Selling Gold and Silver in the UK: What Dealers Pay

Most guides to selling gold are written by people who want to buy it from you, and it shows. They lead with the gold price, imply you will get something close to it, and leave the awkward parts until after your parcel is in the post. This one goes the other way round. Here is how a dealer arrives at a number, why that number sits below the headline price, which British coins are treated differently by the tax rules, and the handful of decisions that change what you walk away with.

Five things worth knowing before you sell

• Spot is a reference price for large wholesale trades, not an offer to you. Every dealer quotes a buy price below it and a sell price above it, and the difference is the spread.
• Weight and purity set the floor on bullion. Everything above that floor is a judgement about how easily the item sells on.
• Post-1837 Sovereigns and Britannia gold coins are exempt from Capital Gains Tax as sterling currency. Foreign gold coins are not treated the same way.
• Silver carries VAT when you buy it and you cannot recover that as a private seller, so silver needs a larger move in your favour before a sale breaks even.
• The fastest route out is almost always the one that pays least. If you are not in a hurry, getting more than one quote is the cheapest thing you will ever do.

---

Why the offer is below the price you saw

The number quoted in the news is the spot price: the wholesale price for unallocated metal traded in large sizes between institutions. It is a real price, but it is not a price available to a private seller posting in four coins, and no dealer anywhere pays it.

What exists instead is a two-sided market. BullionVault defines the spread plainly as "the difference between the price offered to you when you want to buy precious metals and the price bid for your bullion when you want to sell", and notes that "bid prices for precious metals are always lower than offers". That is not a quirk of one dealer. It is how every market in every asset works, and gold is among the tighter ones.

What sits inside that gap is worth being specific about, because it is not all margin. Somebody has to verify what you sent is what you say it is. Somebody has to carry the price risk between agreeing your number and selling the metal on. Insured, tracked carriage runs in both directions. And the dealer has to make something, or there is no dealer to sell to next time.

Which suggests a test worth applying to every quote you receive, ours included. An unusually generous offer on a physical item is not a gift. It is a claim that one of those four jobs is being done more cheaply than anybody else manages, and sometimes that is true. More often it means the verification is lighter, the carriage is not insured in both directions, or the number quoted before your parcel arrives is not the number offered after it. The gap is not the enemy. The gap is the work, priced, and a firm willing to say what sits inside it is telling you what it intends to do with your parcel.

Size matters more than sellers expect. The same coin bought in a tube of twenty-five prices better than one loose coin, because the handling cost per item falls. This is the mirror image of the pattern we set out in our guide to buying gold bars in the UK, where the smallest bars carry the highest premium per gram. Small units cost more to buy and fetch proportionally less to sell. That is the same fact seen from both ends.

What actually sets your number

For bullion, the calculation is unglamorous and that is the point: weight, multiplied by purity, multiplied by the market price, less the spread. A one-ounce coin of a known specification needs no debate. The dealer knows what it is, knows it will sell again, and can quote inside a minute.

Purity is expressed in parts per thousand, and UK hallmarking law gives that language its legal footing. Under the Hallmarking Act 1973 it is an offence to describe an item as gold or silver in trade without a mark applied by an official Assay Office, above threshold weights of one gram for gold and 7.78 grams for silver. A mark of 750 means 18 carat gold; 925 means sterling silver. Those marks are how an item stops being "some old jewellery" and starts being a quantity of metal.

If you would rather run that calculation on your own holding before you ask anybody for a number, what is my gold worth takes it step by step, with the Sovereign arithmetic worked through and the hallmark standards set out in full.

Bullion coins and bars sit outside that system, because they carry their own recognised specification and are bought and sold by that specification rather than by a hallmark.

What sells easily, and what needs judging

The dividing line running through that table is verification. Anything a dealer recognises on sight prices fast. Anything requiring a judgement about condition, authenticity or collector appetite takes longer and carries a wider spread, because the person buying it is taking on more risk. That is also why the two most straightforward British coins to sell are the ones covered in Gold Britannia versus Gold Sovereign: both are instantly recognisable, both trade in a deep market, and neither needs a conversation about what it is.

