If you’re looking for some more exciting ways to manage your finances, we’ve got you covered! The newest addition to iCard Digital Wallet expands your opportunities to invest in cryptocurrencies and precious metals. If your billing country is Italy, Romania, France, Spain, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Sweden, Czech Republic, Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Portugal, or Slovenia – you can enrich your financial portfolio on another level.
Let’s unveil the first steps of precious metals investments, which are at your disposal thanks to our partnership with Bitpanda!
Precious metals as assets
Precious metals are known to maintain or increase their value in times of market volatility, thus are considered as the safe haven of investments. Gold (XAU) is the most popular precious metal and so far, the most reliable – its background as being highly preferred by humans throughout history comes from its durability, and its value is determined by the market on a daily basis. If you’re looking for other opportunities to invest, it’s safe to say it isn’t the only asset that flickers under the sun and reflects on your financial future. Feel free to choose among silver, platinum, and palladium for your investments, too.
Silver (XAG) is even more widely used than gold and its price depends on the metal’s application rate for various industry purposes (e.g. production of solar cells, air conditioning, batteries, jewellery). For this reason, it can be more volatile, but it has become more attractive to investors recently.
Platinum (XPT) is even rarer to find than other precious metals, but it’s essential to many industries and tends to have a pretty high price. It’s used for fuel cells, neurosurgical and dental tools, drugs for cancer treatment, and computer equipment, and is one of the least reactive metals. Platinum’s value depends on supply and demand, and geopolitical conditions. Nevertheless, it’s a useful investment when the economy is unstable.
The newest, but the most valuable metal is palladium (XPD). Although it’s not associated with wealth and exclusivity, it’s often preferable due to its various uses and high durability. It’s used as a substitute for platinum in jewellery, electrical contacts, and catalytic converters. Palladium’s price can depend on the global economy.
Preparation for investing in precious metals
Needless to say, research is the most essential step before you start investing. Also, being aware of the overall market volatility and uncertainty can minimise the risks in your investing, yet assets like the precious metals are likely to continue keeping up their reputation of safe havens, so this can put you at ease a bit.
Whether you want to stack a rich portfolio or you still feel unsure about any big investments – you have various options! With iCard, you can start with as little as €1 and you can become the legal owner of specific shares of a precious metal. All the assets are physically-backed and are stored in a high-security bullion market vault in Switzerland. Keep in mind there are certain storage fees, which are deducted from your investment account on a weekly basis, but they only apply if your portfolio holds more than 20 g of gold, platinum, or palladium, or more than 200 g of silver. The standard weekly storage fees are as follows:
- 0.0125% for gold
- 0.025% for silver, platinum, and palladium
Get to know the transaction fees, too:
Buying:
- 0.5% for gold
- 2.2% for palladium
- 2.5% for silver and platinum
Selling:
- 1% for gold
- 1.8% for palladium
- 2% for silver and platinum
Both fees are determined and required by Bitpanda.
To invest or not to invest?
After you’ve done your research, but before rolling up your sleeves, most probably you’ll ask yourself this question. On the one hand, precious metals are secure and such tangible assets protect your funds in case of a market crash. Investing in gold, silver, platinum, or palladium via iCard alsotakes away your responsibility to go to a trader, buy a metal, store it at home, and then keep wondering if someone will steal it. On the other hand, as any other investment, this one also carries a certain risk.
Several factors like supply and demand, geopolitical issues, economy, and imbalance in the number of buyers and sellers, can drop the metals’ prices. Additionally, as they don’t have any cash flow, precious metals will bring you no income and you have to consider the storage fees that you’d have to cover. Therefore, making your investment decision primarily depends on your financial goals.
How to use the investment module in the iCard app?
Thanks to our newest addition, now your digital wallet has a variety of functionalities. You can find both cryptocurrencies and precious metals when you tap on the “Invest” menu and filter your desired assets. Just like for the cryptocurrencies, you can view lots of information on the metals – their market performance over the past 24 hours/week/month/year, volatility, daily high and low, and market cap. You can also read about each asset’s history and see the total balance of all assets you have.
If you haven’t gone through the mandatory verification process before you start buying or selling, you have to tap on “Get started” and complete your enrolment to start investing.
How to buy?
Just follow these easy steps:
- Open the iCard app and tap on “Invest”.
- Tap on “Buy” and select the asset you want to buy.
- Enter the amount you want to invest and choose the account you want to invest with*.
- Review the details and confirm.
*If you choose an account that’s not in EUR, your funds will be converted into Euros with the respective exchange rate.
Now let’s take a look at an example:
- The price of 1 XAU is 58.3657 EUR. You planned an investment of 100 EUR, which will be withdrawn from your iCard account and which includes the fee that is 0.5% of the total amount. This makes your investment amount equal to approximately 1.7047 XAU and you will be buying 99.5 EUR worth of gold. Now you own a piece of physical gold, which is securely stored by Bitpanda.
How to sell?
All you have to do is:
- Open the iCard app.
- Select an amount to sell (either in EUR or the asset itself).
- Review the details and confirm.
Check this example of selling:
- You want to sell 100 EUR worth of gold and 1 XAU is 58.3657 EUR. With the 1% fee for selling, the amount that will be withdrawn from your account is 101 EUR. It will cover the 1% fee for selling but you will eventually receive the amount of gold you want to sell for 100 EUR, which equals approximately 1.7133 XAU. Once you sell an asset, the money from the transaction goes back to your account, and you can use it again with your iCard Digital Wallet, as you usually do.
Final steps
Before you leave the blog, keep in mind it’s essential that you look for professional investment advice and determine your financial goals before you start investing. Also, you should learn how to recognise scams – remember that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Make sure you never share any details in suspicious calls or messages, don’t claim any investment offers that seem too good to be true, and double-check everything you receive.
Download iCard and enjoy investing:
