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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Rono, post: 2349623, member: 6492&quot;]Howdy,</p><p><br /></p><p>Generally, you don&#039;t want to borrow from your 401(k) although there are exceptions such the adoption of a child as you mentioned.&nbsp; Yes, you pay interest to yourself, but you lose the compounding of your larger balance AND, should you lose your job with an outstanding loan, you MUST pay it back, ASAP or be taxed and penalized on the outstanding loan amount.&nbsp; (pauses to shudder). </p><p><br /></p><p>Also, when you&#039;re employed and contributing to the 401(k) via work, you are limited to the choices they offer.&nbsp;&nbsp; Your choices are not nearly as bad as I have seen.&nbsp; First, check with your employer/administrator to see if they offer a &#039;brokerage&#039; option.&nbsp;&nbsp; If not, lobby for one.&nbsp;&nbsp; Many of the better plans offer a brokerage option for a modest fee.&nbsp; My civil service system 401(k) and 457 both offered the option for $50 per year.&nbsp; I was able to trade online.&nbsp; This would STILL not permit you to purchase physical bullion but you could get very close.&nbsp; I&#039;ll talk about investment choices in a minute.</p><p><br /></p><p>With regard to your 401(k), you absolutely must match and reap any employer match that you&#039;re offered.&nbsp; That is Rule 1.&nbsp; Rule 2, is additional &#039;retirement monies&#039; available to invest should go to a Roth IRA until you reach its annual limits ($5K - $6.5K depending upon age).&nbsp; Monies beyond this go into taxable accounts.</p><p><br /></p><p>Note, that for folks that have legacy 401&#039;s with previous employers, I would highly recommend transferring them to a Rollover IRA account.&nbsp; Over time, you can consolidate them in account.&nbsp; I also would highly recommend moving it to a full service No Load mutual fund family such as Price, Fidelity or Vanguard.&nbsp; You can buy their funds or via their brokerages services individual stocks.&nbsp; It all makes life easier.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Now, when you are able to buy securities, investing in precious metals becomes a lot of fun.&nbsp; There are mutual funds that almost exclusively invest in gold and silver mining stocks.&nbsp; Indeed, most pm mutual funds ONLY invest in mining stocks.&nbsp; For bullion, you can invest in ETFs such as GLD and SLV, but YOUR GAINS ARE TAXED AT 28% because the &#039;blue meanies&#039; consider bullion to be a collectible.&nbsp; Your gains on a mutual fund are taxed at 15% (long term).&nbsp; An exception for the cute is Central Fund of Canada CEF which is a closed end fund investing in gold and silver bullion at ~55/45, respectively.&nbsp; And, at this point in time, it is being taxed at 15%.&nbsp; What this means is that within your 401, or IRA or whatever tax deferred or exempt account, you keep your bullion ETF&#039;s.&nbsp; Never, ever put a bullion ETF in a taxable account. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>With individual stocks, you can get crazy like me.&nbsp;&nbsp; There are large cap and small cap miners in both gold and silver.&nbsp; For me, I&#039;ve always found the maximum leverage with be with junior silver miners.&nbsp; However, this is nose bleed stuff, and not recommended for the faint at heart.&nbsp; &nbsp; Again, I particularly like to play with these in an tax exempt or deferred account.&nbsp; Makes life easier.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now all this said, I still prefer that folks keep their &#039;bullion&#039; stash in the form of physical bullion.&nbsp; By stash, I&#039;m referring to what I consider to be a core holding of 5-7% of precious metals within everyone&#039;s wealth portfolio.&nbsp;&nbsp; This is your security blanket, if will.&nbsp; My grandkids have stuffed animals they call their bed buddies.&nbsp; Well, my stash is my bed buddy.&nbsp; I like hands on possession.&nbsp; Too many ways to do it safely - safe, safe deposit box, jewelry, etc.&nbsp; Cripes, a tube of 20 AGE&#039;s is about 2&quot; tall and the size of a quarter and is worth ~$25,000 and you can hide it in the oatmeal box. </p><p><br /></p><p>BTW, right now I have beginning momentum investing plays in the juniors riding SLV, EXK, AG, GPL, and ASM.&nbsp; They&#039;ve been running great, but we&#039;ll see about the open and how they drop.&nbsp; &nbsp; I might be pulling the plug.</p><p><br /></p><p>Good luck,</p><p><br /></p><p>peace,</p><p><br /></p><p>rono[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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