If coins are most of what you hold, selling gold coins in the UK works through them one at a time: what a dealer checks and in what order, which coins move fastest here, and which of yours to part with first.

Where the UK tax rules actually bite

This section is deliberately narrow. Tax treatment depends on your own circumstances and this is not advice, but two rules are specific enough to change which items a seller reaches for first, and both are published by HMRC.

Capital Gains Tax and British coins

HMRC's Capital Gains Manual states that "Sovereigns minted in 1837 and later years and Britannia gold coins are currency but, like all sterling currency, are exempt because of TCGA92/S21 (1)(b)". In plain terms, those coins are treated as sterling currency rather than as an asset that can produce a chargeable gain for UK individuals.

The same manual is equally specific about the coins that are not British. It records that "the chattels exemption does not apply to coins which are non-sterling currency, TCGA92/S262 (6)(b)". A foreign gold coin therefore does not get the chattels treatment that other collectables can, which is a meaningful difference if you hold both and are deciding what to sell.

VAT, and why silver behaves differently

Investment gold that meets the published criteria is exempt from VAT: under HMRC's Notice 701/21 that means bars of a fineness not less than 995 thousandths, and coins of a fineness not less than 900 thousandths or which are legal tender in their country of origin. Silver has no equivalent exemption and is charged at the standard rate of 20 per cent.

For a seller, the consequence is the part that usually goes unmentioned. A private individual selling silver does not charge VAT, but neither can they recover the VAT paid on the way in. It is simply gone. That means silver has to move considerably further in your favour than gold before a purchase and sale round trip breaks even, and it is the single biggest reason silver disappoints people who bought it expecting it to behave like a cheaper version of gold. Silver also has its own selling problems, from the white marks that worry sellers to the difference between a Britannia and an American Eagle, and we take those apart in selling silver in the UK. We set the two metals against each other properly in gold versus silver, and the wider position on UK rules is covered in gold investment in the UK.

How selling to Yard Mint works

Our sell gold and silver page publishes indicative buying rates per gram and per troy ounce, recalculated automatically from our own vaulted product pricing rather than quoted only on request, so you can work out roughly where you stand before you speak to anybody. Treat it as an anchor rather than a settlement: it is a rate for investment grade metal, and form, condition and quantity all move the final figure. The page also states plainly that we buy bullion, meaning coins and bars, and not jewellery or scrap. The form asks what you hold, and we come back with current pricing and the next steps before anything is posted.

Tell us what you actually have, in as much detail as you can manage. Weights, quantities, whether coins are in capsules or tubes, whether bars still have their assay cards, and whether anything is damaged. A precise description gets a precise answer. A vague one gets a cautious one, because caution is what a buyer does when they cannot see what they are being offered.

Two practical points that apply wherever you sell. Post insured and tracked, both ways, every time; the saving on cheaper postage is trivial against the value of a parcel that does not arrive, a point we made at more length in transporting gold to a vault. And establish in writing who pays return carriage, and how quickly items come back, if you decline the quote. Any reputable dealer answers that question without hesitating.

Expect to prove who you are before being paid. That is normal, it applies across the trade, and it is not a sign that anything is wrong.

Six mistakes that cost sellers money

Working out your proceeds from the spot price

It is the most common error and it guarantees disappointment. Spot is where the calculation starts, not where it ends.

Selling the wrong item first

If you hold a mixture, the tax position and the ease of resale both vary by item. Deciding what to sell before understanding that is how people end up parting with the easiest thing to sell rather than the right thing to sell.

Breaking up a set or discarding the packaging

For anything with a collector element, the box, the certificate and the completeness of a set are part of the value. They cannot be recreated, and throwing them away converts a collectable into scrap.

