Gold has always held a very important position in matters of finance and a nation’s economic well-being. Gold has always been considered an asset. Women from centuries have held on to their jewelry and passed on their asset and the related wisdom to generations. Gold has been used as currency, remains a financial asset for banks and nations and a personal asset for individuals.

Picture this. You have gold bullions worth millions. Wouldn’t you be worried about the safety of your hard-earned fortune? You may spend sleepless nights over the security of your gold. In case you need money, selling them will not be very easy given that you will need to transact in bullions and not in a smaller unit. Wouldn’t it be easier dealing with some papers than enormous bars of the precious metal?

More and more people are being inclined towards investing in gold mining stocks than gold bullions. This article will discuss why you should buy gold mining stocks than gold bullions.

It is important that you consider certain factors before investing. You need thorough knowledge and understanding of mining to invest in gold mining stocks. Mining risks account for more volatility in the prices of stocks as compared to that of its physical counterpart, the gold bullion.

Easy trading: Wise investors usually hold a balanced portfolio of gold mining stocks and gold bullions, thus taking a calculated approach to gold investment. However, when it comes to the ease of gold trading, the stocks hold a much stronger place as against gold bullions. Gold mining stocks enable easy buying and selling in the market.

Reduced costs: Holding gold bullions will require you to spend a considerable sum in insuring the precious metal. Having gold stocks, on the other hand, does away with this high cost factor.

Fewer complications: Investing in gold mining stocks makes life simpler for you in the sense that you do not need to worry about the quality of gold involved. You will no longer have to test the purity of gold you own because your gold will now be in stocks not in bullions.

No storage issues: With gold bullions, you always have to worry about safe and secure storage for your gold. You also need to spend a large amount of money for the safety and storage of your gold. Investing in gold mining stocks does away with your storage concerns.

Easier transactions: While holding gold bullions makes it difficult to transact in any denomination, you can transact in the smallest unit of gold with gold mining stocks.

Easier resale: The resale price of gold bullions is usually less. Gold mining stocks do not suffer from this limitation.

Experts believe that an investment in gold mining stocks will reap higher returns than an equivalent investment in tangible gold. Though risky, gold mining stocks are considered to be worth investing in. It has been observed that the profits of mining companies are increasing at a more rapid pace than the prices of the products they are mining.

A great way to get into the precious metals craze going on right now is to look towards mining and producing companies dealing with precious metals such as gold. One of those gold mining stocks is Agnico-Eagle Mines Limited (NYSE:AEM) located out of Toronto, ON. At the time of this writing AEM was trading at just over $70 per share with a market capitalization of $10 billion.

AEM produces gold through it’s gold mining operations located in northwestern Quebec as well as mine construction projects in that same location. Agnico-Eagle is also mine construction projects located in Finland and Mexico with exploration operations in all of those countries as well as the United States.

Over the past year the companies stock as increased 86% fueled no doubt by the huge climb in gold prices. The company claims large potential for growth through press releases found on it’s website where Agnico-Eagle boasts that its largest mine is the 100% owned LaRonde mine. LaRonde is Canada’s largest gold deposit in terms of reserves. This has allowed AEM to have low operating costs and provide the company with other previous metals such as silver, zinc, and copper which are byproducts of the mine. Development at LaRonde is expected to keep the mine going through 2020.

Other gold mines the company is constructing hope to add to this growth and include Kittila in Finland and Meadowbank, Lapa, and Goldex in Canada. From 2006 to 2007 Agnico increased it’s gold reserves by 33% and looks to increase those reserves by 5 five over the next 2 years. They also are looking to produce over 350,000 more ounces of gold this year than they did in the previous year.

Their stock, however, appears to show this growth already factored into the price as it trades at a P/E ratio of 69. Is this a case of investors loving the stock because of it’s potential growth, or investors joining the bandwagon of buying gold in a bull precious metals market.

Recently we discussed the iShares ETF IAU which is a gold trust ETF like the silver trust ETF SLV. Now here’s another one that, if you’re into ETFs, you may be interested in. It’s called streetTRACKS Gold Trust (GLD).

Like IAU and SLV, GLD buys and stores gold and allows investors to buy a share of the gold it owns. The price basically tracks the price of gold per ounce at about 1/10th the value of an ounce of gold. Fees are taken off for running the fund, which is the reason for not tracking the price exactly.

Currently, the precious metals market has been taking off as investors try and find a safer place to put their money than the stock market. If you want to buy gold, rather than buy gold bullion, you can purchase gold through the ETF and take advantage of long term capital gains tax benefits. If you buy gold bars or coins you’ll need to pay full capital gains taxes.

These are just some of the advantages that buying gold through ETFs such as IAU and GLD can offer.

If you want to get into gold and you don’t want have gold bullion collecting dust in the corner of your safe deposit box, then an iShares electronically traded fund might be the way to go for you. With iShares IAU ETF you can own a fractional ownership of gold held by the iShares Gold Trust.

Rather than own large sums of gold you own roughly 1/10th an ounce of gold per share you own in the iShares trust. And the best part is, you can trade these easily from your regular stock trading account. This means if you buy and hold you can take advantage of long term capital gains rules rather than taking the sale of a gold bar as a fully taxed gain, as you would do if you owned gold bars.

Some people say they want to be able to hold the gold, but those same people don’t realize that when they buy stock in a company they have nothing to hold, so why not do the same with buying gold. The ETF IAU will allow you to own a piece of a precious metal that has historically held it’s value. And with the spread of wealth around the world increasing, demand for gold can only go up (or so we think).

Buying gold now during this volatile time period may be risky, but if you hold long enough, we imagine that owning an ETF like IAU will prove to be very valuable, and easy to trade.