交割，因此它在许多欧洲管辖区内没有资格享受一些税收和监管优惠。除此之外，因为是合资公司，ETF证券公司只能获得该基金三分之一的收益。
麦克尼尔表示：“因此，我们创办了自己的基金——ETFS Physical Gold。除了一些细微的差别，这两只基金几乎一模一样。”这些差别主要体现在其所享受的监管待遇上，尽管其每年0.39%的管理费用比GBS低了一个基点。
全球其它资产管理公司很快就发现了一个吸纳资产的机会。美国2004年推出的SPDR Gold Shares ETF一直是这个竞争激烈的领域内发展最快的ETF之一。在中东，Dubai Gold Securities推出了一种适合伊斯兰世界的投资工具，这种工具同样是以金条为基础。
瑞士资产管理公司宝盛集团(Julius Baer)使用了一种巧妙手法，吸引了多疑的投资者购买它的一年期黄金ETF。宝盛集团投资管理主管史蒂芬•安格勒(Stefan Angele)表示：“仓库里有一个网络摄像机。当你购买ETF时，你会获得一个存取码，你可以用它登录，察看你的黄金。”
他指出：“人们对财政形势非常担忧。他们想重新回到金本位制，因为他们不相信央行。”他指的是瑞士最近做出决定干预市场，使瑞士法郎贬值。
然而，很难看出投资者是否经过清晰的思考。 安格勒说：“这与情绪有关。” 麦克尼尔更加直言不讳：“买黄金的人是地球上最多疑的人。”
不过，投资者情绪和投资策略可以以非常奇怪的方式结合到一起。尽管投资黄金ETF的巨额资金似乎都流入了实物支持的基金，但实际上，很多投资者偏爱的是ETF证券公司基于期货的基金，或者是领先资产管理公司(Lyxor)上个月推出的交易所交易票据(ETN)。
麦克尼尔表示：“我们的ETFS Gold管理着大约1.3亿美元的资产，而3个实物基金则为70亿美元。”
这些工具投资于衍生品，以投资于短期固定收益工具的抵押品作为支撑。它们可能会带有对金价的风险敞口，但它们也与大多数黄金投资者试图避开的金融体系密切相联，此外，还有管理抵押品的额外费用。举例来说，由于管理抵押品的费用较高，领先资产管理公司ETN目前的价格超过了100个基点。
麦克尼尔表示：“我不知道为什么。有些投资者只是喜欢跟踪指数。”他说，其它的动机更难以解释。
“曾经有一个人向我们要产品简介。他说，他喜欢ETFS Gold的原因是因为它每股的价格低于10美元，而他喜欢低于10美元的股票。”
对金光不那么着迷的投资者可能仍然热衷于投资黄金，他们将其视为一种有用的多元化投资渠道，对抗通胀的保值工具或仅仅作为一种不断升值的资产类别。对于这类人而言，以期货为基础的ETF可能比较适合他们。如果他们准备承受大于金价本身波动的波动性，那么他们可以向黄金股票型基金配置资金。
石令豪形容他的基金提供了一种“与金价连动的装置”，这样，它应该在经济景气时表现优于市场，而在不景气时差于市场。从去年的表现来判断，投资者需要对不确定性有所准备。在去年前三季度亏损了逾50%以后，该基金在最后一季度反弹了38%，并且这种好形势还在继续。
另一位黄金基金经理——贝莱德(BlackRock)的格雷厄姆•伯奇(Graham Birch)在经历了不稳定的2008年后去休假了，该年他的基金下跌了17.4%。
这只基金仍然很受追捧，因为韩艾飞(Evy Hambro)将在今年接下来的时间里履行伯奇的职责。不管投资者的投资动机是什么，黄金追逐者看起来仍会继续忽视黄金的波动性。无论是就实物支撑型的黄金ETF，还是利用黄金波动性的复杂衍生品结构而言，这都将会为各个黄金管理公司提供机遇。
译者/董琴
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