Cleaning coins

This one is close to irreversible. Polishing a coin removes surface and leaves marks a buyer can see immediately, and it moves an item from the collector column to the metal column. Wear is expected on an old coin; a scrubbed surface is a defect.

Accepting the first number because the parcel is already there

Momentum is not a valuation method. Agree the terms of declining before you post, and the first quote stops feeling like the only quote.

Selling in a hurry when you did not have to

Every route has a fast version and a patient version, and the fast version always costs more. If the money is not needed this month, two quotes and a week of thinking is the highest-return work available to you.

Who should probably wait

Anyone selling purely because the price has moved this week. Short-term moves are exactly what the spread is designed to absorb, and round-tripping a holding on a headline is a reliable way to pay the spread twice for nothing.

Anyone holding silver bought recently, for the VAT reason above, unless the money is needed. And anyone holding proof or commemorative pieces who has not yet found out whether a collector market exists for them, because selling those to a bullion buyer means accepting metal value for something that may be worth more intact.

There is also a decision that is not selling at all. If the reason you are considering a sale is that storing metal at home has started to feel uncomfortable, that is a storage problem rather than a market one, and home storage versus vaulting addresses it directly.

Frequently asked questions

How much will I get if I sell my gold in the UK?

Less than the spot price, and the gap depends on what you hold and how much of it there is. Recognised bullion coins and bars price closest to the metal value because they are quick to verify and quick to sell on; anything needing a judgement about condition or authenticity carries a wider spread, and quantity helps because handling costs fall per item. The more useful question is what the gap buys you: an indicative rate published before you contact anybody, delivery arrangements and cover agreed before your parcel moves, and the conditions stated in advance rather than after it has arrived.

Why will nobody pay me the spot price for gold?

Because spot is a wholesale reference for large trades, and a two-sided market always has a buy price and a sell price. The gap covers verification, insured carriage in both directions, the price risk the buyer takes on until the metal is resold, and the dealer's margin. Every dealer has one; the honest ones will tell you it exists. If you would rather not pay that gap at all, the alternative is metal that never moves: vaulted holdings change hands without being posted or re-verified, which is why they trade on low spreads.

Do I pay Capital Gains Tax when I sell gold in the UK?

It depends entirely on what you sold and on your own circumstances. HMRC treats post-1837 Sovereigns and Britannia gold coins as sterling currency, which is why they are exempt under TCGA92/S21(1)(b), and separately records that the chattels exemption does not apply to non-sterling coins. That is general information rather than advice, and anyone with a material gain should take independent guidance on their own position.

Is there VAT on selling silver?

A private individual selling silver does not charge VAT. The point that matters is the other direction: silver is standard-rated at 20 per cent when you buy it, and a private seller cannot recover that, so silver needs a larger price move than gold before a round trip breaks even. Investment gold meeting HMRC's published fineness criteria is exempt from VAT.

Should I clean my coins before selling them?

No. Cleaning removes surface metal and leaves visible marks, and for anything with a collector element it can move the item permanently into the metal-value column. Honest wear is expected and priced in. A polished surface is treated as damage.

Do I need the original box and certificate?

For plain bullion it makes little difference beyond the assay card on a bar. For proof and commemorative issues it can matter a great deal, because the packaging and certificate are part of what a collector is buying and cannot be replaced.

How long does it take to get paid?

Once a quote is agreed, the time is mostly carriage and verification rather than paperwork. Items have to arrive, be checked, and be confirmed as what was described before an offer can be settled. Sending a clear description up front is the single thing that most shortens it.

Can I sell gold I inherited or was given?

Yes, and it is common. Expect the same identity checks as any other seller, and expect a dealer to ask sensible questions about items with no packaging or paperwork. If what you inherited is jewellery or scrap rather than bullion, we are not the right buyer: Yard Mint buys coins and bars only, and a jeweller, pawnbroker or scrap refiner will value those pieces on hallmarked gold content instead.